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Surviving Burnout (2015)

lifeofaudrey.com

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Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#111

Post by steveBK123 »

delusional wrote: post #74
ElFitz wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Burnout is just the moment whe you stop fruitlessly caring. To me it was the moment I started breaking down in tears when getting to the subway station down my street, on my way to work. Every day. The next time was when I could not speak about my job and the project I was working on without stammering and my mind going blank (and still couldn’t for months after quitting). “Frustrated" and "stop to fruitlessly care…

This might be asking too much on a public forum, but would you be able to describe what differentiates these two for you? Feel free to decline if it's too personal or you just don't feel like it.

For me I think depression & burnout have opposite impacts on sleep, not sure what others have experienced.

Depression, in the literature, in my experience, and what I've seen in my spouse leads to just wanting to sleep and not get out of bed.

Burnout, however, lead me to be completely incapable of sleep. I couldn't fall asleep for hours. I'd wake up 10x/night in some anxiety sweat thinking about some way I could make the abomination of a project 1% less horrible. I'd wake up 2 hours before my alarm, in pitch black pre-dawn light in dread and just feel like I needed to get the day started.. so much to do, and it was all going to fail, but I had to be seen to be trying.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#113

Post by grayfaced »

misja111 wrote: post #82
hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The good old fashioned Job Resources / Job Demands 2x2 strikes again. - Low resources * low demands = low motivation + average stress. You don't really give a shit about the job, but it's also not taking a lot out of you either. - High resources * low demands = high motivation + low stress. The dream! - High resources * high demands = high motivation + average stress. You've got a lot on your plate - but you also fee…

> High resources * low demands = high motivation + low stress. The dream! I disagree with that. High resources * high demands is the dream for many people including myself. Low demands -> low motivation, at least for most people. Having a stress free job with low motivation for a long time can even lead to burnout!

Low demand doesn't have to mean low purpose. I would split demand out into two: urgency and significance. I want significant work, but not urgent work. Constant urgency will burn me out. Some people may prefer urgent work over non-urgent work because they enjoy the hustle. But I think everyone has limited capacity for urgency.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#114

Post by steveBK123 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #21
bruce511 wrote: post #8

>> caring about the results of our actions but having no meaningful control over those outcomes This really dies sum it up in a useful generic way. Ultimately the balance of this sentence will differ from context to context, but the equation ultimately has to balance. Put another way, if you care a lot, but have no agency, then ultimately you will be frustrated. If you care a lot, but have no resources, then again, y…

The most burnout-inducing environments I’ve worked in have all had one thing in common: They had a person or class of people that had wormed their way into being in control of everything while being responsible for very little. This left the rest of us to be responsible for the consequences of their decisions while having little to no input on the things we were held accountable for. The absolute worst company I work…

Yeah my last place was like this, and all the non-engineers sucked at their jobs leaving engineers to pick up the slack on everything from project planning to sprint planning, to engaging with users, gathering requirements, prioritizing tasks, etc.

This despite having an entire product team who was making all sorts of insane non-product decisions (technologies, programming languages, binary storage formats, vendors to outsource to, etc).

The product team was somehow too busy to make it to any meetings with tech leads & devs, despite seemingly not talking to users either since we were left doing so. We'd have 10hrs/sprint of planning meetings, and our product guy would show up for 30 minutes of one meeting. Unbelievable stuff.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#115

Post by gavi »

Audrey's experience with burnout is unfortunately all too common in the tech industry. It's important to recognize that burnout is a structural issue, built on individualism and meritocracy. As Audrey suggests, structural problems require structural solutions. Healthy organizations can lead to healthier individuals. Support and recovery funds should be available to those affected by burnout. It's time for the tech industry to prioritize the well-being of its employees and work towards creating an environment that doesn't lead to burnout.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#116

Post by steveBK123 »

ElFitz wrote: post #96
delusional wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might be asking too much on a public forum, but would you be able to describe what differentiates these two for you? Feel free to decline if it's too personal or you just don't feel like it.

In short, depression, to me, was total and absolute hopelessness. Burn out, on the other hand, brought me dread, anxiety, exhaustion, and the feeling of being trapped in a pointless but never-ending cycle. If I were to dive into more details, depression gave me a rock-solid certainty that I could never be happy, or meaningfully enjoy life in any meaningful way. There might have been some joyous and light-hearted mome…

Yes you could summarize them as having almost opposite effects.

Depression - it's hopeless, there's nothing I can do..

