Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On • Hacker News Board

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#91

Post by afarrell » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:30 AM UTC

cbsks wrote: post #90

afarrell wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>996 is fine if you’re a founder Is it? You have production access to the company’s most important relationships. If you’re falling asleep in meetings or just unable to exercise emotional intelligence, that seems pretty bad for the company. EDIT: falling asleep in meetings is bad, not good.

It is. Because then the overtime is completely self-imposed.

If a sysadmin comes to work drunk, that would also be self-imposed. Would that be acceptable for the company?

If not, why is it okay to come to work drunk-with-fatigue?

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#92

Post by ackbar03 » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:31 AM UTC

The prevalence of 996 shows why China is able to start so many strong tech companies. Discontent reflects the rising awareness for standard of living and ethical or not also sort of implies rising labor costs in future.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#93

Post by danpalmer » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:34 AM UTC

_cs2017_ wrote: post #81

rococode wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

edit: seems like there are contradicting statements from him on this so I'll remove the stuff I had written earlier. It appears he is generally against forced hours but highly encourages his employees to work those hours anyways.

Recently, I have seen multiple Bloomberg articles that were way outside the normal margins of journalistic prose, and far into the territory of clickbait and even misinformation. A while back I thought Bloomberg was a high quality source. Either Bloomberg got a lot worse; or I was too dumb to realize how bad they were in the past.

They compensate their journalists based on how much the articles move the market, so that may explain things.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#94

Post by a_imho » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:36 AM UTC

What about other sectors? What time do non tech workers work in China?

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#95

Post by sgt101 » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:37 AM UTC

Quite a lot of Romans endorsed slavery and gladiators. As Lenin said - first look who benefits!

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#96

Post by sgt101 » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:40 AM UTC

cbsks wrote: post #90

afarrell wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>996 is fine if you’re a founder Is it? You have production access to the company’s most important relationships. If you’re falling asleep in meetings or just unable to exercise emotional intelligence, that seems pretty bad for the company. EDIT: falling asleep in meetings is bad, not good.

It is. Because then the overtime is completely self-imposed.

I'm not an investor, but if I were an investor I would want my stewards of capital to be awake and aware and full on. Airline pilots and professional drivers (truckers) have mandated rest, for a reason.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#97

Post by alkonaut » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:40 AM UTC

iliketosleep wrote: post #72

I assert that there are a great numbers of CEOs who would absolutely love their employees to be working 996 without overtime pay, only most of them won't admit it directly. We cannot expect CEOs to be paragons of virtue - part of the reason they succeed because they discard virtue in favor of profit. Having said that, the solution is not simple. In places like China, it's probably up to the government.

Exactly that is why there are laws (in China I guess not). I can't work more than 200h overtime in a year or 48h in 4weeks (meaning that after four 52h weeks I can't do anymore overtime), regardless of whether I'm paid for it or not. So after two 996 weeks my manager would be in criminal territory if I don't get two very short weeks afterwards. In my experience, this seems to actually work too. Crunch time is replaced by slipping or hiring, as it should.

These laws don't require that anyone forced anyone to do it - the manager is literally responsible to make sure people don't work too much. Obviously this will happen occasionally anyway, but now it is at least llegal.

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#98

Post by rajacombinator » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:42 AM UTC

Alibaba/express/whatever has some pretty jank technology. Maybe they should try working smarter instead of harder?

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#99

Post by farhanhubble » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:43 AM UTC

Is it only me or is there an established cause as to why people who become successful search for reasons and 'motivational' phrases, like, 996 and passion or Move fast and break things, to attribute their success to?

Re: Jack Ma Again Endorses Extreme Overtime as Furor Rages On

#100

Post by lazyjones » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 7:48 AM UTC

sgt101 wrote: post #96

cbsks wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is. Because then the overtime is completely self-imposed.

I'm not an investor, but if I were an investor I would want my stewards of capital to be awake and aware and full on. Airline pilots and professional drivers (truckers) have mandated rest, for a reason.

I'm an investor and former VC-backed founder and I'd like my stewards of capital, who are typically the best work force in the early days of startups, to work more than 40 hours. I'm sure that they do in the overwhelming majority of successful startups.