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Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

truzzi.me

281–290 of 418 posts

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interviews aren't the only cost of hiring. Onboarding is very expensive for knowledge workers.

Onboarding is expensive at dysfunctional organizations. Further, the reality that churn is high among better employees [1] offsets the concern. But regardless, going through an extensive vetting process is an illusion. It has extraordinarily little correlation with actual work fit or productivity, but the more "rigorous" the process, the more likely you are to stick with a poor fit. [1] - low performers will hang aro…

perfectly said +1

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#282

If you expect the interesting work to land in your lap you are either one of those people that redefine (maybe invent) entire fields of research or you're incredibly lucky. In other words, your work speaks for itself and people want to give you more of it. For most people we need a job in order to keep up with the rising costs of living. If, however, you're like 99.99% of people and are good at what you do then you'l…

So you were able to find something interesting in (somewhat meaningful but still) boring work. that speaks to you in a positive light but it doesn't change the overall point that the OP was trying to make

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if this is still the case, but at least back then (10+ years ago), quite a few people working helpdesk and IT (system admin, network admin, etc.) were CS majors. Or at least it seemed so from my own network. CS was seen as the gateway degree to any kind of computer related career, not just SWE. Are things different now? I am actually not a CS major - I'm an information systems major. Funny enough, anothe…

> Are things different now? For me personally, if I were going to go into some other IT fields tomorrow, I’d skip the expensive ass degree period. A lot of IT feels closer to a modern trade than anything.

A lot of jobs require a degree just to get past the HR filter though. In fact, I distinctly remember seeing a even a lot of helpdesk jobs requiring "degree in computer science or related technical major". Again, this is 10 years ago, not sure what the landscape is like today.

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#285
post #13

I have nice boring job. Few years ago I was upset with the boring part. But with kids and mortgage I don’t really care anymore. I am very happy to be paid more than a manager in a small company being only individual contributor in big Corp. I also have approval to sell my hardware from big Corp. So I can explore new things with commercial potential without a fear. Life is good.

Stability and work life balance are terribly underrated.

I'll take a boring stable 40 hour a week job over a fun job that somewhat frequently requires 50+ hours. Time is the only thing I cant get back. Money really is just a number after a certain point.

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#286
Question for the author: would you really work for $1/hr? Why? That’s essentially zero, and for zero you could work on whatever you like all day. Is it being part of a team? Being able to say you have a job (and put in on your resume)? Is it that you don’t have your own ideas of what to work on?

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#287
post #172
post #55

I’ve been on the receiving end of similar requests before. “I’ll work for free or nothing if you let me do what I love under the umbrella of your organization because I love it so much.” I did one or two agreements like this and then stopped altogether. The individual would start their work, others would start to depend on its existence and the individual would leave in a matter or weeks or months because something e…

Seems like a weird idea to me anyways, to offer to work for very little money or even nothing, as long as the work is interesting. To me it seems that time is much better spent on a fun personal (side) project. And who knows ... maybe the side project will earn some income in time.

But that's not the idea is it? The idea is to define the terms, and see what the bids are. Perhaps, if the bids are too low, the decision would be to 'pay oneself' (spend from savings) while working on said side project. But the point is simple - an attempt to find a union of two interests at a price that makes sense.

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#288

Anything is interesting if you engage with it. And being bored is a state of mind. It's a fallacy to say "that's boring". The bored-ness is in your head, not in the task.

I don't know... Have you ever done manual QA as a full time job?

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#289

Anything is interesting if you engage with it. And being bored is a state of mind. It's a fallacy to say "that's boring". The bored-ness is in your head, not in the task.

I don't know... Have you ever done manual QA as a full time job?

Some mechanical menial jobs can be satisfying. At least when you can get in the zone, and see what you've accomplished at the end of the day.

I grew up on a farm. There was a lot of that. It took mental discipline, which most folks may not have an opportunity to develop in this hypercharged media world.

Re: Hire me and pay what you want, just give me interesting work

#290

Anything is interesting if you engage with it. And being bored is a state of mind. It's a fallacy to say "that's boring". The bored-ness is in your head, not in the task.

I’m guessing you’re a manager.

Developer all my life.
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