Lost Job Due to Popular Article [on Software Estimates] | Hacker News Reader

Lost Job Due to Popular Article [on Software Estimates]

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24 pointsebcode21 comments

While this really is a terrible situation I have the following questions:

1. You are clearly working as a contractor, this requires a lot of financial discipline, why do you not have enough runway saved up to deal with this? From personal experience working as a contractor I always ensured I had 6+ months worth of runway.

2. This title inflation is really scary. You are not the CxO of anything if you are a contractor. Unless you mean you are the CxO of your own company through which you contract. However even then the way you conflate your own position in your own company and the role you fulfilled at the client does not inspire confidence.

It is truly terrible that you are in this situation and it is honestly a very horrible thing for this company to do. Either way if it does not breach the contract they have with you then there is nothing illegal about it.

At some point we all need to take a very long hard look at ourselves and realise that crying foul when the wheels come off life is not the answer. People set themselves up to not be able to absorb the terrible things that can happen in life. Some general advice that should serve anyone that is contracting well is:

1. Don't live above your means! 2. Save at least enough money to carry you through 1 year of living expenses should you lose your current contract. 3. Always keep a close eye on the contract market and move contracts regularly. That keeps you interview fit and aware of current demand. 4. Realise that life is not fair and plan for it! Not only do you sometimes get terminated by an employer (rightly or wrongly as they might simply not need your service anymore) but you could have an accident tomorrow that puts you out of work for months. (Believe me I have had such an accident and if I did not follow rules 1 and 2 I would have not been able to relax and recover fully before needing to rush back to work)

Best of luck and I hope that the lessons of this experience does not pass you by.

1: "It looks like you're poor. Being poor is really stupid! You shouldn't be poor. I have a lot of money saved up, and I face much less problems than you do!"

No not at all. If you work as an IT contractor of his calibre you need to assume some personal responsibility for your own finances. If you cannot do that then you cannot cry foul when life throws you a curve ball.

This has nothing to do with someone that is poor or someone caught in poverty and the poverty trap.

Please provide a better argument than making things out to be so simple as poor and not poor. I grew up in the third world, was poor, got an education and built my life. Your comment truly disgusts me as it trivialises poverty and makes it out as if we have no choice in our lot in life.

Could you have possibly put less thought into this comment? If this guy needs 5k to stay afloat for the next month, then he must have been taking home at least that much. He's not poor by any means.

> "It looks like you're poor. Being poor is really stupid! You shouldn't be poor. I have a lot of money saved up, and I face much less problems than you do!"

Being poor is usually stupid if you are earning a lot of money (which most developers are). There are plenty of ways you can go from wealthy to poor (I've done it myself), but if that happens in a 24 hour period then there is probably some very poor financial management going on.

A self-described "CTO / Co-CEO" asking for donations via GoFundMe...

The chances that this was illegal are very low, and generally laws against censorship apply to government and government agencies, not to private businesses.

Beyond that, I hope you get through ok and find a new position soon.

It's not illegal but if the current levels of corporate encroachment into our personal lives continues then this sort of stuff should be made illegal.

Here's a link to his [very weak] article. https://hackernoon.com/the-myth-of-software-time-estimations...

CTO/Co-CEO at DuroSoft Technologies LLC. Principal software developer behind BitFort+Hierarch

That's the company that he worked for I imagine.

> That's the company that he worked for I imagine.

I doubt it, a CxO doesn't get fired like that.

CxOs generally aren't contractors either, I think.

Firing seems to be a major overreaction to that article. I've seen people write really stupid things about their employers but that was reasonably distant.

Needs some milestones, like "will name and shame the company" at $2500. A link to the article would be good too.

Finally, that's some extreme title inflation in the header image their. If you're working for someone you don't deserve a CxO title, especially if you don't have funds to make it through to the next month.

I'm not sure about how contracting works where this guy is, but in the UK if you're contracting you can (generally) be let go by the end of the hour if your management wants it. Nothing illegal about that at all.

Also, I can see how someone who's paying this guy a day rate might not take too kindly to an article written by said day-rater that looks rather like "don't worry about how long you'll be paying for this project". He's asking them to pay that day rate for an undetermined length of time for undetermined outcome.

A good reminder to bank a few month's runway if at all possible.

This. I had a years runway once and still nearly lost the house (going through some personal issues and being unemployed). Made me really glad I had a modest apartment and wasn't up to my eyeballs in debt, I would have lost everything.

And that's why you can't help people unless they are ready to be helped. Because if you do it before, they will hate you or even fire you (only in US?).

> only in US?

Nope, everywhere. Hurt people ego and they will attack you without giving it a second thought.

I'd argue it probably happens less in the US (and the western world) than in many other places with much more strict seniority rules.

I was referring to the firing part, because the law might protect you in some countries. But yes, hate I think is the same everywhere.

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