undefined | Better HN

0 pointsdumbfoundded4y ago0 comments

Generally speaking, I think your comment and its parent have a poor attitude and not one that anyone should emulate. For me, it's about finding new problems and new challenges. I can't stand facing the same problems over and over again so when I do, I automate/fix those problems and then I find new ones to solve.

You should always be "trying". The idea that you corner some obscure but vital part of your company's infra and then just coast is pretty abhorrent to me. Instead, if you find something difficult, complicated and manual, you should make it easy, simple and automated.

I do believe that firing people based on big data analysis is pretty dumb as some tasks require lots of deliberation and thought without much output initially. But the idea of working hard = being dumb, seems like a pretty creative way of justifying being lazy.

0 comments

4 comments · 3 top-level

anonuser1234564y ago· 1 in thread

>I think your comment and its parent have a poor attitude and not one that anyone should emulate.

I don't think working hard is dumb. To get into my position I had to work hard and acquire a lot of knowledge / skills. I had to defer a lot of gratification, skip a lot of parties and endure a lot of stress.

But people have lives outside of work. I can accomplish in a day now what might have taken me a month early in my career. I can make better decisions now that result in much less future work... lower amounts of maintenance etc. So should I put in the same grinding effort? That makes no sense to me. I don't grind anymore. Been there, done that.

sombremesa4y ago

> I don't think working hard is dumb.

I think GP's attitude (different from 'working hard', more akin to 'overdelivering') can be "dumb", depending on the context. If someone is doing 1/100th of the work per unit of time you're able to do, why would you work the same amount of time for the same compensation? Is that any different than selling gold at the price of copper?

Of course, having equity in the business changes the equation somewhat.

Otherwise, the only issue anyone should have here is what the agreement between you and your employer calls for, and how transparent this relationship is. Just because others in the marketplace are making bad deals shouldn't mean you have to as well.

hinkley4y ago

The people that have the bad attitude at my job are all of the burned out people who are now dealing with a list of problems most of which I have been bitching about for years that somehow became a giant avalanche this year.

Everything is fine is a rotten attitude when you are piling up accidental complexity all day and victim blaming anyone who can’t or won’t wade through it. If I were king I’d fire every single person who was happy with the state of affairs a year ago. And then I’d start calling all the people I liked who have left for something better and beg them to come back. We got rid of those assholes, come fix things. Please.

cududa4y ago

As someone that enjoys occasionally coasting, I get bored really fast and find new areas to contribute to and problems to solve.

I think you may have gotten downvoted from the tone of the comment by folks that have arcane mastery over some system, which I can get from their perspective, depending on how long they’ve been in the industry/ niche/ company

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse