The Best Programming Advice I Ever Got (2012)(russolsen.com)
russolsen.com
The Best Programming Advice I Ever Got (2012)
http://russolsen.com/blog/2012/08/09/the-best-programming-advice-i-ever-got/
11 comments
What I don't understand about this is how people are able to express their dissatisfaction about someone else making the code faster, when it's so transparent that they are just butt hurt that their way of doing it wasn't so good after all. Of course I get that such people could from then on hold a silent grudge against you, but I can't understand how they can openly complain about this without making it totally obvious that it's just an ego thing.
I have been there in that sort of situation where managers twist their eyebrows at an efficient or productivity-enhancing solution. The essence of the java enterprise consulting business is fixing an unnecessary complicated mess with a similar, new buzzword backed mess.
So the interesting thing here is how bureaucracy and efficiency seem like natural enemies; a subject which always reminds Terry Gillian's Brazil movie where the terrorist guy is the one who fixes things.
So the interesting thing here is how bureaucracy and efficiency seem like natural enemies; a subject which always reminds Terry Gillian's Brazil movie where the terrorist guy is the one who fixes things.
The original architecture sounds like maybe it was just ahead of its time.
/s
/s
I think that the advice, if taken literally, is a bad advice.
But it does point to the fact that the system is not just the technology, but also the people around it
I think that a better way to go about it was to comment first with the proper people that you MIGHT be able to make it run faster before doing anything (all though you know that you already did it). And drop the case if they don't want it.
I can see that somebody might want to move the drawing calculation process to a more powerful box serving more clients, and distribute the client with a different license... in other words, there could be a business case for the original configuration, and knowing it might help you to discover the negative stakeholders (the people interested in the status quo)
Should you always stay out of others people code? I think not, I think that there is a place for it. But from there to modify and publicize the modifications there is a big distance. Some people treat their code as their baby, and no parent like their kid criticized.
But it does point to the fact that the system is not just the technology, but also the people around it
I think that a better way to go about it was to comment first with the proper people that you MIGHT be able to make it run faster before doing anything (all though you know that you already did it). And drop the case if they don't want it.
I can see that somebody might want to move the drawing calculation process to a more powerful box serving more clients, and distribute the client with a different license... in other words, there could be a business case for the original configuration, and knowing it might help you to discover the negative stakeholders (the people interested in the status quo)
Should you always stay out of others people code? I think not, I think that there is a place for it. But from there to modify and publicize the modifications there is a big distance. Some people treat their code as their baby, and no parent like their kid criticized.
> But it does point to the fact that the system is not just the technology, but also the people around it
People come and go. They don't die when they are sacked. They are absorbed by other companies to do other possibly more awesome stuff. There is no point of delaying progress of software because that might mildly inconvenience some people.
If half of the Adobe got sacked over a shitstorm caused by some rogue programmer making Photoshop suck 20% less I'd say it was worth it.
The superpowers of companies is that they can die (or get severely crippled) without utterly destroying of what they consist of.
People come and go. They don't die when they are sacked. They are absorbed by other companies to do other possibly more awesome stuff. There is no point of delaying progress of software because that might mildly inconvenience some people.
If half of the Adobe got sacked over a shitstorm caused by some rogue programmer making Photoshop suck 20% less I'd say it was worth it.
The superpowers of companies is that they can die (or get severely crippled) without utterly destroying of what they consist of.
(In the following, we will stipulate that your "rogue programmer disrupts Photoshop, resulting in a better product and getting half of Adobe fired" situation is plausible, for the sake of illustration.)
The half of Adobe you posit getting sacked wouldn't say it was worth it, though, and from a certain perspective -- namely, their own -- they'd be right.
After all, Photoshop is already the unquestioned leader in its field, and the closest competitor isn't even within shouting distance, so what good does it really do Adobe's business if Creative Cloud's Photoshop component sucks 20% less?
(Yes, no one is happy with the change from Creative Suite to Creative Cloud; this I concede. But those who are unhappy with it aren't decamping to the GIMP or some other laughable knockoff; instead, they are buying CS6 licenses, and they aren't going to be convinced to replace those with Creative Cloud subscriptions by a mere 20% improvement in Photoshop.)
Meanwhile, there are a whole lot of people earning livings as part of Adobe Inc., who, in your "rogue programmer disrupts everything" scenario, suddenly won't be.
This, for good and necessary reasons, makes every one of those people a political enemy of your rogue programmer; after all, whether he means to do so or not, the effect of his actions is to critically imperil those people's ability to maintain themselves, their families, and the position in life to which all of same have grown accustomed.
(This might seem to you like a mild inconvenience. If so, I can only assume either that you're not getting paid well, or that you're only so recently getting paid well that you've yet to accustom yourself to it, and in either case that you're also not carrying a meaningful amount of debt. Hell, I'm not paid all that well, and I carry less debt than anyone I know, and I can assure you that my recent layoff was nonetheless far more than a "mild inconvenience".)
Getting back to our illustration: Of course, I'm sure our lovable rogue doesn't intend to get all those people laid off; indeed, given his laserlike focus on the quality of the product for which he considers himself responsible and his evident and total innocence of matters political, it probably never even occurred to him that such a thing could happen. This doesn't matter at all. Whether he intended it or not, he's put a huge chunk of the corporation which employs him in danger of being laid off.
Expecting those people to react in any other way than by attempting to squash him, by whatever means prove necessary and lie within their grasp, would be foolish; when you threaten a man's life, or something which a man regards as vital, i.e., essential to life, it is only basic sense to expect that he will react as strongly as is within his power. Speculate all you like on why this should be the case; regardless, it is a fact of human existence, and to regard it in any other frame of mind save acceptance is to waste your time and mental effort on utopian fantasy.
