Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout • Hacker News Board

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#91

Post by scurvy » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 5:40 AM UTC

MichaelGG wrote: post #16

x0x0 wrote: post #2

Random thoughts: It's nice to hear about a situation closer to most startup outcomes. When Matthew notes that someone sent him the acquisition terms and the founders made out well while line level / low level managers basically got nice severances, it's something everyone here should keep in mind. It's great if founders make out well as long as everyone else does too; it's when those outcomes diverge that it rankles.…

I received a buyout offer with the terms of being prohibited to do anything that "directly or indirectly competes with ". Indirectly? So if I take a contract from a competitor and work on improving a DB engine, well that's indirect. It transitively closes over essentially everything. Especially difficult as I contribute to some OSS projects that a lot of businesses in that industry use. I just kept refusing that part…

Indeed. I cross out sections of contracts, initial there, and then hand it to the other party to sign. Most of them agree that what I've crossed out is BS and will initial. If they don't, it's a good sign that they're actively trying to screw you one way or another.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#92

Post by lyonheart » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 5:43 AM UTC

johngalt wrote: post #52

Passion causes burnout. Have you ever noticed that the people who just punch a clock and go home never experience burn out? Even if they end up working overtime? It's always the people who identify with their work that get burned.

This is a point I was starting to make at the last segment of the piece, but my editor (also my wife) encouraged me to edit that down from 1500 words to what's there and break off the piece about the passionate versus the professional into a follow-up. From the feedback I've been getting, it seems to be something worth exploring.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#93

Post by lyonheart » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 5:50 AM UTC

SomeCallMeTim wrote: post #19

Permit wrote: post #3

>The vendor abandoned their technology, and our generous free services attracted people who proved hard to convert to paying customers. This line rings very true. At my company our first product was offered for free. We had thousands of users, but after months and months of work we realized only a small fraction of our user base was going to be converted into paying customers. (Like OP, I began to feel burnt out at t…

>The vendor abandoned their technology Don't forget the other half of this statement: I've always been concerned with basing a product on a locked-in technology from an unproven vendor. And vendors do shut down. I've seen it happen many times. Sometimes they get eaten up by a "bigger fish" that wants to use their technology internally, and they then shut down the external service you were so fond of.

Author here: In our case the vendor was very proven, but the tech and their approach to it was not. What actually happened is a bit more complicated than _abandoned_, but those words got the point across without delving into the irrelevant.

Needless to say, I am _very_ leery now of the motives of open-source products that aren't run like open-source projects.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#94

Post by rarepostinlurkr » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 6:01 AM UTC

woohoo7676 wrote: post #22

joslin01 wrote: post #12

I worked extremely hard at my last start-up to the point of being completely burnt out. I'm happy because it made me stronger, but I'll never forget being over and for about 4-5 months after, never looking at a computer. I didn't want anything to do with them for awhile, and pursued a vicious "I'm gonna go pro in golf" campaign (can't take the idealism/ambition out of a true entrepreneur). I'm really happy now, but I…

Do you have any tips for combating burnout that worked well for you? I'm starting to feel the signs of burnout (which probably means I'm actually in deeper than I think), and I'd like to try to head this off before it gets worse. I know setting hard boundaries for work/non work and taking chunks of time for yourself is a good start, but would love to hear if you had any more advice? Thanks!

I stop doing work on nights & weekends. I generally very much enjoy my job, but when I start to feel off, I cut off all work and just focus on other things that I enjoy. I read more, I play video games, knowing they are "pointless, and I should be using my time better". I watch a movie with my wife instead of opening the laptop and working.

I've found this works fairly well. Sometimes I'll go for two weeks or two months of just turning off 'work'. It has the advantage of letting me continue to be employed.

One of these stints was also when I thought hell, why not try and learn Haskell? ;)

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#95

Post by jschwartzi » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 6:21 AM UTC

protomyth wrote: post #42

spydum wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see your point here. A principled person might refuse to answer the phone, or call back from the business phone, but that is fairly impractical I would admit. My only point here was it seems reasonable for the employer to ask for the world. If it's really worth getting spun up, perhaps you could find out if there is a better version of this boiler plate which respects your privacy. For what it's worth, at my own em…

"My only point here was it seems reasonable for the employer to ask for the world." No, its not. We accept it, but its not reasonable, it just a CYA attitude than infects a lot of our business and political dealings. An employer should ask for exactly what they want and no more.

