Ask HN: What have you learned in 2014 so far?
Anything at all.
Mine: You rarely need to under-estimate the time it'll take to do something. Over-estimate and deliver early, you'll earn a lot of credit from people by doing so.
Mine: You rarely need to under-estimate the time it'll take to do something. Over-estimate and deliver early, you'll earn a lot of credit from people by doing so.
What is 1000 times more insidious is very smart, insecure people. You hire people like that and they'd destroy your company from the inside, because they're (probably) affable, do good work and are so good at navigating internal politics that if you're not paying attention they can chase off the type of people you need and quietly toxify your culture without you noticing it.
The problem is that they are out of their depth, but are not used to failure, so they will do anything to avoid looking like they have failed at anything, including abiding criticism, or engaging in things they're unfamiliar with. If you put them in positions of power. Good Night, and good luck.
also, read anti-fragile and fail more often.
Be careful who you trust. Expect the worst from people, most probably that's what you're going to get.
Most people have no clue what they're doing and are simply reacting to situation.
As for the more technical:
Best practices are mostly bullshit. There is no such thing as doing it right.
Analysis paralysis is a silent killer. I've spent the first decade of my professional life learning how to be a better programmer. Seems like I am going to spend the next one learning about compromises and getting shit done.
on the non-technical front, i've learnt i have a problem communicating in the culture i live in (chile) and that this has become critical (because it's affecting my health care). i'm not sure what the fix is yet. though.
also, reading anti-fragile has helped solidify some ideas i've had for a while, but which seemed unconnected.
and today i just learnt that you can't convert raid 1 to 5 and expect the volume group you had layered on top to survive. but i also learnt that my backups worked, so there's that ;o)
Sales and marketing is just as important as the tech side of a product.
* Working in an open-plan office is hard, but not impossible.
* Markdown is even better than I thought it was.