301–310 of 565 posts
This is what burnout looks like. Unless Yelp has a toxic work culture, it's likely the author brought it on themselves by pushing too hard. After several months, the author will probably start thinking about work again, and begin the job search once more. Not to say that the author's points are invalid; it's a terrible feeling to have to spend your most productive hours working on someone else's problems. He or she m…
I've been a tech consultant since my late teens but got out and passed all my clients on to a close friend so that I could focus on my own work about a year ago. It was a leap of faith for sure, but where there's a will there's a way. During my decade of consulting I set up some automatic income through a few different routes ( never put all your eggs in one basket! ). I entertain the thought of selling what I'm work…
My automatic income combo in rough outlines is:
1. Invest, make sure you diversify. At least 10% return should be possible with a smart combination of stocks, ETF, etc. This should be considered your rainy day fund that hopefully you never need.
2. Open an online shop. A lot of us engineers are so good at 'the internet' that finding a product or category of products where the e-commerce offering can be improved on. You'll never beat Amazon in price, so you have to beat them in curation. Just sell whatever gets you excited. That usually works best. I have 2 online stores that I have automated and staffed to the point they basically run on auto pilot.
3. Aside from selling someone else's products also make something yourself and sell it. Physical products or anything that requires too much support is probably not the best idea here. For me building and selling in app apps, themes, add-ons to products that come with their own audience and market works really well here.
If you want details, I've added contact info in my about.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even if you have enough cash to pay off a mortgage, if you can invest it with better returns than the mortgage interest rate (not hard these days), then it makes better sense to do that. Even Mark Zuckerberg has a mortgage...
Exactly this. General rule of thumb when deciding between eliminating debt or investing is to compare if the debt interest is greater than investment interest (investment rate of return). If (debt.interest > investment.interest ), pay off debt first. Else, invest.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because I see you attend The Iron Temple, you must also be a worshipper of Brodin. Wheymen.
Because I see you attend The Iron Temple, you must also be a worshipper of Brodin. Wheymen. I wasn't aware of any of the references that you used (e.g., "Brodin", "Wheymen") until I looked them up just now. I suspect that you're joking, but for the benefit of other readers regarding my intention: I would personally find it terribly unfortunate if what I've sincerely written in my original post above were to be miscon…
And then he has the gall to ask for donations? Seriously? Can this post be laden with slightly more privilege?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are 2 reasons: 1) Developers cannot reliably estimate software timelines. That often comes with experience and age, but many never learn that skill. It is a skill like programming itself. It comes with practice. 2) Break down in communication between management (product managers) and engineers who are writing code. On the first part. Usually junior software developers simply have not had experience shipping sof…
> 1) Developers cannot reliably estimate software timelines. That often comes with experience and age, but many never learn that skill. It is a skill like programming itself. It comes with practice. This is true. But this is the problem that Agile is supposed to help solve -- with the caveat that most companies don't do true Agile. I guess people are now calling it Continuous Delivery, but the idea is the same: you d…
In a top-down management style, your so-called "Lead Developer" is just the first head on the chopping block. They're leaders of puppet regimes. If the real leaders don't like them, they install a new one. It comes in many forms: layoffs, "performance" related dismissal ("you're not getting enough done!" because of all the rejected requirements docs), even reassignment to "re-engineering initiatives" that have no real chance of seeing the light of day.
Finding a management infrastructure that actually cares about feedback is incredibly rare. I have personally never found it, in 10 years across 6 companies. No amount of process is going to change a bad manager.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it's likely the author brought it on themselves by pushing too hard. Don't fall into the trap of thinking this. It is the case some of the time, but not all of the time. When I first started working in tech in the mid-90s, it was only a year or two before I was considering going back to school in music or to get an MBA. Since about 2004, I've known that I would like to abandon the tech industry. It is now 2015. I h…
I've talked to several developers over the years that dream of being a groundskeeper. A little about this. I worked plenty of my summers at a country club (my dad is a superintendent) and there is something to the work. There's some really shitty jobs (how about weed-eating the the creek banks in 90 degree temps and 90% humidity?), but mowing grass can be really enjoyable. When working at nicer clubs there is a certa…
As much as I loved that job, though, there's no way I could do it for a living. There's a reason it's only high school and college kids that do it -- the pay is horrible. Which is honestly fair, since the job's not very intense.
But there's a reason a lot of guys end up as golf course rangers in their retirement years.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I went through this. Not sure what toxic culture entails, but fucked up deadlines burned me out. Why do all software companies rush so hard.
There are 2 reasons: 1) Developers cannot reliably estimate software timelines. That often comes with experience and age, but many never learn that skill. It is a skill like programming itself. It comes with practice. 2) Break down in communication between management (product managers) and engineers who are writing code. On the first part. Usually junior software developers simply have not had experience shipping sof…
These are all real human struggles. I have them for sure. I just wish you find a place with self aware leadership that endeavors to keeps these emotions in check. Usually startups with leaders who have families are a little better because their family essentially forces them to focus on someone else, at least a little.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it's likely the author brought it on themselves by pushing too hard. Don't fall into the trap of thinking this. It is the case some of the time, but not all of the time. When I first started working in tech in the mid-90s, it was only a year or two before I was considering going back to school in music or to get an MBA. Since about 2004, I've known that I would like to abandon the tech industry. It is now 2015. I h…
Man, I might be slightly depressed at the idea of going back to another job, but meds scare the fucking crap out of me. I was trying to do a class a semester and work at the same time at a startup as a junior full stack engineer for something I truly couldn't care less about (advertising). I think the key thing that's making me look forward to my next position is 1: I found a spot where I'll have an office thus elimi…
* Raises hand *
I was the first dev hire at Datacash and wrote their back-end servers. Datacash only came into existence because an earlier (circa 1995-96) startup trying to sell stuff via the web couldn't handle payments without a card reader and a dialup connection. Handling payments properly is hard, especially as if you do it right (and your business grows) you turn into a juicy big target for black hats everywhere.
I also resemble the OC's burnout, except fifteen years down the line and mostly recovered ... by not working in tech any more. I'm a novelist and I set up and do my own projects more or less in my own time and (as a much earlier tech burnout case said, in Tracy Kidder's "The Soul of a New Machine") I try not to deal with any time frame shorter than a season.
Yes, there is life after you quit your last high pressure tech sector job. And yes, you can find things to invest your personal interest in that don't chew you up and spit you out and which earn you a living. The problem is with the way corporations are internally constituted -- especially with hierarchies of control and command where the people at the top don't have any deep understanding of the problems the people at the bottom are engaged with.