On Heroku and 2012
kennethreitz.org
kennethreitz.org
I love this. I've been learning recently that one of my chief sources of stress is feeling pinched for time. Mainly from feeling like I'm not getting as much done as I need to (I'm a cofounder of a bootstrapped startup). But what I've discovered is that if I relax, and enjoy the feeling of progress as it happens, I can be much more excited about work. And a much happier person.
And, somewhat ironically, extra motivation kicks in and I'm pretty sure I wind up getting more done.
That one line from Kenneth sums up the entire glorious contradiction in a way that makes sense.
If you are such an employer, please consider setting a realistic expectation of what is an appropriate amount of time-off. If there really is no limit, then please consider more intensive training with regard to your company's culture .
Number 3 was the worst. Passionate people will burn themselves out if you don't setup some sort of "vacation monitoring". We liked the idea of making that explicit: lots of vacation, and rules that force you to use them regularly.
In the end we went for 2+1 weeks on the first year, and 3+2 weeks after that.
Let's face it: american companies are not productive over thanksgiving and christmas. They just pretend to be. By making these 2 weeks vacation, we simply embrace reality.
I'm not 100% certain this would work in a bigger company where people think of it as "just a job". But in a small team where everybody is passionate and eager to make it successful, it works great.
Or maybe the 2+1 was for the first year you were a company, as opposed to individual's tenure?
1) The 1st year at dotCloud is a big step for us, and a lot of people didn't make it in the past. Making it means that somebody has truly proven his worth (since he or she wasn't fired) and has adapted to our unusual culture (since he or she didn't resign). By attaching perks like this to the anniversary, we emphasize its importance.
2) We don't want people to join for the vacation. We take a lot of breaks because that's what intense, hard-working people need to avoid burnout. But the majority of people on the job market are not hard-working and intense enough for our standards - we're hoping this will help us filter for them.
Fortunately, at my current company, when we switched to "unlimited" there was an added "and you're expected to take a minimum of 3 weeks per year". So, while the upper bound is still completely nebulous, by setting a reasonable minimum, it's clear they're not just trying to screw anyone over.
At Heroku, we are actively encouraged to take vacation. There has actually been talk of building something to track employee vacation time, to ensure that everyone is taking enough :)
Even though one might take comfort in a de jure number of vacation days, frankly, it seems to me that if one exists in a toxic culture when it comes to vacation no amount of policy is likely to make the situation much better. In the pathological case, it gets lost entirely from over-accrual or turned into a cash payout.
Another way to look at the vacation day policies is they are mostly a reflection of the work/vacation culture, not the cause of it. And in that respect, such a strategy makes it harder to evaluate an employer's gestalt attitude towards vacation. Too bad it comes with a bitter pill of accounting work for all involved.
For what it's worth: Heroku is my current and has been for a couple of years, and I take vacation, and have been reminded to do so. I'd say about 25 days/annum. I've not kept count, but I can think to some of the bigger-ticket travel making up most of that, so if there is a mis-estimation it is not vast.
What works much better is to just decide on what's an acceptable amount of vacation, say 3 weeks, and tell everyone that's what they get; take it or leave it.
This advice or its cousins are found in many places around here and, well, I have a bad feeling about it. Is it not the epitome of egoism?
Is it possible to share a house with friends, or a spouse, or your kids, without ever "doing something you don't want to do"?
And in professional life, if you are a janitor, do you "want" to clean this toilets again? If you are a coder, you will do your share of boring work because you are in a team, right? And if you are a Big Boss, do you really want to fire this poor guy who is no fit here, will be no fit in no company you can think of, and has had already his content of shit on the head?
Even a painter, or a writer, or a comics guy like Mr Oatmeal have to do sometimes some things they do not "want" to do, professionally
The only people who really can avoid doing anything they do not want to do for a long period of time are the movie superstars and kids of some people of power. I do not think they represent a suitable ideal of life, and I do not think they are more happy than more normal poeple, quite the opposite in fact.
