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Ask HN: Is it just me?

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Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#81

Eng mgr at a FANG, was IC previously. The following is assuming the senior folks (managers or senior ICs) around you are acting in good faith. If you actually have toxic senior people, that's a whole different scenario. Managers have to balance two priorities, which are sometimes competing: promoting engineering excellence on their teams, and delivering value for the business. The most common example of a conflict be…

This is it. Most of my employment conflict/disillusionment has come from the “do it now” vs “do it right” dilemma. And sadly in my field of DevOps/SRE, “do it right” is really what we are striving for so it can get pretty disheartening to start getting shot down for feature work over and over again.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#82

I used to get a little crazy and quit jobs over stupid things. But… Becoming (mostly, I’m a veteran so there’s places to go) homeless, living way below poverty level driving a cab for nine years, getting evicted at the start of the pandemic because I living day to day on cabbie pay, almost becoming homeless again (doubt my parents would have taken me in without the pandemic) and being able, through unemployment benef…

Would love to read a book or blog about your experience some day.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#83

I understand this entirely. I usually stay around 3 to 3 1/2 years. Not the worst tenure but not the best. I now prioritize positive feelings, emotions and energy above all. My goal in all meetings and all interactions is to keep positive emotions high. What took me a long time to learn as an analytical and technical minded person is that there is a way to be optimistic and positive without being fake or insincere. I…

How did you learn what to say to start calls and meetings with a positive tone without coming off as if you weren’t taking things seriously enough?

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#84

I've been working more than 11 years at my current small company. There are often times where things do not work the way I want. Bad communication, new strategies I don't like, different opinions on how do something, bad or sloppy code I need to cleanup, crappy processes, etc... etc... But still, after all those years, I don't feel bad about it. That's life and life is a mess sometimes. There are things you can chang…

This is easier said than done. How do you “try your best” and also disengage when there are things you don’t think are correct, just, etc. For me personally I haven’t been able to find a foolproof solution unless I’m working a contract with very scoped deliverables

And in our field a lot of times the “wrong” decision can have tangible negative consequences for work-life balance or general enjoyability of work for one team or another. It can be frustrating to see it play out in slow motion.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#85
Nothing lasts forever. Entropy tends to increase. This is the most general rule.

There’s no point digging deep for details of your specific nuances - they have nothing to do with someone else’s even if look similar on the surface

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#87
> Typically, I will fall out with someone senior, like my line manager. It's normally over something mundane but definitely technical.

This is the most telling part. If it's mundane, I don't think it matters (for them) that the issue was technical. As mentioned in another comment, this likely leads to a loss of trust or respect. This can be both ways not just on one side.

There's a few ways to handle this: 1. accept the pattern and move on, 2. find ways to communicate better to reach some sort of agreement or compromise, 3. learn to "disagree and commit". One thing to realize is that as you report to your manager, they ultimately have the final say regardless of how technically 'wrong' it could be.

I too have had critical disagreements with senior technical or management. In some cases, I could let it go and work for a year or more before leaving out of boredom. Other times, if disagreements or lack of understanding recur, I may be on my way sooner. I've never regretted leaving and finding new opportunities. One thing that's worth trying is different sizes of companies and different stages of growth. Finding good large companies may be more rare as they're typically more conservative and move more slowly.

I didn't answer the question though. Is it just you? Maybe yes or only partly. But it also doesn't matter. It's also great that you can be so involved after 3-5 years, but realize that this is a double-edged sword. At the end of the day, it's a job that pays the bills for most people at the company. Take pride in your work but maybe not get too possessive about it, learn to let go like a child growing up and grow other parts of the system, there's always more. One thing that helps with the too much single-handed development is pair programming, alternating typing and navigating roles. If that doesn't work out, that's fine too--stick with what works.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#88
There is "a you" component. But this is not a unique situation, it happens to a lot of folks all the time, however, everyone is different so any advice here would be general. It probably makes more sense to think of a framework you can apply to reason about the conflicts you've had. For that a career coach or even a therapist could help. These folks are well trained in helping you figure it out.

In the end, you are the only person you can control so it only makes sense to focus on you and what you can do about it.

In my experience these types of Conflicts typically arise when there is a lack of clear communication and expectations. So one way to move forward is to become curious and non-judgmental. Ask questions and be genuinely curious. You mention one instance where it was a "mundane issue related to technology". The outcome here was you changed jobs. So, now the question is.. was it worth it? Was that a positive, negative or neutral outcome?

If it was negative or say neutral.. How would you approach that situation today? Or how could you have approached that situation differently? Perhaps resulting in a more positive outcome for both parties?

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#89

I understand this entirely. I usually stay around 3 to 3 1/2 years. Not the worst tenure but not the best. I now prioritize positive feelings, emotions and energy above all. My goal in all meetings and all interactions is to keep positive emotions high. What took me a long time to learn as an analytical and technical minded person is that there is a way to be optimistic and positive without being fake or insincere. I…

How did you learn what to say to start calls and meetings with a positive tone without coming off as if you weren’t taking things seriously enough?

Always start off with a joke.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me?

#90
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No relationship ends successfully I disagree. I was recently hired at a company that I worked for years ago. I left because I tired of the project, but left on very good terms. Good enough that both the company and myself are looking forward to another run together. That was a relationship that ended successfully.

I meant with the company as a whole, not an individual. By ending your relationship with the company, you're declaring that relationship necessarily deficient in some way. My advice is to define those deficiencies deliberately, rather than in an ad hoc way.

> I meant with the company as a whole, not an individual.

As did I.

I don't disagree, technically, but calling the relationship "deficient" has implications that aren't necessarily true. For instance, leaving a position because of a change in your personal circumstances isn't leaving because the relationship is "deficient" in any sense other than your needs have changed in a way the company cannot accommodate. It isn't because there is anything wrong with you, the company, or your relationship with the company.

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