I remember having a conversation with my father when I was a kid about his company's employees. I was shocked to discover they were being paid by the hour. I remember following up with a question along the lines of "Wouldn't that encourage them to take lots of time to do their work?" He assured me that, although it was a possibility, it didn't happen very often. (and presumably he explained that people who did that could lose their job, so it was to their long-term advantage to not slack off)
Fast forward a few years later, when I'm in high-school and a student asks the teacher - after she explained a homework assignment - if any marks would be given for effort. I couldn't help but laugh out loud, thinking he was pulling the teacher's leg. He didn't join me in laughing or smiling (and probably shot me a dirty look). Uh oh. He was serious!?!?
Maybe I found that proposition silly because I figured there was no way for it to be reliably measured: it would have to be self-reported. How hard would it be to say "I spent 100 hours on this" when handing it in? And if I had completed the assignment in 10 hours and produced equivalent results to his, would that mean he would get more marks than I got because he spent more time?? Worse yet, even if it wasn't self-reported, how would it be measured??? And what about the difference between "brain time" and "body time"?
Nowadays, I understand why people are [usually] compensated by how much their skills are in demand and that it is possible to be 10 times better than someone else at what you do. Maybe I also did as a kid? That might explain my reaction in both instances. Could it also explain my drive for correctness? My passion for getting things done and done right?? Now here's a doozy for you: would this knowledge at a younger age have helped other students??? Or maybe I'm just being arrogant and that I should just shut up for being the nerd that didn't have any trouble with his assignments????
Discuss.
P.S.: Please go easy on me as I have been working on this blog post since November and it's only now that I have been able to finish it.
Showing posts with label job. Show all posts
Showing posts with label job. Show all posts
Friday, August 08, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Hi-tech alumni
What appeared to be a joke article at first glance (Cravath sounds like the french word for a tie) turned out to be a very insightful post by Alex on the topic of quitting and more generally about the habits of a certain class of software developers. I couldn't agree more! In fact, I have found myself proud to announce to my peers that I have worked at Microsoft and Macadamian; that I'm an alumnus or a graduate of sorts from their respective schools [of thought], that I embody some/most of their best practices and serve as a kind of unofficial ambassador.
I can relate to the "bus factor" concept and can even suggest a tangible metric: fantastic developers (who are thus likely to quit) are usually top contributors to corporate wikis, since they are constantly externalizing their knowledge for future colleagues/replacements. This, ironically, increases their value since they can spend more of their [precious] time solving new problems instead of being constantly disturbed for knowledge and acting as a "walking wiki" (which Alex calls "unskilled people"). It's not hard to see how true synergy is achieved by having all documentation at everybody's fingertips. This is what Bill Gates called a Digital Nervous System.
The next logical step to documenting is automating. So even if you feel your "bus factor" is low because everything is documented and your team spends a lot/most of their time solving new problems (which is, by itself, an excellent start) documented AND automated processes are the true mark of excellent talent.
So, in the spirit of the topic, I will quit my job (and there's nothing wrong with that), but I just haven't decided when. And if I start a company, I will include a link to this article in the corporate wiki.
P.S.: I'm posting this to my blog from Google Docs. I had this idea that it would be great to be able to do so and, lo and behold, there it was, under
Update: Ok, it posted, but without a title and the HTML was definitely not clean, but it's a start. I probably just need to tweak a few styles.
I can relate to the "bus factor" concept and can even suggest a tangible metric: fantastic developers (who are thus likely to quit) are usually top contributors to corporate wikis, since they are constantly externalizing their knowledge for future colleagues/replacements. This, ironically, increases their value since they can spend more of their [precious] time solving new problems instead of being constantly disturbed for knowledge and acting as a "walking wiki" (which Alex calls "unskilled people"). It's not hard to see how true synergy is achieved by having all documentation at everybody's fingertips. This is what Bill Gates called a Digital Nervous System.
The next logical step to documenting is automating. So even if you feel your "bus factor" is low because everything is documented and your team spends a lot/most of their time solving new problems (which is, by itself, an excellent start) documented AND automated processes are the true mark of excellent talent.
So, in the spirit of the topic, I will quit my job (and there's nothing wrong with that), but I just haven't decided when. And if I start a company, I will include a link to this article in the corporate wiki.
P.S.: I'm posting this to my blog from Google Docs. I had this idea that it would be great to be able to do so and, lo and behold, there it was, under
Share/Publish as web page...Update: Ok, it posted, but without a title and the HTML was definitely not clean, but it's a start. I probably just need to tweak a few styles.
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