Then there are a few short-lived exceptions, a little slice of a life that is mostly free from hassles of any sort. I experienced this state during a few months myself: I got fired from a boring job, so I had the nice French wellfare and got 70% income for nothing. I also broke with my gf. At that time nobody counted in my life, I could and I did take risks, like getting involved in knife fight. I remember the only thing I did that I did not want to do was to take the train and join my parents to meet my grand-parents. for some important occasion. I actually had to wake up early and shave... But that's not real life, that's a short and egoistic period of my life. It has been somewhat useful in build my experience, but I'd not say I was happy. And most important is I would not make a general advice out of it. Only very few people in the world are lucky enough to find themselves with no professional or familial bounds and enough money to live free-wheeling for some month.
Or maybe the split is on another line: If young Americans can claim to never do what they do not want to do, maybe it is because they use autosuggestion, also known as The Coué method* , to make themselves "want" to do what they really just "have" to do. Using autosuggestion, I could proactively "want" to clean my toddler's diapers, or smile candidly and listen to this friend's spouse, while at the same time, deep in my heart, knowing she is really the boringest person in the world and I'd rather lick the streets than listen to her blabla (but I really like this friend, would not like to lose him...)
So yes, with autosuggestion, it is possible to force oneself to love to do what we hate to do, and it is most likely what many people do. But then, you'd have to balance carefully, because it is cheating, it is lying to oneself, and pushed too far it can become a poison, I guess.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89mile_Cou%C3%A9#The_Cou.C3...
I think you're right, but the author probably did not mean the advice as literally as you're reading it. You're interpreting the advice as a call for egoism [0]; selfishness to the point of being unwise. I think that when people write this, they're actually writing a call for hedonism[1].
Hedonism is different from egoism. Hedonism, the way I see it, is realizing that our existence is ultimately meaningless, and that we should optimize for our own happiness (and well-being) rather than any other metric; all metrics are meaningless, so we might as well stick to what makes us happy. In actionable terms, embracing hedonism means realizing that you should aim towards doing things that make you happy, and that this aim should be your guiding force (at every "single moment in life"). This doesn't mean that you should be happy every single moment; it means you should be optimizing for happiness every single moment. (To use your examples: a spouse knows that compromising will make them happier overall; a janitor knows that although his/her life aren't perfect, doing this is what will lead to his/her life improving (hopefully) or at least keeping them happier.)
Anyway, that's the way I understand this type of advice, and I appreciate the occasional reminders. (Also, I don't actually know much about philosophy, so I might be misusing terminology here; if so, please correct me!)
[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_egoism (maybe?)
You shall not want to do something that you would not want others to be allowed to do. (Eg: you cannot want to kill people for fun in the streets. That's a Kantian principle, IIRC)
You should better have a long-term perspective on what you want to do, and why. If you are tooth ache, your primary self probably do not "want" to go to dentist, but your reasonable self tells you that you have to do it, even without any immediate wishes to go.
Even if you were Xi Jinping or Obama, you cannot control everything you wish to control. The stoistic advice works here: you should do all you can to prepare yourself a nice cruise (or life), but once on the boat, you can't help if you are caught in a storm and should better shut up than complain.
An example is marriage+kids: you should probably jump carefully on this little boat, but once in, better eat your hat than jump overboard at the first annoyance.
I get what you and the OP mean, but I think there's an implicit cost that we're willing to pay in this case.
Do I want to take out the trash? Not always, but I want to live with the people I live with more than I don't want to take out the trash, so I take out the trash. It's probably more complicated psychologically than that, but I'm sure OP would agree.
Trying to convince yourself you're not unhappy is very different than pushing away anything that makes you unhappy. Just my take :)
Like lots of hard problems in real life, it's basically one of predicting the future: which option will result in more happiness later?
As long as you have the power to change it, don't spend a single moment in life doing something you don't want to do.
I think it's a call to action and relates to mustering the will to do what really matters.
It's great to read posts like this. Learning Python, or any modern language for that matter, can lead to a lot more in life than just web apps and server scripts. In this case it lead to 8 countries visited in a single year and countless handshakes.
Great advice. I often forget names and the stress and/or guilt is the worst part.
We have our own office, we're keeping our brand, and we operate the business as we see fit.
We're 2 years into the acquisition with no signs of that relationship changing anytime soon.