
The Art of Not Working at Work - jamessun
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/11/the-art-of-not-working-at-work/382121/?single_page=true
======
IvyMike
It's a problem that's hard to solve: since the amount of work ebbs and flows,
how do you keep your staff busy for 40 hours a week?

Some companies drastically overcommit on a permanent basis, so that 40 hours
is the minimum anyone's ever scheduled for, and when there's a lot of work,
everyone's on massive overtime. These jobs can suck--these are the ones where
you can end up working 100+ hour weeks on occasion, and 80+ hour weeks for
months on end. Ironically, I find these are also the places where people are
most likely to "look busy" in an attempt to protect themselves.

Some companies overcommit on a short-term basis, but make an attempt to
average 40 hours in the long term. A lot better, and _way_ less likely to burn
people out, but still periods of suckiness. But there's a lot less need to
look busy--and there will be periods of undertime, where people are just kind
of dicking around.

The best job I ever had, the manager attempted to commit to 40 hours of work
during peak times. But during down times, instead of letting us idle, he had
us actively work on infrastructure and self-improvement. Build better tools,
evaluate new tools, benchmark things, upgrade things, document things, etc. He
was good at making this productive, and not "busy-work" (which is the
pitfall). As time went on, these investments paid off, and we got faster and
better and our 40 hours of work went a long way. And as far as I can tell,
nobody ever attempted to "look busy", as the actual job was enjoyable. Sadly,
this could not last, and when the dotcom crash took us down the group was
dissolved. :(

~~~
ma2rten
I don't understand this post.

Either you work for a consultency-type company that develops products for
customers, but those don't really have infrastructure, right?

OR you work for a company that has it's own product, in that case, you can
always work on more features or there are more bugs to fix.

~~~
nilkn
In a company of any complexity there are going to be projects that can't
really be tackled by one person in total isolation. Whenever explicit teamwork
and collaboration are required, scheduling conflicts become possible.

~~~
neolefty
> The best job I ever had, the manager ... during down times ... had us
> actively work on infrastructure and self-improvement.

It sounds like there was some coordination & direction going on -- it didn't
just happen automatically.

------
enraged_camel
At my previous employer I was part of the most productive department in the
entire company. A new CIO was hired and the crazy policies he put in place
drove half of my team, including myself, to quit. During my exit interview I
got a chance to have a candid chat with him. Here's a snippet:

CIO: So why are you leaving?

Me: Because we are -- _were_ \-- the most productive team by far and you are
doing your best to run it into the ground.

CIO: The most productive team? Please. The IT department ran reports that
showed your team spends the most time surfing the Internet.

Me: Obviously. That's an indication of the nature of our work: we spend three
to four hours everyday in deep concentration and do lighter work the rest of
the time, and that inevitably involves Internet usage. Look at the results
we--

CIO: Wait, hold on... so what you're saying is that your team is at
approximately %40 productivity?!?!

Me: No, we're at over 90% productivity because no one can "produce" our output
for eight hours straight five days a week unless they are on Adderall!

\---

Unfortunately I couldn't get it through his head that it's just not realistic
to expect people to be productive every minute of every day. His mentality was
straight up, "if you're clocked in you should be _working_ ," which may be
realistic for assembly line workers, but what is commonly called "knowledge
work" happens in spurts (when people are in the "zone") and that's OK.

~~~
zobzu
This dude consequently never worked as a "worker" obviously. Thus your
decision to quit is perfectly sound.

------
calinet6
The problem with work is a lack of purpose, and a lack of knowledge about how
to build it.

Every person wants to feel that the work that they do is meaningful. Find me a
person who says they truly desire for their work—for the majority of their
contributions in life—to have no purpose. We all desire it.

So the problem, then, is: how do we create a purposeful workplace?

Most workplaces operate under a complex inhuman chaos that easily leads to
malaise and disengagement. The problems are cultural, structural, and endemic:
infighting, passive aggressive behavior, individuality, game playing, ladder
climbing, loss of motivation, complacency, self-interest, and more.

These are a consequence of an organization which fails to think
systematically, fails to understand human psychology, fails to base their work
methods on real knowledge, and fails to understand the statistics behind all
components human or otherwise.

In essence, organizations that fail to achieve systemic quality through these
means are the ones which fail to achieve purpose. Aim to improve the system,
and the end result and the structure under which it's produced improves as a
side effect.

