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1-on-1 meeting questions

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Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#151

Post by aspaceman »

huhtenberg wrote: post #144

> How are your parents/grandparents? "Grandparents are dead. Parents are divorced. Father is a roaring alcoholic, mother is on a death bed with cancer. Also they are both A-grade assholes that made my childhood miserable." Really sets the mood for the rest of the interview, doesn't it? In other words, stay the hell away from any personal questions.

Yup.

“They’re all dead.”

Doesn’t set a great tone for a friendly conversation. Nowadays I use euphemisms like “they’re out of the picture” and pray they’re not curious.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#152

Post by smichel17 »

anonred wrote: post #120

Questions aside, I honestly thought the steps to submit a new question was satire... Contributing 1. Fork it 2. Run npm install 3. Add your resource to questions.json 4. Run node index to update README.md with your changes 5. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature) 6. Commit your changes (git commit -am "Add some feature") 7. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature) 8. Create new Pull R…

While making no comment on whether it is ridiculous, I'll point out that steps 1 and 5+ are the same as I'd do to send a PR anywhere, so it's really steps 2, 3, and 4 we're talking about.

That is, let's just make sure we're criticising the actions required, not the number of steps involved.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#153

Post by krzyk »

dehrmann wrote: post #88
skizm wrote: post #61

As a grunt IC 1 on 1s are a nightmare for me. I never know what to talk about. All current project stuff is hashed out in or after scrum. Career development is more of a once per year thing (at least not weekly). If I had a problem with any of my team members I would have brought it up by now (assuming I thought others felt that way, I don't want to be the only one to bring it up or I'll be seen as the problem). For…

> career development is more of a once per year thing If you see it that way, it's a never thing. Career development is an always thing.

OK, and what should I tell?

I want to code and I want money, more money the better. Oh, and I don't want bulshit meetings (1on1s included).

That's basically it for my career, I don't want to be a manager, I don't want to be a tech lead (been there, hated every 3 years of it). What is there more to talk about?

My manager thinks that to be a better individual contributor (go up a ladder) I should do something outside my team, I'm not sure I want that (or know what to do outside) - so most probably when I hit pay rise wall I'll switch jobs again.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#154

Post by vgraupera »

anonred wrote: post #120

Questions aside, I honestly thought the steps to submit a new question was satire... Contributing 1. Fork it 2. Run npm install 3. Add your resource to questions.json 4. Run node index to update README.md with your changes 5. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature) 6. Commit your changes (git commit -am "Add some feature") 7. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature) 8. Create new Pull R…

Oops, I must have just cut and paste from another project. Yeah, all this is not necessary in this case. I will update it.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#155

Post by vgraupera »

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #137
anonred wrote: post #120

Questions aside, I honestly thought the steps to submit a new question was satire... Contributing 1. Fork it 2. Run npm install 3. Add your resource to questions.json 4. Run node index to update README.md with your changes 5. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature) 6. Commit your changes (git commit -am "Add some feature") 7. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature) 8. Create new Pull R…

If they ever make a website for the collected data, consuming JSON is less brittle than parsing a README file.

Yes, the JSON version is for use in a website or app.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#156

Post by tbabb »

kaens wrote: post #110
koonsolo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a strange, helpless way to look at the world. Employment is not a boss->servant relationship, it's a relationship where both parties gain something. You offer a service, and they pay for that. End of story. They act out? Then you find someone else who needs your services. As a programmer myself, I'm in this great position where there is a shortage of good developers, and plenty of companies searching for good de…

> Employment is not a boss->servant relationship It is, for the vast majority of employed people. > it's a relationship where both parties gain something. For the vast majority of employed people, what they gain is the ability to continue to afford food and shelter. Most jobs do not afford the economic reality necessary to allow the employee a position of being able to afford to bargain as anything approaching an equ…

If your boss is taking the time to give you a 1-on-1, then there is an opportunity for both sides to listen to each other.

If you have problems/complaints and you never say anything about them, then don't be surprised if they never change.

