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The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

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Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#151

Post by icedchai »

autoexecbat wrote: post #142
icedchai wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a ton of "fake work" in corporate america. This is basically busy work that isn't used by any real customer, external or internal. That work doesn't need to be done, but shows up because someone committed to it for political reasons (or because they were clueless.) Someone needs a box checked, but didn't check if the box needed to be there in the first place.

It doesn't even need to be fake/busy work. It might just not be quite what's needed by the business or customer and see little/no use.

True, though often that sort of work "feels" different from the more traditional fake work. It's at least built with the intent / belief that a customer will actually use it.

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#152

Post by ghaff »

KittenInABox wrote: post #120
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is a pretty common attitude. That is, "I'm able to pick better workplaces than you are". Not necessarily. It's "I'm less willing to stay at a bad workplace than you are". Maybe it was bad when I picked it. Maybe it became bad after I was there for a decade. Maybe it became bad quickly; maybe slowly. Whatever. When I realize that it's become a bad place to work, I'm not "quiet quitting", I'm putting my resume o…

This is harder and harder the more senior you get. It looks suspicious if you're hopping after 1.5-2 yrs.

One hop is probably fine. There wasn't a meeting of the minds. If it becomes a pattern, it will probably repeat.

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#153

Post by from-nibly »

hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #102

I'm more interested in figuring out what kind of knowledge base most reliably turns a junior dev into a "skilled pragmatist". My guess is the highest ROI thing one can do in software engineering is take your command line environment and OS internals seriously to heart. This can be either bash/Unix or PowerShell/Windows, depending on your career goals, although having gotten reasonably good with both sets I'd recommen…

shaving 20 minutes off a task is useless unless it's something that happens constantly. The real differentiator will be, do you know you can do something, that others in your org think is impossible? Can you turn a 6 month project into a half day script and move on?

Also there isn't "A knowledge base" that turns a junior dev into a "skilled pragmatist". It comes from being a part of delivering value all the way up and down the stack. There unfortunately isn't a book that can really teach you that. You gotta build that in yourself on your own through experience.

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#154

Post by mlhpdx »

OkayPhysicist wrote: post #122
mlhpdx wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is an appealing narrative without evidence. I had the same thought, but I’m grateful to the author for putting their opinions out for us to see. It is an interesting quandary - getting “more” from someone, pragmatic or otherwise, raises questions. Is the premise that they aren’t providing value on a level with salary? Or, is it that the business has a right/obligation to extract more? The latter is offensive,…

Labor relations are intrinsically adversarial. The employer wants to pay as little as they can get away with for as much work as possible, the employee wants to be paid as much as possible for as little work as they can get away with. This article is written for the employer's side, trying to optimize their game. The employees trying to normalize working approximately nothing are optimizing their side. It's not offen…

As an employer/owner/investor I’m not trying to minimize expenses I’m trying to maximize growth/value. Abusing people is not a path to success by that metric.

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#155

Post by chinchilla2020 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #88
hankchinaski wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been doing this for years and I think it's the best output per hour worked strategy if you have a clear exit plan outside scaling the so-called ladder

> if you have a clear exit plan outside scaling the so-called ladder Exit plan is FIRE. Everything else is circus and performance art. Others can play status games, I prefer wealth games: wealth is options and options are freedom. Pragmatic, smart, skilled people are extracted from unless lucky and in a position to see outsized returns from their effort. Better to know what enough is, collect enough freedom coins, an…

I had a bit of an epiphany when I read this comment since you hit the nail on the head so succinctly.

Wealth is the only true path that gives you options. All other paths are dependent on income.

There really is no other exit plan except financial security. Every other plan is just putting you into the walls a new rat maze.

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#156

Post by chinchilla2020 »

georgeecollins wrote: post #109
toomuchtodo wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you have a clear exit plan outside scaling the so-called ladder Exit plan is FIRE. Everything else is circus and performance art. Others can play status games, I prefer wealth games: wealth is options and options are freedom. Pragmatic, smart, skilled people are extracted from unless lucky and in a position to see outsized returns from their effort. Better to know what enough is, collect enough freedom coins, an…

I think that is a great plan and good advice, but you may find as you continue in your career that you enjoy work more. When I was starting out I was always tired, anxious and frustrated. Now I would never even get hired for those kinds of jobs (or take them). You may get to a point where you have a lot more power and discretion at work and enjoy it. There's a lot to be said for working at jobs you enjoy.

I enjoy my work as well.

But I realize that things outside my control can force me into a poor working situation any day.

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#157

Post by ultrasaurus »

hinkley wrote: post #16

I don’t think I can agree that 75% of the workforce falls into one quadrant. Particularly this one. If I’m very lucky the semi space contains 60% of my coworkers, if I’m unlucky (or arrive after the writing is on the wall) it’s more like 1/3. I suspect part of the confusion is that there are some people with enough political acumen to appear like frustrated agents of change without actually having the drive or skill…

Maybe 75% of the people who interact with the kind of person who blogs about institutional efficiency for the HN audience hate conflict but love their craft. Maybe on a good day.

The top 3 jobs in the US are home health care, retail sales and fast food. Not to denigrate any of those roles but I can't imagine 75% of them saying "X is her passion, but she's not about to burn a lot of social capital by rocking the boat". (I'm skipping over the "skilled" part, but substitute accountants & project managers and I still don't see getting to 75%)

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#159

Post by all2 »

hinkley wrote: post #89
ericmcer wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah agree, I have worked with tons of smart people, talented people, people whose parents had them coding in elementary school, but only one person I would consider brilliant. It was jarring how he instantly understood any line of reasoning I was going down. There was no need for context or lengthy background explanations, he would just see what you were doing. That was in most areas also, politics, programming, phi…

He was probably an HSP, which by some estimates is 15% of the population. HSP plus high IQ makes up a lot of people you would label “scary smart”.

What is "HSP"?

Re: The biggest source of waste is untapped skilled pragmatists

#160

Post by toomuchtodo »

chinchilla2020 wrote: post #155
toomuchtodo wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you have a clear exit plan outside scaling the so-called ladder Exit plan is FIRE. Everything else is circus and performance art. Others can play status games, I prefer wealth games: wealth is options and options are freedom. Pragmatic, smart, skilled people are extracted from unless lucky and in a position to see outsized returns from their effort. Better to know what enough is, collect enough freedom coins, an…

I had a bit of an epiphany when I read this comment since you hit the nail on the head so succinctly. Wealth is the only true path that gives you options. All other paths are dependent on income. There really is no other exit plan except financial security. Every other plan is just putting you into the walls a new rat maze.

My path to discovering this was costly and fraught with suffering. I hope by sharing, your experience is less so. The sooner you learn, the sooner you can modify your trajectory for a more favorable outcome. I wish you freedom.
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