281–290 of 332 posts
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anecdote: My first company got bought out and the CEO went around awarding bonuses. It was a calculus of around ( 0.4 * salary * number of years ). When it was my turn, he double-checked with HR that I had worked there as long as I had I was super jr, but sat next to his office. Didn't know I existed. Thanks for the link and perspective
As in, you had worked there very little, or very long?
> Good politics is just being strategic about relationships and influence in the service of good outcomes. Yeah, no shit dude. That's exactly the part that's disgusting. Using the word "just" here feels dishonest. I was subjected early on to someone who viewed every single interaction in every single relationship as transactional and framed every decision around the question "what's in it for me?" It really warped my…
This is what I always try to emphasize to the junior guys I've worked with. I read the book Flowers for Algernon when I was younger and it was the thing that stood out to me the most. It does not matter how right you are if no one likes or will listen to you. Unfortunately, being likeable is inifinitely more important than being right. Your job is to strike a balance between both otherwise stupid likeable people will…
It's not really about being "likeable", but being persuasive. Don't put the cart before the horse.
You're correct that being right isn't enough, but if you make being likeable a direct goal you will come off as insincere and fail.
"Think about the last time a terrible technical decision got pushed through at your company. Maybe it was adopting some overcomplicated architecture, or choosing a vendor that everyone knew was wrong, or killing a project that was actually working. I bet if you dig into what happened, you’ll find it wasn’t because the decision-makers were stupid. It’s because the people with the right information weren’t in the room.…
> "terrible technical decisions". Another point worth bringing up is that sometimes, that stuff doesn't matter. I see so many engineers get hopelessly invested in technical debates that are, honestly, just silly: it's often better for the company to get something barely-good-enough done quickly than to flesh out the "optimal" design over the course of weeks or months, and over the dead bodies of people who have a dif…
When Jeff Hodges gave a presentation of his "Notes on Distributed Systems for Youngbloods"[1] at Lookout Mobile Security back in like 2014 or 2015, he did this really interesting aside at the end that changed my perception of my job, and it was basically this. You don't get to avoid "politics" in software, because building is collaborative, and all collaboration is political. You'll only hurt yourself by avoiding lev…
I used to work for a software company that literally had "no politics" as part of its DNA. It was in the company handbook, it was in our values, people would say it when they talked about what it was like to work at the company. Hell, whilst I can't recall any specific instances, I guarantee that I said it and probably many times[0]. But, of course, it was never true. It might have felt true - certainly superficially…
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It depends on what type of interviews you expect. My value proposition hasn’t been my ability to write code for over a decade. It was first being the first or second technical hire by a then new director/manager/CTO brought in to lead a new initiative as a lead/architect and then working in customer facing cloud consulting roles combined with hands on keyboard coding. With those roles, it’s all about soft skill behav…
Absolutely, I was talking about very technical roles, typically as a software developer. "Individual Contributor" in contemporary corporate jargon. I was never interested in other roles.
I was very much and I am very much an IC. I chose a path to manage and deliver projects with about half and half hands on keyboard coding and the other half dealing with “the business” and not manage people. But if you look at the leveling guidelines of any major tech company, “codez real gud” only gets you to a mid level role.
When Jeff Hodges gave a presentation of his "Notes on Distributed Systems for Youngbloods"[1] at Lookout Mobile Security back in like 2014 or 2015, he did this really interesting aside at the end that changed my perception of my job, and it was basically this. You don't get to avoid "politics" in software, because building is collaborative, and all collaboration is political. You'll only hurt yourself by avoiding lev…
> Good politics is just being strategic about relationships and influence in the service of good outcomes. Yeah, no shit dude. That's exactly the part that's disgusting. Using the word "just" here feels dishonest. I was subjected early on to someone who viewed every single interaction in every single relationship as transactional and framed every decision around the question "what's in it for me?" It really warped my…
I want no part in "it's not what you know" kinds of situations. I'm paid for what I know. The author seems to think being apolitical means not giving your input or making decisions. If I'm not allowed to do that without sucking up to the higher-ups, I'll find another job. Everyone I respect is above politics.
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Smalltalk and professional exchange aren't politics, the author is conflating the too. When people say "no politics" they mean have a position on certain issues that mostly are off topic in a business environment. For example if I have my group where nobody is religeous. You could rant about how stupid religeous people are because nobody would feel particularly attacked and some would nod along. Disregarding that the…
That's politics in the office, not office politics. But you are right that the author is mixing things up: Office politics isn't collaboration as described in the article. Office politics refers to things like one-upmanship, taking credit for stuff, playing the blame game - making yourself look good and others look bad, to get raises or promotions. Or for a phrase used in the article, office politics is about becomin…
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I mean sometimes you are outruled. That's part of recognizing politics, in my opinion. If your VCs want you to do GenAI and you think it's dumb, you are overruled. But you can still benefit from this in a lot of ways. You just need to recognize what you can benefit from.
Sure,though this stands in contrast to the author's thesis: "It’s the loud person who’s wrong getting their way because the quiet person who’s right won’t speak up."
If the hierarchy is saying "it's time for GenAI", you have the option to participate in a way that raises your profile and positively influences the company (involving politics), if you hate GenAI so much you can leave, or you can stay silently and opt out of the process. These are all choices. Personally I'm fine with my VCs making strategic decisions since they trust me to make technical decisions. So we can do GenAI, we'll just do it in a way that works and is sustainable for the codebase.
You should realize that as a technical person your domain is not business strategy. Similarly I'd be shocked if any VC ever came in and told me "to use PostgreSQL" or some other nonsense. If you want to be the person deciding what we build, go into Product.