Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 229 posts

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#131

Post by lazide »

mcdonje wrote: post #30

The problem with this phrasing is it implies that motivation is an inherent aspect of individuals. Nobody is a do-er. Motivation is impacted by a variety of factors.

Actually there are people who are do-ers. Not everyone is wired the same.

Personally I can’t NOT do things. Regardless of if I get paid, it works out, or I even get yelled at for doing it - I fix things, pull things apart and make them better, clean things up, learn, and solve problems regardless of the discipline. If I’m not doing those things, I feel terrible. If I do those things (and the more the merrier), I feel good. I’ve built large scale engineering teams at FAANG’s and laid (inspected) foundations for buildings I’ve made myself without error - concurrently.

It pays well, if I’m smart enough to do things that provide value and most people can’t. But even if it doesn’t, I can’t help myself.

So far that includes networking, electrical (permitted, household and commercial), coding, welding, machining, commercial contracts, logging, real estate investment, piloting small aircraft, rock climbing, concrete work (inspected, residential and commercial), fathering 2 healthy strong and well adjusted boys, framing, hydraulic engineering and water delivery design, teaching and mentoring many strong leaders, bespoke financial instruments, and many more. All at a level equivalent or exceeding highly rated professionals or successful folks I’ve worked with or partnered with. It’s weird, but it is what it is. I can’t help myself, and it feels almost like a disease sometimes. I did El Capitan (Mescalito) solo aid in my early 20’s for my first big wall, ‘off the couch’.

It causes friction because either people don’t believe it, or once they do they can’t understand it - sometimes they even get angry or resentful. I don’t do it because I’m trying to show off. It just is who I am.

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#132

Post by QuercusMax »

bambax wrote: post #77
m463 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember the joel spolsky hiring article. He wants: smart, gets things done EDIT: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2006/10/25/the-guerrilla-guid... on the other hand, here was the quote on choosing officers, which might be a different position altogther: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_von_Hammerstein-Equord#Cl...

Thanks for that quote about officers, it's excellent! Indeed hardworking and stupid are dangerous. I'm not sure if clever and lazy should be put at the top, but they will often find the best solutions.

I think it's probably meaning the same type of laziness that Larry Wall talked about in his three cardinal virtues of a programmer : laziness, impatience, and hubris. The type of laziness and cleverness that will get others to do useful and important work is invaluable.

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#133

Post by didibus »

In other words:

> Can you educate a person who lacks the skills for what you need, but is willing to put lots of effort and determination?

But will that motivation remain once they're over the excitement of learning? You have no guarantees that by the time the Do-er is educated they will still be motivated.

> Can you motivate an educated person that has the skills for what you need to act on them with lots of effort and determination?

The implication of the tweet is that this is "harder", but I don't like the word "harder" here, what does it mean? That it will take longer? That it will require more effort on your part? That it is more likely to fail?

Alternatively, hire a motivated and educated person?

If someone is a motivated Do-er, why can't they motivate themselves to go through education? That also confuses me, you say you're motivated, but don't want to put the time and effort to learn?

Basically, I think this whole "Do-er" and "educated" dichotomy assumption is BS. I think it be more apt to talk about "passion" versus "just a job that pays my bills".

If you expect someone to go above and beyond on the job, without you motivating them to do so through actual benefits and compensation (like better pay, bonuses, etc.), you better make sure you found someone passionate enough about the task itself to be motivated to do so purely based on what the task is.

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#134

Post by [deleted] »

zeroxfe wrote: post #107

I really think that action changes attitude faster than attitude changes action. Learning this the hard way in my 40s, it's been really life changing for me. Particularly when you're depressed, demotivated, find yourself procrastinating, etc. You can try this yourself -- the next time you're feeling demotivated, start with the smallest amount of tiny measurable action. If you can't get out of bed, move your fingers,…

[deleted]

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#135

Post by eptcyka »

didibus wrote: post #133

In other words: > Can you educate a person who lacks the skills for what you need, but is willing to put lots of effort and determination? But will that motivation remain once they're over the excitement of learning? You have no guarantees that by the time the Do-er is educated they will still be motivated. > Can you motivate an educated person that has the skills for what you need to act on them with lots of effort…

I think if you can get the optimum which is getting a motivated doer, go for it. But given the option between the two, go for the doer.

