
Get your work recognized: write a brag document - yesenadam
https://jvns.ca/blog/brag-documents/
======
knolan
For whatever reasons, probably because I don’t say ‘no’ or I’m too arrogant to
say ‘I don’t know’, I’m one of those people who always tries to help.

I don’t keep a brag document but I do keep a folder called People where there
are folders for the people I’ve helped and subfolders for each problem they’ve
come to me with. On one hand it’s useful because I can recycle the code but it
also helps track how I’ve spent my time. I also tried to keep a diary but this
was less successful.

I learned the hard way that being helpful is not always recognised, in fact
I’ve had one manager openly hostile to the idea even if that meant the project
would fail, it annoyed the hell out of me. (This manager came back from his
MBA promoting a Whiplash approach to management and told us to actively
‘destroy’ the other teams in our company so there you go.) This was part of
the reason I moved back to academia, now my job is to help young engineers be
the best they can.

~~~
ssivark
Could you elaborate on how you planned and executed the transition to
academia? Your profile mentions that you lecture in fluid mechanics. Very
curious about what skills/knowledge you could take from your engineering
experience to your teaching.

~~~
knolan
I’m an aeronautical engineer with a PhD in fluid mechanics, there’s not too
much else to say on the transition to academia TBH.

Regarding teaching, my exhaustion with an over dependence on PowerPoint for
every aspect of communication in industry has me rebuilding an introductory
fluid mechanics course in Jupyter with high quality visuals (images and
videos) illustrating important concepts along side simple but useful code
examples.

~~~
abdullahkhalids
Is any part of that online in anyway? I just started as a prof and I am
looking to do as well at teaching as I can.

~~~
knolan
It will all be available on github by the end of August. I’ll post it up here
on HN for the craic.

The challenge is that many of the students really don’t have the first clue
how to really use a computer so getting them to install Python, Scipy and
Jupyter is a big ask. They’ve barely scratched the surface with Matlab, and
I’ve been told that many of them struggle to understand a desktop file system.

Github will render the notebooks and they can copy the URL to Google colab
should they wish to interact with the code. And of course there are detailed
instructions for installing the required tools (and I’m keeping them to a
minimum) on Windows/Mac/Linux for those who have an interest.

The notebooks will also be available as embedded HTML so all the videos,
images and interactive 3D models will just work on whatever device they have.

The idea is to present half the course in this new way and the remainder in
the old way (PowerPoint with redacted equations the students spend their time
carefully copying down and not paying real attention to the discussion). After
the first year I’ll collate the exam results and student feedback and publish
a paper in some teaching and learning journal to share my findings. Hopefully
the response is positive, I’ve put a lot of work into replacing a lot of terse
and often abstract PowerPoint with engaging and detailed content, in
particular I’m really proud of some of the Blender animations I’ve made using
FLIP fluids to illustrate key concepts such as viscosity and surface tension.

~~~
abdullahkhalids
Thanks. Sounds interesting. I will keep an eye out.

------
MaulingMonkey
Consider including screenshots!

A previous job had "monthly" ad hoc desk demos to show off whatever we were
working on to our tech lead. Since I can barely remember what I did yesterday
if my life depended on it, this became a monthly "crawl p4 history and
summarize for myself to summarize for others" routine.

And of course, it's hard to demo when you've just broken your local checkout.
Or touched a common header and need an hour to finish recompiling the entire
codebase. And waiting around all day being conservative with my changes - or
multiple days, in the event of delays or rescheduling - feels like wasted
time.

Slap some screenshots, gifs, or video on an internal wiki and bam - even if
you can't demo in realtime because you broke something or are compiling, you
can still demo. And now you can share it with coworkers who want to build upon
your work, use your tools, etc. as a very easy way to see exactly where you've
hidden the new feature in whatever bespoke thing you're doing!

~~~
leetrout
Where do you work / what do you that you are using p4?

Video games? Or just a large enterprise org?

~~~
jdright
Pretty sure it is videogames. Last bastion of P4, kind of like dinosaurs.

~~~
MaulingMonkey
Yep, videogames.

