51–60 of 250 posts
Just a thought I'm not sure I actually believe myself: Does catering to every trivial whim (email address? really?) of your employees create a culture of entitled whiners? I've never worked at such a place, so I wouldn't know.
Agree with the monitors. The email thing less so. A consistent email format, helps people remember and communicate better. Yes it has less of "YOUR" ego imprinted all over it, but surely there are a plenty of other ways to express yourself? Seems a bit petty, and creates admin more work for you sysadmin and his managers. "GodHatesFags@yourcompany.com". See, now you need a policy against that sort of unpleasantness. B…
Agree with the monitors. The email thing less so. A consistent email format, helps people remember and communicate better. Yes it has less of "YOUR" ego imprinted all over it, but surely there are a plenty of other ways to express yourself? Seems a bit petty, and creates admin more work for you sysadmin and his managers. "GodHatesFags@yourcompany.com". See, now you need a policy against that sort of unpleasantness. B…
Yeh I agree with that, I recently joined a new company and was a little disappointed that I wasnt asked what email I wanted 'dale@company.com' (dale is usually just rare enough that I can get firstnames in these situations) I got dharvey@company.com, and within a few days I realised that every time I needed to email someone I didnt know I never needed to go searching for their email address, I already knew it.
I personally like formulated emails. Maybe it's the fact that I really like consistency but it also makes emailing coworkers much easier. I don't want to have to go hunting through a directory to find their custom email.
1. In my last job I calculated the price of a nice monitor as a percentage of my salary and told my boss that it would only have to make me 0.4% more productive for it to be a good investment. Did I get a new monitor? Nope.
2. A friend of mine works at Google in Sydney and I went to visit. The first thing that struck me as I gazed out across their cube farm (they have a nice office, but it's still a cube farm) was that the OpenGL screensavers on every single desktop were running at a decent framerate, a marked contrast to my workspace, which runs the same screensavers but only 10% have the right video drivers installed :)
The monitors, I totally understand and agree with. That's about actual productivity. But choosing your own e-mail address? There must be a thousand little details like that in my life, every day, that I have no control over, like the color of my desk, or the sound of a coworker's voice. By all means, try to find a workplace that suits you the best, but if a seemingly tiny detail like that bothers you so much, unless…
At Google your username appears everywhere. In mail, code reviews, chat, irc - everywhere. I know some of my colleagues by their username only, I don't even remember their real names. When we start we get to specify three usernames in order of preference. You are given the first one that is available. It means a lot to me to be adg@google.com.
The monitors, I totally understand and agree with. That's about actual productivity. But choosing your own e-mail address? There must be a thousand little details like that in my life, every day, that I have no control over, like the color of my desk, or the sound of a coworker's voice. By all means, try to find a workplace that suits you the best, but if a seemingly tiny detail like that bothers you so much, unless…
Find a company where the engineers are happy, where the engineers don't leave, and where the management understands that happiness doesn't mean a couple of monitors or a nice chair. Happiness is having your opinions valued, getting fulfillment out of your work and being able to effect change within the company.
I think the meta-point sort of makes sense. Places that don't skimp on resources which are a comparatively small fraction of salary (monitors, fancy coffee makers, catered food, etc...) are more likely to value their employees. That said: I use a single 15.6" laptop on a stand (or, of course, in my lap) for pretty much everything I do. I find the added productivity of always having everything I work on in front of me…
Right with you on things that impact productivity, e.g. monitors, chairs, etc., but coming from finance I'm impressed by how Silicon Valley will take huge pay cuts for little things like catered food, pinball machines, or hammocks. I didn't realise it until a VC (not going to name them, but a big one) showed me a graph during his pitch of how much less his start-ups pay in cash + equity versus similar companies for "…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
At Google your username appears everywhere. In mail, code reviews, chat, irc - everywhere. I know some of my colleagues by their username only, I don't even remember their real names. When we start we get to specify three usernames in order of preference. You are given the first one that is available. It means a lot to me to be adg@google.com.
do you really want your raw email available publically?