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#136

Post by maximus-decimus »

zeroxfe wrote: post #107

I really think that action changes attitude faster than attitude changes action. Learning this the hard way in my 40s, it's been really life changing for me. Particularly when you're depressed, demotivated, find yourself procrastinating, etc. You can try this yourself -- the next time you're feeling demotivated, start with the smallest amount of tiny measurable action. If you can't get out of bed, move your fingers,…

At the same time, When it takes 5 minutes minimum to deploy my code changes to my vms to test, I lose all motivation. Momentum is really the right word and a workflow is just soul sucking.

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#137

Post by karmakaze »

zeroxfe wrote: post #107

I really think that action changes attitude faster than attitude changes action. Learning this the hard way in my 40s, it's been really life changing for me. Particularly when you're depressed, demotivated, find yourself procrastinating, etc. You can try this yourself -- the next time you're feeling demotivated, start with the smallest amount of tiny measurable action. If you can't get out of bed, move your fingers,…

My favorite way when I'm not up to doing something is to merely prepare an environment for the thing I'm not going to do right now in the simplest ways. Create a new empty directory not even thinking about its name. CD into it, leave a terminal tab in that directory. Maybe I'll copy/paste a config/makefile or something and search/replace the copied name with the arbitrary directory name. And so on.

Some point along the way, I'll care. Whether it's the dumb name I picked, or some specific thing in the config/makefile I want a certain way--I've been tricked.

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#138

Post by toomuchtodo »

ThrowawayR2 wrote: post #128
codegeek wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hired someone well educated from a Top Ivy League university but they had no motivation whatsoever. I tried my best, gave them everything they wanted (money, work style, tools, training) but they just wouldn't want to be motivated and we failed collectively. They were very smart otherwise and definitely could learn the skills. When I am hiring, for me the biggest things are motivation, curiosity and caring for your…

I have to shake my head when reading some of the replies the parent poster is getting. It is sobering to see so many who have no love for their profession and are trapped into staying solely for money; that's a recipe for an unhappy existence, as can be seen from the bitterness evident in their words.

Many people wouldn't be at their jobs if they weren't paid to do them. Many people don't do what they do out of love for the work.

"On the whole, American workers are generally satisfied with their jobs. Even so, a significant share (30%) view the work they do as “just a job to get them by,” rather than a career or a steppingstone to a career. Views about work are sharply divided along socio-economic lines, and the sense of vulnerability is most acute among workers with no college education and lower-than-average household incomes."

"In addition to job satisfaction, the survey explored what American workers’ jobs mean to them – are their jobs central to who they are, or are they mainly just a source of income? About half (51%) of employed Americans say they get a sense of identity from their job, while the other half (47%) say their job is just what they do for a living. And about half (51%) of all U.S. workers say they view their job as a career, while 18% see it as a steppingstone to a career and 30% say it’s just a job to get them by."

https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2016/10/06/3-how-a... (Pew Research: How Americans view their jobs)

Re: It is easier to educate a Do-er than to motivate the educated

#140

Post by n8cpdx »

theyx wrote: post #84
AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I meet a lot of candidates who have no idea why they applied, what they want in life for themselves but are just randoming sending their Resume hoping it sticks. Yeah, well, while I'm working on that I still need to put food on the table, so I'll apologize ahead of time for faking like I give a rats ass about a career long enough to get through the interview process.

Exactly this! I cannot believe someone is naïve enough to think total strangers will start caring about some company's progress, profits and reputation just because they are being paid minimum wage. Sorry, literally 99% of people who are seen as "do-ers" or motivated are only putting up a show to be hired and to keep their jobs. Being hungry and homeless is a great motivator. None is genuinely excited about your busi…

This doesn't make sense. There are loads of people (myself included) who are intrinsically motivated to do good work.

And not just in the tech industry. Look at all the volunteer opportunities, unpajd city boards, etc that people get themselves involved in. People can be motivated by wanting to make a difference. And yes, some software companies do in fact make products and services that make a difference in people's lives.

Post reply on HN