This sounds too much like life in academia as a post-graduate student. It hit too close to home... too close.
Ha, same here buddy. What department were you in?
How to keep someone with you forever
41–50 of 97 posts
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#42This sounds too much like life in academia as a post-graduate student. It hit too close to home... too close.
The OP responds in the comments:
"Universities are famous for it: small departments filled with people who are expected to spend their entire lives there, with tiny, tiny rewards at stake, a system of recognition that relies on self-promotion, and no chance that any obviously pathological co-worker is going to be shuffled out the door within the next decade. The pressure and pathology can be hideous, and that gets passed on to the students. I can see how the same setup could happen in any school with low staff turnover."
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#43Pray together. The rest will follow.
Religiosity and marital satisfaction don't seem to have any statistically significant correlation. This suggests that praying together probably won't do what you expect it to, on average.
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#44This sounds too much like life in academia as a post-graduate student. It hit too close to home... too close.
Ha, same here buddy. What department were you in?
I'm still in it... I'm a Ph.D. candidate in Distributed Systems, virtualization, Cloud Computing and so on.
Everything fits perfectly. I always wonder if I'm employing my time properly in academia. But they keep me too busy to think about it deeper. Research also keeps anyone tired, too much time dealing with the same problem, lacking some fresh air once in a while to breathe. We are emotionally involved with the work, loyalty and devotion and so on. Intermittent rewards when some of your articles are accepted... And the real awards are distant, the Ph.D. itself.
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ha, same here buddy. What department were you in?
I'm still in it... I'm a Ph.D. candidate in Distributed Systems, virtualization, Cloud Computing and so on. Everything fits perfectly. I always wonder if I'm employing my time properly in academia. But they keep me too busy to think about it deeper. Research also keeps anyone tired, too much time dealing with the same problem, lacking some fresh air once in a while to breathe. We are emotionally involved with the wor…
Well I hope you make it and don't become like the academics surrounding you.
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm still in it... I'm a Ph.D. candidate in Distributed Systems, virtualization, Cloud Computing and so on. Everything fits perfectly. I always wonder if I'm employing my time properly in academia. But they keep me too busy to think about it deeper. Research also keeps anyone tired, too much time dealing with the same problem, lacking some fresh air once in a while to breathe. We are emotionally involved with the wor…
Well I hope you make it and don't become like the academics surrounding you.
Thanks! I'm seriously thinking on finishing my Ph.D. and getting out of the university. The university is full of huge egos (with very few exceptions), and people are very hard to deal on a daily basis. There are hard people everywhere (I've worked on the software industry before, I know them), but in the university this is the rule. Also, as you predicted, I'm afraid I may become like them.
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#47what, do people think about the ethics of a manager using the 'intermittent rewards' part in the form of unpredictable bonuses over and above regular salary (which would be regular) with the intent of harnessing the addictive nature of intermittent rewards, without using the rest of these things (which clearly cross the line into unethical.)
I'm considering implementing a bonus plan... and the question is, do I make them predictable, based on measurable stuff that I share? or do I add some randomness? do I assign them based on my own shifting perceptions? (the sort of people I hire are going to be better at manipulating the set rules than manipulating my perceptions... This is not true for all employees.)
Furthermore, would it still work if I used a predictable bonus schedule that included some random input... e.g. the chance of getting the bonus is, say, some metric based on increases in revenue or profit multiplied by a random value between 0 an 1 or something?
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#48This sounds too much like life in academia as a post-graduate student. It hit too close to home... too close.
As someone who recently left a PhD program, I have to agree with you.
Re: How to keep someone with you forever
#49what, do people think about the ethics of a manager using the 'intermittent rewards' part in the form of unpredictable bonuses over and above regular salary (which would be regular) with the intent of harnessing the addictive nature of intermittent rewards, without using the rest of these things (which clearly cross the line into unethical.) I'm considering implementing a bonus plan... and the question is, do I make…
It doesn't need to be that random on your side of things. It just needs to be unexpected/unpredictable by the subject getting the reward, but in some way paired with the performance you want to elicit more of. Think of gambling, the reward is very predictable if you know the seed values and underlying algorithms, but unpredictable from the gamblers perspective.
This is a classic Variable Ratio (VR) schedule of reinforcement (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinforcement#Schedules_of_rein...).
To get the highest rates of responding, you don't want to tie it to a known schedule, that would instead be some sort of fixed or variable interval schedule, which isn't anywhere near as reinforcing as a variable ratio one.
It should be possible to get multiple bonuses within a short period of time, as long as the desired metrics are being hit. That way, you'll continue to get strong behavior throughout the entire period rather than bursts of behavior as the end of the period nears (rather than the scalloping that you see on the wikipedia graphs).