The annoying habits of highly effective people • Hacker News Board

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#191

Post by manigandham » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 2:16 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #136

sonnyblarney wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" it's a lot easier to get up at 5am, shake hands firmly, and dress for success" Let's not be superfluous. Being a CEO is hard, even the 5 am rising and 'hand shaking' parts.

> Being a CEO is hard Much easier than many other jobs, from mining and nursing to jobs that single mothers do in 2 shifts. And with much more perks, respect, personal influence, and earnings...

It's all relative. Someone in life always has it worse than you and these positions just cant be compared like this in any productive discussion.

Being a CEO doesn't mean you're the boss. It means you serve everyone, from employees to customers to shareholders, and are responsible for every single thing that happens. If someone doesn't do well, it's your fault. And being responsible for others livelihoods with every decision you make is definitely not easy.

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#192

Post by cube00 » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 2:23 PM UTC

siruncledrew wrote: post #2

I think another thing that influences annoying habits of "effective" people is that no executive/manager is going to hold a CEO accountable for being late/strolling into work, whereas if a CEO didn't like it that person would be be immediately told to stop and change their behavior.

Just on "late shaming" in general, sometimes people have legitimate reasons for starting later. They might have been up until early morning in conference with another time zone, they might have family responsibilities, etc. If they're late to scheduled meetings by all means hold them to standard, but if they're just arriving in the office later then everyone else I'm not so sure that's cause to be held "accountable" no matter your level.

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#193

Post by village-idiot » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 2:25 PM UTC

a_imho wrote: post #171

village-idiot wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s absolutely not a true meritocracy, that’s true. But if you’re claiming that individual contributor devs never get promoted for good work, that’s just clearly and utterly wrong.

I claim no one gets to the top for being a hard working developer. Also claim quality engineering is only loosely correlated with advancement, it is one of the less efficient ways to secure a promotion/raise. In fact, managers often have no idea who is doing a good job.

As an absolute statement that is factually incorrect. My former CTO started as a senior developer at the company 16 years ago.

If you want to make the weaker statement that growing from engineer to CTO almost never happens, you’re going to need statistics.

Realistically, humans are mortal and C suite types are made, not born. While not every engineer will become a CXO just due to disparity in job openings, someone needs to be promoted to take the CXO jobs once the previous crop has aged out of the work force. Some of them will be advanced because they’re good workers, others because they’re good at politics. You’ll need some statistics to back up any claim about what percentage are good workers and what percentage are politicians in business clothing.

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#194

Post by PhasmaFelis » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 2:43 PM UTC

UpshotKnothole wrote: post #46

tomnipotent wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She grew up rich Exactly - she won the lottery being born into a rich white family in the U.S.

She won more lotteries than that. She won the lottery of being born rich, white, and connected. And in a country like the US. She won the lottery of being beautiful, of having an excellent voice and musical talent, of having parents willing to use their money and power to further her career of choice. She won the lottery of not having any crippling mental illnesses or learning disabilities, of not being sexually assa…

> But Bo Burnham’s quote really isn’t about that, he’s talking about getting lucky and having your career take off.

I think it was about both. Later in the clip he says to Conan O'Brien "We're tall white guys, we overcame nothing to get here."

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#195

Post by taurath » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 3:06 PM UTC

white-flame wrote: post #75

taurath wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ll add - “they had the privilege of being able to focus their attention and not be harmed for it”.

In betting on opportunity, often times they have everything riding on it. Where does the "harm" you talk about come from? Usually it's because there are other responsibilities you're engaged with. If you literally give everything else up to focus on one thing, these barbs aren't in your life. I'm talking forgoing rent to crash with family/friends, eating ramen, selling/getting rid of your things, live on credit cards…

> You'd be surprised how much that frees you from the immediate "harm" you describe, but you also have nothing to fall back on..

All the things you described doing are the fallback options - you have to have a family and friends, things to sell, credit to burn. Even then, family or friends have less patience to carry you when you’re taking a moonshot unless they also have a lot they can fall back on.

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#196

Post by JumpCrisscross » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 3:18 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #21

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no executive/manager is going to hold a CEO accountable for being late/strolling into work I did this. I had just been promoted to the lowest manager position at a global bank. Our global head had a habit of starting meetings late. After one, I asked to speak privately. I said I had been working hard with my team on improving their timeliness. They responded, and our mornings became more productive as a result. But…

Were you ever terminated or had your contract not renewed for providing upwards feedback that was rejected?

> Were you ever terminated or had your contract not renewed for providing upwards feedback that was rejected?

Not to my knowledge. More memorable was the positive response I received to both of the aforementioned pipe-ups. Granted, I'm pretty up front about wanting open communication in any corporate culture I join, so I'm heavily selecting–during interviews and random conversations–for teams who value that.

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#197

Post by CalRobert » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 3:28 PM UTC

manigandham wrote: post #158

lotsofpulp wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Eventually the truth does come out Why does the truth eventually come out? Or is this an assumption?

Because performance is unlikely to be repeated and at some point the person who is wrongly taking credit will not be able to perform, but this can take days or decades depending on the organization.

Decades? Are you kidding? Nobody's got time for that. Least of all people like myself who started in 2008 when the economy was utter garbage.

If you don't manage to build a decent career/salary/position by your mid-thirties in tech you're quite likely screwed (though before I'm too depressing, I understand there are counterexamples here on HN). Waiting a year or two for recognition is career suicide.

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#198

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 3:48 PM UTC

pandapower2 wrote: post #57

exabrial wrote: post #53

I wouldn't call Tim Cook an effective manager though. He centralizes decisions on himself and had been turning Apple's reputation and Halo-effect into cash rather than innovation.

>and had been turning Apple's reputation and Halo-effect into cash rather than innovation. Sounds pretty much like his job. Apple doesn't exist to innovate. It innovates to produce cash.

[deleted]

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#199

Post by tomnipotent » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 3:58 PM UTC

Broken_Hippo wrote: post #101

tomnipotent wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Getting up early is not a sign of discipline Yes it is. Ask any engineering manager.

I'm pretty sure a few of those wake early simply because it is expected, not because of discipline. They aren't the only ones that have discipline either.

Did anyone bother to read the definition?

  1. verb "train (someone) to obey rules or a code of behavior, using punishment to correct disobedience."

  2. noun "the practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behavior, using punishment to correct disobedience."

So yes, having to wake up to make it to a job at a certain time or else you get in trouble is actually the very definition of discipline.

If people on my team are constantly getting to work late and I have to talk to them to come in early, I've disciplined them and they now change their behavior because of it (come in earlier).

How weird is it?

Re: The annoying habits of highly effective people

#200

Post by manigandham » Tue, Oct 02, 2018, 3:59 PM UTC

CalRobert wrote: post #197

manigandham wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because performance is unlikely to be repeated and at some point the person who is wrongly taking credit will not be able to perform, but this can take days or decades depending on the organization.

Decades? Are you kidding? Nobody's got time for that. Least of all people like myself who started in 2008 when the economy was utter garbage. If you don't manage to build a decent career/salary/position by your mid-thirties in tech you're quite likely screwed (though before I'm too depressing, I understand there are counterexamples here on HN). Waiting a year or two for recognition is career suicide.

The point is it's highly variable. As stated in the first comment: whether it's worth the time and effort is up to you.

I'd argue that 1 year is way too short. The lack of patience causes far more problems today than building up the relationships and gaining the network and momentum to get into higher positions. Most people I know who stuck to a clear goal within a organization that has openings have done better than those who kept jumping around looking for the quick rise.