Sabotage
samgentle.com
samgentle.com
I know I personally like to keep the opinion people have that I am overworked, whether I actually work hard or procrastinate - it's just a really convenient social shield, not only against failure but also against random requests from people. When people notice you have too much free time, for some reason they feel obliged to start inventing things for you to do.
I think it's an alternative to just saying "no". Some people are assertive and can simply refuse a request. Personally, I find assertiveness very cognitively taxing, not to mention socially, so maintaining a bubble of "he's constantly working on something" impression helps. It's probably not the most ethical approach, but it's a coping strategy.
As for self-deprecation of your work, I know I've been guilty of this at times to cover for stress and lack of motivation. It would be true that the particular piece of work is not the best thing I can do (and I can always point to examples of a better work), but fortunately people immediately assume (without me having to suggest anything) that's because of being tired, or new, or something, and not because I am having trouble finding the motivation to pursue a task at 100% of effectiveness. This buys me necessary time to sort my motivations out and hopefully regain the energy to do a better work next time.
It's actually easier if someone demands a favor and they are obviously rude/inconsiderate about it; it's more "okay" to respond to rudeness with a refusal or excuse.
But some people are unable to say "no" to polite requests for assistance even when they have to lie to accept convincingly. Even if it's hugely inconvenient for them, and only of minimal benefit to the asker. So they say "yes", and probably do whatever it is, and then will try to find a way to avoid the asker in future (don't pick up their calls, etc).
There's some argument that everyone would benefit from a more "American" (ideal, not always real) and more direct approach -- e.g., someone asks "would it be easy for you to..." and you answer "sorry, no", and no one is upset. But this is next to impossible in some cultures, and there's also value in (if you're the asker) putting more thought into how you can value other peoples' time more accurately.
Then from time to time an awesome project with shared workloads comes and I magically find the time to do it (;
I've noticed that things can also loop around when you're dealing with family. Just recently I received a proposal from a next of kin for basically making an Android app for equity (i.e. for free). He's younger and I recognize this as a temporary fascination with the startup world ("If everyone buys it for $2, the app will make millions (PLN)!") and I don't want to shut down his dreams (he'll get over it soon by himself), so I can't just say no. Fortunately, I have a convenient excuse of being stuck in China for the next month or so - therefore I'm absolutely busy and have no time!
(OTOH if he still wants that when I get back I'll probably go for it - the app is simple, and who knows? Maybe it will earn some cash, which will be a valuable experience for both of us.)
By the way, should I start tagging those comments as #HNTherapy or something?
And this is where too little sleep helps: it makes you aggressive and lowers your barrier to verbally whack someone over the head. I know my superiors treat me more carefully since I am constantly sleep-deprived due to kids.
> The loser usually takes the imagined moral high ground by sticking to his Code of Honor, a made-up set of personal rules that tells him which moves he can and cannot do. Of course, the rules of the game itself dictate which moves a player can and cannot make, so the Code of Honor is superfluous and counterproductive toward winning. [...] This type of player is trying desperately to remain a “winner” any way possible. If you catch him amidst a sea of losses, you’ll notice that his Code will undergo strange contortions so that he may still define himself, somehow, as a “winner.”
Working long hours, showing people unfinished prototypes, etc. are such "Codes of Honor." For the people who work under such rules, even if their output stinks, they can still feel like keeping to their Code has made them a "winner."
Even if, y'know, the ROI on their time and effort was effectively zero.
If the opponent uses a strategy that seems unfair, then I should use that strategy.
If they are using a high risk strategy, instead of saying that they are just gambling and being mad at them I should instead become better at finding out if they are going to take that path and deal with it.
When it comes to improvement it is self defeating to say that anything out of your control was the problem. If that was in fact the case you shouldn't have let that situtation arise. If someone else is constantly causing a problem for you then you need to create a situation where they can't cause you problems anymore. Be that improve their abilities, isolate yourself from them or be good enough to solve that problem.
Then again I never quite made it to the grandmasters league.
But this article's reasoning makes sense. So do we have different social shields in place? If I work 8-ish hours a day and screw up, what's my excuse? I can't completely figure this one out.
And everyone screws up from time to time, organizations should understand that too much fear of breaking things is not a good thing: http://engineering.teacherspayteachers.com/2015/10/11/the-fe...
Instead of focusing on blame they should focus on processes to avoid the screw-up from happening again.
Me, I prefer to work 9-5. It's boring, but it's sustainable and does not cause me stress about whether I'm working the 40 hours / week my contract tells me to do.
When I worked in the UK, many businesses had a work environment that steered towards the US model, but 9am - 5:30pm was the norm. More flexible working hours are starting to be more common, but statistically the total hours worked is very static over the last decade. [1]
On the other hand, here in Germany the concept of "Feierabend" is sacrosanct. Feierabend is the word Germans use to describe the time after work (and the point at which they "clock off"). Germans start work earlier than in the UK, but many finish around 4:30pm or even earlier on a Friday.
That being said, the productive hours of work here in Germany appears to be different (possibly just observer bias). They seem to get a lot done in those hours. I see less meetings and less general chit-chat throughout the day. In the UK I would often experience the collection of people around the coffee machine discussing last night's TV programs. I've never seen that kind of thing here.
Spain was a completely different experience. People didn't appear to work so much, but that was simply because initially I didn't realise that many people have two jobs, with siesta parked in the middle. They often start earlier and finish late in the evening. The statistics show that Spain (and Greece more so) have a higher number of hours worked annually than Germany (and the UK).
From an economic perspective though, those extra hours haven't traditionally produced growth in the same way as the Germans have. That's not to say that the Germans are particularly more productive (I think that is rather hard to quantify and there are many more factors in play than just being "productive"), but in terms of pure economic success, Spain and Greece are certainly well behind their northern European partners.
A lot of that is also due to the kind of economies these countries have though. Germany produces things for export and benefits greatly from a depressed Euro and has done so for the last 15 years. Spain and Greece do not have such economies, and have been hit with the triple punch of economic depression, reduced EU financial support and forced austerity. It is like taking a heroin addict (EU grant money) and forcing him to go cold turkey, but also removing all the furniture in the room and leaving him with a cold concrete floor and walls and leaving one barred window that overlooks a methadone clinic day centre.
Younger generations have a different attitude, which I assume is spilling over from the US: Follow your passion. Find work you love to do. This implies you love to work longer hours.
Personally, I don't use an excuse. I just fix the problem, which is typically more useful than having an excuse.
Being able to work without an excuse required me to realize that I am human, and even under perfect conditions, I'm going to screw up. I put as many safety barriers around my work as I can to help prevent it (code linters, static analysis, testing, etc), but it still happens. Accepting that it can happen, and moving on when it does happen seems to work pretty well for me.
In any case, overworking and sleep deprivation are definitely bad. No matter what the reason behind them and what actions to be taken, they should not be an acceptable norm for any sane person. That's for sure.
Likely adjusted for timezone. EST here.