Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

news.ycombinator.com

711–720 of 862 posts

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#711
post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The daily stand-up is entirely reasonable and productive if you do it right. The problem is people who insist on doing it wrong. Upper management has no business deciding when a team has their stand-up. Agile means "people over process", after all.

Sure. But the real reason management loves the 'morning standup meeting' is because it enforces morning attendance of all employees. So much for those flexible work hours. Oh, you do get to go home late to finish your work of course.

My team has morning standups. We first changed the time, then agreed to make my participation optional, when it became clear that (due to personal reasons) I was struggling to make it to the office on time. It's a shame, too, because they're some of the best standups I've ever had. Our flex time is actually a thing, with some of my team mates showing up early and usually leaving around 17:00.

I think I was asked, at every interview I've been to in the last few year, how I handle receiving difficult feedback. This is the only place I've ever interviewed at where I was asked how I handle giving difficult feedback.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#712

I work remotely for a company in the Bay Area, doing mostly web development. - Compensation is great. - Few calls, very little micro-management. - People I work with are great. - They don't care about where I'm working from as long as the timezone isn't too far off. Somehow I feel miserable. I can't quite explain it. I think it's because the work I do is boring and I've been doing it for a long time. I've been workin…

the best jobs are where I can sit down with people beside me and crack jokes all day.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#713

I'm the sole developer working on my current project, which is overhauling a massive DOS era application, as well as overhauling an early 2000s era CRM/business management tool, that almost all of our work happens through. Did I mention that the DOS application is a HIPAA billing application that must meet all HIPAA guidelines as well as write EDI X12 billing files? I'm very junior, been coding for ~5 years, 3 profes…

You do know that HIPAA violations can land you in jail, right? Run. Don't walk. Vacate immediately. Leave. I'm finding myself hoping that this is a fake, because I wouldn't wish this situation on anyone at all.

I don't think anyone has gone to jail for HIPAA violations who wasn't intentionally misusing or stealing PHI.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#714

Earlier quoted context omitted.

talk to people around the office and figure out the mission of the company, figure out how to make peoples tasks easier to complete so they have less work to do, and can work easier throughout the day.

It's not that I don't have work. I have plenty of things I could be doing on a daily basis. It's that there is no direction. No plan. No priority. I just show up and do whatever I do and go home. Once a week, I send a report to my supervisor of my activities for the week. My projects are entirely separate from the other developers here, so it's not really an option for me to go sit with them and co-work because we do…

How does your company make money? Thats the priority. Make whatever they have to do.. to make money.. easier. Also, bring up Silo-effect with your supervisor and let him know you wanna go meet the other team, go take a cookie tin or some beer or whatever to the other team and introduce yourself and hang out 30mins in the morning or something just to get a feel for what theyre doing/pain poitns etc... ask questions to get a feel for how _they_ interpret the organizatiosn priorities and plans... maybe they have an entirely different paradigm/perception.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#715

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sit during my teams standup, it’s a standup because it’s a daily sync not because of literal standing.

actually it is supposed to be a literal standup. standing encourages very quick and to the point updates.

Yes but the act of standing is a crutch, if you pardon the pun. What matters is brevity.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#716
This isn't nearly as bad as the others here but recently our scrum master came back from scrum of scrums and said everyone was massively over pointing stories because apparently it looks so bad to management if you don't complete something within it's estimate.

A week later I finished something early and was instructed to not bring anything else into the sprint because, you know, visibility is more important than actually being productive.

I get that deadlines and metrics are important. And I get that managers/mgmt will never see eye to eye with developers about how long stuff takes. But this is just sheer idiocy, encouraging doing the bare minimum and a culture of fear instead of rewarding good work. If I actually told the next up the chain about it, they'd absolutely sweep it under the rug.

So yeah I'm interviewing looking to go somewhere way, way smaller at this point.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#717

On my last job, a new manager called me for a meeting on Friday 4PM. I spent the whole month on an extremely stressful project. The meeting was about an app that integrates credit card payments, billets and bank account on a terminal that is going to be available to the general public. The deadline? 11PM of the same day. Final version. From 0 to 100% in 6 hours. I said that it was impossible. He said that I was incap…

Kudos for landing a better job. I guess you were quite young at the time and I hope you matured more than to put yourself in such a harmful situation again. If you deem that something is senseless, impossible or on the verge of abusing you must say so and stand your ground. It is the right thing to do not just for you but for your coworkers and the larger ecosystem you are moving about. It's what that general said about 'The standard you walk past, is the standard you accept' only this time it was about the standard you put up with.

All the best

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#718

On my last job, a new manager called me for a meeting on Friday 4PM. I spent the whole month on an extremely stressful project. The meeting was about an app that integrates credit card payments, billets and bank account on a terminal that is going to be available to the general public. The deadline? 11PM of the same day. Final version. From 0 to 100% in 6 hours. I said that it was impossible. He said that I was incap…

Sounds to me like constructive dismissal

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#719

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one of the reason I hate about PIP( performance improvement program). They set ridiculous goals for you in very short amount of time that nobody can possibly complete, then fire you on grounds of incompetence. A friend of mine who works in Facebook told me that an employee committed suicide due to the pressure of PIP. I suspect that guy was put into PIP due to poor rating (meet most), then was given a ridicul…

It's a sad story; but PIP is really the pink slip; you take it as an advance notice that you're going to be fired, and start looking for jobs. I've heard stories of people completing PIP programs successfully, but quite honestly, I don't get it. Once you got to that point, you're not a good fit to the team and/or they don't appreciate you. Makes no sense to stay. I could understand staying with the company & switchin…

I generally agree- its a clear shot across the bow that the company no longer wants you there.

A funny story though from about 10 years ago (IE financial crisis): A sales person my wife worked with was put on a PIP. It had very clear revenue goals, modified his commission plan to be more performance based, but he could make more if he exceeded those goals, etc.

To everyone's astonishment, he started selling like crazy. There was only one problem- his boss forgot to "unfire" him with HR. Right after the PIP period expired, he gets a big deposit that isn't his commission check in his bank account- it was supposed to be a severance payment.

The guy immediately withdrew it from his bank account, and kept as little in there as possible so they couldn't get it back without confronting him, and later claimed he thought it was a commission and claimed to have spent it. They made him pay it back on a payment plan in the end, but only after forcing them to admit it was a severance and all that. He left as soon as he could find a better job.

Re: Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired?

#720

On my last job, a new manager called me for a meeting on Friday 4PM. I spent the whole month on an extremely stressful project. The meeting was about an app that integrates credit card payments, billets and bank account on a terminal that is going to be available to the general public. The deadline? 11PM of the same day. Final version. From 0 to 100% in 6 hours. I said that it was impossible. He said that I was incap…

It's amazing how much overlap there is between jobs where they treat you poorly, and where they don't pay you enough. You'd think it would be the opposite, but it's all part of them not valuing you.

Poor pay is often a result of a downward spiral of dysfunctional/failing organization. Your manager gets paid poorly, your coworkers, other teams. Best people leave first and new good people don't want to join. Demotivated teams lacking any talent produce bad product. Poor product looses customers, which forces management into freezing/cutting salaries. Everything compounds. After certain threshold there is no way back, but it is surprising how long can organizations with no hope stick around, and just keep people miserable.
Post reply on HN