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No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

sahillavingia.com

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Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#431

Post by DoreenMichele »

rattray wrote: post #430
DoreenMichele wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the criticism is probably of the Canadian health care system a la "She had to go to another country to get her scan in a reasonable period of time (and that country has a terrible global reputation for being insanely expensive and broken itself in the health care department)."

She didn't have to go to the US for the MRI; implication was the clinic was in Canada. Private care isn't illegal or anything there. People from the US go abroad for care all the time.

Sorry, you are correct. Nevermind.

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#432

Post by pc86 »

philmcp wrote: post #182
pc86 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A B2B business has two choices if they want to institute a 4-day week. They can be closed 20% of the week, when their competition is likely open, or they can be open 5 days and spread 4 days of work out among their staff. So now if your coworker takes off Tuesdays, and you take off Wednesdays, you better not have a question for him on Tuesday morning. And isn't 28 hours 3.5 days?

I think if managed correctly the second option is more than achievable for a software development team. I agree it doesn't work for all industries / jobs (e.g. support staff etc), but for the majority of technical positions, I think the gain in productivity and saving in salary will more than make up for these inconveniences. I also think it will make the recruitment of developers easier as you'll be offering a benef…

I'm sure some people will disagree but working less for less money isn't seen as a benefit to me, especially in the US where there may be healthcare implications. And as others have said, given static overhead you're more likely to earn less per hour. You're likely better off going contract and having a higher hourly rate and just billing less, but that has its own set of difficulties.

The real benefit I've seen very few places implement is a 36-38 hour week, over 4 days, with no decrease in salary. Productivity is the same or slightly higher (quite a bit higher if it's a set schedule, e.g. everyone has the same day off so there's no communication latency). Satisfaction is through the roof because not only are people getting paid more per hour, but it's a benefit that they're extremely unlikely to find anywhere else, so retention goes up as well.

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#433

Post by samvher »

eloff wrote: post #229

I've been working like this, 16 hours a week for the past year. About 3 hours of that is meetings, and the rest is straight up coding. I don't make a lot of money, but I've never been happier with a job. I honestly don't feel less productive than when I worked full time. I spend the rest of my energy working on a project I intend to turn into a saas business. I think this kind of thing, where your job doesn't dominat…

Out of curiosity, where do you work?

I'm in the process of negotiating a similar setup with my employer, at my previous organization I worked 60% and also felt very happy with that. It seems to be hard to arrange unless an employer already knows you, though. (At least for interesting/challenging jobs with growth.)

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#434

Post by tasuki »

cercatrova wrote: post #326
OJFord wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't realise that on the internet you need to mention a jurisdiction when you talk about things like law and tax.

Sites like HN, reddit, Twitter etc are de facto US based, assume if no country or jurisdiction is specified that it's the US. Now, which state it is in the US is a different matter.

Fyi I downvoted you because I'm based outside of the US.

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#435

Post by pards »

rattray wrote: post #338
wolco5 wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Australia spends 10.5% on health. US 17.5 Is the increased level of care worth 7% In Canada it's 11.5 so 6%,extra. In Canada the waiting lists for mri and other advanced testing can be long where the same tests/operations can be done as a walkin option that day in the US.

waiting lists "can be long" – it's time to stop parroting these misleading statements. They can be, if your test/operation isn't urgent. Urgent things are treated right away. Frankly, as an American, I think we have shit quality of health service, based on the insurance cos' red tape and restrictions and paperwork alone. Getting healthcare in this country is a bureaucratic nightmare. Maybe the docs and meds and tests…

I'm in Canada. In 2010 my son was unwell, having issues with lethargy, balance and vomiting. We took him to the local children's hospital and he had a CT scan within 2 hours and an MRI an hour after that.

As part of his ongoing treatment the hospital scheduled an MRI every 3 months for a year, then every 6 months for 5 years, and now it's annual. The scans happen on time every time.

Waiting lists are prioritized based on urgency.

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#436

Post by ElFitz »

capableweb wrote: post #423
quickthrower2 wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly that's very nice money and more than I make full time. I'd happy take a role like that and work (10 hours per week?). Even if I wasn't that keen on the role (that's 30 hours per week to do what I want!)

I'm not sure where the company nor the employees are based, but it does seem ridiculously high and probably more than what 90% of the people in this world earns while working full-time. With that high salary and low amount of hours, I would personally feel bad, as the contrast against my peers and people around me would be too high.

