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Ask HN: What's your working day like?

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Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#161

Post by client4 »

CEO - Full time, 6 (soon to be 8) people (Startup Internet Service Provider)

Workday (highly variable)

- [7:00] Wake up, read Reddit / HN, check email (I'm trying to change this habit, it takes too long

- [8:15] Go to the office / Starbucks. Respond to emails, check my task list, hop on chat and make sure people have activities for the day

- [9:00] Try and do some sort of focus work, eg. Read and Sign contracts, write documentation, respond to emails

- [12:30] Costco Hotdog / Solent / Grilled chicken lunch

- [1:00] Go to Home Depot and pick up something we need

- [1:30] Physical construction. Install customers, troubleshoot networking issues, drill walls, dig holes

- [6:00] Try to remember to eat

- [7:00] Do some sysadmin things

- [8:00] Go to Lewis and Clark Brewery and discuss plans with co-founder

- [10:30] Head home

- [11:00] Read phone, brush and floss, sleep

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#162

Post by redleggedfrog »

Full stack web developer in .NET.

5:25AM : Alarm goes off.

5:26AM : Make tea in microwave.

5:30AM : Study period where I learn new tech.

6:30AM : Make a double espresso.

6:35AM : Catch up on the tech news. Sometimes I play a short video game.

6:50AM : Personal hygiene.

7:05AM : Fresh eggs (from our chickens) over-easy on toast/bagel/English muffin.

7:20AM : My commute. Often in the summer it's 30 minutes and by bike.

7:30AM : Read email, handle any requests. Check our internal task system for what I should be working on.

7:45AM : Greet the incoming devs (I'm almost always in first) and catch up a bit. Start firing up the tools and find my place from yesterday: Visual Studio, SSMS, Notepad++, Beyond Compare, Firefox, Chrome, Outlook, Slack, Lync (yes, both, one for devs, one for management), VLC (for headphone time), Nomad

8:00AM : Go DnD. Check email at 1/2 past the hour. Check task system to see if priorities have changed.

12:00PM : Lunch! 45 minute walk, or play Magic the Gathering.

1:00PM : Go DnD. Check email at 1/2 past the hour. Check task system to see if priorities have changed.

4:30PM: Check my personal email (list for the store?), then I'm outta here!

There are random meetings from time to time, but maybe only one or two a week.

Honestly, I can't imagine it much better.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#163

Post by traviswingo »

v3gas wrote: post #149
Maven911 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

not a security engineer, but working at a large financial company a lot of these points hit especially 11:15 & 11:16 and 17:00 :))))

I don't get it - how can it matter that you make tons of money if you are not satisfied with your life? (legit question)

It's easier to argue money doesn't matter when you're not making a sh*t ton. If you have a family to support and are making a crap ton of money it's more difficult to walk away from. But yeah, it's definitely not worth dying inside for.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#164

Post by monkmartinez »

david-gpu wrote: post #56
monkmartinez wrote: post #31

Profession: Firefighter - Full time Workday (kind of, nothing is typical at the firehouse): - [06:00]: Wake up - get dressed covertly and slip out of the house - [06:30] Arrive at the station - Get coffee! Find my "relief" which is the similarly ranked person on the off going shift. - run 911 calls - [07:30] Have "line up"; Where we discuss what drills we have planned, eat some breakfast... drink more coffee. Talk ab…

Most interesting. As a layperson I have trouble understanding what happens 17:00 to 06:00 the next day. What does it mean to "flag down" if you are still running 911 calls all night?

Typically between 17:00 and 06:00 I am trying to learn something other than EMS and Fire... in between calls of course. Lots of my buddies watch sports and/or read during that time.

If you are at a busy station that typically is the time you get the snot kicked out of you. That is, every time you put your head down the "tones" go off and you get back into the truck to handle a problem for the citizens of your community. Some problems are real, some are perceived, and most just need a firefighter/EMS person to tell them what they should do.

