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Maybe you should do less 'work'

johnwhiles.com

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Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#401

Post by nickjj »

wildmanx wrote: post #390
nickjj wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Working less than 40 is nice but once you get down to 20 you have whole DAYS where you can do whatever you want I spent around 10 years working about 20 hours a week doing freelance work. It's good until it's not. Basically, yes you do have a lot of time and often times you can decide to be done at noon if you'd like. Taking entire days off is also possible unless it's expected to do something in a timely fashion s…

> So what you really end up doing is finishing at noon some days and then procrastinating on everything while you do nothing productive or fun because you've done everything you could with your budget 100 times over after years of this lifestyle. This indicates that you are tying "free time" closely with "spending money" by doing some costly activity. Perhaps that's the issue right there. Just sitting in the sunshine…

> This indicates that you are tying "free time" closely with "spending money" by doing some costly activity. Perhaps that's the issue right there.

I'm kind of the total opposite really. I can have fun and enjoy myself without spending "real" money but guilt free money IMO make things more enjoyable when you're talking about keeping yourself occupied for spans of years.

For example I do walk a few miles every day, totally disconnected. I really like this. I've been doing this for a bunch of years on both a 20 and 40 work week schedule. I usually walk around my neighborhood but there's a couple of spots within a 10 mile radius that are nice to mix it up by going through trails, etc.

But when you finish work every day at noon those walks are going to fill up an hour or 2 of time. The same goes for reading for an hour or so. There's still a ton of time left.

Everyone is different but even as someone who can keep themselves fairly self entertained walking + reading + coding gets tedious if you're doing this every single day for 4-5 hours for ~10 years straight. It's not that they become boring but it leaves you wanting to do more things. I still do find legit joy in walking and occasional reading but when that's done my idea of procrastinating is basically looping HN, Reddit and YouTube while thinking "why are you doing this, wouldn't it be better to just work 40 hours and save more money so you have better options later?" or "yeah, go do something else but wait that's $75 bucks -- are you sure it's worth it?".

One thing I would like to try is moving somewhere new every 3-4 months. I think that could fill a gap of boredom because I find exploring new areas by foot really fun.

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#402

Post by vladak »

0des wrote: post #228
slowmovintarget wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read that twenty years ago, and it is still relevant.

Just curious, do you have any other recommendations that are more or less timeless?

https://archive.org/download/the-unwritten-laws-of-engineeri...

I had a colleague that can be considered brilliant engineer and I believe could be doing all kinds of exciting hard projects and work in the top tier companies. When our manager decided to leave the company, he went along, for a job which in my view is nowhere near his maximum abilities (although he might argue otherwise), quoting the 'Be as particular as you can in the selection of your supervisor.' rule from the above book (which is relevant to the other thread in this topic).

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#403

Post by mnsc »

"And that's why money isn't nearly as important as SLACK. You can print or burn money, but you can't manufacture SLACK. It is The Final Commodity. So They want it _all_."

The Book p. 94

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#404

Post by shoo »

mnsc wrote: post #403

"And that's why money isn't nearly as important as SLACK. You can print or burn money, but you can't manufacture SLACK. It is The Final Commodity. So They want it _all_." The Book p. 94

https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2017/09/30/slack/

> Slack. The absence of binding constraints on behavior.

> Poor is the person without Slack. Lack of Slack compounds and traps. > Slack means margin for error. You can relax. > Slack allows pursuing opportunities. You can explore. You can trade. > Slack prevents desperation. You can avoid bad trades and wait for better spots. You can be efficient. > Slack permits planning for the long term. You can invest. > Slack enables doing things for your own amusement. You can play games. You can have fun.

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#405

Post by deltaonefour »

ironmagma wrote: post #381
deltaonefour wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are bartering your value to the organization and getting less in return. That's the definition of getting fucked. If you want to start your own company then you are fucking other people. In either situation, somebody is getting fucked.

You mean that if I started my own company then I would be “fucking” other companies, since we have a distinction between companies and people.

No. You'd be fucking your employees.

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#406

Post by zemvpferreira »

lijogdfljk wrote: post #340
zemvpferreira wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that the original commenter's last paragraph was a bit unnecessary, but let's not kid ourselves either: if everyone put in a solid 2 hours a day doing good, essential work all good, essential work would be done in 6 months. Most of our time at work is spent doing things which are either pointless or downright damaging.

