As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support • Hacker News Board

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#141

Post by wonton2 » Thu, Nov 30, 2017, 10:42 PM UTC

wickawic wrote: post #129

dhimes wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It took me a long time to get this right too. I came across this amusing page and realized I wasn't a bad person, because there is a lot of truth to this. specifically, #39: http://showcase.netins.net/web/tash/rules/rules.html

This page is very silly, it basically says 'men get to do what they want when they want'. I like how the longest rule is about being 'single-minded', which is basically just an excuse for not taking part in all facets of your relationship. Here is another perspective which you may find equally dumb: https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/ Note that this comic is coming from a totally female perspe…

This is assuming they both want the same thing. Society pushes us into marriage and getting kids, not just into gender roles. I think greater equality will lead to more single people, not more men doing house work. Because people will realize they actually have a choice. Most people don’t want to clean and administer the same stuff every day. And although nobody would prefer that thir kids were never born, people would not feel like they are losing out if they never get kids. Developed countries have people get fewer kids later in their lives. Maybe it is because of the economy, but kids could help their parents with money, so i dont think so, i think it is by choice. You could call it people getting more selfish, i say it is people getting more rational, or «analytical» if you will.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#142

Post by doomlaser » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 1:38 AM UTC

cdubzzz wrote: post #115

doomlaser wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Descender http://web.archive.org/web/20081225163958/http://www.sloppyd...

Nice, looks like it was around about same time as Quinn - https://web.archive.org/web/20110805131134/http://www.simonh... Did you ever hear from TTC?

Managed to elude that, though I did meet Pajitnov at GDC years later.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#143

Post by jrochkind1 » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 2:26 AM UTC

laumars wrote: post #65

cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

> And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. They can be different but I don't think they necessarily need to be. Thankfully Im seldom customer facing these days but when I am and when I used to be I would "debug" human patterns with the same analytical approach as software development. Even ones that turned out not to be technical queries in the end.

Agreed. I don't think they are actually that different mindsets at all. Debugging isn't the only thing a developer/engineer does, but I agree support (for software) is much like debugging, that's a good observation. Debugging is debugging.

Yes, you've got to actually be compassionate and considerate when working with humans, and you don't with code. That's not a 'brain mode', it's just a skill or capacity. Some of us have more of it than others, but we all can improve it or get better at it. Most (maybe not all but most) developers are working with other developers (whether teammates or open source maintainers/collaborators), so it's an important skill to develop even for exclusively developers.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#144

Post by kgbdrop1 » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 3:14 AM UTC

dogles wrote: post #61

erader wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi there! Support manager here. I've been leading support teams for years, led support QA teams, built troubleshooting processes and worked very closely with dev teams. A lot of what I wanted to bring up doesn't apply so much to solo dev's, but I want to vouch for non-devs and anyone that might start working on team. Support brains and developer brains are actually not that different. I see on HN way too often that d…

It’s support’s job to focus on one thing at a time, meanwhile it’s a coder’s job to try and keep dozens of things in mind at a time. Context switching IS hard regardless, but like you said, one of the roles has it baked into the job description. The crux here is that Programmer committed to X work done by the end of the week, and Support is effectively subtracting their time to accomplish X. This is a managerial prob…

Maybe other support organizations are different or maybe I am busier than normal, but the concept of one thing at a time is foreign to me.

To outline today: Left comments on ~15 net new cases to jump start the troubleshooting by the technicians assigned to them

Help led a morning meeting reviewing cases where people are stuck

Researched whether an old (7y) version of the software had a piece of functionality

Made comments helping ~5 different technicians globally on their cases

Helped a colleague craft a SQL query to help replicate an issue then talked over strategy

Logged into a colleagues VM where they had an install problem

Had a call with the pre-sales brass about trends in the support organization

2 walk ups:

- Intermittent reload issue when triggering things via API

- How to setup a reverse proxy with IIS

Assigned cases for initial responses to meet our contractual obligations

- Left 5-10 public facing comments to meet SLA to assist the team

Emailed some devs about whether a customer can run using the latest version of the database which underpins our software

Responded to 3-4 different issues in the Slack for our Consultants on-site with customers

Came up with a PowerShell script to work around a bug for another tech at the behest of our Escalations folks who walked up

Caught up on a case that I'll be covering for next week which has Executive VP visibility (ultimately making things right after the initial tech botched a system)

Personal cases:

- Install problem on a server with FIPS

-- Then get thrown under the bus on a customer facing email about the further issues

-- After bypassing that there was a user rights assignment problem; emailed some devs about why we require it / work-arounds for a locked down government server

- Reload of data problem due to the permissions for the service account

-- On the call discussed:

--- Architecting for high availability

--- Long-term maintenance activity to ensure stability

- Reviewed 2GB of logs for an intermittent issue

- Worked on reproducing a client side bug

- Called / left voicemails / sent emails for 3 customers trying to get a remote session scheduled

- Alleged security vulnerability. Called / emailed the customer asking for more clarity; stood up servers to reproduce and researched how to capture the data needed to confirm

All while constantly monitoring email / 3 slack instances / 1 Microsoft team instance / my queue for fires to put out

In some sense, that's a slew of single things, but it's uncommon for me not to be moving onto the next task as I am winding down the previous one. Nor is the work-flow all in the same vein.

In any case, my 2 cents.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#145

Post by justinpombrio » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 4:19 AM UTC

crispyambulance wrote: post #110

kqr wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. This is something I can have trouble with even personally. I have noticed that when I get home from a long day of cold, analytical problem-solving, I mbrain bad at shifting my brain to empathetically listen and provide emotional support for my wifes problems.

The daily transition from work to home is difficult for many couples and this problem has existed since forever, but it has _nothing_ to do with "being analytical" at work and then having to "be empathetic" at home. It doesn't matter what your job is or if you're a husband or a wife, there's a period of time after coming home from work that is beset with opportunities for arguments. Lots of people experience this, no…

A story from my father:

My mother worked in a psych ward, and would come home stressed. She asked that, every day for the hour after she got home, she not be bothered with anything. She just wanted a break between the (inevitable) difficulties of work life and the (potential) difficulties of home life.

So no, not analytic related and not gender related.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#146

Post by FollowSteph3 » Fri, Dec 01, 2017, 4:51 AM UTC

Interestingly enough I've found through my own company that it's not so much whether or not you're solo but rather the price of your software that determines if you can economically offer phone support or not.

I wrote about it here: http://www.followsteph.com/2006/10/10/is-technical-phone-sup...

I then followed it up with an article discussing whether or not companies should charge for support based on my findings in the previous article: http://www.followsteph.com/2010/10/19/should-software-compan...

The short version, under the $1000 price point it's very hard to economically offer free phone support as part of your product. If you're product is subscription based then the same metric applies using the total lifetime value of your customer. Under that price it's very hard to do, whether your a solo developer or a company without charging for support.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#147

Post by justinmoh » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 3:18 AM UTC

cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

I agree.

Perhaps that’s also depends on your expertise or stage you’re at. I’d say if I continuously do this for five years, all the positive points described by OP probably not as useful anymore.

Your dedication of doing it for ten years amazed me.