The secretive rise of the 'overemployed'
businessinsider.com
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As long as they perform the tasks of their jobs, why shouldn't they be "getting away with it"?
It's seems as if the "free market" exists only for the companies and bosses.
Speaking from personal experience, my task list is filled with an infinite number of features to implement and bugs to fix. It's a dynamic landscape that changes with every new technology, user feedback, or market demand. It's not something that can be completed within a set timeframe, rather it's a continuous process of improvement and adaptation.
For paid work, it's mandatory. Companies do planning, sprints, tasks, prioritization and so on.
Else it's not software development, is an infinite pile of random tasks.
This approach seems to only be effective if one team member significantly outperforms the rest. If a company's sprint is easily manageable, does this suggest that the team size should be reduced, potentially leading to layoffs?
Or, god forbid, that it reached an optimal work/life balance for team members, while still hitting specific company targets, and should be left as is.
To answer your question: no, it doesn't imply[1] that.
Your comments suggest you have a mental model of markets where workers should be rewarded (compensated) by the employer for their toil instead of producing value. That's bad business. It's especially bad business when the reaction is a campaign to realign the organization with an a priori interest in making sure it employs only toilers.
> If a company's sprint is easily manageable, does this suggest that the team size should be reduced, potentially leading to layoffs?
"Should" from the perspective of whom? You're running on a platform of wealth concentration for business owners. Predatory value extraction. Parasitism instead of symbiosis. <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37472726>
Ignoring that, if management has so little idea what workers' output should look like that they resort to basing their assessments on how much it seems to hurt to the worker, then the business should consider focusing on management when deciding who to let go.
Seriously though... this is ridiculous but it's 100% the fault of the employer for over-hiring and bad management.
Curious how you would measure whether they are "performing the tasks for their jobs". I think most folks would say that measuring SE output is very difficult to do and as such, most managers give their team the benefit of the doubt that they are working at a reasonable but sustainable pace.
I am not sure that I personally would want to work at a place that places huge emphasis on measuring my output, even if that would free me up for potential OE. It seems like this thinking leads to a commoditization of software engineering work and promotes a very transactional relationship with an employer.
Ive noticed that the places where people do tend to be the ones where 5x productivity is rewarded with 1x the pay and a pat on the back, which is more common than the more rational 5x pay for 5x productivity.
If that is the case then the rational economic agent (a developer) operating in a free market will find an outlet for that productivity that produces material gains in line with their increased productivity.
Assign engineer 4 stories due this sprint. After a few days, 1 story is done. After a few more 2 more are done. Before the end of the sprint, the last story is done. All 4 stories are demonstrable. All 4 stories pass peer review. Engineer is even around for brainstorm sessions and ceremonies.
Some places go a lot further than this but this is my personal bar as a manager. That you're in standup, that you're doing the work, and that the work doesn't require rework and is accepted by the team.
1. This assumes that that a someone can/will usually accurately scope 4 stories, with proper requirements, and clear peer review standards. In practice, this can be hard to do and inconsistent.
2. If someone falls behind on their assigned story quota, how would a manager know whether that is because the story didn't meet the criteria in item 1, or because the person isn't putting in sufficient effort because of OE or other commitments? How I typically see this play out is most people assume that its not related to effort and try to work with the employee to push back deadlines and better refine the story.
They could expect to know the reason this happened (e.g. prerequisite not ready, this design issue is not solvable so we're testing alternatives, etc.).
And if it happens often, they can always fire the person.
To return your own question: "If someone falls behind on their assigned story quota, how would a manager know whether that is because the story didn't meet the criteria in item 1, or because the person isn't putting in sufficient effort?"
Whether that's because they just slack off, or because they don't have the skills so everything takes extra time even though they work hard, or because of "OE or other commitments" is irrelevant, isn't it?
Besides, it is not just "other employment" that would have such a concern. The same is true for e.g. trying to build a personal startup MVP on your spare time or building a simpler passive income side-gig, both things which HN crowd loves, and which employees should totally be allowed to have (and lots of IT success stories wouldn't be possible if they weren't).
I highly suggest you focus on this rather than "are they doing the work?". Having accurate estimates and proper scoping of stories is vital to predicting releases and maintaining a road map. If you feel your org is lacking in this, I would focus on this first. As engineers, we need to scope multiple things into the story. Development, Testing, Deployment needs, Documentation. It's not just a "ticket" to do "x". Story points are complexity metrics. Not man hours. Don't feel like you need to complete Y story points to be effective. Story points are relative. Which brings me to your second point.