It is pure and almost zen-like in its simplicity, but instead, lacking the
necessary knowledge and the means to implement it, most corporate environments
devolve into a haystack of individual-focused complexity, which leads to the
dark center of corporate culture which we all dread: the one which robs our
work of purpose.

Improve the system, understand how every part of it works, and improve
everything. Begin at Deming:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming)

~~~
rdtsc
Things that can kill the workplace environment (some I've seen, others I've
heard about during the years from acquintances):

* Performance metrics that are too exact, defined or constrained. Where everyone turns to gaming them. Your peers' input becomes the crucial factor in your raise? "Ok, start rubbing everyone's back. Don't challange stupid decisions to avoid not being a "team player". Start seeing people let bugs slide so they can "save the day". Other stupid thing is "lines of code written and/or bugs squashed" \-- Start seeing large files stretched out with useless drivel. Or stupid little bugs created and squashed to boost stats.

* Management failure. Micro-managing. Breathing down people's necks.

* Management failure. Too macro-managing. Disappear for days without letting others know. Assign projects then never check up on them later.

* Management failure. Encourage in-fighting by assigning conflicting projects to people (tell Steve to make it blue, and then tell Joe to make the button green).

* Management failure. Strategic decisions, product features are made and discussed in secret then ordered are sent from above to the workers. Workers don't know what the end goal is, just that they need to build this GUI or this Web page that does this one thing.

~~~
zobzu
all of these are sadly true and happening frequently.pretty sure the company i
work for went through all these phases and more after having been a little
successful. (so now it dies slowly i guess?)

~~~
calinet6
Why yes, this is how companies die.

------
GuiA
_> Everywhere we look, technology is replacing human labor. In OECD countries,
productivity has more than doubled since the '70s. Yet there has been no
perceptible movement to reduce workers' hours in relation to this increased
productivity; instead, the virtues of "creating jobs" are trumpeted by both
Democrats and Republicans._

When the first laws for 40 hour workweeks (or 35 hours, for countries like
France) were passed, almost half a century ago, they were seen as stepping
stones to shorter workweeks- the goal was to go down to 30, then 20, and maybe
at some point in the year 2020 we'd only work one day a week.

Well, turns out that's not how it turned out.

~~~
yodsanklai
France switched from 39 hours to 35 hours per week about 15 years ago. This is
still very controversial and right-wings parties would like to somehow revert
the change.

~~~
GuiA
Sure, and right wing parties also want to tear down the banlieues and send all
the "immigrants" "back home". At this point "les 35 heures" is so engrained in
French society that going back is practically impossible.

~~~
jmnicolas
Right wing doesn't mean far right. What you describe is the (non official)
program of the far right "Front National" not the normal right wing "UMP".

~~~
barnaby
Have you seen the election results in France recently? FN might as well be
called the "normal right" in France at this point.

------
hammock
Further reading:

[http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/](http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/)

[http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2014/09/17/we-have-them-
surrounded...](http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2014/09/17/we-have-them-surrounded-
in-their-tanks/)

[http://nydwracu.wordpress.com/2013/10/28/transcript-
balaji-s...](http://nydwracu.wordpress.com/2013/10/28/transcript-balaji-
srinivasan-on-silicon-valleys-ultimate-exit/)

~~~
tomaskafka
+1 for linking Venkat's blog!

I add this epic series: [http://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-
principle/](http://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/)

Edit: Lol, Gervais Principle is linked two more times down the page. Obviously
relevant :))

------
overgard
I think in large part, automation/technology has made most work unimportant. I
mean, remember how people used to have secretaries? Now that's a luxury for
only the elite. And it makes sense, when you have email and voicemail and so
on, you don't really need a secretary. Nice to have, sure, but that's a job
that technology has pretty much marginalized.

I wish I had a reference, but I remember reading a story about a steel mill
that has like 1/5th the workforce it did 30 years ago, but is producing the
same volume. That's one example, but I really don't think it's isolated.
Everything is getting more efficient. There's this notion that more efficiency
always creates more opportunity, but I find that idea suspect. Sometimes,
sure, but at a certain point, sometimes things are just good enough.