And half of a company the size of Adobe is a group of people with a very great deal of power, indeed. Even if we scale down from Adobe as a whole to just the Photoshop project team, at least some of those people are perforce going to be in the higher ranks of management. In fact, since our rogue is a Photoshop developer, at least some of those people are going to be in his direct line of command.
No points for guessing what happens to our lovable rogue when, through his innocence of the political realities of any large human organization, he places at risk the jobs of one or more of his direct superiors. Even if, by some impossible miracle, he manages not to lose his own job, then he's certainly not long for the company, because among the people he's managed to alienate are many of his peers. This means he's got more people looking to put knives in his back than he could keep up with, even if he realized he needed to be looking over his shoulder.
Of course, our lovable rogue being not entirely without some sort of rudimentary sense of interpersonal relationships, even if he isn't shuffled aside immediately and laid off as soon as practicable, he'll realize that his only sensible option is to resign, because there is no longer any chance that he'll be able to work productively with his erstwhile colleagues, who now consider him about as safe to be around as old dynamite that's sweating nitroglycerin.
So our rogue will quit his job, lick his wounds, and find somewhere else to work, and odds are the lesson he'll take from his error is, from the perspective of his future prospects and his ability to advance his career, the single worst one he could possibly choose: specifically, that office politics are incomprehensible, deadly, and evil, that anyone who engages in them is therefore necessarily an awful person and best avoided, as are office politics in general, because an honest hacker can't understand the game well enough to play it, and it'll only end in tears.
None of which, of course, is true. But all of it accords perfectly with the default attitude among software engineers toward office politics, and I'm starting to think that might have a lot to do with the way that the default position of software engineers, when it comes to dealing with management, is "screwed".
The half of Adobe you posit getting sacked wouldn't say it was worth it, though, and from a certain perspective -- namely, their own -- they'd be right.
After all, Photoshop is already the unquestioned leader in its field, and the closest competitor isn't even within shouting distance, so what good does it really do Adobe's business if Creative Cloud's Photoshop component sucks 20% less?
(Yes, no one is happy with the change from Creative Suite to Creative Cloud; this I concede. But those who are unhappy with it aren't decamping to the GIMP or some other laughable knockoff; instead, they are buying CS6 licenses, and they aren't going to be convinced to replace those with Creative Cloud subscriptions by a mere 20% improvement in Photoshop.)
Meanwhile, there are a whole lot of people earning livings as part of Adobe Inc., who, in your "rogue programmer disrupts everything" scenario, suddenly won't be.
This, for good and necessary reasons, makes every one of those people a political enemy of your rogue programmer; after all, whether he means to do so or not, the effect of his actions is to critically imperil those people's ability to maintain themselves, their families, and the position in life to which all of same have grown accustomed.
(This might seem to you like a mild inconvenience. If so, I can only assume either that you're not getting paid well, or that you're only so recently getting paid well that you've yet to accustom yourself to it, and in either case that you're also not carrying a meaningful amount of debt. Hell, I'm not paid all that well, and I carry less debt than anyone I know, and I can assure you that my recent layoff was nonetheless far more than a "mild inconvenience".)
Getting back to our illustration: Of course, I'm sure our lovable rogue doesn't intend to get all those people laid off; indeed, given his laserlike focus on the quality of the product for which he considers himself responsible and his evident and total innocence of matters political, it probably never even occurred to him that such a thing could happen. This doesn't matter at all. Whether he intended it or not, he's put a huge chunk of the corporation which employs him in danger of being laid off.
Expecting those people to react in any other way than by attempting to squash him, by whatever means prove necessary and lie within their grasp, would be foolish; when you threaten a man's life, or something which a man regards as vital, i.e., essential to life, it is only basic sense to expect that he will react as strongly as is within his power. Speculate all you like on why this should be the case; regardless, it is a fact of human existence, and to regard it in any other frame of mind save acceptance is to waste your time and mental effort on utopian fantasy.
And half of a company the size of Adobe is a group of people with a very great deal of power, indeed. Even if we scale down from Adobe as a whole to just the Photoshop project team, at least some of those people are perforce going to be in the higher ranks of management. In fact, since our rogue is a Photoshop developer, at least some of those people are going to be in his direct line of command.
No points for guessing what happens to our lovable rogue when, through his innocence of the political realities of any large human organization, he places at risk the jobs of one or more of his direct superiors. Even if, by some impossible miracle, he manages not to lose his own job, then he's certainly not long for the company, because among the people he's managed to alienate are many of his peers. This means he's got more people looking to put knives in his back than he could keep up with, even if he realized he needed to be looking over his shoulder.
Of course, our lovable rogue being not entirely without some sort of rudimentary sense of interpersonal relationships, even if he isn't shuffled aside immediately and laid off as soon as practicable, he'll realize that his only sensible option is to resign, because there is no longer any chance that he'll be able to work productively with his erstwhile colleagues, who now consider him about as safe to be around as old dynamite that's sweating nitroglycerin.
So our rogue will quit his job, lick his wounds, and find somewhere else to work, and odds are the lesson he'll take from his error is, from the perspective of his future prospects and his ability to advance his career, the single worst one he could possibly choose: specifically, that office politics are incomprehensible, deadly, and evil, that anyone who engages in them is therefore necessarily an awful person and best avoided, as are office politics in general, because an honest hacker can't understand the game well enough to play it, and it'll only end in tears.
None of which, of course, is true. But all of it accords perfectly with the default attitude among software engineers toward office politics, and I'm starting to think that might have a lot to do with the way that the default position of software engineers, when it comes to dealing with management, is "screwed".
I disagree that it is morally wrong to threaten people's livelihoods, or that anything is morally permissible to defend one's own livelihood.
If, by some crazy chance, someone managed to make my job unnecessary, I would just suck it up and get a different job.
I would suggest reading some General Equilibrium theory, which explains why making someone's job unnecessary is actually a good thing overall, even though it might harm that person.
