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Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

sloanreview.mit.edu

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Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#71

Post by settsu »

gbrown wrote: post #59
ChuckMcM wrote: post #3

That you should “always be learning” is absolutely true. It helps with neuro-plasticity and keeps you engaged. That said, as a manager I find it hard to get direct reports to accept sometimes that it is not only okay, but required, by me that they learn new things. I do what I can to encourage it, offer to buy books for people, give time to do online course work, etc. They often complain that they don’t feel like the…

Tie it to deliverables, like reporting back to the team about the content or giving seminar style talks.

> Tie it to deliverables

That's a great idea in theory because tackling a real world problem tends to motivate towards a real world solution.

However, learning invariably encompasses failure which rarely measures up well with typical (if arguably useful/useless) performance metrics that developers contend with.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#72

Post by rytill »

WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #24
jpincheira wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bad. Went I went from JS front end to iOS, I was put in a learning period on my own + internship in the iOS team and that worked great. It’s how companies like Spotify also did it. They paid companies like the Big Nerd Ranch to travel to Stockholm and give workshops to future iOS devs. They benefited and I also did, as it helped me evolve into a full-stack (web, mobile & server) developer. This was essential for me t…

We have a formal mentorship program and employees get 4 hours a month for professional development. We still feel we fail them.

Using the word "still" there is uncalibrated. 4 hours per month is barely anything.

Imagine yourself trying to learn a real skill in that allocation of time.

If anything, you may even be reducing your tech employees' "professional development" with that metric, because I bet the average tech employee already spends greater than 4 hours per month on active learning with or without management actively allowing them.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#73

Post by settsu »

michaelcampbell wrote: post #58
rafaelvasco wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes it is. Another big red flag is micro managing. Managers that want to control even the amount of coffee you drink or how many times you go to the bathroom, if you go out too much etc. Super annoying;

That happens?

It's not unheard of for contractors in non-NA & non-EU locales.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#74

Post by znpy »

Bootwizard wrote: post #9

I'm currently a frontend engineer. I told my team lead a while back that I'd like to transition to the server side, especially since our server team is woefully understaffed and our frontend team is overstaffed. He told me "Sure but you'll need to learn all that stuff on your own time". So I never did it because I'm interested in doing other things at home.

The middle ground here is that I'd try to grasp the basics on my own time, then ask the switch.

I can understand your boss though: would you swap a competent employee for an incompetent one, paying the same amount? Probably not. Yes, you retain your knowledge about the front-end, but you wouldn't be using that.

My advice would be to work out the basics on your time and then ask somebody in the backend team to be involved, baby steps.

If you actually become useful for the backend team, they will advocate themselves for your switch, and bring you up to speed once there.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#75

Post by draw_down »

runninganyways wrote: post #23

This is one of the reasons I quit programming. I could be spending time improving as a developer but instead they've got me doing some totally inconsequential "bug" fix (spend the next two hours updating this translation for the third time). I just got sick of someone rationalizing me doing non work by saying it's better for the business as though I have no broader perspective of what might be better for the business…

It absolutely is bullshit, but switching to dealing with a different sort of bullshit, for less pay, doesn’t strike me as much better. I’m just trying to make enough so I can stop dealing with bullshit altogether.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#76

Post by rectang »

I'm currently negotiating with two potential employers, one of them one of the bigs. It would be great if they would pay me to learn at work, but I don't feel like I'm in a position to ask for that — that's an industry=wide problem.

So I'm trying to hack the system to get fewer hours: 30-32 per week. That gives me enough time to self-study, handle some of my own training and overdeliver, yet still have a life.

I have extremely strong open source bona fides, I'm an inveterate organizer of study groups both at work and elsewhere, I speak regularly at meetups in order to force myself to learn new things well. Giving me the space to train myself is a great deal for potential employers.

But they aren't biting. 40 hours is what they are set up for and it is hard for them to figure out how to be flexible, even if they want to.

At my last job with a small growth-stage startup, I successfully negotiated for 32 hours, and it worked out great for all parties. But it seems harder than I think it should be to close such deals.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#78

Post by pjmorris »

swarnie_ wrote: post #4

This is why i love my current employer and i won't leave unless i'm forced to. We have a policy of "Chargeable work always comes first but if you've got nothing to do go learn something, we'll call you when something comes in" This has lead to times before where we go dead around the same time every year and you spend 2 months being paid to independently upskill. Come the busy November-February period its really obvi…

I've been lucky enough to work in two, maybe three, places with implicit or explicit policies like this. It's something I shop for now when job-hunting.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#79

Post by runninganyways »

1-6 wrote: post #54
czechdeveloper wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I ask what you do now? I'm programming for one and half decade and wonder about moving to something else. But it's bit scary as software is only thing I know.

Great question, this is what I was wondering as well.

Well I dropped the golden handcuffs. So right now I'm flipping cars (replace a clutch, head gasket, etc.) driving for Lyft, and I might get a part-time job. I'm definitely not making as much money as I used to. But for me the traditional strategy of working for a company and saving up for retirement wasn't working anyhow. it was like well I'm either going to have to deal with this now when I can do something about it or when I'm older and I won't be able to do anything about it.

So I'm kind of where I was when I was 20 except now I have a whole lot more skills and experiences. I'm not actually sure what I'm going to do long term. All I really know is I was headed down the wrong path and I've been lying to myself for far too long.

But actually I do kind of know. The only thing that really makes sense is some kind of tech entrepreneurship. I mean I know success isn't guaranteed but it comes down to kind of a deep question which is what do you want to do with your life. Sitting behind a desk coding what someone else tells me to all day long is simply not going to get me where I want to be in life. So I kind of jumped off the cliff hoping I can learn to fly on the way down.

I totally might fail so don't follow my lead too much.

I will tell you that since I've been working on cars all day I'm so much physically stronger than I was as a coder and it feels fantastic. It isn't really long-term because technically you're not allowed to buy a car with the intention of fixing and reselling it unless you're a dealer but succeeding and failing based on my own decisions feels so much better then being cemented underneath someone else in a corporate hierarchy.

I was a developer for about 10 years and even though I could get another development job I'd rather crawl through the mud and find a new way forward before I get too old and it's too late.

Re: Learning at work is work, and we must make space for it

#80

Post by radicalbyte »

Bootwizard wrote: post #9

I'm currently a frontend engineer. I told my team lead a while back that I'd like to transition to the server side, especially since our server team is woefully understaffed and our frontend team is overstaffed. He told me "Sure but you'll need to learn all that stuff on your own time". So I never did it because I'm interested in doing other things at home.

It looks like you have a pretty inexperienced lead.

I'm extremely happy when my team members want to expand their horizons, it keeps them engaged in their work and makes the team as a whole stronger.

Your lead should have paired you with a backend developer and have had simple backend tickets assigned to you. This works really well in turning Windows developers into Web developers (together with some coaching).

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