Burnout - it's hopeless, but there's so much I can do, let me burn myself out trying to do all of it at once, even though it won't move the needle more than 1%. Almost like "Sunday scaries" but all the time or months nonstop. Just a constant mid-level anxiety & panic.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#117

Post by yobbo »

bruce511 wrote: post #18
brailsafe wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very well-articulated. I finally felt like I was bouncing back when I just accepted not giving a fuck and doing the absolute minimum to fulfill whatever the goals seem to be of whoever's deciding on them. Do they care about rendering performance? No? Well then I'm sure as hell not goimg to lose sleep over it, and if it seems actively harmful to customers *that I've met* then it's just a place to leave. There's always…

As you move up the business ladder, or indeed start your own business, it's interesting to see how priorities evolve. When you're a coder, the code matters. It can be frustrating to see resources allocated to say marketing. When you are responsible for acquiring resources, then there's more to care about, more to balance. When to market. When to get new hardware. Programmers care about code performance, code elegance…

Not really. The specifics about how a product is differentiated might seem like irrelevant minutia (fps or rendering times, for example) to an outsider while still being critical for market success.

Installing people into senior positions does not make them better at recognizing these factors, or more incentivized to care.

The point is that a senior can use your argument to trivialize the efforts of an engineer, seem reasonable to outsiders, and be wrong.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#118

Post by ElFitz »

steveBK123 wrote: post #116
ElFitz wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In short, depression, to me, was total and absolute hopelessness. Burn out, on the other hand, brought me dread, anxiety, exhaustion, and the feeling of being trapped in a pointless but never-ending cycle. If I were to dive into more details, depression gave me a rock-solid certainty that I could never be happy, or meaningfully enjoy life in any meaningful way. There might have been some joyous and light-hearted mome…

Yes you could summarize them as having almost opposite effects. Depression - it's hopeless, there's nothing I can do.. Burnout - it's hopeless, but there's so much I can do, let me burn myself out trying to do all of it at once, even though it won't move the needle more than 1%. Almost like "Sunday scaries" but all the time or months nonstop. Just a constant mid-level anxiety & panic.

Absolutely.

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#119

Post by steveBK123 »

avnfish wrote: post #88
notimetorelax wrote: post #10

Does anyone have an advice for those who stay employed by a megacorp? I’m on a vacation this week and have just realized that I was effectively in isolation outside of my work.

Megacorps can be made to work for you (albeit with a certain set of tradeoffs): * milk the wellness benefits as much as possible - including any therapy cover * look at leave of absence / sick leave (larger corps are better able to accommodate) * transfer to a better team * adjust your hours downwards either explicitly or tacitly Megacorps aren't great at the whole empowerment and outcome control thing, but you can a…

Yeah I've been at smaller firms for last 10 years, but the first half of my career was at 100K+ employee firms. My wife has mostly stayed at such large firms.

High performers underestimate how long you can get away with BS at a megacorp. Quarters to even years is the correct answer.

Guy on my team who we took on from the "layoffs list" of his old team. We were forced to hire from this list before hiring externally. Lasted about 2 years with us & then comes to me one day "Hey I'm gonna get laid off, I don't know when but it's been discussed with HR.. oh anyway I thought it would have happened last year". Suddenly it clicked why his work product had been diminishing by the month with us. It still took them a few months to go through with it. So the guy spent 3-4 years in the firm in the process of trying to / being laid off.

We had another guy who we inherited from a wound-down project, basically didn't count against our budget for the year. His choice was to join our team or be fired. Anyway just weeks into it, he called me one day and said "I have a thing with my family, I can't tell you what it is but I'll be gone for a month". I asked him if he talked to HR and he said yes. I called HR and they asked ME what I wanted to do... I was ~25 years old and this dude in his 40s had a family thing.. sure whatever.

Anyway, as you can imagine he basically disappeared and only touched base on the phone to say he need another month, over&over, etc. I punted it up to HR & my manager. He basically just disappeared for the rest of the year (~6 months) until new years layoffs season..

Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)

#120

Post by [deleted] »

papito wrote: post #55
reddoormat wrote: post #50

Throwaway account. I work at an early stage startup which I joined on the day one about two years ago. I don’t want to get into too much details but couple months ago we did a pivot, threw away most of the old product and now pretending the new offering is complete (it is the opposite). I was onboard with the new vision for the company but couple months ago I started noticing something isn’t right. I felt anxious, ti…

My advice - save walk-away money when you are young. It's incredibly satisfying to slam the door and walk away from an abusive work environment full of incompetents. We take a lot of abuse in our 20s because we are still learning what a functional and what a dysfunctional work place is. You can learn a ton from both, but at some point, once you realize what work should be, give yourself the ability to move, or you wi…

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