Even knowledge work is susceptible. On one hand, it's great that things like
programming are becoming a lot easier, but on the other hand, if your
programmers are 10x more productive in Ruby than they are in C... well you
probably don't need as many programmers. Remember the great recession? I think
one of the interesting things that happened there is that a lot of jobs got
eliminated out of necessity... and then they never really came back. The
popular opinion is to blame a weak economy and I'm sure that's a factor, but I
think a lot of it was, companies got rid of those people and then realized
they didn't really need them.

The problem is, society hasn't caught up. So everyone feels the need to prove
they're doing /something/, and firing someone is an awful experience, so I
think most people are employed because they have to be employed, and because
their employers don't really want to have to cut them loose unless they have
to.

Even startups aren't really immune to this. Sure they have to be lean, but how
many startup exist because the founders think they need to be doing, well,
something.

~~~
sswaner
Nucor Steel. High tech and highly engaged employees driven by compensation
heavily based on meeting production goals keeps employees highly motivated to
stay engaged.

I worked there as a temp in college when they would shut down the mill for 2
weeks for maintenance. On one of these, a billet melted in a reheat furnace,
throwing off the schedule and threatening the ability to get back to rolling
steel. As soon as the temperature in the furnace dropped below 150F they
wrapped us up in heavy clothing, made wooden soles for our boots so the rubber
wouldn't melt and sent us in with jackhammers to overhaul the furnace. They
were very determined on meeting goals.

The employees got crazy good bonuses that at times exceeded their base
salaries, all dependent on shipping steel.

[http://www.managerwise.com/article.phtml?id=172](http://www.managerwise.com/article.phtml?id=172)

~~~
jjoonathan
Sounds great except the part where they void the bonuses for an entire week
every time someone uses a sick day or vacation day.

~~~
mcguire
Holy crap!

" _However, if they are late to work they lose their bonus for the day. And if
they miss a day of work during the week they lose their bonus for the entire
week._ "

Sounds like a recipe for the (alleged) effects of the medieval justice
system.[1]

[1] The punishment for murder is death. The punishment for stealing a chicken
is death. Get caught stealing a chicken? Try to kill everyone who has ever
offended you.

~~~
mrec
See also:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazexiang_Uprising](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazexiang_Uprising)

------
serve_yay
Things like the incident discussed at the top interest me, because the
reaction is _always_ directed at the "lazy" person for not working hard enough
and taking advantage, but never at the organization for apparently being
incapable of knowing what the hell its employees are up to.

------
rcthompson
Reminds me of a Dilbert comic from over a decade ago. Dilbert was working from
home, and the joke was him saying something like "Do I owe my employer the
full 8 hours of work or just the 2 hours of productivity I would have if I
went in to the office?"

~~~
mynameishere
Really should link to it:

[http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1995-02-06/](http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1995-02-06/)

(God, I'm ashamed it took me 10 seconds to find that.) He eventually goes
crazy.

Anyway, I've experienced the same in a declining company, in which people were
fired or quit, and I'd get their full responsibilities, and it literally added
15 minutes of work per week to my schedule.

~~~
rcthompson
I would have linked to it, but I only read it in a dead-tree book at my
parents' friends house a decade ago, so I had no idea where I would find it in
the archives (didn't know when it was originally written). Apparently the
Dilbert website has full test search for all the comics now, which would have
made it a lot easier.

So, thanks for the link!

------
comrh
I remember being told the internet revolution would allow people to work
shorter hours without being tied to a desk. Maybe this is just a symptom of
the old 9-5 model breaking in a world where I can finish a lot of work during
my commute.

Also the idea that we should be "true believers" in a job and not just there
for a paycheck is so bizarre and unrealistic. Everyone hopes for one of those
jobs where you really enjoy what you're doing but no one concludes the job for
them is roadkill collector.

~~~
transitorykris
When you've increased your efficiency you've only freed up time to create
additional value. If you don't do it, your competitors will.

~~~
anon4
Except when everyone just sort of naturally agrees that we're at good-enough
value already and doesn't bother, which is what's happening at a lot of these
places.

You don't push and your competitors don't push because all the people who are
at the low level of actually doing things rather than sitting in meetings
don't feel like bothering with it. Surprisingly (or not) it actually works out
well with the only bad part being some fat cats in suits think they're paying
money for actual work. Not that it matters if they "waste" their money, it
will trickle back up to them pretty soon.

------
0x5f3759df-i
This is what automation will create if we continue the logic that everyone has
to work and if you don't have a job it's because you're a lazy freeloader.

If we keep this mentality of a full time job for every person we are in for a
rude awakening in the next couple decades. Automation is going to replace
large segments of the economy and they will do that work better than a human
ever did.

The idea that everyone needs a job to be able to survive is an idea we need to
let go of if we want to continue to progress.

~~~
zobzu
well thats like the industrial revolution but at a different layer.

i think another real difference is that we have way more people on the planet
now (way too many, all scientific evidence points that out, too) thus this
will be worse than the industrial revolution.

Added to that, computers can automate a lot of "thinking jobs" as well, in
fact.

At some point we've to realize that:

\- you cant keep pooping babies because you feel like you're more important
than the planet

\- you cant have a 8h work day for everyone, and you also can't enslave some
people to these and have the other as the manipulative ultra powerful
individuals

Unfortunately that's exactly the state of the world today. If ever we solve
this, we might even solve more important problems like energy, life, and what
not - much more quickly than ever before.

(and I therefore vote to be governed by skynet any day of the week)

~~~
jjoonathan
> way too many, all scientific evidence points that out, too

The hallmark of scientific evidence is citation. You don't provide any.

> you cant keep pooping babies

Developed countries typically have birth rates lower than the "sustaining"
birth rate.

> you also can't enslave some people to these and have the other as the
> manipulative ultra powerful individuals

 _This_ is the elephant in the room. Labor vs capital is stacked as it is, and
automation _will_ make it worse. We have to try to figure out a way to deal
with it before things get violent (and they _will_ get violent if we don't).

------
Nursie
"One day, in the middle of a meeting on motivation, I dared to say that the
only reason I came to work was to put food on the table. There were 15 seconds
of absolute silence, and everyone seemed uncomfortable. Even though the French
word for work, ‘travail,’ etymologically derives from an instrument of
torture, it’s imperative to let it be known, no matter the circumstance, that
you are working because you are interested in your work"

I would be coding and making software anyway, most likely. I often play with
it in spare time anyway. But if you weren't going to pay me, I sure as hell
wouldn't be doing it for you. And I'd be a liar if I said otherwise. Even if
what you have me doing the exact same thing I'd be doing at home for nothing,
sure as hell the only reason I come to work is because you pay me.

I don't see why we can't be honest about this.

This is also one of the reasons I'm a contractor/freelancer these days. So I
don't have to pretend to care about your business, or pretend to be committed
body and soul to the project. That's beyond the scope of my contract.

------
tomaskafka
Hypothesis: Purposefulness is limited by upstream = it can only decrease as
you go deeper in a hierarchy. A.k.a. you can't build a (non-faked) purposeful
company in a bullshit field.

Think for example a would-love-to-feel-purposeful software development company
supplying to some redundant government agency or corporate branch.

In such a purpose-less field, you can only create a fake sense of purpose, and
that only works as long as you find short-sighted people that don't realize
that what they are living for is fake. Lot of 'creative' ad agencies do that,
wasting best years of great 20-30 year olds to create award-winning animated
microsites for cereals.

What happens next is that these guys & girls drink away their unrealized
frustration on countless parties (the work-hard-party-hard falacy), before
realizing that things won't get better, and finally trying to find a
purposeful place.

Also, Zappos.

Problem: The more you understand what's going on, the harder is to find a
place that you would find purposeful. You become more and more unemployable by
a majority of companies and are left with a choice of devoting your life to
non-profit stuff (the important/non-urgent quadrant) while scraping by, or
compromising your beliefs in some job-for-cash. Or trying to be that one lucky
guy who built a lifestyle business that doesn't lie in bullshitting others.

------
netcan
Ronald Coase is one of the most famous economists of the the previous
generation. His most influential work is 'The Nature of the Firm' which starts
fro a very interesting premise. Why do Firms exist?

If bargaining, prices & markets are such an awesome and efficient thing, why
don't the different employees in a firm just form markets, ecosystems where
they buy and sell good and services and make ipods or packaging materials. Why
do firms get so big? Why are firms run like market-less totalitarian
dictatorships internally? If 10 year plans created by bureaucrats about how
much lubricates, steel & cutlery should be produced fail so terribly relative
to a prices/markets based economy, why are big plans dictated by executives
and filtering down layers of management any better?