------
WorkForPizza
"This blog post isn’t just about being promoted or getting raises though. The
ideas here have actually been more useful to me to help me reflect on themes
in my work, what’s important to me, what I’m learning, and what I’d like to be
doing differently."

I just went through and created a brag document for myself. While I'm not sure
I'd show it to my manager, it certainly helped my work get recognized _by me_.
There are a lot of days where I feel I haven't gotten a lot done, and those
tend to overshadow the days I feel productive. Looking back on the past seven
months, I was actually shocked to see how much I've accomplished. I'm going to
try and keep up with this on a monthly basis, because at the very least it
gave my mental health and confidence a little boost.

~~~
patrickyeon
Your manager wants to see this! Do you know what happens if you look good?
Your manager gets to look good too. It is in their interest for you to be a
stellar employee.

------
LifeIsBio
I had heard similar advice before, so when I started a new job this past
spring, I decided to try it out for myself. As I go through the day, I write
down what I’ve accomplished. I closed out a ticket, helped someone fix a bug,
went to a meeting, etc.

I pretty quickly noticed two things. First, I personally find this really
motivating. For no one other than myself, I want to have a satisfying list at
the end of the day. Second, neither I nor my boss are going to find this level
of detail useful in a year. You need some way of aggregating (as the article
mentions) “the big picture” over time. I’ve started using an app to help
hierarchically aggregate these notes per time period, and it’s super useful.

Unfortunately, it’s not in a shareable state yet, but maybe one day. :)

~~~
thrwaway48261
For

>neither I nor my boss are going to find this level of detail useful in a
year.

Actually, if you include copious screenshots, you might find it useful
forever! You could just change your text, to make your screenshots talk about
whatever you wanted to show. Maybe a UX flow observation or suggested change.
Maybe you want to show a UI inconsistency. Or you want to showcase a theme
change between two major versions or when changing some front-end component.
Regardless of why you originally prepared the screenshots, a picture says a
thousand words.

If you want to make your writing perennial, try adding screenshots!

If nothing else it will have historical importance.

~~~
LifeIsBio
Multiple good points here! I should have said “useful in a year without
context.” or something similar. The daily write-ups will always be directly
available from the aggregated summaries. But pictures are another great way of
providing context! Maybe it’s because I’m more of a backend person, but I
haven’t felt a pressing need to add screenshots at work yet. All of the
scenarios you suggested though make it sound like a great idea. Thanks!

------
shrikant
I've been doing this at work for the last 4-5 years, and it's been an
incredibly valuable exercise. In my case, it's just a simple spreadsheet
called "Things Done".

I too have trouble saying "no" when someone asks me to help out, and I decided
to keep track of all the things I do that I think add value, but more
importantly (along some dimensions), things that the people asking me to help
value. I started doing this after I realised that there's lots of stuff that I
take for granted, but that other people find incredibly useful because they're
simply unfamiliar with the domain or technology in question.

I do have the benefit of some relatively trusted senior leadership though, who
help me to summarise and focus this list towards the end of the year so that I
don't end up emphasising the wrong things as part of my year-end summary.

------
Zelphyr
Linden Lab had (still has?) a similar system called “The Love Machine”.
Instead of noting what you did, your peers would recognize you by “sending
love”. There were several ways to do that. One was through IRC where everyone
would hang out when I was there (pre-Slack). You could tell the LoveBot,
“/love username for fixing that annoying bug” and it would get recorded.

Every quarter, bonuses were paid based on how much love you got. It wasn’t
much on average if I recall but it was a nice addition to the recognition.

