He joins a proven unicorn at its inflection point and then leaves mere days after hitting his vesting cliff. All of this "learning" and "experience" talk is sopping wet with cynicism.
Reflections on OpenAI
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Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#62He joins a proven unicorn at its inflection point and then leaves mere days after hitting his vesting cliff. All of this "learning" and "experience" talk is sopping wet with cynicism.
Can you please make your substantive points without crossing into personal attack and/or name-calling?
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#63It is fairly rare to see an ex-employee put a positive spin on their work experience. I don't think this makes OpenAI special. It's just a good reminder that the overwhelming majority of "why I left" posts are basically trying to justify why a person wasn't a good fit for an organization by blaming it squarely on the organization. Look at it this way: the flip side of "incredibly bottoms-up" from this article is that…
I would never post any criticism of an employer in public. It can only harm my own career (just as being positive can only help it).
Given how vengeful Altman can reportedly be, this goes double for OpenAI. This guy even says they scour social media!
Whether subconsciously or not, one purpose of this post is probably to help this guy’s own personal network along; to try and put his weirdly short 14-month stint in the best possible light. I think it all makes him look like a mark, which is desirable for employers, so I guess it is working.
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#64„the right people can make magic happen“
:-)
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#65> The Codex sprint was probably the hardest I've worked in nearly a decade. Most nights were up until 11 or midnight. Waking up to a newborn at 5:30 every morning. Heading to the office again at 7a. Working most weekends. There's so much compression / time-dilation in the industry: large projects are pushed out and released in weeks; careers are made in months. Worried about how sustainable this is for its people, gi…
I’m sure they’ll look back at it and smile, no?
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#66> The Codex sprint was probably the hardest I've worked in nearly a decade. Most nights were up until 11 or midnight. Waking up to a newborn at 5:30 every morning. Heading to the office again at 7a. Working most weekends. There's so much compression / time-dilation in the industry: large projects are pushed out and released in weeks; careers are made in months. Worried about how sustainable this is for its people, gi…
Those that love the work they do don't burn out, because every moment working on their projects tends to be joyful. I personally hate working with people who hate the work they do, and I look forward to them being burned out
Sure, but this schedule is like, maybe 5 hours of sleep per night. Other than an extreme minority of people, there’s no way you can be operating on that for long and doing your best work. A good 8 hours per night will make most people a better engineer and a better person to be around.
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
Those that love the work they do don't burn out, because every moment working on their projects tends to be joyful. I personally hate working with people who hate the work they do, and I look forward to them being burned out
"You don't really love what you do unless you're willing to do it 17 hours a day every day" is an interesting take. You can love what you do but if you do more of it than is sustainable because of external pressures then you will burn out. Enjoying your work is not a vaccine against burnout. I'd actually argue that people who love what they do are more likely to have trouble finding that balance. The person who hates…
I read gp’s formulation differently: “if you’re working 17 hours a day, you’d better stop soon unless you’re doing it for the love of doing it.” In that sense it seems like you and gp might agree that it’s bad for you and for your coworkers if you’re working like that because of external pressures.
I don’t delight in anybody’s suffering or burnout. But I do feel relief when somebody is suffering from the pace or intensity, and alleviates their suffering by striking a more sustainable balance for them.
I feel like even people energized by efforts like that pay the piper: after such a period I for one “lay fallow”—tending to extended family and community, doing phone-it-in “day job” stuff, being in nature—for almost as long as the creative binge itself lasted.
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#68> The Codex sprint was probably the hardest I've worked in nearly a decade. Most nights were up until 11 or midnight. Waking up to a newborn at 5:30 every morning. Heading to the office again at 7a. Working most weekends. There's so much compression / time-dilation in the industry: large projects are pushed out and released in weeks; careers are made in months. Worried about how sustainable this is for its people, gi…
If anyone tried to demand that I work that way, I’d say absolutely not. But when I sink my teeth into something interesting and important (to me) for a few weeks’ or months’ nonstop sprint, I’d say no to anyone trying to rein me in, too! Speaking only for myself, I can recognize those kinds of projects as they first start to make my mind twitch. I know ahead of time that I’ll have no gas left the tank by the end, and…
I think senior folks at OpenAI realized this is not sustainable and hence took the "wellness week".
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#69He joins a proven unicorn at its inflection point and then leaves mere days after hitting his vesting cliff. All of this "learning" and "experience" talk is sopping wet with cynicism.
Can you please make your substantive points without crossing into personal attack and/or name-calling? https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Sorry, I removed the personal attack.
Re: Reflections on OpenAI
#70> The Codex sprint was probably the hardest I've worked in nearly a decade. Most nights were up until 11 or midnight. Waking up to a newborn at 5:30 every morning. Heading to the office again at 7a. Working most weekends. There's so much compression / time-dilation in the industry: large projects are pushed out and released in weeks; careers are made in months. Worried about how sustainable this is for its people, gi…
The author left after 14 months at OpenAI, so that seems like a burnout duration.