I look at this from a physics perspective. I generally have 3-4 hours a day where I am making something (as I take on more leadership it goes down to 2-3 hours a day). During this time I am doing 'real work', i.e. applying force to our goal posts to move them toward delivery. Simply said, work is force over time and force = mass * acceleration. If I look at that as development force = knowledge x development effort, then my 'real work' is increasing my development effort. However, the time I spend refreshing, increasing my skills and my general knowledge, is increasing my knowledge, aka mass. Therefore it still increases the amount of work I can do. I can do more with 4 hours of work than many junior devs I know can do with a week. Not because I'm special, but just because I've done it before and now the technologies.
Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
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Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#72The guilt you're feeling is intentional. The culture of capitalism is the driving force behind it. By recognizing it, you're already partway to breaking free.
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#73This sounds like it might be good thing for the company. Having employees who have extra capacity is incredibly important for an organization that wants to get things done; if you're constantly hard at work on something important, when something else comes up (someone has a question, there's a bug or an outage, whatever), you either have to delay the thing you're already working on, or delay the thing that came up. T…
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Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#74At 3 hours a day, you work as much as everyone else does. [0] [0] https://www.inc.com/melanie-curtin/in-an-8-hour-day-the-aver...
If I’m your boss, sitting next to you and in full view of your screen, and I’m there for 8 hours working, will the average person work a real 8 hours?
> If I’m your boss, sitting next to you and in full view of your screen, and I’m there for 8 hours working, will the average person work a real 8 hours?
You probably get a few weeks of “real 8 hours” before your best employees find somewhere less oppressive to work and leave your micromanaged company.
Your bad employees will stay because they don’t have better options.
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#75While I don't seem to have all the information here, what I do have is enough to make a really good suggestion. I have some of the same issues with goofing off and such like that. So with this, a couple of questions. 1. Do you find yourself avoiding work you don't want to do outside of the job? 2. Was this a problem in school? 3. Have you talked to a doctor about this? Number three is the most important. I have ADHD,…
ADHD and WFH have basically been a death sentence for me in regards to my output and velocity. Some days are good, some days are horrible. As someone who received their ADHD diagnosis at 22 (well after I fumbled through a CS degree wondering if I was a moron, while also working part time at startups) it changed my life. Ignorant people will say "nobody needs stimmies" but 5mg Adderall has legitimately changed my life…
Good thing you live in , I guess you would have been screwed if you lived in a society before Adderall and ADHD existed, eh?
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#76You're really selling me on moving my company to a 4 day work week.
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#77Check threads here: https://www.teamblind.com/
It is a way of life at FAANG, Uber, etc.
Don’t feel guilty. These companies will eventually realize they need to change, or perhaps they are okay with it.
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Not working enough? Just take meth!”
Being snarkily dismissive of mental disorders isn't a great look, especially when OP stated that they also went to therapy for anxiety/depression and also stated they work less now than they did before because they're able to properly focus.
It might have been unhelpful way of formulating the response, especially in the light of OP's comments about getting treatment for anxiety and depression.
But the comment was probably meant to highlight that there's a sense of ambiguity in medicating what's likely a natural individual difference in brain chemistry. Many diagnosed with ADHD would be considered perfectly well-functioning in a society where hunting, defense or other stressful, spontaneous physically and psychologically demanding activities were common. Many of them would excel at it far beyond the ideal office worker.
So in that sense it can be considered a critique of contemporary society's requirements and standards.
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Not working enough? Just take meth!”
Being snarkily dismissive of mental disorders isn't a great look, especially when OP stated that they also went to therapy for anxiety/depression and also stated they work less now than they did before because they're able to properly focus.
ADHD is an executive function disorder. OP clearly has perfectly fine executive function if they are gainfully employed getting good reviews.
If you have ADHD, doing what OP is doing is not going to be easy untreated.
Re: Ask HN: Feeling guilty for doing the bare minimum at work
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've actually noticed a completely inverse relationship between how hard & how many hours I'm (actually) working and how well I'm perceived by my peers and by management. This is unrelated to acute problems caused by errors on my part, or anything like that. I don't get it, but if I feel like I'm working hard I now take it as a very serious alarm bell. Some of my best feedback has come when I was starting to get nerv…
If you're working hard at a lot of places you're not getting noticed. If you spend more time talking to people (about work?) They think you're busy. Sometimes the person who is fixing problems is seen as better than the one who is not - it's hard for people to tell which challenges are self inflicted. Sometimes I think the way to get noticed is to spend money. Someone always has to approve your purchases so you get n…
Your first sentence is actually restating the difference between maker schedules and manager schedules http://www.paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html