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Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

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Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#371
So far (10 years) these rules have always worked out for me in the long run:

1) Your loyalty belongs to your company. Always do what is best for your company.

2) Always share your knowledge freely.

3) Never strategize in order to "secure your job".

4) Always pick the project or job where you will learn the most (grow the most as a person).

I would guess 90% of people I have met ignore this and start strategizing at some point. They seem to always lose in the long run.

"The company treated me wrong, so why should I work as efficient as I can?"

"I can't teach him EVERYTHING or my job won't be as important/secure any more."

"I will pick this project, because I have done something similiar already, so it will be easy work."

When sticking to 1-4, relevant people will notice eventually and your trajectory will go up.

When ignoring points 1-4, relevant people will lose respect for you. And even worse, you will lose respect for yourself.

This is just my opinion or my experience so far.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it bad for the employer to get 8x as much out of some workers?

It's not bad for the employer to get 8x as much out; it's bad for the employer to pay 8x as much, when they could pay (say) 3x as much and keep the other 5x as profit.

Doubly so if the easily measurable increase in quantity could be achieved at the expense of other qualities that are much more difficult to put in indisputable numbers.

That guy who closes tickets faster than anybody else at the company, but does so by crapping all over the code, he's being discussed all the time here on hacker news.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#373
post #129
post #21

This question is a beautiful example of typical incentives workers feel and how screwed up they are. On HN people talk often enough about how if you have a worker who gets their job done in 30 hours instead of the company's usual 40-60 hours, you should give them 30-100% more responsibility, but much more rarely "and 30-100% more pay." Butt-in-the-chair hours are super important culturally and it's been that way for…

Adam Smith began his wealth of nations with a description of the division of labor and an essay on how this division leads to an increase in productivity. Specifically, he gives the example of a worker who's sole job it is to make pins, and who devises a way to make them by machine, while previously, each pin was hammered out by hand over a matter of minutes, the new machine makes them in seconds. This division of la…

It was still legal in 2015 in the Netherlands: http://www.nu.nl/economie/4142545/inspectie-adviseert-minist... . Looking at the German Wikipedia ("Akkordlohn"), it is still legal in Germany in specific circumstances.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#374
I understand that the company told him to not mess with the system, but why not show them that you found a way to automate the process without admitting that he's been using it for a long time.

Maybe I'm too optimistic or naive but after successfully showing them that it works and saves time the conversation could move on to optimizing other tasks and problems the company surely encounters. Instead of letting the guy go I could easily see how they find additional value in him in other areas.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#375
post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xRqXYsksFg

Over promise, under deliver. Smart move. Certainly one that anyone in programming can relate to.

I think you must've meant, "under promise, over deliver"? At least that's what Scotty was suggesting.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#377
There's no universally accepted "right" answer to questions of ethics. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normative_ethics#Normative_eth... for some approaches.

I'll provide a few perspectives.

Act consequentialist ("hardcore"): Is the world as a whole better or worse off after you take that action? Probably better off. By taking that action, there'll be less money in your companies pockets. That money may trickle down a bit to Average Joes, but probably will go mainly to rich people who don't need it. On the other hand, you'll have more free time, you'll be happier, and your child will get to spend more time with your son.

Rule consequentialist: Evaluating the costs and benefits of this particular action is error prone, so you're better off just following a good rule of thumb. In this case, I think a good rule of thumb is to oblige by your contract. Your contract as a full time salaried employee is to, basically, give us your time for 40 hours a week and work reasonably hard. If your contract was some sort of fixed price freelance gig, then things would be different, but by signing the contract you did, you gave them your word that you would work reasonably hard for 40 hours a week, and keeping your word is a good rule of thumb.

Rule consequentialist: Evaluating the costs and benefits of this particular action is error prone, so you're better off just following a good rule of thumb. In this case, I think a good rule of thumb is to be honest, and tell your boss.

Deontologist: You have a _duty_ to follow your contract. You should do it _because it's your duty_, not because you think it'll lead to good consequences.

Deontologist: You have a _duty_ to be honest.

Deontologist: You have a _duty_ to be the best possible father you can be, no matter what it takes.

Virtue ethicist: You should follow your contract, because doing so is sticking to your word, and sticking to your word is virtuous. You shouldn't be sticking to your word because you think following that rule-of-thumb will lead to good consequences, you should be doing it simply because it's virtuous.

Virtue ethicist: You should do what is best for your son, because being a good father is virtuous.

Personally, I believe in consequentialism, and I believe that you can use your judgement to decide whether or not to use act or rule consequentialism, based on whether you think you have a decent grasp of the trade offs. If you don't have a good grasp of the trade offs, you can expect a rule-of-thumb to do a better job than your attempted analysis, and should go with the rule-of-thumb. Otherwise, go with the results of your analysis.

In this situation, it seems to me that the trade offs are relatively clear, and that you could go ahead and keep it to yourself. But I wouldn't blame someone for taking the position that the trade offs aren't actually too clear, and it'd be better to fall back on a "be honest" rule-of-thumb.

Note: I expect that if you told them, they would take the program, and either a) use it and fire you, or b) maybe keep you around as a contracter or something to add to the program. You wrote the program during work hours, on a work computer, presumably. So legally, it is there intellectual property. Assuming you don't have some atypical clause in your contract.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#378
If you were a company, no one would bat an eye, they'd say your employer is free to scour the market for the best options, they found you and are happy. I think many companies provide services that are easily automated and customers don't realize how little human labor is actually involved.

You could offer something like: "Hey, I can rewrite the entire system, make it completely automated. This will cost you ((time_it_takes_find_good_job + some)*your monthly pay). After that I'll be gone. hat you already did the work doesn't really matter imo and you leave your boss better of, and hopefully yourself too.

Re: Is it unethical for me to not tell my employer I've automated my job?

#379
post #129
post #21

This question is a beautiful example of typical incentives workers feel and how screwed up they are. On HN people talk often enough about how if you have a worker who gets their job done in 30 hours instead of the company's usual 40-60 hours, you should give them 30-100% more responsibility, but much more rarely "and 30-100% more pay." Butt-in-the-chair hours are super important culturally and it's been that way for…

Adam Smith began his wealth of nations with a description of the division of labor and an essay on how this division leads to an increase in productivity. Specifically, he gives the example of a worker who's sole job it is to make pins, and who devises a way to make them by machine, while previously, each pin was hammered out by hand over a matter of minutes, the new machine makes them in seconds. This division of la…

> Would it be unethical to apply AI to solve Mechanical Turk tasks?

The buyer pays for having a human in the loop, you claim to put a human in the loop but don't. Fraud, plain and simple.

Would it be unethical to sell "I can't believe it's not" as actual butter?

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