If, by some crazy chance, someone managed to make my job unnecessary, I would just suck it up and get a different job.
I would suggest reading some General Equilibrium theory, which explains why making someone's job unnecessary is actually a good thing overall, even though it might harm that person.
You miss the point in a fashion utterly typical of engineers. I couldn't have paid for a better illustration, and I greatly appreciate your having provided such a fine one free of charge, hence the upvote by way of recompense.
If you re-read my comment, you may notice that I never mentioned morality. That's because morality has no place in tactical analysis. Clutter your consideration with irrelevant philosophizing if you so please; the only effect it can have is to cloud your appreciation of the matter, which at the very least will certainly redound to your detriment. (At most, it will also redound to the detriment of others.)
The point of the exercise, after all, is to illustrate how everyone acts in defense of his own interests, insofar as he's able to identify and further them. There are subtleties; for example, engineers often identify so strongly with an employer as to mistake its interests for their own. But whether someone accurately recognizes his interests or not, he'll still act, as best he's able, to further whatever he believes his interests to be.
It will thus never help you, in understanding how a given person is likely to behave in a given situation, to waste time on whether you think a given action right or wrong. That won't affect his behavior, so there's no reason it should affect your prediction of same. (Whether he thinks a given action right or wrong, as for example if he believes it in his interest to behave in accord with a concept of morality favoring altruism, does matter, of course. But that's something which you can predict, given sufficient observation and analysis.)
For the same reason, considering how you expect you would act in a given situation, or even how you actually would act in that situation, won't reliably help you appreciate how anyone else is likely to behave. You're you. No one else is. Factoring yourself into your analysis of someone else, then, only adds useless noise.
Economics, too, is a branch of philosophy. It will not help you here. Perhaps you propose to explain to someone that your actions, placing a vital part of his life in danger of upheaval, is actually a good thing, or that it's "...a good thing overall, even though it might harm that person." Having so amazingly presumed, no doubt you'll be astonished when it does nothing to placate your interlocutor. Engineers, after all, are often embarrassingly incompetent when it comes to interacting sensibly with other people.
But all of this overlooks the fundamental handicap you evince, which is the inability to differentiate between a philosophical exercise and a tactical one. The former can be a diverting pastime, perhaps even on occasion a valuable one. The latter, effectively pursued, will show you ways to preserve your position and achieve your goals -- and also enable you, should you so desire, to help others preserve and achieve theirs. Ineffectively pursued, or worse not pursued at all, it will have the opposite effect.
Perhaps this seems cold to you. Reality's like that. But consider: technology is applied science, and science is systematized knowledge. What I describe to you here, admittedly in very general and ill-formalized terms, is simply a means by which to develop, systematize, and apply knowledge in the realm of interpersonal relationships. As with any technology, whether it's "right" or "wrong", "good" or "evil", depends entirely on how you constitute those categories and how you employ the technology at hand; no morality inheres.
Perhaps, too, you prefer a diet of pablum to one of red meat. It's your lookout either way; I freely concede that, were it not to my benefit in helping me refine my (as yet still rather inchoate) understanding of the subject, I wouldn't be engaging in this discussion at all. If it's to your benefit as well, good for you! If not, well, that's your problem, isn't it? I may be named for a priest, but I've long since abandoned any pretensions to being a redeemer.
If you re-read my comment, you may notice that I never mentioned morality. That's because morality has no place in tactical analysis. Clutter your consideration with irrelevant philosophizing if you so please; the only effect it can have is to cloud your appreciation of the matter, which at the very least will certainly redound to your detriment. (At most, it will also redound to the detriment of others.)
The point of the exercise, after all, is to illustrate how everyone acts in defense of his own interests, insofar as he's able to identify and further them. There are subtleties; for example, engineers often identify so strongly with an employer as to mistake its interests for their own. But whether someone accurately recognizes his interests or not, he'll still act, as best he's able, to further whatever he believes his interests to be.
It will thus never help you, in understanding how a given person is likely to behave in a given situation, to waste time on whether you think a given action right or wrong. That won't affect his behavior, so there's no reason it should affect your prediction of same. (Whether he thinks a given action right or wrong, as for example if he believes it in his interest to behave in accord with a concept of morality favoring altruism, does matter, of course. But that's something which you can predict, given sufficient observation and analysis.)
For the same reason, considering how you expect you would act in a given situation, or even how you actually would act in that situation, won't reliably help you appreciate how anyone else is likely to behave. You're you. No one else is. Factoring yourself into your analysis of someone else, then, only adds useless noise.
Economics, too, is a branch of philosophy. It will not help you here. Perhaps you propose to explain to someone that your actions, placing a vital part of his life in danger of upheaval, is actually a good thing, or that it's "...a good thing overall, even though it might harm that person." Having so amazingly presumed, no doubt you'll be astonished when it does nothing to placate your interlocutor. Engineers, after all, are often embarrassingly incompetent when it comes to interacting sensibly with other people.
But all of this overlooks the fundamental handicap you evince, which is the inability to differentiate between a philosophical exercise and a tactical one. The former can be a diverting pastime, perhaps even on occasion a valuable one. The latter, effectively pursued, will show you ways to preserve your position and achieve your goals -- and also enable you, should you so desire, to help others preserve and achieve theirs. Ineffectively pursued, or worse not pursued at all, it will have the opposite effect.
Perhaps this seems cold to you. Reality's like that. But consider: technology is applied science, and science is systematized knowledge. What I describe to you here, admittedly in very general and ill-formalized terms, is simply a means by which to develop, systematize, and apply knowledge in the realm of interpersonal relationships. As with any technology, whether it's "right" or "wrong", "good" or "evil", depends entirely on how you constitute those categories and how you employ the technology at hand; no morality inheres.