I can .. somewhat agree with that. Not to disagree with your general direction though, but i don't honestly think i could boil what i do down into 2 hours. On paper? possibly. In practice i spend far more time thinking about problems, taking breaks from problems, etc - than i do actually writing the solutions. But i'm not claiming i'm any good heh, just that it often takes me hours and hours. Your assertion is genera…

Moreso I'd say your hours might be very good and productive but you are counterbalanced by 10 other people doing absolute shit jobs.

How many people work as prison guards watching over people on harmless drug offenses in the US? How many soldiers are stationed or fighting in pointless wars? How many loggers work in the Amazon, or how many poachers? I'd much prefer they take some of your work instead.

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#407

Post by sam_dusk »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #366
nickjj wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Working less than 40 is nice but once you get down to 20 you have whole DAYS where you can do whatever you want I spent around 10 years working about 20 hours a week doing freelance work. It's good until it's not. Basically, yes you do have a lot of time and often times you can decide to be done at noon if you'd like. Taking entire days off is also possible unless it's expected to do something in a timely fashion s…

> Taking entire days off is also possible unless it's expected to do something in a timely fashion such as meet with someone or produce results by XYZ day. I found in practice it wasn't possible to really drop off the grid for continuous 4 day weekends. I've tried to hire part-time employees or 4-day workweek employees in the past. You described essentially the #1 roadblock. It actually works okay as long as you have…

maybe the problem is the 4day workweek. I worked 30h for some months and 32h for half a year in between always fulltime. People want to shovel one day free and then add a weekend but that creates all those sync issues and makes them just less productive. But instead work 6h every day in intelligence jobs like programming. When I did that I had zero sync issues because in core time I was always there, I had no downtime during work. Effectively I got just as much if not more done than fulltime but still everyday felt like I had half the day to myself (going swimming ...). It is a worlds difference in quality of life (unless you have to fill the free time with other family work or waste your life on Netflix).

If I was an employer in IT, I would only hire 6h day workers (full pay). No breaks but no more than 6h 5 days a week. I can do 6h concentrated work almost any day with an afternoon/evening of other things. 8 or 12h only works occasionally on average when I work 8h I add more than the 2 extra hours of time wasting, because less satisfied/concentrated/happy.

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#408

Post by jakupovic »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #366
nickjj wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Working less than 40 is nice but once you get down to 20 you have whole DAYS where you can do whatever you want I spent around 10 years working about 20 hours a week doing freelance work. It's good until it's not. Basically, yes you do have a lot of time and often times you can decide to be done at noon if you'd like. Taking entire days off is also possible unless it's expected to do something in a timely fashion s…

> Taking entire days off is also possible unless it's expected to do something in a timely fashion such as meet with someone or produce results by XYZ day. I found in practice it wasn't possible to really drop off the grid for continuous 4 day weekends. I've tried to hire part-time employees or 4-day workweek employees in the past. You described essentially the #1 roadblock. It actually works okay as long as you have…

>The problem for me was that few other people were available to do things during the week.

This describes what I felt after a few months of "not working". Most people I knew, and probably most people in US, are in a 5/2 schedule. Work 5 days then you get Friday night and whole weekend off. If you add 5 more days to that schedule it all mixes and after a while it got old, too. your millage may vary :)

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#409

Post by cinntaile »

ehnto wrote: post #362
cinntaile wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're not talking about being more productive in the same number of hours. If you earn $2000 you pay more taxes than if you earn $1000, even if you work double the hours to earn $2000. So you still get rewarded for your extra time.

That's not how most jobs work, you get paid a salary, some people still work 60hr weeks and do not get paid more than their peers.

I refer you to my GP comment, where this is covered.

Re: Maybe you should do less 'work'

#410

Post by adamsmith143 »

thn-gap wrote: post #350
adamsmith143 wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree but I think it's more relevant to compare the same levels at the same org. I would be pretty shocked to hear that there is any 10x delta in total comp across L5s at Google lets say.

The 10x delta exists. You just have to compare the L5 engineer from the lowest paying region with the L5 from the highest paying one. And for the same effort and output.

I don't think that counts as all else being equal. L5 in India vs L5 in SFBay Area isn't an interesting comparison.

A 10x difference between 2 L5 engineers in Mountain View is what I really meant.

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