The Rule of Awesome
learntoduck.net
The Rule of Awesome
1–10 of 37 posts
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#2Yeah, I'm pretty sure timely and imposed awesomeness is exactly what is needed.
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#3Last time I did something awesome I had 3 days left in my quota.
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#430 days to do something awesome, and then...?
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#5Awesome and relevance aren't always aligned.
Some days, we do something awesome in the office (laser cut a table from aluminum sheet, or print hundreds of digits of \pi directly onto a storebought pie [0] for example), and everyone around says "Whoa! That's awesome!".
At the end of the day, though, we're physicists, and we need to ship some physics out the door.
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#6"If we are hiring you because you are awesome, then you have 30 days to do something awesome"
I'm curious about how much autonomy and latitude people need to do something that breaks the awesome threshold. It seems to me that the more guided or directed someone is, the less likely the work they do will be considered awesome.
I tend to prefer more quantifiable terms. For example, having a clear million dollar improvement to the top or bottom line in one year. However, I very much agree that everyone should add something to the team.
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Re: The Rule of Awesome
#7I might be wrong, but I would like to think everyone getting a new job has something in them to do something awesome. Well anyone with a decent amount of experience anyway.
A fresh set of eyes and no history is all it takes a lot of the time. I am not sure this makes someone really awesome though.
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#8Awesome and relevance aren't always aligned. Some days, we do something awesome in the office (laser cut a table from aluminum sheet, or print hundreds of digits of \pi directly onto a storebought pie [0] for example), and everyone around says "Whoa! That's awesome!". At the end of the day, though, we're physicists, and we need to ship some physics out the door. [0] http://guavaduck.com/laser/
I disagree.
Take a military analogy - if you're not doing something "shippable" (ex: fighting), you are training to maintain or raise your potential for when you will have to get in action - or at least to maintain discipline.
I'm not into physics, but if I had to place my bets between a team of physicists who loves to redo the world with the help of beers during long lunch hours, and a team of physicist who is into laser cutting a table from an aluminum sheet, I'd place my bet on the latter.
You may not be "shipping" physics at the moment, but you are maintaining your knowledge, training doing something that might seem pointless but will help you keep your skills or even develop new ones (ain't there a place for physics to decide how to best laser cut aluminum? Can you write an equation for the precise minimal laser power required to cut, depending on the metal and its depth?)
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#9Awesome and relevance aren't always aligned. Some days, we do something awesome in the office (laser cut a table from aluminum sheet, or print hundreds of digits of \pi directly onto a storebought pie [0] for example), and everyone around says "Whoa! That's awesome!". At the end of the day, though, we're physicists, and we need to ship some physics out the door. [0] http://guavaduck.com/laser/
I disagree. Take a military analogy - if you're not doing something "shippable" (ex: fighting), you are training to maintain or raise your potential for when you will have to get in action - or at least to maintain discipline. I'm not into physics, but if I had to place my bets between a team of physicists who loves to redo the world with the help of beers during long lunch hours, and a team of physicist who is into…
I agree.
Play is incredibly important. I only wanted to point out that 'awesome' alone may be insufficient as a hiring criterion.
Re: The Rule of Awesome
#10>If we are hiring you because you are awesome, then you have 30 days to do something awesome. And awesome is simply defined as me (or your supervisor) thinking to him/herself, “man, that's awesome!” just once.
"You have 30 days to do something awesome"? Really?
Well, how about you stuffing your job offer you know where?
Professionals, including trained Computer Science and IT professionals, demand professional respect. They are there to solve specific needs. In our case code quality code, iterate, engineer and polish programs to completion, ensure a solid architecture for your offering, and all that.
Programming is not a parlor trick, and employees are not trained dogs to do back flips at will for your amusement.
The sense of self-entitlement of those BS managers always amuses me. As if your shitty startup is the be all end all, and people should be grateful and "amaze you" for having given them work. Like some decadent Roman emperor towards his circus act: "amuse me or die".
Not to mention that amazing some exec with something "awesome", as everybody has witnessed at some point, can be miles away from shipping solid code and solving the company's real problems keeping it from sinking.