Perhaps, too, you prefer a diet of pablum to one of red meat. It's your lookout either way; I freely concede that, were it not to my benefit in helping me refine my (as yet still rather inchoate) understanding of the subject, I wouldn't be engaging in this discussion at all. If it's to your benefit as well, good for you! If not, well, that's your problem, isn't it? I may be named for a priest, but I've long since abandoned any pretensions to being a redeemer.
> The half of Adobe you posit getting sacked wouldn't say it was worth it, though, and from a certain perspective -- namely, their own -- they'd be right.
Maybe I wasn't clear enough that I'm expressing my own perspective by which expanding of scientific, technological and creative capacity of humankind is priority over almost everything apart from preventable loss of life.
> effect of his actions is to critically imperil those people's ability to maintain themselves, their families, and the position in life to which all of same have grown accustomed. (This might seem to you like a mild inconvenience. If so, I can only assume either that you're not getting paid well, or that you're only so recently getting paid well that you've yet to accustom yourself to it, and in either case that you're also not carrying a meaningful amount of debt. Hell, I'm not paid all that well, and I carry less debt than anyone I know, and I can assure you that my recent layoff was nonetheless far more than a "mild inconvenience".)
If you are interested from where I come from I'm getting paid well only recently. If by "accustoming myself to it" you mean borrowing shitload of money on account of my future anticipated income, then yes I haven't accustomed to my high pay, neither I'm intending to.
It helps that I'm not a fan of cars, houses and social status.
I know that for some people it is a life struggle to find and keep jobs. But most of people involved in software development are not that people and if they make it a struggle it is by their own choice. Even though they are paid more than few times than the amount other people can live comfortably off of, they manage to pile up debt so high that earning a living becomes their life struggle as well. Some even draw perverse sense of nobility and meaning from it. They can now see themselves hardworking breadwinners even though staying afloat would not be any concern if they just hadn't put themselves in such a financial conditions by living above their means.
Why am I calling software development employee being sacked a "mild inconvenience"? If you wan't me to explain from personal angle I'd say that decade of freelancing and bootstraping companies without much success but also without dire failures that would have left me indebted ensure me that my sense of financial safety as a software developer is in no way associated with having a job. I know for a fact that I can live off of 20% of what I'm earning now for many years. To keep himself afloat software developer needs a computer and ability to communicate with it and with people who want to make a computer do things they themselves don't know how to force it to do. Job is a nice thing but optional.
I'll give you that not being American helps massively with financial safety. No one required from me to put myself deep in debt to educate myself. No one required from me to put myself in debt when I or a person close to me experiences medical emergency. No one requires me to pay rent to landlords of San Francisco or to greedy US financial sector in form of mortgage. What astonishes me is that so little people exercise their ability to stop being Americans. I know it's hard and they'll try to rip you off one last time on exit but still...
> After all, Photoshop is already the unquestioned leader in its field, and the closest competitor isn't even within shouting distance
IMHO closest competitor to Adobe Photoshop is Adobe Fireworks, but since it's no longer Macromedia Fireworks it will stay out of even shouting distance forever. Same goes for every other contenders since we allow leaders to just buy contenders. And as for opensource alternatives there won't be any until better tooling will draw more competent ux and visually talented people to opensource software development.
> so what good does it really do Adobe's business if Creative Cloud's Photoshop component sucks 20% less?
I'm even less concerned about Adobe's shareholders mild inconveniences than about Adobe's workers mild inconveniences. Making Photoshop users jobs they do suck 20% less would be huge and for me would outweigh even total collapse of Adobe.
Maybe I wasn't clear enough that I'm expressing my own perspective by which expanding of scientific, technological and creative capacity of humankind is priority over almost everything apart from preventable loss of life.
> effect of his actions is to critically imperil those people's ability to maintain themselves, their families, and the position in life to which all of same have grown accustomed. (This might seem to you like a mild inconvenience. If so, I can only assume either that you're not getting paid well, or that you're only so recently getting paid well that you've yet to accustom yourself to it, and in either case that you're also not carrying a meaningful amount of debt. Hell, I'm not paid all that well, and I carry less debt than anyone I know, and I can assure you that my recent layoff was nonetheless far more than a "mild inconvenience".)
If you are interested from where I come from I'm getting paid well only recently. If by "accustoming myself to it" you mean borrowing shitload of money on account of my future anticipated income, then yes I haven't accustomed to my high pay, neither I'm intending to.
It helps that I'm not a fan of cars, houses and social status.
I know that for some people it is a life struggle to find and keep jobs. But most of people involved in software development are not that people and if they make it a struggle it is by their own choice. Even though they are paid more than few times than the amount other people can live comfortably off of, they manage to pile up debt so high that earning a living becomes their life struggle as well. Some even draw perverse sense of nobility and meaning from it. They can now see themselves hardworking breadwinners even though staying afloat would not be any concern if they just hadn't put themselves in such a financial conditions by living above their means.
Why am I calling software development employee being sacked a "mild inconvenience"? If you wan't me to explain from personal angle I'd say that decade of freelancing and bootstraping companies without much success but also without dire failures that would have left me indebted ensure me that my sense of financial safety as a software developer is in no way associated with having a job. I know for a fact that I can live off of 20% of what I'm earning now for many years. To keep himself afloat software developer needs a computer and ability to communicate with it and with people who want to make a computer do things they themselves don't know how to force it to do. Job is a nice thing but optional.
I'll give you that not being American helps massively with financial safety. No one required from me to put myself deep in debt to educate myself. No one required from me to put myself in debt when I or a person close to me experiences medical emergency. No one requires me to pay rent to landlords of San Francisco or to greedy US financial sector in form of mortgage. What astonishes me is that so little people exercise their ability to stop being Americans. I know it's hard and they'll try to rip you off one last time on exit but still...