His answer was transaction costs. Markets have transactions costs. Every
transaction needs to be negotiated, sold, etc. That's a cost. To get efficient
transactions really need to be repeated. The market needs to be big enough and
transparent enough. The totalitarian nature of the firm has costs too. But, as
long as these are less than transaction costs, it's preferable.

Anyway, back to the slacking… I think a lot of the pathologies of our life at
work are a result of this sort of totalitarianism. They _are_ the
inefficiencies. People are estranged from their work because they are
estranged from it. There's a strong social pressure to express (or even feel)
deeply connected to your work. It's an explicit demand from employers. The
demand isn't as far fetched as wise guy cynics think because there's an
inherent human tendency to vend meaning in work and in groups of people. We're
wired that way

Still, we're in this system where the motivation to work is unnatural (money,
social pressures, your boss) to us. The feedback from our work is
disconnected. For every Leonardo there have been a million oil painting
sweatshop monkeys. A million poor shmucks trained to implement agile
development in some dark dingy bank tech consultancy.

Our personality at work is different. A meek, boring shell. Non work is one
pathology among many. But, if you like positivity, it also means that our
world is full of unutilized people.

------
Kaihuang724
I see this a lot in the industry I work in, which is design. As a web
designer, we're either on a tight, impossible deadline or we have nothing to
do. Although it's common, I feel this is a problem that has to be taken into
account and corrected at the project management level. I can only speak for
the company I work for, but our project managers typically have a hard time
planning design as they don't fully understand the process, which then makes
it impossible for the designers to allocate time correctly.

For anyone currently facing this situation, I would highly suggest using your
free time to work on personal skills (if possible, as dictated by your
company's leniency). Whenever I have free time, I try to learn development
practices, new languages, new techniques, etc. as much as possible so I don't
rot with boredom.

Or I come here and read article after article until all the links are grey.

------
emsy
There already were quite a few posts about this phenomenon on HN, most notably
from David Graeber, author of "First Five Thousand Years of Debt". Even I, who
worked as a programmer experienced this phenomenon, even though my then
employee was _desperately_ looking for programmers. Some of my colleagues even
evaded work voluntarily. Management had failed us. Asking about 10 people who
work at desks (not specifically offices, for example I talked to electrical
engineers), all of them had experienced the phenomenon either first hand or
second hand.

Edit: The Graeber article was linked to in another comment :)

------
BashiBazouk
I had a job like this. My boss/owner of the business abused a provision in the
California unemployment system designed for seasonal lulls in labor pools.
When ever I was out of work to do, I was sent home and those hours were paid
for by the state at the usual unemployment rate. I was doing high level
graphic production and design to which I am quite skilled. At crunch time I
can get through mountains of work quickly. Then at normal work flows I could
quickly run out of work if I gave it my all. Then there was days of work
trickling in... Annoyed me to no end. Here I am in the best paying job I'd had
so far in my career and the only time in my life I've been on unemployment all
at the same time. I was making enough at full hours to pay bills and have a
decent lifestyle but boy did that unemployment rate cut in to that. I became a
master of looking really busy doing absolutely nothing. Or working a quick
half hour job in to an hour and a half. Of course it helped the other hat I
wore at the job was being the main IT guy...

------
api
[http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/08/the-rise-of-
bullshit-...](http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/08/the-rise-of-bullshit-
jobs.html)

------
nperez
3 hours of personal time in the office might be a bit much, but the figure of
60% of purchases being made during work hours doesn't surprise me and I don't
think it's a big deal. There is only so much output that can come from a
person in a day. When I work for 3 or 4 hours straight, I can physically feel
the brain-drain and need a break. A few minutes of personal time taking a walk
outside or ordering stuff I need at home is all it takes to get back in my
zone. I actually once fainted publicly after working too many hours straight
without taking the slightest hint of a break. There's a balance that you need
to strike. Take care of yourself. Get stuff done. Don't work 9 hours straight
without taking a few breathers to stay on your game.

~~~
cauterized
They also dated that statistic to ~15 years ago, when most people had internet
access only at work (or broadband only at work).

------
dismal2
I'm reading this at work to not work.

