A firm that starts work at 9.06am | Hacker News Reader

A firm that starts work at 9.06am

bbc.com

73 pointsEwanToo67 comments

I used to work at Pivotal and have many friends still there. The 9:06 and reasons here are correct.

The line "Then the firm's programmers hit their computers, with no other meetings or distractions for the rest of the day," is absolute rubbish. Most teams have at least an Iteration Planning Meeting and a Retrospective each week, as well as generally a team-specific standup the majority of (if not all) days. As well, there are of course manager 1 on 1s, the rare company meeting, and ad-hoc meetings as a project sees fit. Sorry, I just had to comment because the quoted line is absurd.

Edit: and the line about leaving work 6pm sharp is just as ridiculous. In the consulting side it tends to be true that your workday is over at 6 PM, but you're not going to get shoved into an elevator before you finish your commit message at 6:01. The limit is there so you don't overwork and so that the client companies know they can't push their consultants arbitrarily late.

I would've made this comment, maybe with a different tone.

IPM and Retro last strictly one hour. Team standup might be 10 minutes. 1-on-1s might be every 3-4 weeks, length varying 30 minutes to an hour.

Ad hoc meetings are rare. Usually introduced reluctantly and dropped as soon as possible.

Missing from your list are the additional meetings an anchor takes on -- pre-IPM (if that's thought to be necessary), CL/LL checkin (length and frequency vary), Labs Project Status meeting (30 mins on Friday).

Cloud R&D Pivots also attend a weekly joint standup. Sometimes global, sometimes local, length varies 10-20 minutes.

And, of course, if you're a manager, you will be having 1-on-1s with some Pivots every week.

But for the most part, it is possible for engineering pairs to be heads-down and working for hours on end.

Edit: should mention I work for Pivotal. I'm actually off to get ready for work. Anyone who wants to ask me questions is free to hit me up, email is in my profile.

Also worked at Pivotal, and this is definitely true. The number of meetings is must lower than in other firms (in my experience), but meetings are still a part of life.

Breakfast, though, is such an amazing operational hack that I'm surprised the article didn't go into more detail.

Humans are very rhythmic creatures, and our circadian rhythms are moderated a number of environmental factors -- the big two being sunlight, and food.

By having both breakfast and lunch happen at the same time each day, your body adjusts to getting at least two meals on a regular schedule, which helps with maintaining a constant energy level throughout the day.

On top of that, it makes it physiologically more difficult to be late to work. Your body knows that a meal is coming up and you will tend to wake up on time.

And while, yeah, you don't leave at 6:01, it's pretty rare to see people at the office after about 6:30. So, it's pretty easy to get to sleep at a consistent time as well.

This is important enough that it's part of one of my conference talks: that a regular cadence throughout the day, including set meal times, is a great way to boost happiness, improve health, and more importantly, get more "quality hours" out of the day.

I am quite surprised that the BBC ran this piece, which seems to be an advert for Pivotal.

I guess this is just how PR works, but again, the BBC is supposed to be neutral in promoting individual businesses.

The BBC is far from neutral. I think it's pretty dangerous to believe that they might be able to neutrally report the news (even if they wanted to).

A few years ago they laid off a whole bunch of journalists. Often they just don't have much time to write their own stories.

The institution is a shadow of what it used to be 10 years ago. It used to hold the government to account. Now it's more like a British RT with added clickbait.

Well, the BBC is unlike any other news organization, culturally - it is more like a branch of the Civil Service. If you showed up for an interview there as a tech journalist and you actually knew the difference between say Java and C++ because you'd used them both, then you're "just not our sort old chap". But show up wearing the right old school tie, conjugate a few Latin verbs, and spend the interview reminiscing about the good old days punting at Oxford and you're in. So the whole place is stuffed with people who fundamentally can't evaluate whatever they're told by any outsider - not even which outsiders are really experts or not.

Judging by the upvotes it's getting here, people are interested in it.

The fact that it may be in Pivotal's interest for the article to be published should have no effect on the BBC's decision-making process – the same as it is with critical articles.

There have been a few articles like this, I presume we have PR folk shopping us around to journos.

In some ways, the "gee whiz" and "look how quirky!" stuff is highlighted because it's a novelty. That's how you get press: you do something different in a way that can be understood by others. Cutting through to the essence of anything takes time and practice, which a reporter doesn't have.

For example: is Google all about free food? Of course not. Is Valve entirely their desks? No.

Individual practices aren't Pivotal. Individuals are.