> After all, Photoshop is already the unquestioned leader in its field, and the closest competitor isn't even within shouting distance
IMHO closest competitor to Adobe Photoshop is Adobe Fireworks, but since it's no longer Macromedia Fireworks it will stay out of even shouting distance forever. Same goes for every other contenders since we allow leaders to just buy contenders. And as for opensource alternatives there won't be any until better tooling will draw more competent ux and visually talented people to opensource software development.
> so what good does it really do Adobe's business if Creative Cloud's Photoshop component sucks 20% less?
I'm even less concerned about Adobe's shareholders mild inconveniences than about Adobe's workers mild inconveniences. Making Photoshop users jobs they do suck 20% less would be huge and for me would outweigh even total collapse of Adobe.
I wasn't. I'm expressing. My own. I come. I'm getting. I haven't. I'm intending. I'm not. I know. I'm calling. I'd say. Would have left me. Ensure me. My sense. I know. I can. I'm earning. I'll give. Required from me. Put myself. Educate myself. Required from me. Put myself. Close to me. Requires me. Astonishes me. I know. In my humble opinion. I'm even.
You seem to have a problem of perspective.
You seem to have a problem of perspective.
I just strive to not talk in the name of other people and I believe it's exact opposite of a problem.
The point I'm making is that you are doing everything but looking at the question from a perspective other than your own, and that's the sine qua non of competence at office politics -- the correct analysis of the social and political pressures currently affecting any given other person, and how a prospective action on your part might influence them.
To refer briefly back to my example: If our lovable rogue doesn't care whether, by attempting to improve the product, he risks both getting himself fired and damaging the political situation around that change to the point where it has no reasonable prospect of being made in the definite future, then he should go right ahead and do what he wants to do.
If either of those concerns matters to him at all, though, he'll be much better served by instead laying off a ways and making sure he's got a solid grasp of the situation, and only then commencing to consider how to make the change he wants to make in a way that'll favor its survival, or whether there is no such way and he'll be better off just adding it to his "when I find a way" list.
To refer briefly back to my example: If our lovable rogue doesn't care whether, by attempting to improve the product, he risks both getting himself fired and damaging the political situation around that change to the point where it has no reasonable prospect of being made in the definite future, then he should go right ahead and do what he wants to do.
If either of those concerns matters to him at all, though, he'll be much better served by instead laying off a ways and making sure he's got a solid grasp of the situation, and only then commencing to consider how to make the change he wants to make in a way that'll favor its survival, or whether there is no such way and he'll be better off just adding it to his "when I find a way" list.
The point wasn't to stay out of people's code. He used that "advice" as a reminder to not be what those people were/are.
And what are "those" people?
People who get upset if you touch their code.
I think in your other comment you missed the fact that there was already an ongoing debate about this particular part of the code, and it wasn't going anywhere. In such a case a demonstration that the other method is faster is more compelling than more fruitless debate. Speculations on other reasons why the code should've used 2 processes is useless, as it is clear from the article that this change made it possible to get things done faster, no need to argue with that.
"People who get upset if you touch their code" which is what i mean when i said that some people treat their code as their baby.
I wrote it before the debate began, it just got posted after it, that is not in my control.
The speculation was to point out that he didn't managed the situation properly, he just dismissed the current implementation as idiotic and proceed to change it. But you missed my point too. Which is why in some scenarios run faster might not be the first priority.
I wrote it before the debate began, it just got posted after it, that is not in my control.
The speculation was to point out that he didn't managed the situation properly, he just dismissed the current implementation as idiotic and proceed to change it. But you missed my point too. Which is why in some scenarios run faster might not be the first priority.
With "the debate" I referred to what is mentioned in the article of the two departments who disagreed about the best strategy.
I don't quite follow you. In the article it's made quite clear that people wanted the code to run faster because then they could get more work done. Yes there are conceivable scenarios in which faster code is not better, but the article made clear that it wasn't the case, so I think the speculation didn't add anything.
I don't quite follow you. In the article it's made quite clear that people wanted the code to run faster because then they could get more work done. Yes there are conceivable scenarios in which faster code is not better, but the article made clear that it wasn't the case, so I think the speculation didn't add anything.
Good read, BUT the advice is stay away from Drama and especially work Drama. Seems to me 50% of people are damaged immediately by work Drama and the other half die slowly with maybe one or two sort of winners.
I would go work somewhere else and stay happy.
I would go work somewhere else and stay happy.
Yea, the lesson is: If you find yourself in a situation like that, bail out as fast as you can. When we're young we are often not taught—or more importantly we do not have the opportunity—to simply GTFO of the crappy situation we're in (Family, Bullies, etc.). It has tragic consequences both early in life and later on. It's (one of the reasons) why we get school shooters, why people stay at crappy companies when they don't have to, why people stay in destructive relationships.
Modern society often allows us the freedom to avoid people and situations we can't control but don't want to be in. For the love of god, please take advantage of that.
Modern society often allows us the freedom to avoid people and situations we can't control but don't want to be in. For the love of god, please take advantage of that.
We are also not taught how to make the decision to GTFO. I've recently had to make such a decision and really had no prior experience to based anything on. It was a completely new experience.
Yes I eventually made the decision to GTFO but it's still lingering in the back of my head if I made the right one.
Yes I eventually made the decision to GTFO but it's still lingering in the back of my head if I made the right one.
I've done it multiple times now since I've graduated from college. It makes you uneasy each time and shortly afterwards I definitely questioned myself. But today, I don't regret it one bit.
Thanks for that. Only time will really tell but after I made the decision, it was rather freeing.
I think that's probably telling in itself. I've GTFO'd twice; one time was by my own choice, while in the other I had to be helped along by the organization a few months after I failed to follow my sensible instinct to resign. Both times, once I was finally out the door at last, I found myself feeling like a weight had come off my shoulders.