~~~
WelcomeScreen
That's really not something to brag about. I've worked at two software
companies in the Bay Area with people like you. At both companies, I put in
well beyond a solid eight hours each day picking up the work that people like
you are not doing. There are honest, hard working people you are screwing
over.

~~~
iaw
I wouldn't be so sure, depending on his role in the operational scope he could
be underutilized. I frequently find myself with too little to do because I can
work quicker so I'm typically waiting for the people that need 8 hours+ a day
to complete their responsibilities before I can make progress.

In my case, it's the people that think they're impressive working 8 hour+ days
that need to learn to be more efficient that are causing issues.

~~~
lordbusiness
Exactly. Some people work better when they're 'up against it' under a crushing
deadline, or just don't take as long as the average person.

Personally, I am able to achieve a lot more when I am under the gun, and often
find myself procrastinating until the last minute and then pull a rabbit out
of a hat. This is not a new phenomenon, nor is it misunderstood. Some people
work like marathon runners, some people work like cheetahs. The cheetah cannot
be expected to be at full capacity 100% of the time.

If two people both produce the same output, but one of them needs 40 hours and
the other can do the same work in 2, who is the 'inefficient' person here?
Let's evaluate the product, not the workflow.

------
enobrev
This article very clearly describes the anxiety I felt as I melded into the
workforce a few lifetimes ago. Not to say that I could have possibly
articulated _why_ I felt such a need to get away from the employers of the
day, but one can reminisce...

Back then I was doing on-site tech support for a market-data software company
serving the major investment banks of the time (a major partner and competitor
to Knight Ridder, DTN, and Reuters for those who might have any idea). My days
we very full, supporting DOS-based servers and workstations; In the evenings I
spent my hours working on an intranet, which, as I understand, still remains
in what's left of the expired once-incredibly-successful company.

Soon after, I was laid off as the company downsized to almost nothing. As I
took on a couple jobs from former customer contacts, I found it far too easy
to waste time on the clock. I hated it. I hated the water cooler. I hated the
extended lunches. Getting paid relatively well for little output was nice in a
way, as I had plenty of friends my own age back home who would kill for such a
position and wage. But it wasn't for me. I didn't care as much about wasting
company resources (though I did care), but I felt it was a complete waste of
my own time.

Within a year of being laid off, I went full-time freelance, and within three
years I was able to pick my clients. Most of the time, my contacts at my
clients' companies were as incredibly intelligent as they were underutilized.
At odd hours, we'd get into the nitty gritty of what was _really_ needed for
the client to succeed and I was able to propose interesting solutions, not
only to offer what was asked, but what would take them further. And my
attempts to give credit to said employees usually (not always) seemed to fall
upon deaf ears.

As a freelance developer, I was able to continue to pick clients, work on
interesting things, meet incredibly interesting people, get the job done, all
from my own desk on my own time, and when it was done - move on. Meanwhile, I
saw friends and contacts fall into stagnation as they remained underutilized.
Some happy, with the stability to support their families and lifestyles. Many,
less so.

I'm obviously very lucky as a programmer - someone who can jump into almost
any industry, learn as much as possible about their needs, remain busy for as
long as the project exists, and then move on. I think that's what drives my
interest in software more than anything. Provided I can ask the right
questions to the right people, there is never a shortage of interesting things
to figure out for a good wage. I don't pity those who don't currently have
such an option, as that would undermine the respect I have for them.

But I do firmly believe the closer we get to enabling such a world for those
of us who are not so well versed in translating business requirements to tech
solutions would be a societal benefit. I certainly don't think everyone should
be a business entity unto themselves. But the flattening of the company
structure - beyond the walls of the institutions that hold said structures
dear - has a good deal of potential for the creative possibilities of the most
competent workers therein.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Some folks aspire to the minimum amount of work and the maximum amount of pay.
And they are shocked when they get laid off after a decade of that, that
nobody wants to hire them. Like you I really enjoy the work so if I'm not
getting the work I need at work I'm doing various things outside of work.
(lately it is designing a 3D printer) I'm not sure when I realized that time
doing nothing was just getting closer to dead with nothing to show for it, but
once I had internalized that, idling wasn't really an option any more.

~~~
dba7dba
"Some folks aspire to the minimum amount of work and the maximum amount of
pay. And they are shocked when they get laid off after a decade of that, that
nobody wants to hire them."

Wholeheartedly agree. However don't forget those who worked hard but were just
got stuck doing something that was ONLY relevant in that organization. Once
laid off, they belatedly find out their 'skill' isn't a skill outside of the
organization.

Hence I believe you should be extra vigilant about stagnating skill set when
working at a company for more than just a few years. A lesson I'm learning
now.