I joined the software industry after getting tired of all the [sometimes seemingly mindless] rigours of the construction industry that I worked for at the time. I wanted freedom, such as work anywhere anytime. Now, the pendulum has swung too far on the other side and I again long for some ritual that will help me maintain sanity.

Reading this article convinces me that some ritual is still possible in the tech industry and I feel like working for this company.

All Government departments in my city start at 08:00 and finish at 16:21 !! No weirdness about the finishing time though - it is just so that the fortnightly pay run ends on an even hourly number.

UPDATE: It seems that nearly all state and federal public services in Australia have strange knock off times... [0]

[0] - http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2014/06/industrial-action-fo...

> so that the fortnightly pay run ends on an even hourly number

How isn't that already the case with 10 x 8 hour days? or 8.5 etc?

Your linked article mentions another interesting idea: that an additional 9 minutes a day is more than 5 days a year.

I used to work for a medium sized company (~500 staff) that made us all work 10 extra minutes each day "off the clock", but then gave it back in the form of a number of whole and half days throughout the year when the company would be closed for business. Usually that meant that we'd get an extra day off before a long weekend or bank holiday, an additional day before christmas, that sort of thing. This was on top of 33 days of paid annual leave, so a sweet deal.

My bad - It is not to make an even hour at the end of the fortnight. I asked a public service friend of mine and he said because there was an odd number of hours that our public servants had to work per fortnight (as the article I posted also pointed out). I assume it all works out evenly over 365.25 days or something? I've never worked in the public service, so cannot speak for their methods.

Victorian countryside government offices finish at 5:06 pm. It is due to 36.8 hours work week. Absolutely strange.

Another Darwinite, I presume? "Fourtwennyone" is more than a contract, it's a cultural institution.

You presume correctly! :) All I know is that if I am in the city having meetings, I try and jump in the car and head the heck out by 4:20 in order to beat the "public service exodus traffic jam"...

Ah yes, the famous rush quarter-hour.

I'm going to be visiting Darwin in February. Who has the best chicken laksa these days? I haven't found any good ones here.

A straw poll among my friends say that Rendezvous cafe in the Star Village is still the pick for Laksa, or Linda's(?) stall at the Parap Markets on Saturday... :)

My basic plan was to hit one of the markets and just eat all of them.

God I wish I could bottle it.

I think this is bs. Everyone has their own unique sleep cycle. Different people have different peaks.

Again another company running with Agile keyword, keeping all the stuff about about control, and removing all the stuff about autonomy.

This basically treating programmers like infants, ignoring the fact there a lot programmers have responsibilities around work like kids. Not everyone is a 22 yo developer.

i think your right... sounds like absolute bs brewed in the finest dung pile of clock watching excel pushing loonies. everyone can be autonomous when we tell them they can be, and only then.... I don't start until 9:30 and work until 6... with a bit of flexibility on the end of the day.....people don't care as long as my hours are done

I work for Pivotal.

I understand why you could take that interpretation, but it's not the way the place works at all.

If I need to leave early, I leave early. If I need to come late, I come late. If I need to go out during the day, I go out during the day.

What I can't do during those hours is work.

Ok, why does the article say if you miss the Scrum meeting at 9:06, your absence will be noted?

Will my absence be noted everyday, since I come in at 9:30 everyday?

I don't see where in the article the "absence is noted". I come in late each Friday because of a regular appointment. I tell my colleagues that I will be in late because it seems like the courteous thing to do.

We're not a scrum shop. XP with Lean trimmings. Which we constantly tinker with.

In the long run, the process is built on co-location and pairing. Of these, we'll take pairing. Which only really works if everyone is present at the same time: if you create and dissolve pairs as the number of engineers fluctuates, then you create a really confusing fan-out/fan-in effect on the work in flight.

I worked on a project where were spread across two timezones, which simulated people coming at different times. We'd be 2 pairs, 4 pairs, then 2 pairs. It was a carwreck.

Different article:

http://uk.businessinsider.com/pivotal-906-am-breakfast-meeti...

"So Pivotal decided to employ both a stick and a carrot. The stick is a mandatory morning meeting at 9 a.m., where your absence will likely be noted. The carrot is the breakfast buffet, "sort of a prize to get in," Mee says."

I don't agree with that characterisation, which gives a Taylorist vibe.

I've never noticed anyone marking a roll, punching a card or scanning the room.

That's because it is. Placing meeting at 9 AM is manipulative way of putting social pressure on people to get in at 9am without making it policy.