I could be wrong, but I don't see any way it's possible for that feeling to come along with a lurking realization that I'd made a mistake. (Certainly it never has in my experience, at least, and I've made plenty of mistakes.)
I could be wrong, but I don't see any way it's possible for that feeling to come along with a lurking realization that I'd made a mistake. (Certainly it never has in my experience, at least, and I've made plenty of mistakes.)
If you bail on every company that's dysfunctional and political (that's about 90%, including of startups) you'll probably get stuck with the job-hopper stigma before you find a good company.
Employers get away with horrible conditions and general dysfunction because of the job hopper stigma, but unfortunately, one person leaving bad situations immediately (instead of wasting months to years trying to make lemonade out of piss-lemons) is not going to break that stigma. In fact, it's going to lower your value and make you more likely to end up in dysfunctional companies.
A better strategy is to play the game, well, by learning how to do enough in typical, semi-dysfunctional environments to get career credit, while keeping an eye out for better opportunities. This all-or-nothing attitude that many young people have toward corporations ("if they think that way, then I don't want to work for those losers anyway") doesn't pan out in the real world. Even the good companies have plenty of stupid, political people in them.
Employers get away with horrible conditions and general dysfunction because of the job hopper stigma, but unfortunately, one person leaving bad situations immediately (instead of wasting months to years trying to make lemonade out of piss-lemons) is not going to break that stigma. In fact, it's going to lower your value and make you more likely to end up in dysfunctional companies.
A better strategy is to play the game, well, by learning how to do enough in typical, semi-dysfunctional environments to get career credit, while keeping an eye out for better opportunities. This all-or-nothing attitude that many young people have toward corporations ("if they think that way, then I don't want to work for those losers anyway") doesn't pan out in the real world. Even the good companies have plenty of stupid, political people in them.
I disagree. I work at Google, and I can't imagine getting in trouble for making an unambiguous improvement to someone's code.
There is, of course, some politics. It's just not at the level where people could openly be pissed off just because someone made them look bad by doing better. Politics happens over much more ambiguous things, like what length people from one team should go to to fix bugs affecting another team. These are areas where there are legitimate differences of opinion, so it's only natural that people's biases affect their work.
There is, of course, some politics. It's just not at the level where people could openly be pissed off just because someone made them look bad by doing better. Politics happens over much more ambiguous things, like what length people from one team should go to to fix bugs affecting another team. These are areas where there are legitimate differences of opinion, so it's only natural that people's biases affect their work.
The answer to "job-hopper stigma" and any and all other competence-trigger hurdles is simple. Sell the benefit, not the feature.
In other words, change the conversation from "who you are" to "what you can do for them". A track record of accomplishments does a lot more to convince a stake-holder that you know what you're doing than a list of previously-held positions. If all you have is a list of previously-held positions, then sure, if there's more entries on it than years, you'll have a rough go at it. But you don't have to operate this way.
Nobody is unemployable. There are only people who have figured out how to convey competence and people who haven't.
In other words, change the conversation from "who you are" to "what you can do for them". A track record of accomplishments does a lot more to convince a stake-holder that you know what you're doing than a list of previously-held positions. If all you have is a list of previously-held positions, then sure, if there's more entries on it than years, you'll have a rough go at it. But you don't have to operate this way.
Nobody is unemployable. There are only people who have figured out how to convey competence and people who haven't.
Well. Conveying competence is, indeed, a valuable skill. But the most it can do for you is to get you a seat at the table. What will you do once you've got the job, and it comes time to play the game?
And, while we're at it, why assume that the only possible reward for playing the game is the opportunity to keep playing the game? Isn't it possible that, in playing the game with sufficient skill and artistry, you can create for yourself the opportunity to do the work you joined that company to do?
...to be honest, I really don't know the answer to that last question at all. But it sure is an interesting question, don't you think?
And, while we're at it, why assume that the only possible reward for playing the game is the opportunity to keep playing the game? Isn't it possible that, in playing the game with sufficient skill and artistry, you can create for yourself the opportunity to do the work you joined that company to do?
...to be honest, I really don't know the answer to that last question at all. But it sure is an interesting question, don't you think?
> What will you do once you've got the job,
Do your job? I'm having trouble understanding what you're getting at. If you don't like your work environment, then leave. Just don't take six months to figure that out. But really, you should know whether you would like working there before you take the job. It's not that hard to take a few of their current employees out for coffee and ask them what it's like to work there.
Not every job has the insane level of politicking described. Just find a place where you fit in. It exists.
Do your job? I'm having trouble understanding what you're getting at. If you don't like your work environment, then leave. Just don't take six months to figure that out. But really, you should know whether you would like working there before you take the job. It's not that hard to take a few of their current employees out for coffee and ask them what it's like to work there.
Not every job has the insane level of politicking described. Just find a place where you fit in. It exists.
> really, you should know whether you would like working there before you take the job.
My worst work place had an extreme micro-manager of a president. People were fired after working there 15 years on the spot and others their department was under performing for years and years never were let go.
Final straw: Unannounced layoff of 10%. They fired people at their desk all morning and afternoon and did not have an all company meeting till 3:30 pm. The bonus the job had a loop hole and didn't have to pay unemployment tax. So everyone didn't know they did not qualify for unemployment and were left with 2 weeks severance pay and found out they didn't qualify many weeks later after they were denied their unemployment.
Should have known: This was a place I knew intimately for 5+ years. I was friends with most of the staff. I did have coffee with half a dozen people and well made a 10+ year commitment mentally before taking the job left 6 months afterwards on my 4th year of employment. Now I LOVE my job working for Head Start.
My worst work place had an extreme micro-manager of a president. People were fired after working there 15 years on the spot and others their department was under performing for years and years never were let go.