~~~
ozim
That just seems awful. Popular people would get all bonuses. If something was
done by someone popular, everyone will be quick to send love to that person.
Not so much for shy, always behind his desk guy. Which in turn would make shy
person more frustrated that no one is recognizing his work. Where frustration
could in the end spiral out of control and make good person, but maybe not
popular to be miserable.

~~~
hu3
Yep. In software its common for devs that add features to get all the praise
while bug fixes get no love.

------
vvanders
There's a great variant of this if you work remote.

I send my manager a list of all the things I worked on each day, usually 5-10
items with no expectation of reply or action. Usually takes me no more than
3-4 minutes to write.

This gives him visibility into my day and keeps him in the loop without the
overhead of scheduling a daily sync or 1:1. You can also use them as input
into a brag doc or the like as well.

------
osullip
A simple method for recording achievements is to email yourself.

You can forward a "Thank you!" note from a customer, a "Well done!" from a
manager or email yourself if you do something you are particularly proud of.

------
bpicolo
My company runs twice-yearly performance reviews. In the quarters where we
don't run them, I personally run with my team quarterlies that match well with
this concept. "What have you done in the last 3 months" and "What are you most
proud of in the last 3-6 months" are probably the most important questions on
the list.

This also helps tailor understanding for what the engineers are keen on doing
/ accomplishing.

------
yesenadam
Seems like a great idea for almost any field or work, not just programming-
related. And even for outside work, just life generally, for nobody but
yourself to read (although there's common ground with a CV)--it's not easy to
remember everything you achieved last year, or this year even. Would be nice
to see that on one page (or a few pages). I'm going to try it.

~~~
stellar678
As a homeowner with what seems to be an ever-growing list of projects, I
noticed that I would unceremoniously delete them when complete. The projects
themselves quickly become part of the background of life, so I realized this
deletion was depriving me of the ability to appreciate just how much I do
accomplish.

Now I’ve started moving them to a “done” list, with a date and photos. It’s
not a panacea, but it feels really good and helps build motivation when I
review that list and watch it grow.

~~~
afarrell
I might also suggest putting up pictures somewhere that you can use as a
conversation piece. I know _I_ like hearing people talk about their DIY
projects.

------
DVassallo
I think a valid question to ask yourself is: Why do you want to be recognized?

I believe recognition/praise/rewards/etc are not conducive to lasting
satisfaction. They feel good for a while, but wear off quickly. OTOH, choosing
not to pursue these things is very liberating, and helps you detach your
satisfaction from things outside your control.

~~~
sky_rw
Did you read the article? This is pretty explicitly about performance reviews
at your job, either manager or peer based. Most people would want to be
recognized so that they can keep their job and possibly get a raise. Maybe you
float above us mere mortals and are not victim to such petty things as job
stability and wages to support your family. For the rest of us this kind of
practical advice could be very helpful.

~~~
DVassallo
Yes I read the article.

It depends on what you want. Satisfaction and peace of mind, or an endless
chase for the next reward/recognition/promotion/raise/etc? If the latter, than
it’s very important to be effective at getting your work recognized. But if
the former, why bother?

~~~
sky_rw
Most people would bother with this because they are not in the position to
quit a $500k/year job and brag about it everywhere. Most people don't
subscribe to existential nihilism and need to pay their bills so they can feed
their children and afford better living conditions. Surely this career advice
applies to them as much as to elitist coastal software engineers. In all the
spare time you have not chasing meaningless and temporary satisfaction, maybe
try developing some humility and empathy.

~~~
DVassallo
Obviously money/status matters a lot, but only up to a certain point. Are you
able to feed your children right now? Are you paying your bills? If yes, how
does getting a raise help with that? You can’t feed your children twice. My
point is that we sometimes keep chasing these external rewards without knowing
how much is enough. It’s hard to find lasting satisfaction when nothing is
ever enough.

------
jonnyburch
This is great. I've always found it really hard to remember what I did a month
ago, let alone 5 months ago for my bi-annual (if that) perf review. Even worse
as a manager. Building more of a habit around this stuff would be awesome.
(BTW really recommend James Clear 'Atomic Habits'[0], found it really
interesting.)

We're thinking about building something like this for people to track personal
growth more easily at Progression [0]. Thinking nice pretty exports,
benchmarking, all sorts of other stuff too.

Genuine request, if anyone does this regularly I'd love to speak to you.

[0] [https://jamesclear.com/atomic-habits](https://jamesclear.com/atomic-
habits) [1]
[https://www.progressionapp.com/solo](https://www.progressionapp.com/solo)

------
pletnes
In some consulting businesses, managers want similar up to date documents / CV
when marketing consultants externally to prospective customers. E.g which
projects you’ve worked on etc.

------
mud_dauber
I built a brag doc several years ago while prepping for an interview. I used
it to match the list of expected interview questions - it worked like a champ.
Highly recommended.

------
zigzaggy
This is a good idea. While I’ve built similar documents by request, I never
thought about always keeping one going. Good tip, thank you.

------
jnwatson
I’ve been digging through resumes in the last few weeks. I’d much rather see
one of these brag documents than a boring list of jobs.

------
pythonbase
This is why I started a blog [0] and pushed some repos at GitHub.

0: [https://www.kashifaziz.me](https://www.kashifaziz.me)

