191–200 of 246 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even if your company offers it, you should be careful about taking it. There are a few downsides: - Your advancement and promotion chances are basically zero in such a position. Not due to some conspiracy, but just because you're not around for half of the conversations people are having about the direction of the product/team. - If it isn't standard practice for the whole team, they all start to slightly hate you, n…
This is one of those annoying problems of working remotely. Unfortunately if you are working from home, you might be building mountains. But no one is seeing you do it, what that generally means is unless you announce explicitly what you are doing people think you are doing nothing. Contrary to whatever one thinks and the truth is. Perceptions matter a lot more than the reality.
I don't announce anything unless you count commits and issue tracker updates. I am being paid for my work. Those who pay me give me the requirements and know it very well what is being done. Well, since they are paying for it and want it done, how can they not know what is being done?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I respectfully submit that you are 100% wrong. At least, you're wrong in stating your opinion so forcefully in the second two paragraphs after a (to me) flippant caveat in the first. The important question isn't whether there're 10% scenarios where company cultures are actually meritocratic, but how much the proportion changes over time. I'll submit my anecdotal evidence that it is growing. And my career continues to…
>>I work remote most of the time and so do I good portion of my colleagues. That is the reason why working remote is helping you. Since most of your colleagues are working remotely too. In Rome, behave like a Roman.
I'd submit that remote work is neither helping me nor hurting me. Because the company culture recognizes the value of intrinsically motivated employees, we ensure that employees are happy. Working remote is one of the manifestations of that focus.
Specifically, working remote is orthogonal to my success in my career specifically but fundamental to my happiness and willingness to work towards a successful career in the first place. Does that clarify where I'm coming from?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is exactly what a lot of companies and managers will try to tell you.. But it is a bunch of nonsense. An actual 40 hour a week programmer is an awful asset, if we do more than ~20 hours of work a week the rest is bad code and the shit we are to tired of thinking about to fix/automate. The ones who work 50+ hours have forgotten that things can be automated or even pondered before diving in, or that are powerless…
Its true that if you make it rain by working 20 hours, you get to be the superstar of the team. But that's not possible, at least not in 90% of the scenarios. Office as we know it, is more than a workplace for an individual. Its a place where people meet together to collaborate with each other. Its also a social network where people eat lunch, drink coffee and talk about life, and such stuff together. If you are not…
I am not there 100% of the time and I fit just fine.
> Nobody likes calling and discussing things over phone/chat/email what could easily be discussed by meeting at ones cubicle and talking over it for 5 minutes.
I like email, wiki, IM and issue trackers. Gather your damn thoughts and put then in writing. Dropping by in-person or skype calls are for stage setting. And what makes you think I like being interrupted by someone for something that can be said in the IM?
Oh, and it wasn't any different when I was holding a day job.
Perhaps this is a good thread to pose this question. I am a front-end engineer in my early twenties. Right now, 40+ hours a week is doable and I am paid well, but I don't need all of the money I'm earning. I would gladly take a 50% salary cut and work ~20 hours a week. The only problem with this is that I feel like this is a risky thing to bring up with an employer. Has anyone ever had any success getting a good part…
I'm an engineering student right now but I know exactly how you feel. I like the content but the thought of working full time terrifies me. I spent a couple of months as an intern/observer in a company and I can't imagine devoting my life to work. It would almost certainly make me burn out in a year or two. I've been looking into jobs that work few hours but are highly qualified and they're usually outside consultant…
Reducing commute and other wasted time is probably still the low hanging fruit for most people. If your work is sufficiently varied, I don't see how 60-80h/wk is unsustainable at at least 1.5x the work you'd accomplish in 40h, if (and only if) the other hassles of life are taken care of for you -- no cleaning, commute time, etc. I don't think I could do a single task for 80h/wk productively, but I could certainly do…
"I don't think I could do a single task for 80h/wk productively, but I could certainly do my primary job for 40-60h/wk productively and then spend 20h/wk doing meetings with users, conferences, etc." What experiments have you performed to validate this hypothesis?