>"2. If someone falls behind on their assigned story quota, how would a manager know whether that is because the story didn't meet the criteria in item 1, or because the person isn't putting in sufficient effort because of OE or other commitments?"
Quota is why you fail. There isn't a quota. There isn't a set number of stories a person should do. Only what they are capable of. Also, one 8 point story is probably worth more business value than eight 1 point stories. Not always, but usually.
You can measure an individual's contribution to velocity, you can measure an individual's number of stories completed. However, neither of these are metrics of whether that individual is providing business value.
To measure whether an engineer is pulling their weight, talk to the other members of the team about work deliverables. You'll know pretty soon whether or not that individual is supporting the team (and thus may have lower story point totals) or is just absent from the discussions.
You can NOT justify firing someone simply because they have another job, so long as it doesn't interfere with their duties or is during the same hours if hourly. At least not in the USA. There is no law against moonlighting so long as there isn't a conflict of interest.
I mean, you can exercise at-will employment and just fire them because you feel like it, but your reputation will tank.
I know employers want to trap their employees into working just 1 job, 1 career, for 50 years, with no strings attached, and no pension to offer, but the reality is many of us have to work two or more jobs because we can't afford our mortgage or need to pay off those predatory student loans we were promised would be eliminated but weren't.
So here's my take. If you suspect someone is working more than one job, be an adult and have a 1:1 and ask them about it. Ask them what you can do for them to have them commit to only working for you. If you are offended that they dare work two jobs when you believe the company is providing more than enough, I bet you don't have a 7% mortgage.
Instead of leading with the stick, try the carrot. Empathy will go a long way.
However, an organization's goals, and its expectations of what it can and requires to achieve, as well as how long it will take, are dynamic. That means its representatives decide what those goals are. If I can convince my boss/skip/what-have-you that certain goals will require more time and more resources, then I can stretch their expectations into the future in such a way that they benefit my ends.
So long as my boss's expectations are met, then I am "getting the job done."
No different than if my boss decides to press screws into my thumbs on another "top priority project that needs to be done ASAP" to put pressure on me so that he can achieve his goals.
So perhaps a better way to measure productivity -- if we are to put a word to it -- is from the age-old intuitive standpoint: does it feel like we are moving closer to, and achieving, our goals? I think an approach any more concrete or systematic than that is just a tool for gaining leverage in the aforementioned negotiations.
Ahh, that feel word. I love it. Management conveniently also wants to make you _feel_ heard and _feel_ like that promotion is just around the corner.
It's been months and I received the same answer when I asked.
They're also actively hiring to expand our team and the upper end for the same role is 50k more than I'm currently getting.
When we hire someone new I'm definitely inquiring how much they're getting... It's unfortunate companies treat people this way.
Outside of this salary nonsense it's an overall good place to work though and a pretty cush job. Just frustrating that loyalty is punished because it can be.
This (unfortunately not so uncommon) hand wringing around reducing employment to a "transactional relationship" seems crushingly naive.
Close examination shows that this is just a covert way of saying: a manager, tasked with figuring out whether other people are doing their jobs, decides that the best course of action is to not do his.*
> Curious how you would measure whether they are "performing the tasks for their jobs"
What is this, a public referendum? Another way to offload the costs of working out how to make a given business successful onto others? It depends on the business. And it's work that needs to be undertaken (and the associated costs borne) by the business itself.
*(Only time in my life I've ever gone for the gender-specific rather than the neutral "his or her" or "theirs". The phrasing doesn't seem to work as well another way, though.)
First the product manager should have some tasks in mind (e.g. get the new product X to ship), and an idea of a realistic workload to be done in X time.
No task should be given without a timeframe (which can be flexible or less flexible) for its completion in mind. When tasks are done give the next task+timeframes bunch. This can include new features, refactoring, and code-debt fixup tasks.
As long as those conditions are met, it should be no problem to see if they're "doing their job" or are getting behind etc.
If what they want is: "let's keep this person occypied to 100% capacity, giving them arbitrary new tasks or even busywork in a constant feed where everything has to be done ASAP with no timeframe in mind", it wouldn't work. But that's a slave ship, not a software planning process. Even factory production lines have specific quota to hit.
>I think most folks would say that measuring SE output is very difficult to do and as such, most managers give their team the benefit of the doubt that they are working at a reasonable but sustainable pace.
Well, they shouldn't measure SE output with anything expect whether their targets are met. If they find those targets are too lax, it's not them that they agreed to them. If targets slip, the developer should have a reason -- specific issues preventing it, waiting for other part to complet, an unexepected hard problem, etc.
How do you measure performance? Every job has some sort of performance standards. My manager outlines ine every year and I have an annual performance review (and a mid-period one at six months). If I am not performing up to expectations, I will hear about it.
