Why your programmers just want to code • Hacker News Board

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#111

Post by dgreensp » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 4:25 PM UTC

This article comes to entirely the wrong conclusion, and I am very encouraged at the number of commenters pointing it out.

Engineers engineer. They are highly trained professionals who are doing their job when they are figuring out how to build something, improve something, or fix something, often with the goal of being able to develop new features quickly without an inordinate number of bugs.

Your engineering team shouldn’t be running your business. Even if they have good ideas. And in practice, they will be overruled immediately, anyway, the moment someone with any real authority makes a roadmap or a key decision, because they are engineers. They aren’t answerable to the board. They haven’t studied the market and competitive landscape in depth. They can’t pivot the company.

There’s something perverse and The Office-like about diagnosing Jamie as a problem “but it’s not his fault.”

Engineer runs into boss’s office: “Sir, code quality is critically low. I suggest we begin paying down technical debt before it’s too late.” Boss, smiling to camera: “This is Jamie. When he started, he was a team player. He believed in the vision. He didn’t spend all day nit-picking about things like code quality. Look at him now! I don’t blame Jamie, though. I blame myself. If I had made Jamie feel like his big ideas and product insights were welcome here, early on, he wouldn’t have devolved into seeing himself as a mere code monkey.”

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#112

Post by malyk » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 4:32 PM UTC

nickthemagicman wrote: post #51

jdowner wrote: post #42

A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts: "Excuse me, can you help me? I promised my friend I would meet him half an hour ago, but I don't know where I am." The man below says: "Yes. You are in a hot air balloon, hovering approximately 30 feet above this field. You are between 40 and 42 degrees N. latitude, and…

Holy lord thank you. When did it become incumbent on devs to come up with the entire business process as well? I feel like I'm here to code your ideas, not come up with the ideas and processes as well as code them. It's literally plain and clear at that point how pointless management and buisiness is in those situations

That sounds so...boring!

Not only that, you are unlikely to advance far if you are relying on other people to tell you what to build.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#113

Post by TeMPOraL » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 4:43 PM UTC

whack wrote: post #102

TeMPOraL wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if my comment is that orthogonal - the core point of the author may be what you described, but the article exemplifies some pretty pathological issues too. As for the issue of "would-be enthusiastic employees becoming disengaged because their ideas are not given a fair-hearing", I do agree. This also affects communities, and even interpersonal relationships. There's hardly a better way to destroy someone…

I liked the way you described displaying enthusiasm as a form of vulnerability. I never thought of it that way, but it's very true. It takes courage to openly display enthusiasm, and it's so easy to deflate it by making snarky comments or stonewalling.

Yes. When you share something with someone, or put an effort for someone, out of the depths of your heart, that's when you're vulnerable for rejection or ignoring.

I unfortunately know it from personal experience, from way before I entered the job market. I've always been full of enthusiasm for stuff, but after few unfortunate episodes in my past, I find it hard to share that enthusiasm with people - especially those close to me. I like to think I'm making progress in fixing the damage, but the process is slow.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#114

Post by TeMPOraL » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 4:46 PM UTC

thisisit wrote: post #97

TeMPOraL wrote: post #37

> His concern for market share and business health is replaced with (...) > His enthusiasm for changing the world is replaced with nit-picking the development process. Here's your answer. It's because you hired the programmer based on technical competence and not their attitude to servitude in business. You get what you measure. You didn't disqualify me as a candidate because I think your business is boring and I nee…

> So, stop blaming Jamie and start making the changes that your culture demands. The sooner, the better. This is the last line in the article. So I am wondering what led to the conclusion that this article blames stuff on the programmer?

The stuff I addressed in my comment is the backdrop of this article, and I understand it as being the implicit expectations of the author. I question the validity of those expectations - I believe they're unreasonable and unfair to the programmers.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#115

Post by scruple » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 5:24 PM UTC

marktangotango wrote: post #108

jdowner wrote: post #42

A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts: "Excuse me, can you help me? I promised my friend I would meet him half an hour ago, but I don't know where I am." The man below says: "Yes. You are in a hot air balloon, hovering approximately 30 feet above this field. You are between 40 and 42 degrees N. latitude, and…

his “team-friendly” interactions were usually sarcastic. He often talked about technical debt, our lack of innovation, and the “stupid” decisions holding us back. An irritating “I told you so” sentiment plagued his comments and feedback. The easily missed point here is that Jamie, on some level, still cares. The ones this author doesn't recognize are the ones who don't give any outward sign of annoyance, because they…

> I've personally seen it exactly once.

I've seen it twice.

I left the first company where I saw it (I stayed for 6 years and learned more here than everywhere else else combined, despite the other problems) because despite having all of these brilliant people and alignment with front-line managers and other teams and strong process and strong product guidance the company was ruled over by a tyrant in the CEO and CFO. The CFO only cared about the bottom line and the CEO, too, but he cared more about taking full credit for all of our engineering successes. The folks I kept in contact with say not much has changed but that they've brought in some MBA types in the form of senior managers and things have been doing downhill since.

