How to Do Great Work • Hacker News Board

Re: How to Do Great Work

#421

Post by simonebrunozzi » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 2:15 AM UTC

nicbou wrote: post #406

_x5ft wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for your note, and for all you do to help moderate HN. Moderators like you help keep the site honest. I have reviewed the link you provided. I agree with the guidelines noted therein. I asked some of my peers to give an objective read of my comment and they found it an accurate reflection of how they too responded to the posted essay. I cannot identify anything about it that was contrary to what is observed…

I'm not a moderator, just a fellow user.

I think he knew, and he just labelled you.

Re: How to Do Great Work

#422

Post by xapata » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 4:55 AM UTC

mkoubaa wrote: post #387

xapata wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all people who do great work are great people. In fact, I suspect a negative correlation.

Great person does not imply good person. My comment was about great people

Interesting. "Great person" is tough to design.

Re: How to Do Great Work

#423

Post by gjenkin » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 6:39 AM UTC

matwood wrote: post #370

JohnCurran wrote: post #355

I respect Paul and everything that he writes, even if I don’t agree with it. It takes some serious stones to publish your thoughts on the internet - whether people agree or not. In any case. This seems like a continuation of the never ending quest for people to sacrifice themselves for the betterment of a corporate profit they will never see. I’m not interested in eliminating the ceiling - I want to raise the floor.…

> I am frustrated that the USA’s money advice largely comes from billionaires. One of my big issues with the 'follow your passion' advice is it almost always comes from people who are already rich. And, those people are often trying to leverage worker passion to staff their companies. As a young person, don't follow your passion. Instead, figure out the fastest way to economic security and once there, then figure out…

> One of my big issues with the 'follow your passion' advice is it almost always comes from people who are already rich

This. My sister is quite an accomplished artist who decided out of college to follow her passion. https://instagram.com/carmeljenkin?igshid=YzcxN2Q2NzY0OA==

She is not rich and has to hustle like crazy to sell her artwork while also working tables at a casino and raising a daughter. I doubt that she would advise anyone to just follow their passion without first establishing some kind of financial base.

Re: How to Do Great Work

#424

Post by yarekt » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 7:56 AM UTC

jiggywiggy wrote: post #391

movedx wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been studying a lot of Buddhism as of late. One thing it has taught me in the Middle Way. In short, it means do nothing in excess, which includes doing nothing at all. This balanced view leads to me to believe you, Paul, and "hustle culture" that's all over YouTube are both right and wrong. I've come to live by a simple system... Try to do fulfilling work that's meaningful to future generations, whilst also putt…

You speak mostly of not getting attached. Which is mostly a method not to build negative karma in Buddhism and build positive karma. But positive karma is not a goal in itself in Buddhism, realization is. The Madhyamaka way, translated to the great middle way, mostly refers to combining freedom & meaning from emptiness. Meaning things are neither real, nor or they an illusion. Therefore the middle. This is because un…

Interesting that Aristotle's Ethics also speaks about this. Good and bad are not at the ends of a scale, but good is in the middle, and bad either side. From what I understand it, excess of anything, even something normally regarded as "good" would result in bad things. Yea, I'm not very eloquent here, but you get the idea

Re: How to Do Great Work

#425

Post by ChrisMarshallNY » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 8:17 AM UTC

> The three most powerful motives are curiosity, delight, and the desire to do something impressive. Sometimes they converge, and that combination is the most powerful of all.

It’s interesting that he hardly ever mentions making money as a principal motivator.

There’s a big insistence that the desire to make money drives quality (because competition).

In my experience, it’s the opposite. Money is made at the expense of quality.

It’s certainly possible to “bikeshed” on Quality, but I enjoy doing Quality work, even though it sometimes draws scorn.

Re: How to Do Great Work

#426

Post by dchftcs » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 8:27 AM UTC

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #425

> The three most powerful motives are curiosity, delight, and the desire to do something impressive. Sometimes they converge, and that combination is the most powerful of all. It’s interesting that he hardly ever mentions making money as a principal motivator. There’s a big insistence that the desire to make money drives quality (because competition). In my experience, it’s the opposite. Money is made at the expense…

Depends on what quality you optimize for. The quality of the execution, the quality of cost controls, etc.

If you mean the quality of each unit of the product, then yes, you're largely right. You just need enough quality to let people buy from you, and any corner you can cut without losing sales is profit. However, often a startup needs to push the quality bar at first to be competitive with large existing incumbents in a market segment.

Re: How to Do Great Work

#427

Post by yarekt » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 9:08 AM UTC

hopa wrote: post #257

artisanspam wrote: post #255

As I've gotten older, I believe more and more that having a desire for great work has more negatives than it does positives. This post really demonstrates why I believe this – mainly because PG doesn't touch at all on why someone would want to do great work while romanticizing how great it is to have that desire. I don't think the question that ambitious people should be asking themselves is "what is work that I can…

Completely agreed. Media excessively romanticizes compulsive workers.

> Develop a habit of working on your own projects.

work shouldn't always imply working for your employer. Without that implication I'm ok with romanticising a compulsive worker, creating something is an ambition we should all strive for

Re: How to Do Great Work

#428

Post by movedx » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 9:24 AM UTC

jiggywiggy wrote: post #391

movedx wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been studying a lot of Buddhism as of late. One thing it has taught me in the Middle Way. In short, it means do nothing in excess, which includes doing nothing at all. This balanced view leads to me to believe you, Paul, and "hustle culture" that's all over YouTube are both right and wrong. I've come to live by a simple system... Try to do fulfilling work that's meaningful to future generations, whilst also putt…

You speak mostly of not getting attached. Which is mostly a method not to build negative karma in Buddhism and build positive karma. But positive karma is not a goal in itself in Buddhism, realization is. The Madhyamaka way, translated to the great middle way, mostly refers to combining freedom & meaning from emptiness. Meaning things are neither real, nor or they an illusion. Therefore the middle. This is because un…

> In the end the goal of Buddhism is not to change outer conditions but to get to a state were hapiness is experienced regardless of outer experiences.

I would argue not trying to change the outer conditions is an extreme view, which is a notion rejected in Buddhism ;-)

Some things can be changed, like keeping your environment clean. You can, of course, simply find happiness regardless of the state it's in - clean or filthy - but you're kidding yourself, and only yourself, if you believe you won't be happier if it is clean(er). Therefore, you can find (more) happiness by changing the environment you're _but_ also excepting that it will get dirty again, requiring you to clean it again.

All this being said, neither of us is right or wrong. That's sort of the point.

Re: How to Do Great Work

#429

Post by leksak » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 11:01 AM UTC

Perhaps too unrelated but it is amusing to me that this isn't served over HTTPS and I wanted to share that remark as it got caught in my HTTPS everywhere extension

Re: How to Do Great Work

#430

Post by mempko » Mon, Jul 03, 2023, 1:53 PM UTC

My problem with Paul Graham's work is he keeps pushing on nature over nurture. Most work can actually be learned and you don't need a "natural aptitude" for it. This is especially true of knowledge work like programming, but also true of things like 'musical' or 'acting' or anything else. Most things can be learned.

I wish Paul Graham would stop pushing that silly outdated concept of "natural aptitude".