The recreational activities I seem to seek out in the remaining time, even without any external pressure, are all startup related. I don't know which are considered in scope as "work" vs. "recreation". If I had a choice of watching TV or talking to people about their YC applications, I'd probably do the latter. If I had the choice of reading The Economist or a great startup post-mortem, the latter. Play Battlefield 3 vs. take apart a competitor's product.. Talk to someone about sporting events of the local team vs. talk to someone about what I'm working on...
I've never been able to do 80h/wk on a single task for more than 3 weeks without dramatically worse productivity and burnout, but the mixed time use works fine, at least for me.
I guess I could try working (in the most inclusive definition) for only 40h/wk. I did that for a while when living in a diving location, spending the rest of my time diving, and it didn't feel better; I missed having enough time to do things, but maybe I got more work done per hour.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Its true that if you make it rain by working 20 hours, you get to be the superstar of the team. But that's not possible, at least not in 90% of the scenarios. Office as we know it, is more than a workplace for an individual. Its a place where people meet together to collaborate with each other. Its also a social network where people eat lunch, drink coffee and talk about life, and such stuff together. If you are not…
> If you are not there 50% of the time, unfortunately I don't see how you will fit in with everybody else. I am not there 100% of the time and I fit just fine. > Nobody likes calling and discussing things over phone/chat/email what could easily be discussed by meeting at ones cubicle and talking over it for 5 minutes. I like email, wiki, IM and issue trackers. Gather your damn thoughts and put then in writing. Droppi…
Of course since you are a hacker yourself so you are likely to be open to such a environment which you yourself like working in. But I'm talking of a general corporate job kind of a scenario where a lot of people work together in collaboration. Things go a lot smoothly when every one works together, of course they can go smooth either way too. Provided everyone co operates, especially the managers.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I once saw a janitor who always had more work to do. She worked 40 hours a week and then did the extra that the boss asked her about on any given day. She could've told him that cleaning desks wasn't in the contract. Or she could've reported the overtime. But not everyone has those kinds of luxuries if they want to keep their jobs. Some jobs always have more shit to shovel, be it actual shit or feature creep. And som…
I think the point is that people should have the luxury to only work 40 hours, and/or properly report overtime and keep their jobs. Over here if an employer forced one employee to work more than 38 hours a single week , they could be fined up to $6,600. Firing a worker for not working more than that would be unfair dismissal and attract more fines, prosecution etc... There are provisions for reasonable overtime, but…
The best ways to gain leverage over employers that I can think of, short of unionizing or passing broad regulation: free basic healthcare coverage provided by the government to all, and a strong economy. An ability to leave your job without fear that if you get sick you will die/bankrupt will do wonders. An ability to leave your job because the demand for labor outstrips supply will make employers compete by offering better perks, compensation, benefits, work environments, etc (already the case in high tech).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I disagree with this sentence from that article: "You could probably work twice as many hours as a corporate employee, and if you focus you can probably get three times as much done in an hour.". You cannot work double the hours and be more productive. If you work 80 hours on a continual basis, you will get less done than if you worked 40 hours. I have seen smart people reduced to blubbering idiots by the hours they…
You cannot work double the hours and be more productive You can't simply put typical workers on a schedule that's twice as long and expect more productivity, that's true. Individually, though, you can normally become extraordinarily more productive if you have the right motivation. people working crazy hours succeed. Why is this such a mystery? Haven't you ever thrown yourselves into a new startup or idea and spent e…
Why on Earth would I want to go back to the 40-hour work week? http://www.fairwork.gov.au/employment/conditions-of-employme...
My wife works in an office in Australia where most people work over 60/hrs a week and she's pressured to work more than 50. If some enthusiastically work over 50hrs, everyone else basically has to stick around as well or they will be evaluated poorly and lose out on advancement.