It is important to learn to use your skills to create what you feel, not what some other person tells you to. Developing a skill is the easy part, learning to use it is harder, because you need to find out who you are.
I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
51–60 of 336 posts
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#52Work-life balance is really important, and having a safety net outside of your workplace and project is key to not going completely batshit. What's really bad is to find yourself in a position where you see your cofounder/coworker the vast majority of the time, and your work/project gets tangled up in the normal ebb and flow of the relationship. You really, really don't want to get into a loop where you need to decom…
“If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things.” ― Albert Einstein
Find a hobby :)
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#53Employers, even the good ones, will put as much work on your plate as you can handle and then keep going. Systematically a workplace just isn't set up to help an employee handle stress, or even pay attention to an employee's stress level. They'll ask you to work overtime even if it is obviously killing you because that's just how the typical work environment is structured. Even moving higher up in the food chain, to…
No they won't. Plenty of good employers understand work life balance, they understand that output doesn't linearly increase with time, especially in development.
Good employers push their employees in terms of not letting them coast, giving them meaningful work and challenging them to be their best. That is not the same as piling on work and ignoring stress levels. There is an optimum amount of stress at which humans are at their most productive.
If your employer isn't like that then they aren't a good employer.
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#54Here is my advice, if you think you are really that good, start your own company. Proof it, let the market test you.
Capital doesn't grow on trees.
If we're talking about software development, I bet you can piece together a computer from the trash (where do you think my home servers come from :)) that will be good enough to run a company. After that, your only issue is food and rent (which can be either a small or big issue depending on where you live).
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps, instead of seeing your job as "what the job description says", you should see it as "whatever actually gets me rewarded." Which is to say, at some companies, playing office politics is your real job. "Work" is just a signal you can emit to show that you are willing to submit enough to not get fired.
Perhaps doing more office politics than productive work is your job's signal it's time to leave. Do you want to work at a company where more resources are wasted on keeping the lights on so to speak than providing value to users? I sure don't. If you can't talk to the CEO or CTO, if you're technical, on your first day physically at the company, that's a Bad Signal (tm).
Yup. If you become good at corporate politics, you become someone who's good at corporate politics. It's the first time I really understood the whole 'if you stare into the abyss, it also stares into you' thing.
It's a bit like martial arts. Being good at it is nice since you don't have to be afraid of being beaten up. If you have to fight someone every day however, there might be something wrong.
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#56This is sad, but it's also plain old human psychology. If you help someone out, you put yourself in an inferior position. If you're always the one sacrificing yourself, people around you will feel more and more superior to you. At some point, they will start expecting that you sacrifice yourself whenever shit hits the fan. This doesn't mean it's bad to help out, or to sacrifice yourself once in a while. But in order…
> If you help someone out, you put yourself in an inferior position. What? This doesn't make sense. When you help someone out, you are putting that person in an inferior position. Does a beggar feel superior to you because you tossed him a quarter?
I guess I could have been more clear.
When you toss a coin, you are already in a superior position. You toss the coin to be nice, and/or to affirm your position as superior (depending on your personality).
That's totally different from agreeing to work over the weekend to save somebody's ass. It's OK as a one-off, but if you do it more often than others, that's when you put yourself in an inferior position.
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#57(Generalisation Warning)
This is the dark side of the (otherwise desirable) trait of "getting things done" as employee.
I you don't actively manage your working hours and hold yourself back, somebody else will suck you out until you have nothing left.
At the end, you will be very unsatisfied for some obscure reason: You did everything you was asked for, yet somehow noone appreciates you and you still earn entry-level.
In my opinion, you should only use 80% of your working hours doing the "real stuff". Devote 20% of your working hours to non-technical work, active career development and image management.
1) talk with your boss about clients
2) show interest in the business side of your project
3) ask challenging non-technical questions
4) have a nice chat with your manager about non-work stuff
5) make sure everyone knows who had the interesting feature idea last week
6) make sure that the decision which overruled your recommendation is in the meeting report.
...
This is good for you and the company in the long run.
Some of your tickets will have to wait, then. Maybe the deadline won't be met perfectly.
That's fine.
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#58The trick to avoiding complete burnout is easy. First - don't care at all about your job. Remember that all corporations are by definition psychopaths and they will treat you accordingly. Second - never do more then 35% of the work you are capable of doing in a day. Third - if you find yourself getting stressed out tell yourself repeatedly "It's only a stupid job. There is no point in stressing about it."
This has worked for me.
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#59This is my biggest fear for myself.
I think you'll find that it's a common fear. But not so common a thing to happen. Lots of sensible things like exercise and leisure activities will work wonders to distract you from your stresses and worries
Re: I Knew a Programmer Who Went Completely Insane
#60The trick to avoiding complete burnout is easy. First - don't care at all about your job. Remember that all corporations are by definition psychopaths and they will treat you accordingly. Second - never do more then 35% of the work you are capable of doing in a day. Third - if you find yourself getting stressed out tell yourself repeatedly "It's only a stupid job. There is no point in stressing about it."
+1