We shouldn't even accept it on formal terms. If they need that kind of access during legal proceedings then we might, in good faith, provide that kind of access but it should be provided because we have a good business relationship and not because we signed a contract that gave them the right to our first born.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#96

Post by gaius » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 7:35 AM UTC

brightball wrote: post #59

tzs wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what happened to the company you left?

I stabilized them over the course of that year and helped them transition to new developers. Company is doing fine as far as I know and should be for a while. They've got a massive network effect which is why they were able to survive months of chaos from a bad rebuild. That's the only reason I came on in the first place. The network effect bought a lot of time to fix things and there was no clear "Facebook" to their…

Sounds like the owners played you like a violin.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#97

Post by brightball » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 11:22 AM UTC

gaius wrote: post #96

brightball wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stabilized them over the course of that year and helped them transition to new developers. Company is doing fine as far as I know and should be for a while. They've got a massive network effect which is why they were able to survive months of chaos from a bad rebuild. That's the only reason I came on in the first place. The network effect bought a lot of time to fix things and there was no clear "Facebook" to their…

Sounds like the owners played you like a violin.

Nah, it worked out. They had to replace me with 3 people. :-)

Besides, I didn't want the company to go under. I'd spent the last year making sure they didn't and didn't want all of that work to be for nothing. Plus, I didn't want the other people who worked there to be out of the job.

Eventually, everybody who worked there with me left on their own.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#98

Post by brianwawok » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 1:14 PM UTC

hessenwolf wrote: post #46

shostack wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what if "8 hours a day" isn't the magic number for everyone? What if for some people, the magic number to avoid burnout is 4 hours a day? Or the other end of the spectrum...12?

I'll not lie, I'm a 14, 14, 6, 4 kinda guy. Then Friday through Sunday is for playing, thinking, and reading, but mostly meeting up with people to exchange ideas, potentially with beer.

And for a job that isn't customer facing, we should allow if possible.

I can understand why the cashier at the store needs to work 8s.. how would I schedule people based on how many hours they feel like working?

For programming with delivery at the week or month level.. people should be able to slice the work how it works for them.

(I think my ideal work is like 12 - 7 - 7- 6- 6- 3 or something)

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#99

Post by copsarebastards » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 1:43 PM UTC

nostrademons wrote: post #86

copsarebastards wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure that you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes." --William Gibson Another thing to consider is that the problem might not be you, it might be that the situation sucks.

Any good therapist would probably ask "So, what are you going to do about it?" Changing your situation and changing your self are both acceptable answers, but the therapist should at least point out that changing your situation is possible too.

Agreed. I didn't mean for my comment to sound like I was discouraging people from seeking therapy. The best thing my therapist did for me was help me realize that I needed to be willing to cut people out of my life.

Re: Regretting the Golden Handcuffs: Beware the Costs of Burnout

#100

Post by saalweachter » Thu, Sep 03, 2015, 2:36 PM UTC

ethbro wrote: post #84

saalweachter wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you describe your problem as a lack of fulfillment ? Personally, I find my day job technically challenging, fun, and often rewarding, but I don't really find it fulfilling in some deep meaningful sense. I feel useful but not meaningful. It took me a while to realize that this was the problem I was having -- and that just switching from software engineering job to software engineering job wasn't going to change…

There are a lot of kind of people in the world. With regard to life fulfillment (in the sense of "doing good things"), I think there are two broad categories: people who require their work to be personally fulfilling or who require life outside of work to be so. From personal experience, if you're the kind of person who tends to be more invested at work (seeks out challenges, takes pride in your work, feels pleasure…

In my case, my job isn't a drain -- it's useful, good work, not evil, good coworkers, fat paycheck, good hours, lots of flexibility. From a practical standpoint, I'm willing to wager that most people don't find fulfillment in their day job, and my job puts me in a pretty good place to find fulfillment outside of work.

On the other hand, at the moment I'm still young enough to start a second career -- it wouldn't be completely crazy for me to go back to school, learn a completely new skill set, grind up through the ranks, and try to have an impact in some other field.

On the gripping hand, I'm not so young as to be in an impatient rush about everything. I don't need to completely upset my entire life just yet. So I'm carefully researching alternate careers to decide if I'd actually find them fulfilling and have an aptitude for them (it'd be a shame to spend ten years and realize I'm not fulfilled by my second career either). And I'm trying to expand myself a little bit more outside my day job, so that my happiness doesn't rest on a one-legged stool.