In my case it's a very impressive act of manipulation, since I eat breakfast at home before coming in.

I guess I don't see it your way. The word "manipulative" implies two things: first, that I am a dupe. And second, that there is a malicious intent to trick people into doing something against their interest.

I've been at Pivotal for three years. If the intent is malicious, then it's been executed with such universal and flawless attention to detail across every manager and director I've dealt with that I am simply unable to distinguish it from honesty.

Given that it's indistinguishable, I'm just going to pretend I work for and with honest people, no matter how perfect their conspiracy to be nice to me might be.

I dont understand why people hate meetings so much. Meetings are bad only if you are mentally absent in it. If you "decide" to actively participate you can soak in so much of knowledge in such short time. There was times at the beginning of my career when I used to sneak into adhoc meetings of senior tech guys in my team, and got away with quite a lot of info (including some odd stares and "yes, you want anything"? as well !)

Meetings are ok if they have a clear agenda, a goal what should be decided in the meeting and a small focused group of attendants. If all this is true meetings can be very helpful to get some decisions or a better common understanding for a project.

However often meetings are called in without a real goal - just for the sake of having a meeting. Or a large group of people is invited which don't necessarily contribute to the outcome. If any of those are true the meetings can feel like a giant waste of time for the participants. If people feel they are in a waste-of-time meeting they start working on other things in it, e.g. replying to email, .... This makes the attendant group even less focused and the decreases the outcome even more. These kind of meetings often happened to me in bigger projects in corporate environments, where there were weekly meetings scheduled for almost everything.

I'm in a lead role now, and I tried my best to do away with meetings keeping in line the general resentment for meetings among the devs. But, I often see that it's counter productive for the team as a whole in the long run. Without meetings, cross functional discussions screeched to an almost halt, most guys would get deep into their silos not caring about the big picture etc etc. Also, it was a huge pain keeping track of open tickets/tasks as most fail to update progress on a regular basis. In short, I feel, having periodical meetings is far better in the long run for the health of the team as a whole, at-least in practice.

I dislike meetings because they are wildly unproductive most of the time. The vast majority of the time, you could just send a couple emails, rather than disrupting everyone for a half-hour meeting. Also meetings generate a lot of false urgency and stress, which is counter-productive.

And free Kool-Aid in the kitchen apparently, apart from breakfast

Whenever I read some piece about this company advertising its "qualities" I can't help but to turn my eyes

And don't get me wrong, agile is great, pair programming is great, free breakfast sign me up

The real question is what do you lose when you put the process before the people. (Oh wait I remember reading something about this somewhere)

I work for Pivotal. The koolaid is unexpectedly delicious.

I've never worked for an employer that cared more about me as an individual.

How does that work for me? I like to start at 7:30am. By 9:06 my productivity is starting to peak for the day. Yes, I knock off early too.

I imagine there can be exceptions. The rules are meant for productivity - if someone is more productive on a slightly different schedule I imagine they'd be for it, assuming their actual motivations are honest with their claims.

I'm the only one at my company who comes in several hours before opening hours. I also leave several hours before closing. I made a personal request for this and my company obliged.

Ironically, I'm writing this nearing midnight on a Sunday...from work.

@ezl

I'm pretty sure the point of the parent's question was an implied: "If I was an employee there, how would this work for [people like] me?"

I'm pretty sure ezl's answer implied "it wouldn't, and so you shouldn't work there"

it doesn't. companies don't need a system that works for everyone. they need a system that works for their employees.

Pivotal has nearly 100% of developer time spent pairing. This requires entire teams to be in sync on in/out and lunch schedules, else there will be non-pairing time. That's not the end of the world, but most teams don't have code review, favoring the live review of paired development. While at Pivotal, I did observe the rare team with an 8AM start instead of 9, but as far as I know everyone opted into being on an alternative schedule, and it was for out-of-time-zone client work to enable better communication with the client.

Similar for me. My energy buildup starts at 12:00 and peaks at around 19:00-20:00 so I start as late as possible and try to put as much meetings as possible in the morning.

Maybe it doesn't have to work for you? It's a team sport.

This isn't the military, there is no higher purpose or mission. This is about shareholder value. Why sacrifice yourself for some shareholders you've never met in a one-sided deal, when you can just go work for someone who is willing to meet you halfway?