All relationships with employers must be transactional. Or rather, they are transactional. You either know it or you don't. You're getting compensated to perform duties. Or you're getting compensated for time. Or you're getting compensated for expertise. The entire relationship exists for the sake of mutual benefit in a clear agreement of terms.
Pulling this stuff off usually requires a tremendous amount of lying and deceit.
I'm sure people exist with that don't ask don't tell situation, but I don't think it's the norm
I'd say it depends a lot on the legal framework of employment contracts. I don't know how it is in the US, but in Germany you sign a contract with your employer stating „I will work X hours a week for you“. It's not about the output.
If you work less than X hours, you commit fraud and breach the contract. Your employer can then fire you for an „important cause” and typical legal protections don't apply. If your employer forces you to work more than X hours without compensating you appropriately, he breaches the contract and you can sue him for that.
So obviously, there have been a lot of legal cases like „Does changing your clothes count as working hours“, „Does driving to a client count as working hours“, „How do working hours need to be tracked“,...
I'd rather sign up for a salary and time blocks during the day to be available for meetings, but my contribution is measured in output, not hours I logged.
If I take 40+ hours to do my work, that's on me.
You get $X/year whether the company gives you so little work you're only working 20 hours a week, or if they give you so much that you're working 60 hours a week. Neither is forbidden by typical contracts.
Some salaried workers are supposed to be paid overtime if they work over 40 hours, but I don't think I've ever heard of it actually happening. Most salaried employees don't even have timecards.
Theres an underlying argument about whether it's okay for employees to try to only work 20 hours a week if it's okay for businesses to try to get them to work 60. Basically that we should either have something like Germany does that limits both sides, or both sides should be free to try to screw the other. A lot of people find it acceptable for companies to try to overwork people, but not acceptable for employees to slouch off.
Unless you're actively informing your employer that you're blocked or not being assigned enough work, there's an implication that your output is the product of full-time hours.
You could probably get away with it for a time, since it's hard to validate that and there's a default expectation of good faith. Either way, it's essentially (if not actually) fraud. You can't negotiate a certain price for a certain expected value based on your resume and interview performance, and then intentionally deliver a fraction of that value. If you think an employer would be happy with that, then why not try and negotiate the same compensation for a part-time role? Or work as a contractor with a fixed price for each task, and then beat every time estimate to earn a higher effective hourly rate? Or simply provide notice partway into the engagement that you feel you've been delivering more value than your current level of compensation would justify, and therefore will be reducing your time commitment?
You're free to sell your services in whatever way you'd like on the free market. The problem is when you enter into an agreement to sell them in a particular way, and then fail to deliver on that while deceiving the other party into believing otherwise.
Uh, they can. You're talking about price-setting; if you bill by the hour and charge X USD, then feel free to set your price at 3X USD instead. That's how agreements work.
Unless by 3x multiplier you mean, "tell them I charge X USD per hour and then when the time comes even though I only worked 13 hours in a given week I'll claim to have worked 39", in which case that's, you know, fraud.
> You can't negotiate a certain price for a certain expected value based on your resume and interview performance, and then intentionally deliver a fraction of that value.
Non-sequitur. Either that, or you're not really talking about value, but you're still using that word anyway.
Yes, that's literally what I said.
If you think you're entitled to a higher rate, charge a higher rate. Don't lie about the amount of work you did.
In addition to playing it loose with the word "value" you have a broad definition of "literally". What you literally said is what I quoted, "why shouldn't lawyers and other high-skill hourly workers add a 3x multiplier to their reported hours". And the answer in the latter case is simple (and given): because it's fraud.
> Don't lie about the amount of work you did.
Another non-sequitur.
Don't put onions in my coffee. Don't drive on the wrong side of the road.
No kidding?
Just because someone can get off with something doesn't mean they should or if it would be good for society for everyone to act that way.
So it sounds like some of this overemployment noise is just the classic moonlighting on the side.
Interesting take. Having multiple jobs makes each one disposable, leveling the ordinary, tilted relationship between companies and workers, in which the company treats employees as fungible and the employee has to take it. In that sense it seems more honest and equitable to me than the jobs I've had.
For me, when I don't have enough work to fill a day, my reaction is not "gosh, I'd better find more work," it's "I'll go read a book, or work on a project". I'm financially secure, with no family to support. I can't imagine wanting to work more in exchange for more money, and if I get laid off I've got savings to cover it. I have no issue with what these people are doing, but I doubt I'd ever join them.
The alternative is that workers should own their own work versus waiting to be told what to do, which is what is being proposed here. But apparently you think that's a management issue.
