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

If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

betterthanrandom.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 372 posts

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#101

Post by magicalhippo »

writebetterc wrote: post #68
magicalhippo wrote: post #12

I recently had a bout of this at my current work. For a while I was struggling to pinpoint my discontent, but I ended up realizing it was because I felt I was undervalued compared to the contributions I had made over the years. As it happened, my superiors had come to realize the same, so when I asked for a talk, they preempted my plan by announcing this. As mentioned by the article, I've since been included in much…

> As it happened, my superiors had come to realize the same, so when I asked for a talk, they preempted my plan by announcing this. What is "this"?

Sorry, was in a hurry

By "this" I meant that they had undervalued me and my contributions.

As a consequence I got a promotion and, as mentioned, included in higher-level talks.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#102

Post by closewith »

steveBK123 wrote: post #87
gadders wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's almost like you could create a 2 x 2 matrix of Useful Vs Valued - Not Useful, Not Valued: Get good or change jobs/industries. - Not Useful, Valued: talks a good game (or is doing useful stuff that is not apparent) -Useful, Not Valued: Could be useful at non-strategic stuff, or does good work without self-marketing, or has bad management and needs to leave. - Useful, Valued: Ideal situation.

Some of these may also work in different life stages. Want reasonable job security & compensation but currently pursuing a masters / raising an infant / dealing with elderly parental care - "useful&not valued" may not be so bad for a few years.

The opposite is true. In those situations, you want to be valued but useless.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#103

Post by closewith »

steveBK123 wrote: post #97
JadeNB wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't "not valued" at odds with "reasonable job security?"

If there's a grid of 4 types of people, the two boxes of "not useful" are usually let go first

That's missing the point here completely, as it's not the useless who are let go first, it's the unvalued.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#104

Post by chokominto »

dinetrimr wrote: post #77
aaviator42 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry to hear that, and hope you're able to figure out something sustainable soon. To other readers: don't quit your job until you have a new source of income locked in!

Thought I had one, turned in my notice but they rescinded offer a week later for no obvious reason and went hiring freeze. Was about the exact point when the market started inclining couple of years ago. Still think if I had interviewed a month before I would have got the position Been jobless ever since. I blame my self for it, for not having the insight. Consequences were severe

Wow, that's crazy. Hope you'll find something soon.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#105

Post by temporallobe »

47282847 wrote: post #46

“ I distinguish four types. There are clever, hardworking, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are clever and hardworking; their place is the General Staff. The next ones are stupid and lazy; they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the mental cla…

In reality it’s more like a line graph with stupid to clever on the Y axis, and lazy to hardworking on the X axis.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#106

Post by Tsiklon »

gadders wrote: post #81
47282847 wrote: post #46

“ I distinguish four types. There are clever, hardworking, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are clever and hardworking; their place is the General Staff. The next ones are stupid and lazy; they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the mental cla…

It's almost like you could create a 2 x 2 matrix of Useful Vs Valued - Not Useful, Not Valued: Get good or change jobs/industries. - Not Useful, Valued: talks a good game (or is doing useful stuff that is not apparent) -Useful, Not Valued: Could be useful at non-strategic stuff, or does good work without self-marketing, or has bad management and needs to leave. - Useful, Valued: Ideal situation.

The punnet square of value and utility

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#108

Post by prmph »

> I had become the go-to person for making things run smoothly, for fixing urgent problems, for delivering. But every time I pushed toward more strategic and ambitious directions, there was a lot of can-kicking and “let’s think about it” that went nowhere.

If you are effective where you are, why would the organization want to promote you and lose the work you are doing now? Maybe the higher-ups were aware of the Peter Principle.

More deeply, this hints at something we probably all need to internalize. Engineering and "management" should be separate tracks. Right now, management is mostly synonymous with people manage, lording it over people. Good engineers might aspire to rise higher into "management", which might be a poor fit for their skills, interests, and temperament. Engineers should be able to rise to the top as engineers.

If you see management as your ideal destination, then go into that from the start. Become a management trainee, not an engineer. But overall I think (people) management should lose it's aura of prestige. It's just a skill like any other, and people in those positions are frequently ill suited to it.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#109

Post by riehwvfbk »

DiscourseFan wrote: post #43

It takes some guts to be in management, but being a good worker-bee will only get you so far. You have to know how to work with others, you have to be able to make critical decisions at the right moment. Not everyone has the talent for it. And if you don't have it, you don't have it. Will you, as this author has described, find a comfortable position in life, be able to afford whatever you need? Absolutely. And you'l…

> Will you, as this author has described, find a comfortable position in life, be able to afford whatever you need? Absolutely.

Only when the times are good, as many of us had to learn the hard way.

When times are tough and there aren't enough resources to go around - there is no substitute for being the one allocating the resources, or at least close to them.

Re: If you are useful, it doesn't mean you are valued

#110

Post by k3vinw »

einpoklum wrote: post #93

There is another kind of useful-but-not-valued, and that's the person who does things that management ignores, or finds not worthy of investment of time, but inoculate against future trouble or enable other work, or make it considerably easier, down the line. If you engage in that kind of work, it's not just that you'll not be recognized/valued, but rather - be thought negatively of, for doing that.

I’m curious. What kind of work would management ignore or look at negatively? If the work needs done, shouldn’t you be able to justify to management?

For example, by doing X this will improve our efficiency in performing Y by 80% and help us achieve our goal by reducing time wasted on Z.

Post reply on HN