Final straw: Unannounced layoff of 10%. They fired people at their desk all morning and afternoon and did not have an all company meeting till 3:30 pm. The bonus the job had a loop hole and didn't have to pay unemployment tax. So everyone didn't know they did not qualify for unemployment and were left with 2 weeks severance pay and found out they didn't qualify many weeks later after they were denied their unemployment.
Should have known: This was a place I knew intimately for 5+ years. I was friends with most of the staff. I did have coffee with half a dozen people and well made a 10+ year commitment mentally before taking the job left 6 months afterwards on my 4th year of employment. Now I LOVE my job working for Head Start.
Hardly an "insane level of politicking", as you like to put it; in a relatively close parallel early in my career, I cost my contracting firm a moderately lucrative client, and verged closely upon getting us sued, out of the same sort of sheer ignorance, as applied to vulnerability reporting rather than feature improvement.
I mean, sure, it would (possibly) be ideal if everyone in our field simply looked at the technical aspects of everything, without any personal or emotional investment whatsoever. What about your experience on this planet has given you to imagine that it's reasonable to expect any aspect of human life, singly or in the large, to be anywhere near ideal?
I mean, sure, it would (possibly) be ideal if everyone in our field simply looked at the technical aspects of everything, without any personal or emotional investment whatsoever. What about your experience on this planet has given you to imagine that it's reasonable to expect any aspect of human life, singly or in the large, to be anywhere near ideal?
Virtually all startups are dysfunctional in a variety of new and surprising ways, but I think you can clearly identify the main dysfunctions (or at least, things which won't be addressed) in 50-500 person companies, and figure out how much you care about those factors.
this !
awesome articulation bud !
I read his advice as, "Don't be That Guy."
That's an important corollary to the author's actual point, if you ask me. Sure you shouldn't make golden calves out of bad old code, but also don't be the guy that mercilessly hacks apart other people's code without allowing them to defend it. Instead have a socratic dialogue about the pros and cons of different approaches to the problem.
If I understood the article, the pros were technical, and the cons were political. And, here's some actual good advice: Never try to solve a political problem by technical means (or vice versa).
That's the opposite of Facebook's mantra that "code wins arguments". Which has worked well for me.
If I understand correctly, that's Facebook saying that decisions are not going to be made politically. They're going to be made on the basis of what is best technically. And that's great... for Facebook.
What I was talking about is companies with a different culture, where politics gets into technical decisions. In that culture, you can't just fix the technical problems, precisely because at that company, code does not win arguments. Politics does.
What I was talking about is companies with a different culture, where politics gets into technical decisions. In that culture, you can't just fix the technical problems, precisely because at that company, code does not win arguments. Politics does.
> And that's great... for Facebook.
Really? Because I'll bet you any sum you care to name that Facebook is just as riddled with internal politics as any other organization of its size in the field, Google specifically included. To believe otherwise is to believe that the people who make up Facebook are other than human.
Really? Because I'll bet you any sum you care to name that Facebook is just as riddled with internal politics as any other organization of its size in the field, Google specifically included. To believe otherwise is to believe that the people who make up Facebook are other than human.
He made a classic mistake that I think all of us make once: overperformance without proper (managerial or executive) support.
Overperformance fucks up more careers than underperformance, because it makes enemies. (No one actually gives a shit about the pittance drawn away by an underperformer on salary, but overperformance puts peoples' reputations on the line and is generally volatile.) You don't want to fall into that trap. I'm not saying that people should do shoddy work, but if you're going to do more than that you're asked to do, make sure it's behalf on someone powerful enough to clear obstacles and get your back, and who will.
He improved the product and, through no intention of his own, ended up ears deep in office politics. It's a perennial risk. It takes at least one of those, for most of us, before people realize that if you're going to overperform, it should be for something you own. That way, you avoid the risks (you can't get fired from your own side project) and keep the rewards, instead of the reverse.
Overperformance fucks up more careers than underperformance, because it makes enemies. (No one actually gives a shit about the pittance drawn away by an underperformer on salary, but overperformance puts peoples' reputations on the line and is generally volatile.) You don't want to fall into that trap. I'm not saying that people should do shoddy work, but if you're going to do more than that you're asked to do, make sure it's behalf on someone powerful enough to clear obstacles and get your back, and who will.
He improved the product and, through no intention of his own, ended up ears deep in office politics. It's a perennial risk. It takes at least one of those, for most of us, before people realize that if you're going to overperform, it should be for something you own. That way, you avoid the risks (you can't get fired from your own side project) and keep the rewards, instead of the reverse.
Totally agree.
"Overzealousness worse than fascism"
And I don't believe in such idealism, if he was doing it for the sake of performance he should show it to the developers first, and not perform a show for his boss and boss's boss and THE BOSS and who knows who else. So what was the real intention behind this?
And I don't believe in such idealism, if he was doing it for the sake of performance he should show it to the developers first, and not perform a show for his boss and boss's boss and THE BOSS and who knows who else. So what was the real intention behind this?
I don't think he had an ulterior motive. I think he was young and had never had a negative career experience and therefore didn't realize what office politics were about and that, even if the execs seem like nice people, any information you furnish to them stands a nontrivial chance of being used in a horrible way.
In a collegial, sympathetic R&D type environment, people are happy when others improve their work. However, in an office environment, it's not the same thing, because you can hurt peoples' careers without even trying and unintentionally make enemies.
In a collegial, sympathetic R&D type environment, people are happy when others improve their work. However, in an office environment, it's not the same thing, because you can hurt peoples' careers without even trying and unintentionally make enemies.
The lesson is that the system is often more than just the computer software. The requirements may be more than just the software requirements.
I was fortunate to recognize that early at my current job. We have boatloads of software requirements documented, but the prime directive is not even spoken aloud: "Produce 40 billable hours per week, for each employee, forever."