That's my point: go work somewhere else. You can't work in a team that does pair programming and choose to work at different times. It's about culture match. If you don't fit the team, don't expect the team to fit you.

that early is fine if you don't have kids... or have kids who start school at some stupid time like 7am.... my kids don't start school until 8:50... so starting before 9 is completely unrealistic unless i get a massive pay rise to cover child care for 2 kids before school 5 days a week

It used to be fine when I was 100% remote ;). These days the kids are a bit older and I like to be home earlier to be able to hang out with them in the afternevening.

The simple answer is don't work there.

This approach assumes people don't know how they work best so imposes a structure on them that limits the hours worked, makes sure people are fed etc.

I would have thought developers are more likely to have put a lot of thought into how they're most productive. It's a bit patronising imposing something different on people who feel they've figured it out.

I work for Pivotal.

It's not really an imposition.

Many engineers like flexible hours and prefer to work for companies who like that.

Since we pair full time, it's not practical to have flexible start or finish times.

If anything, the "imposition" is committing to pair programming. Many folk don't like it, or don't like the idea of it, and never apply.

I think imposing pair programming 100% is a bit weird. I find pair programming is excellent for some tasks. For simple tasks it's a hindrance.

There are some tasks where soloing is unambiguously better (reading docs springs to mind) or where pairing confers very little advantage (writing a large draft).

Lots of people don't like the idea of pairing by default.

I was skeptical about its utility, except as a way to learn.

But these days I find that I don't want to solo if I can help it. On days when I'm soloing I have to use more ritalin to manage my ADHD than on days when I'm pairing.

I find I have no time to think when I'm pairing. I tend to build experimental abstractions and chop and change them quickly to best fit with the problem, and vocalising what I'm trying to do slows me down 10x - not just is it tedious to explain the bigger picture I have in my mind about the change I'm performing, but while vocalising I don't have time to think further.

And when I'm not at the keyboard, the slowness of my pair and the inelegance of their code - it's hard to formulate the right nudges or wait for their cogs to spin and realise the issues with their approach.

I'd love to work with better programmers, but they're hard to find.

Pairing is a skill, it take practice and not everybody will find it applicable.

When I first learned to drive a car I couldn't talk at the same time.

I definitely agree that it's a skill to be learnt and it's something I enjoy.

Is it really useful to do it all the time though? Like there must sometimes be edge cases where people will achieve more alone, e.g. if it's something simple/repetitive, isn't it more productive to just hammer through?

Sometimes, yes, it would be as effective to solo. But we're reluctant to break pairs because it means the same fan-in/fan-out problem reappears.

So for repetitive stuff we often wind up throwing together something to do it for us.

Additionally, in Pivotal Labs, one goal is to teach the practice of pairing. It works best by total immersion.

By analogy, French teachers try to make the class speak French at all times, even if sometimes it's easier to speak a mix of English and French.

Whenever companies i've worked for have provided breakfast, i've always abstained. I only eat breakfast if i'm going to the gym before work, in which case I eat beforehand. Otherwise I wait until lunch (around 12:30). So it always seems strange when companies offer it as an incentive to get in by a certain time.

> Employees at the US firm's 20 global offices all have to be at work and ready to go at exactly 9.06am

How is it 9.06am for everyone globally? Are they talking about each location's separate stand-up?

It's a poorly-worded sentence.

Each location starts at 9.06am local time.

Disclosure: I work for Pivotal.

They still haven't figured out our pattern of "if you keep me out of a meeting about my project that's the day I'm taking a hour lunch during your hour meeting". So either invite me to the meeting about my project or I'm taking lunch because if you think I'm going to pound away on a keyboard while you learn what to come back and tell me out of context then your wrong.

> So we thought, 'let's provide breakfast for everyone.' It gives them a reason to get here.

Oh well...

For an article that is about the precise time of 9.06am, why use an illustration of a wall-clock that is 18 seconds late? Is it a coded message?

Why do they all show a text editor containing either JS or PHP code?

Curious, honestly.

Having done some shots similar to this...

You have code on the screen. Someone goes: "is that confidential/does it disclose a client/does it disclose any operational security issues/does it have too many swear words" so you go through it all and check. I don't think I've ever found an issue, but.... you have to check. So you do it.

Then they do another shot. So you do it again.

Then by the third time you start going "can you use that shot you took last time"?

Stock image... Do a reverse google image search on it and you'll find lots of articles using it.

They're Getty images stock photos. BBCs human interest articles are full of them.

Yuck.

> all have to be at work and ready to go at exactly 9.06am.

> everyone has to leave the office at 6pm sharp because staff aren't allowed to work into the evening.

I worked for similar company before. It was toxic environment.

nothing motivates people like having their exact hours monitored

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