If there is a 1-on-1 meeting happening, then a communication channel is open. I suppose you can choose to cynically shut it again, but if you make that choice, then don't be surprised to find that you don't have a voice.

A person could try hard to avoid being the squeaky wheel. They could take no curiosity about themselves, or their surroundings, or their organization's goals, or how their boss sees them, or how others see them, or how their habits affect their work, and basically stay the same for years on end, doing the same job, at basically the minimum quality and execution to stay employed.

And then "at the next round of layoffs" that person will find themselves surprisingly replaceable. Probably by a cheaper, more junior person who can do the exact same work at the exact same minimum quality. No reason to keep the guy who hasn't improved for years, and basically tells you to F-off any time you ask him how you can help him.

Guess what: Being invested in your work can make you more valuable. The cynical route often doesn't pay, and frequently fulfills itself.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#157

Post by Forge36 »

huhtenberg wrote: post #144

> How are your parents/grandparents? "Grandparents are dead. Parents are divorced. Father is a roaring alcoholic, mother is on a death bed with cancer. Also they are both A-grade assholes that made my childhood miserable." Really sets the mood for the rest of the interview, doesn't it? In other words, stay the hell away from any personal questions.

Thank you for your honesty. It sounds like you aren't close with them. There is nothing wrong with that.

Do you have anyone you are close with to talk about things? Is there anything going on in your personal life you need to deal with which may be impacting your work?

IE: I care about more than just the work you do, I care about you. I'd like you to be happy and know more about your life to ensure when you turn into an ass I can justify the behavior and dismiss it. "His dad died recently. His dog died this week. People have been taking at him due to projects being behind and he was on vacation the week all hell broke lose retiring his involvement" Shit happens, if you're looking for happy things from your employees don't ask them these questions.

If your quote is truly what's happening in your life, I'm sorry. That sounds miserable, in posting here: I can't tell why you shared that. If I was your manager, is this a recent development and you need time to process? If not what prompted you to be so honest with me? Is there anything else you'd like to share?

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#158

Post by JMTQp8lwXL »

daeken wrote: post #143
JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they ever make a website for the collected data, consuming JSON is less brittle than parsing a README file.

It's Markdown, not just "a README file". It's designed to be easy to edit by hand and easy to parse; there's literally nothing at all gained by using the JSON file that they have. At all.

You'd be more likely to have a bug parsing the markdown file than the structured JSON. There aren't many tools out there for converting markdown files into JSON and piecing what you want out of it.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#159

Post by dehrmann »

krzyk wrote: post #153
dehrmann wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> career development is more of a once per year thing If you see it that way, it's a never thing. Career development is an always thing.

OK, and what should I tell? I want to code and I want money, more money the better. Oh, and I don't want bulshit meetings (1on1s included). That's basically it for my career, I don't want to be a manager, I don't want to be a tech lead (been there, hated every 3 years of it). What is there more to talk about? My manager thinks that to be a better individual contributor (go up a ladder) I should do something outside m…

> I want to code...and I don't want bulshit meetings (1on1s included)

There's a role for ICs who just want to code alone, but they're always limited by not being able to be part of something bigger. And yes, while you can job hop a bit for higher pay, it will start to become apparent in interviews that you're really just a solo coder and probably not worth the money they're asking.

You won't escape one-on-ones, but if you have a good rapport with your manager, if a performance review is generally positive, you can say you're happy where you're at right now professionally, you want to continue delivering the same quality work, but you want to focus on other parts of your life. Managers are happy to have people doing good work who don't want to leave.

You also want more money? Nope, it doesn't work that way unless you're a brilliant asshole, and no one likes those. Either be content as a mid-level coder (and paid like one) or start building relationships with people and teams and take on larger, more ambiguous projects. There isn't a right answer here, you just have to decide what you value.

Re: 1-on-1 meeting questions

#160

Post by syspec »

My favorite conversation starter for work related or at social events is:

”So, what’s keeping you busy these day’s?”

People always have things keeping them busy, work project, home project, personal project.

This question is much more inviting to conversation than “how is it going” or “what’s new”

I have never asked this question and received “nothing” in response

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