Flag down was captured perfectly by @throwanem.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#165

Post by thatwebdude »

Etheryte wrote: post #134
TeMPOraL wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Profession: software "engineer" too. [08:00] First alarm goes off; [10:00] I'm starting to wake up [11:00] Some quick HN checking [12:00] Ok, off to office. [13:00] At the office; talking with customer if needed, otherwise desperately trying to get some work done amidst noise and distractions, including but not limited to people occasionally playing board games for a break. [18:00] All my cow-orkers in the room have…

Your work schedule speaks to mine on a spiritual level. I can't imagine working anywhere where strict hours (9-5 or similar) are required.

It's not necessarily strict; just most convenient.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#166

Post by nyrulez »

erikb wrote: post #146
treehau5 wrote: post #46

Profession: Software "Engineer" [06:15] First alarm goes off; [06:45] Finally wake up, get out of bed, shower, shave, make espresso for me and the wife [07:15] out the door, 30 minute commute to office [07:45] breakfast bagel at my work cafe [08:00] arrive at desk, begin contemplating work -- work on something I procrastinated on the previous day so that I can have a good standup report [9:00] everyone arrives at off…

Many people complain about the usual work chaos. I'm also an engineer and I don't get it. For me, having other people come and ask questions is not distraction but an opportunity to help, learn to know their point of view, learn new things. Meetings are a way to influence the direction of the company however small my influence may be. Other people talking can really distract if it's heavily on topic, but usually also…

Hmm. How about actually building stuff? For most software engineers, thats a very important part of their job/life/happiness. That requires long focus and flow. And in my personal opinion has a great sense of fulfillment attached to it compared to lot of scattered micro impacts. Ultimately you need to learn to balance both otherwise it gets very frustrating​.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#167

Post by smoe »

Profession: Web developer - full time, Bogotá - ~10 person startup.

- [6:30] Wake up. No alarm clock, usually just the sun.

- [06:30 - 07:40] Guitar and drawing practice

- [07:40 - 8:15] Getting ready and walk to the office

- [08:15 - 08:45] Catching up with emails/conversations I didn't get to the last day. Make coffee.

- [08:45 - 09:15] Daily standup. Brief follow-up discussions

- [09:15 - 12:00] Work.

- [12:00 - 13:00] Lunch. Usually outside of the office (tons of affordable restaurants in the area), to get some fresh air and actual break from work.

- [13:00 - 18:00] Work. On average about half an hour of meetings per day.

- [18:00 - 23:00] I try to keep my evenings as unplanned as possible, so i can spontaneously go out with friends. Otherwise more Guitar/drawing practice, reading, watching tv series.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#168

Post by HappyTypist »

3hr0way4234 wrote: post #96

I'm amazed by how early you all get up! Profession/position: Software developer - full time, office-located* - peers are remote but boss is local - [9:45-10:30] wake up, shower, breakfast [10:30-11:00] either cycle to work if there are any bikes/slots in the local bicycle rental system, otherwise walk [11:00-12:15] sometimes we have a video meeting with the remote coworkers at this time, otherwise, mainly procrastina…

Quit. You will thank me.

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#169

Post by gagabity »

beilabs wrote: post #25

CTO - 6 staff - Kathmandu 6AM - Wake up - read news / email / Facebook 6.30 - Exercise on exercise bike for 1 hour 8.45 - Office - check PRs, slack, Pivotal Tracker 9.45 - Standup meeting 1pm - Lunch 7pm - Dinner 7.30 - Back at office 10pm - Home - movie / reading / sleep I have no commute; my office is right beside my house. The only meetings we have are remote (slack / skype) which happen every so often. All commun…

Kathmandu in Nepal? They have a tech scene over there too?

Re: Ask HN: What's your working day like?

#170

Post by monkmartinez »

dba7dba wrote: post #112
ryanx435 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I looked into becoming a volunteer firefighter after I got out of the Marines, but honestly the extremely long training required and the extremely high potential for PTSD from fire calls gone bad put me off from it.

Los Angeles FD has firefighters earning regular pay AND extra pay for having PTSD if you were involved in a particularly bad fire. Not sure how much that extra pay is.

The fires don't bother me much. It is the calls involving children that just eat me up... definitely have some stories and sights that I would love to delete.
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