~~~
BillyMaize
Exactly the position I am in now. After a couple of years I am looking to move
on but I am finding that no one needs the experience I have. Everything I have
done for my current company is desktop development and the vast majority of
the nearby jobs are web development. Companies these days don't want to hire
anyone who can't hit the ground running so it's a rough situation. Better to
get out now than many years from now though.

~~~
dba7dba
I think this article may be of some interest to you.

[http://www.kalzumeus.com/2009/09/05/desktop-aps-versus-
web-a...](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2009/09/05/desktop-aps-versus-web-apps/)

Also, ever look into trying out micro ISV? You may not get rich but doing
doing something like it will help you work on techs that are popular/relevant,
not what your managers wants done. Or try working on side projects with free
time?

------
somberi
A related (somewhat humorous) article from The Economist:

Quoting the article:

"The first principle of skiving (or shirking, as Americans call it) is always
to appear hard at work....The second principle is that information technology
is both the slacker’s best friend and his deadliest enemy. ...The third
principle is that you should always try to get a job where there is no clear
relation between input and output. The public sector is obviously a skiver’s
paradise. In 2004 it took two days for anyone to notice that a Finnish tax
inspector had died at his desk. "

Full Article: [http://goo.gl/HftcFx](http://goo.gl/HftcFx)

~~~
psykovsky
Why the tracking link? Yes, it's a serious question.

~~~
forgotpasswd3x
I wondered the same thing. Used unshort.me for this.

[http://www.economist.com/news/business/21627649-how-
thrive-w...](http://www.economist.com/news/business/21627649-how-thrive-work-
minimum-effort-guide-skiving)

------
nasalgoat
Automation and massive amounts of available resources are primarily
responsible for my idle time at work - once you build a reliable
infrastructure, with automatic setup and failover configurations, running on
machines that are basically 90% idle outside of peak hours, what exactly are
you supposed to do?

~~~
b_emery
This ideal situation won't last forever. Figure out what is next, and start
training for it. (Otherwise you become one of the old admins clinging to your
way of doing things, and slowly becoming obsolete).

~~~
jqm
Agreed 100%. Always expect that sooner or later there will be a housecleaning,
and if keep current you will be prepared.

~~~
Roboprog
Make sure there's a code for that activity on your weekly TPS report!

------
ams6110
This is VERY common in university and municipal jobs. Many people at those
insitutions are supurfluous and literally do nothing useful, or they may have
one or two responsibilites carefully assigned to justify their position but in
reality it's nothing someone else doesn't have plenty of time to handle. They
get away with it because there's no pressure to show a profit, or penalty for
a loss, at the end of the day. They have their budgets, and they spend that
money. Ultimately these jobs are controlled by politicans, who hate to fire
anybody because a) that might make them unpopular and b) political power in
those organization correlates highly to the number of people who work under
you.

~~~
shitlord
I used to work for a beltway bandit and I experienced the same stuff described
in the article. If you want an easy, comfortable job, that sort of work is
perfect. If you want to do impactful work, it's the worst place you could be.
Yet, that is exactly what you are promised: the opportunity to do purportedly
important work, when all evidence points to the contrary. I just wish we could
be honest with each other about this sort of stuff.

------
StavrosK
> If you add any actual value to your company today, your career is probably
> not moving in the right direction. Real work is for people at the bottom who
> plan to stay there.

Does anyone know what he means by this? I'm afraid it hits too close to home
for me.

~~~
xacto75
In most corporations (at those I've been involved with), the people who
actually get the work done very rarely advance.

Your career is not the work you do. It's how you're perceived socially within
a company structure.