The second time, I came in to the organization and it wasn't great but things worked and we were solving real problems for real people and for some reason it clicked well between the different groups/departments. Then the CEO and board, in their eternal quest to go IPO, disrupted the Engineering upper management chain, and we went through 3 different CTOs in the span of about 16 months. Suffice it to say, the magic was lost. That company is _still trying_ to go IPO, of course, and _still thinks_ they'll achieve it by bringing in different executive management players, last I heard.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#116

Post by w_t_payne » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 6:52 PM UTC

scandox wrote: post #9

w_t_payne wrote: post #4

The programmer in this story has realised this fundamental truth: The spoken word is ephemeral and easily forgot. The design of the product that pays the bills is not so easily undone. What people say in meetings; all the posturing and preening; the petty one-upmanship and power-play — none of this has any relevance to what actually gets done in the real world. When it comes to what actually gets implemented — all of…

> What people say in meetings; all the posturing and preening; the petty one-upmanship and power-play — none of this has any relevance to what actually gets done in the real world. That just sounds like you've had very negative experiences in terms of meetings / company culture. I have lots of meetings where collaboratively we come up with much better approaches to problems, by sharing information and ensuring everyb…

My comment illustrates the situation in a particularly dysfunctional and corrosive organisation.

Whilst none of us want to work in a place like this, and none of us enjoy the experience if and when we are forced to do so; we cannot pretend that workplaces like this do not exist.

Sadly, dysfunction is probably more prevalent than we would like to admit.

Fortunately, we are blessed to live in a world with endless variety; a world in which workplaces with a much healthier and productive culture also exist; places which genuinely foster cooperation and loyalty and encourage and support their employees to contribute and to feel positively about their contribution.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#117

Post by w_t_payne » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 7:04 PM UTC

watwut wrote: post #33

w_t_payne wrote: post #4

The programmer in this story has realised this fundamental truth: The spoken word is ephemeral and easily forgot. The design of the product that pays the bills is not so easily undone. What people say in meetings; all the posturing and preening; the petty one-upmanship and power-play — none of this has any relevance to what actually gets done in the real world. When it comes to what actually gets implemented — all of…

> When it comes to what actually gets implemented — all of the power is in the hands of the programmer who gets there first. After all — once the die has been cast and the direction set, who is going to undo the work and start again? In this, the programmer is the decider. That is how you loose customers. And how software teams get bad reputation and then wonder why-oh-why are other departments so hostile next time t…

Absolutely true ... which is why you have to work very very hard to prevent the rot from setting in in the first place. Setting the right organisational culture is such an important step in avoiding this corrosive and unhealthy situation.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#118

Post by Toast_25 » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 7:41 PM UTC

malyk wrote: post #112

nickthemagicman wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy lord thank you. When did it become incumbent on devs to come up with the entire business process as well? I feel like I'm here to code your ideas, not come up with the ideas and processes as well as code them. It's literally plain and clear at that point how pointless management and buisiness is in those situations

That sounds so...boring! Not only that, you are unlikely to advance far if you are relying on other people to tell you what to build.

I agree! You are coding ideas for people, but somebody needs to translate those ideas into code for them to work, and what might be planned might not be the best or most efficient course of action.

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#119

Post by sridca » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 8:09 PM UTC

send_computers wrote: post #101

jdowner wrote: post #42

A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts: "Excuse me, can you help me? I promised my friend I would meet him half an hour ago, but I don't know where I am." The man below says: "Yes. You are in a hot air balloon, hovering approximately 30 feet above this field. You are between 40 and 42 degrees N. latitude, and…

At the heart of it though there is a good point, the culture of a workplace can determine how developers operate. That's it but the full picture is: The culture of a workplace determines how everyone operates. Managers do not 'set' the culture and drive workers with amateur psychology, although they might like to think they do. Whenever I see the attempts to control how I operate in the workplace, I play along and go…

But how can your work be the same if attitude (ultimately) affects the work produced?

Re: Why your programmers just want to code

#120

Post by Terr_ » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 9:24 PM UTC

thisisit wrote: post #97

TeMPOraL wrote: post #37

> His concern for market share and business health is replaced with (...) > His enthusiasm for changing the world is replaced with nit-picking the development process. Here's your answer. It's because you hired the programmer based on technical competence and not their attitude to servitude in business. You get what you measure. You didn't disqualify me as a candidate because I think your business is boring and I nee…

> So, stop blaming Jamie and start making the changes that your culture demands. The sooner, the better. This is the last line in the article. So I am wondering what led to the conclusion that this article blames stuff on the programmer?

> So I am wondering what led to the conclusion that this article blames stuff on the programmer?

I'm seeing the same problem over on Reddit [0], I think that the problem is that the article buries the lede.

The entire first section is consistent with "blaming the programmer", and the title of the next section is "Why are some programmers such jerks?". That's probably where a lot of people just stopped.

[0] https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/7gpt3n/how_you...