But then you’d also be able to afford spending it helping your community and giving some to local or non-local charities

Heck; I’ve always thought that the first thing I’d do after winning the lottery would be paying off my parents’ mortgage ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (disclaimer: haven’t won yet)

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#437

Post by konjin »

dannyw wrote: post #410
konjin wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a huge trough in what you can do with what you can buy when you earn between $80k a year and ~$8m. It's the same shit just better. Your shitty commuter house 3 hours out of town is now a mansion 20 min outside of town. Your shitty 1990 ford fiesta is a very nice 2020 BMW. Your shitty healthcare plan is a great healthcare plan, but the main difference is how nice the plants at the doctors office are. If you wa…

“Everything is better but I don’t get a nuclear warhead”.

I don't want everything to be better. I want nuclear warheads.

Nuclear reactors really, you can't imagine what you can do with a piece of derelict land when you throw enough power at it.

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#438

Post by ElFitz »

chii wrote: post #376
tw04 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you were working 80% as much, they would probably only be able to pay 70% of your salary. ...why? Unless there's an implication that they'd need to hire more people, why would they need to pay you less? If you're generating the same amount of revenue, just working fewer hours, their fixed profit should be able to cover your fixed healthcare whether you work 80% of the time or 10% of the time. As long as they aren…

> If you're generating the same amount of revenue if you worked only 80% but is able to generate the same revenue as working at 100%, then surely one of the following must be true: you either slack off the 20% of the time, or the company is overpaying you for the work you do! Therefore, it must be assumed that if you worked only 80% of the time, you're only 80% effective. So the fixed cost of an employee doesn't decr…

Depends on the type of work you do and what the company pays you for. It is the means (your time)? Or the outcome?

Had quite a few clients and employers asking and haggling over trying to get it both ways.

If you consider a creative job where you only care about the output, then the more creative it is, the less (above an undetermined threshold) time spent working and output are correlated.

The means (again, time spent) not being an accurate predictor of the outcome, they don’t matter much, and there is no reason to tie the salary to them.

If you consider a non-creative (factory / fruits picking) or vaguely creative (low-level factory-style coding, data input) job, then the less creative it is, the more time spent working and output are correlated (up to a physical / mental exhaustion threshold).

Here, the means are a good predictor of the outcome, hence the salary being tied to the number of hours spent working.

It really depends ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#439

Post by pessimizer »

lostcolony wrote: post #349
brianwawok wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then by that note, premature optimization doesn’t imply excess complexity nor effort. So we have gone in a complete circle and conveyed nothing.

Pretty sure that doesn't logically scan. If it doesn't imply excess complexity nor effort, it's not premature to optimize it. Why write the inefficient algorithm when you remember the efficient one, and it's no more effort? But if an optimization will imply excess complexity or effort, and you aren't sure it's needed, it's premature. Worrying about load when you have 3 users is almost assuredly premature. Not to say…

"Premature optimization is the root of all evil" is a thought-terminating cliché and a tautology - if it's premature, it was done too early.

When people discuss the phrase, the conversation degenerates into random proclamations about when one should worry about things, proclamations that immediately break when applied to specific situations.

Re: No meetings, no deadlines, no full-time employees

#440

Post by irateswami »

heavyset_go wrote: post #342
philipkiely wrote: post #15

I work at Gumroad, mentioned in this article. Sometimes, I read things by CEOs about how a company works on the inside and I wonder if it really looks like that, or if it is a view from the top that doesn't reflect what it's really like. This article, with its discussions of the upsides and downsides, is accurate to my experience and my understanding of other people's experiences. For many people, Gumroad wouldn't be…

> Everyone at Gumroad is paid very well and should be able to afford the same. Have you looked at how much decent health insurance coverage costs on the individual market without income-based ACA subsidies? It's absolutely insane, and even more insane if you want family coverage. For a similar, but nowhere near equivalent, of an employer provided healthcare plan, I'm looking at spending more than $9,000 in premiums e…

Bingo. Saying that the employees are paid well enough to buy their own health insurance is a red herring because it's not an apples-to-apples comparison, companies get far better rates on insurance products. Gumroad could probably save a significant amount of money by providing health insurance to their employees and just not paying as high of a salary.
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