I'm now realizing nobody really knows what they want their manager to do
It's also a bit weird to look down on "double dipping" at the individual level but we work in an industry that aspires to do as little as possible and maximize profit at the company level as much as possible.
Many of our employers have or want to have business models where they sell software subscriptions and maximize the revenue for writing the software once. If your employer manages to sell 2x as many subscriptions for the same work, then they're smart and have a great business model. If a person figures out how to juggle several jobs, they're double dipping.
Note: I was brought up to believe in 40 hours work for 40 hours pay, etc. I still believe that, and I wouldn't short my employer in order to hold a second job. But I have held full time jobs plus doing writing on the side. If the view is that a salary entitles an employer to every single productive second of my time, that salary better be amazing.
If someone in that situation started signaling they have free time, they'd likely get assigned to shovel more features rather than fixing debt.
"loyalty" is a two-way street.
Once I worked for a "huge company", where I had gotten 4 patents, increased revenue, added value, started & led a new global team, taught the hard stuff to more junior members, great reviews, blah blah blah.
Then I got laid off. Found another job pretty quick. couple months later the "huge company" realized they screwed up and tried to "rehire" several of us back. To a man, we all said: "Why should I even want to work for a place that fired me?"
So don't talk to me about "Loyalty".
BTW, doing your day job from 9-5, then doing outside "contract work", "consulting work" or independant stuff like running a PC storefront or Web design has been going on forever ... nothing new here, move along, move along...
Honestly, if you're fully remote and don't have any commute, that sort of thing is quite doable if that's how you want to spend your time.
Beats "working" 3 or 4 jobs and spending over 40 hours a week doing so.
Sincerely,
-CEO of V
-Board member of W
-Board member of Y
-Director of dishonest charitable foundation Z
*Reminder, I'll be out of the country 11/17 - 1/15, taking the entirety of our extended family to Bali. Love, peace, and prosperity to all!
Similarly, I think people have the right to optimize their time and income. Of course, it can be made illegal through your employment contract. So just like big corporations, you need to include the possibility of a lawsuit and a fine into your expected outcome calculations.
Having been both an IC and a manager at one of the FAANGs, it's not unimaginable to me that there will be people who can pull off two jobs and still get more done than average.
Personally, I'm not sure whether it's an optimal strategy. You might be better off getting promoted really fast, if you feel you have the opportunity.
But I won't judge.
The only purpose of larping fantasies like this is to create outrage and boost view counts on these online newspapers.
The best thing you can do is really not to click on that link.
If we are allowed whataboutism why is there no write up piece on board members seat collectors and C-level execs?
I guess I can appreciate the OE hustle, but that's just a super minority of remote workers and we all know that one bad apple ruins the bunch. Most of us just want to earn a decent living and do some good work, same as always.
Beyond BI, check out news on LinkedIn. The latest i read was something like, "Is remote work more harmful to women getting ahead in the workplace?"
There's clearly an agenda out there and we need to be vigilant on calling the BS out.
Because "There's some sleight of hand at play[...] in the employer/employee relationship (favoring the employer)."
Is that legal? It's certainly not 'the market' at work, or working well, but simply corporations monopolizing peoples productive hours, even those not actually part of the job, with an 'exclusive contract'.
'Employment' is a bit of a racket IMHO, so any way of getting out from under the thumb should be encouraged.
E.g., if you wrote very similar web code for both Meta and Tinder and one of them noticed and sued the other for copyright infringement things could get awkward.
The math does not add up.
One full time job is 8 hours per day (added: often more, as this is in IT). 3 x 8 = 24. There are no more than 24 hours in a day. This leaves no time for rest, eating, etc...
I say that because I'm aggressively not a good engineer. When I joined FAANG years ago I couldn't get hired as an engineer. I joined the company working in Operations and both myself and that side of the house benefited from me being able to script out automation or describe to internal Eng exactly what needed to be built. I chose to not role as an engineer to work at FAANG.
While there, I watched the quality of hiring erode drastically over the years. With that, came a lot of super mid employees including on the business side who were frankly extremely entitled and felt like they had justified that they were actually great hires because they worked at MANGA. That shift was really quite annoying to be around, since it became a game of B players hiring C players hiring D players.
Leetcode is fucking awful though, I'm confident that if you could solve "hiring incredible engineers" you'd have a great business venture. Also, I don't want to say that the hiring market isn't tougher than before right now, but maybe that it is a good thing that will push qualified engineers to companies that can't pay MANGA salaries and where they'll be very valued.
What? The period of the pandemic was when every software company was hiring like their lives depended on it