And that is why the database is a mess and the code sucks beyond all reason. Any reduction in technical debt directly translates to a reduction in the perception of work being done. In short, the customer knows nearly nothing about software development, is willing to pay for status reports, process documentation, and meeting minutes rather than working code, and has a budget completely independent from the value of the work product.
Have you ever looked into some code and seen a WTF block, and it turned out to be a workaround for a bizarre bug? Here, the entire code base is the WTF block. The bug is in the human organization. I do not have the permissions to commit anything to that source tree. So I suck it up and send out resumes.
You don't fix anything until you first understand why it is broken. In the context of the CAD rendering, it is likely that some people had invested a lot of effort into convincing the management that their laziness was actually hard work plus frustration at their resource constraints. Think like Wally from Dilbert. That slow rendering is a system-enforced cap on productivity, slowing down the fastest workers.
In the psycho-clueless-loser model, that is the losers getting a leg up on the clueless. A psycho would have first manipulated the political situation for personal advantage before releasing the fixed code. A loser would have left it alone as already being to their advantage. Don't be clueless, folks.
I was fortunate to recognize that early at my current job. We have boatloads of software requirements documented, but the prime directive is not even spoken aloud: "Produce 40 billable hours per week, for each employee, forever."
And that is why the database is a mess and the code sucks beyond all reason. Any reduction in technical debt directly translates to a reduction in the perception of work being done. In short, the customer knows nearly nothing about software development, is willing to pay for status reports, process documentation, and meeting minutes rather than working code, and has a budget completely independent from the value of the work product.
Have you ever looked into some code and seen a WTF block, and it turned out to be a workaround for a bizarre bug? Here, the entire code base is the WTF block. The bug is in the human organization. I do not have the permissions to commit anything to that source tree. So I suck it up and send out resumes.
You don't fix anything until you first understand why it is broken. In the context of the CAD rendering, it is likely that some people had invested a lot of effort into convincing the management that their laziness was actually hard work plus frustration at their resource constraints. Think like Wally from Dilbert. That slow rendering is a system-enforced cap on productivity, slowing down the fastest workers.
In the psycho-clueless-loser model, that is the losers getting a leg up on the clueless. A psycho would have first manipulated the political situation for personal advantage before releasing the fixed code. A loser would have left it alone as already being to their advantage. Don't be clueless, folks.
For those like me unfamiliar with what's here termed the "psycho-clueless-loser model", it appears to be what is more commonly termed the "Gervais Principle", and you can find what looks to be a reasonable overview of the subject here: http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-o...
Great article. I was just thinking "whoever told you that was high" when the author pivoted and said it was bad advice. The first comment was spot on...if the current is dragging you toward the drama, swim up the shore to a new gig.
> But the best way to have a future is to be part of a team that values progress over politics, ideas over territory and initiative over decorum.
I am not being too cynical in thinking that this doesn't exist? I mean this is the core of how teams interact. Politics is reality. So is territory. Fuck decorum, though.
I am not being too cynical in thinking that this doesn't exist? I mean this is the core of how teams interact. Politics is reality. So is territory. Fuck decorum, though.
This story leaves me with a completely different takeaway message than the author got.
It seems like he got involved in situation he didn't understand and may have risked his job (and perhaps the jobs of others) in the process. His process demo'd better, but he has no idea why some people were opposed to it.
What if this was a product that emphasized security, and he inadvertently violated the security model to get speedups? Understand the processes you're working on, and the problems that your co-workers are dealing with. In this case, he could have made his life easier by identifying the "faction" that wanted what he wanted and working with them.
It seems like he got involved in situation he didn't understand and may have risked his job (and perhaps the jobs of others) in the process. His process demo'd better, but he has no idea why some people were opposed to it.
What if this was a product that emphasized security, and he inadvertently violated the security model to get speedups? Understand the processes you're working on, and the problems that your co-workers are dealing with. In this case, he could have made his life easier by identifying the "faction" that wanted what he wanted and working with them.
"Understand the processes you're working on, and the problems that your co-workers are dealing with."
Go further than that. Step back and look at the environment as a whole. It helps to spend time understanding a situation before assuming you have appropriate ideas about changing it (ref. below).
https://www.wittenburg.co.uk/Entry.aspx?id=46870dcd-70cb-4ef...
Go further than that. Step back and look at the environment as a whole. It helps to spend time understanding a situation before assuming you have appropriate ideas about changing it (ref. below).
https://www.wittenburg.co.uk/Entry.aspx?id=46870dcd-70cb-4ef...
In my opinion I think the author did try to address the big picture. He brought it to his boss, and his boss's boss. If ideas are commodities worth trading then why was the market closed from the top down? This is a lesson in corporate culture which I think the author explains quite well.
> In my opinion I think the author did try to address the big picture.
Sure. But grandparent's point is that he did it backwards: first he made the changes he wanted to see, and then he demoed it up the chain and got himself in hot water. Had he first taken time to develop a thorough understanding of the situation and the environment in which it had origin, he'd have been able accurately to evaluate how best to take action in order to bring about his desired result -- or indeed whether it might instead be best, despite what had originally seemed to him a desperate need for improvement, simply to cultivate the detachment necessary to take no action at all.
Sure. But grandparent's point is that he did it backwards: first he made the changes he wanted to see, and then he demoed it up the chain and got himself in hot water. Had he first taken time to develop a thorough understanding of the situation and the environment in which it had origin, he'd have been able accurately to evaluate how best to take action in order to bring about his desired result -- or indeed whether it might instead be best, despite what had originally seemed to him a desperate need for improvement, simply to cultivate the detachment necessary to take no action at all.
Then someone would have been able to explain objectively why his solution was less good. It wouldn't have been this wishy washy political struggle that only hurts the department and technology.
I'd prefer to lose a job that was caught up in such a scuffle. (Of course, I say that in times when a job can be got).
I'd prefer to lose a job that was caught up in such a scuffle. (Of course, I say that in times when a job can be got).