~~~
abdullahkhalids
Friendly advice from fellow Pakistani. Your homepage needs about 10x less
words. I looked at it and didn't want to read it at all.

~~~
yesenadam
That made me curious so I looked... I think the problem's more with the
design, the font colours and images, which produce a feeling of sea-sickness.
I don't think the amount of text would be unpleasant to read if those things
were fixed.

------
0xakhil
I am amazed how fast this website loads. Great job!

~~~
ori_b
Turns out it happens naturally when you're light on images, don't include gobs
of JavaScript, and leave out ads.

------
gcatalfamo
Serious question: how do you avoid “overdoing” it? Or getting to narrow with
the scope besides using common sense?

------
realshowbiz
This comes off as desperate.

The sad truth is hardly anyone truly cares what you are doing at work. Really,
think about how much you truly care what your peers do day-to-day.

Your boss and co-workers care about:

a) results

b) not having to deal with bad/negative/pita personalties

c) avoiding crisis

Pull your weight, be helpful, and if you have a boss micromanaging you it’s
time to update the resume, not do more work to justify your existence.

~~~
nlh
“This comes off as desperate”

I think this is exactly wrong. This kind of response is what people often fear
when it comes to self-promotion. And it certainly may be what you fear (but
I’m not you so I can’t say for sure), but I can assure you (and others out
there) that it is not desperate to look after your interests and make sure the
hard work you do - visible and invisible - gets recognized.

What I think you’re saying is addressed by the author in her post - that good
work will automatically be recognized on its merits alone and that it’s
desperate to go above and beyond that.

And in many companies this is the case (and has been since work began). But
the author’s whole point is that it is actually ok - and not desperate - to
make sure your work gets recognized outside the scope of the normal “big
projects get visibility” way things often work out.

~~~
realshowbiz
I respectfully disagree. I think good work and humility speak for themselves.

~~~
afarrell
This is why companies never spend money on advertising.

------
coss
Keep a worklog, preferably on company wiki. Export a backup every so often.

------
spyc
Great idea and article!

------
amelius
What is described here is just an honest list of "things I did" and has
nothing to do with bragging.

It seems that the term "brag document" is only used as clickbait.

Edit: yes the article says it, but the title does not

~~~
yesenadam
The article says:

 _Where I work we call this a “brag document” but I’ve heard other names for
the same concept like “hype document” or “list of stuff I did” :)._

------
z3t4
Could make it a daily blog.

------
acollins1331
I've been doing something like this for the past year or so, I just have a
Google doc called "Workflow". If I encounter an error or problem I've never
seen before, I write the error down, and then the solution (with links if
appropriate). Bold the ones I never solved or had to work around. Put eureaka
moments in italics (oh THATS how it works!?). It helped me a lot because I
would stumble around before that remembering I had this same error or problem
a few weeks or months before, but could not remember how I solved it. I'm much
more productive and it's cool seeing a list of all the things I've solved.
Also, when multiple days go by without and entry you feel really really good.

~~~
mooreds
I do this on my blog. That way everyone benefits.

~~~
acollins1331
With the type of things I put into my work journal I think everyone benefits
by me keeping it private!

------
jxi
This is great advice. It's akin to my manager asking me to write pieces of my
own promo packet throughout the year. It'll also be a great time saver during
review season.

------
lazylizard
Fix the computer -> my job. Remember that i fixed the computer-> his job.

~~~
afarrell
Your manager is a flawed human with lots of reports. If she fails to remember
what you accomplished, who’s life does it impact?