This essay is actually very good: [http://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-
principle/](http://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/)

My personal experience is that those who are highly skilled and add value
become an immediate threat to those who are just "punching a clock". It's
important to note that those people may be at _any_ level of an organization.

~~~
StavrosK
Damn, thanks for that :/ That's the situation I am currently in, looks like
I'm going to have to stop actually working and playing the politics game
instead. Or just get another job that's not as soul-crushing.

------
msoad
I wanted to open an Ask HN for this but now that this article is here, let me
ask it here.

I'm really frustrated with my current situation. I'm extremely passionate
about my work. Whatever I do, I want to make it perfect by spending a good
amount of time on it. In every tram I go, I'm the one that does most of the
work and move things forward. But after a while I lose steam. I see others are
abusing the situation and leaving all the work for me. For example, right now
my team is doing open source work and anyone can see your commits. I commit at
least 20 times a day while my co-workers commit 2 times per week
average(actual numbers). Maybe they are on their regular routine but I'm too
hyper active and think they are slacking but at the end I leave. I changed
jobs 5 times in 4 years and ever time I got a better job because I achieved so
much in a short period of time in previous position.

I'm not ready for starting my own company and want to work for others to learn
enough for it. But with this situation I'm really confused what to do? I know
not 5 companies doing it wrong. It's probably like this everywhere.

I enjoy working hard and making shit happen but I don't want others abuse it.
How can I solve this conflict?

~~~
Consultant32452
I can only speak from my own perspective. I realized, that for me, I would
_always_ feel like someone was taking advantage of me. If it wasn't other
developers, it was BAs/sales or even the management (or owner for small
companies). The only way I got over it was to become a consultant. This
allowed me to completely emotionally divest myself from stupid mistakes the
company makes. I never have to think about how my review is horribly
inaccurate, or anything else. I make my hourly wage, I do a good job, and
people like it when I work for them. At the end of the day I go home and no
one is calling me in the middle of the night to deal with issues. Everyone is
different, so there's no telling what will make you happy, but for me, that
changed my whole outlook on working and dramatically improved my emotional
fitness.

~~~
stickhandle
This. When you get a whiff that you are good, its time to go solo.

------
x0rg
This never happened to me, but I know people who had to quit their job because
they were too bored. In reality, it's often the case that there are many
people doing too much 9+ ours a day and people totally wasting their time. The
sweet spot IMO is 8 hours per day the most productive you can be (you'll never
get 8 hours of productivity).

------
yason
Sometimes, does it matter at all? Once all important things get done
eventually and relatively in time and the company earns enough money to chug
along, it's just cost of doing business. The idle hours couldn't sometimes be
cut away without hampering the productivity during active hours either.

In public sector the situation is trickier. There are no objective indicators
of how productive the office is. Unnecessary hours can easily pile up. There
needs to be something that forces prioritization and tries to improve
effectiveness. I'd say a fixed tax percentage might work: if the government
can fund more of itself by raising taxes then it must work to prioritize its
activity to only do the necessary work and to support the companies in that
country to generate more profits.

------
Shivetya
As a system admin and developer second I tend to code to make my primary job
even less of a burden. My direct boss jokes he could care less how busy I am
not as long as I am there when it hits the fan.

Yet it can be a brain drain when you run out of things to do, being a social
butterfly was a skill I had to learn. In the course of that activity I did
find work through helping others as we did work on the same platform. I could
code and work up wonders in SQL simply because I had the idle time to learn
what I wanted to do.

Still it would be nice to not be in a box. Then again I am not sure what I
would do with not so integrated and reliable systems that I do watch over.

------
Spooky23
You need to decide what you want to do and where you want to go. If you work
for the government, your masters are ultimately politicians and bureaucrats.
If your goal is to move to the top of the pyramid, you need to play there
game. That means kissing babies and being visible.

Other times, there is a ceiling you can't go through. If you're an IT guy
working at an engineering firm, you'll never be a PE, so you're pigeonholed.
If you're an accountant, you'll never be the CEO of Microsoft.

If you're not a daylaborer, you're not working every hot of the day.

------
BorisMelnik
When I used to work at jobs like this, where I had not a lot of responsibility
part of what made it OK was "the art of looking busy." This could be anything
from" reading work emails, printing and highlighting sentences, making lists
of people, places and things, taking notes of activities. The list could go on
and on.

------
wglb
This is an interesting article in light of patio11's about doing business in
Japan: [http://www.kalzumeus.com/2014/11/07/doing-business-in-
japan/](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2014/11/07/doing-business-in-japan/) reply

------
aaron695
Too many 'Just So' stories.

The fact no one missed a dead person for two days is meaningless.

In a good business, with good employees, you should be able to do 2 days work
straight uninterrupted.

