
Do the right thing, wait to get fired - bsterne
http://brendansterne.com/2013/07/11/do-the-right-thing-wait-to-get-fired/
======
crazygringo
I'm not exactly disagreeing, but don't forget the other side too -- that you
might not know what you're doing, that you might not understand the good
reasons that certain rules are in place, that you might not understand the big
picture and that your actions might backfire and/or be counterproductive.

Don't forget to be humble too, and realize that what you _think_ is the right
thing, isn't always the right thing. There's no inherent valor in "breaking
the rules" \-- if you can, it's much better to gently persuade, bring people
to your side, and talk things out.

Again, not disagreeing with the article, just pointing out that life isn't
that simple always.

~~~
ozataman
In further support of these points... Thinking outside the box, breaking the
rules as a last resort to do the right thing and other similar actions _can
indeed_ produce the extraordinary results, in certain situations, the
organization is hoping for after all. Yet this strategy will work only for the
very top performers: Those who can sense and _actually produce_ the truly
largest "contribution" to their company (as opposed to what seems right,
interesting or cool to them), even when it more or less eludes their higher
ups; those who can do this while also being politically savvy enough to
contain the consequences and sell their actions as actually in line with
everyone's goals; those who are almost magical in being able to produce the
kind of results others are very unlikely to do etc. It can work, I've seen it
work, but I think it is important to realize that not everyone can or should
do it. When it works, it is certainly a great boon to the career of the said
top performer.

Know that by doing this, you may be counterproductive both to your
organization and your career. If you take it to the extreme, you may become a
friction rather than a "problem solver".

The most common pitfall I've seen is a highly technical person considering
things like "refactoring", "getting it right" more important than getting to
the finish line fast. Remember that you may be missing what's really the most
important thing for your company at the time.

I've also seen commonplace "complaining" about inconveniences that are
actually quite legitimate. It's just that you don't know all the facts or
haven't been put in a position to produce the bottom-line results. Things look
different when you're the one navigating the ship.

OTOH, I've seen this strategy work best when the very formal
scope/objectives/deliverables of an effort are clearly wrong and would indeed
lead to a subpar outcome for all involved. Implemented successfully, this
strategy could produce outstanding results by forcefully course-correcting and
then actually delivering great results. Remember though that you'll be blamed
for everything if your course-correction isn't great, even if the original
direction would also have been equally bad.

~~~
daemin
I always think that whenever a new rule or procedure gets created there should
be sufficient reasoning as to why it had been created, what conditions
prompted it, and what it's designed to solve.

With that information people can see why something needs to be done a certain
way, and additionally they will know when rules and procedures should be
eliminated. In my mind this would allow people to deduce when exceptions to
the rules are applicable, and hence be more effective.

Unfortunately I have not actually seen this happen in real life.

~~~
tomjen3
Googles coding guidelines does exactly that, I imagine because they would
otherwise spend too much time debating them over and over again.

------
tghw
At my last company, I earned myself the unofficial job of Employee Advocate
because of this philosophy. The company (which I won't mention by name, but
can be easily determined) was set up to be a great place for developers to
work, and for the most part succeeded in that goal.

But as time went on, there were some failings in a few areas, so I decided
that I would be the one to push the founders to continue realizing their goal.
I know I became a thorn in their sides on several issues, but I could also
tell that other employees appreciated me speaking up, especially the non-
technical staff, which often did not receive the same benefits as developers.

I always figured that if I got fired for speaking my mind on an issue, that
would be okay, because it would be a clear indication that the company was too
far gone and it was time to leave. Fortunately, for me and the company as a
whole, that never happened.

Despite being a thorn, I remained on good terms with the founders. They seemed
to understand where I was coming from, even if they did not agree.

~~~
Udo
Heh, out of curiosity I clicked on your link and for a second there I was
thinking "wait a minute, I've seen this guy before... in some documentary" :)

~~~
tghw
They were _filming_ that?!

All joking aside, I only avoid mentioning the company by name to avoid linking
it to any search results. Otherwise, I'm glad to talk about it because I
consider it a strong trait of the company.

~~~
alanchavez
I guessed the name of the company right away when you said "well known for
treating developers right, but I still needed to make sure it was what I
thought it was.

Could you provide a little bit more of details on how the founders disagreed
with you? I'm very much interested in knowing more about it.

~~~
tghw
Email me, it's not the sort of stuff to discuss publicly.

------
moocow01
As could be posted at the top of just about every HN article this is highly
situational.

If you are in a prototyping, web advertising, etc etc business - sure, your
probably just feeding your employer new business strategies to make everyone
money. The business is typically fine with experimenting with new ideas hoping
to uncover a new money machine - obviously Google's business model is a great
fit for this and they seemingly encourage it.

If your doing what Ill call "real engineering" (to ruffle some feathers) on
large intricate system this could be a very bad idea. Perhaps you even think
your doing the right thing but if you're working within a highly technical
environment with many participants you are just going to look immature.

In other words, imagine if everyone at Boeing adopted this strategy as
individuals - I think we'd all be opting for taking the Greyhound bus.

~~~
singlow
I didn't take it that he was referring to making your own choices on every
technical decision - but rather about ethical decisions.

~~~
moocow01
"I do the Right Thing for Google and the world"

I think it pertains to technical or ethical or anything else. The risk is that
what you think is the right thing may be the right thing for one person but
the wrong thing for another - in fact Id say most decisions fall under this
umbrella.

------
snowwrestler
In general, rules are for under to average performers--to keep them from
causing harm. If you're a true expert, you can break the rules in your areas
of expertise to get a good result.

If you break the rules and get a worse result...probably you weren't actually
the expert you thought you were. So practice some humble introspection before
breaking all the rules.

NOTE 1: A "good result" can include a failed experiment, if you learn
something and the failure mode is predicted and mitigated. Surprise disasters
are always bad though.

NOTE 2: I said "in your areas of expertise." Being a top engineer does not
mean that you can break other rules like expense reports or sexual harassment.
Too many people make that mistake.

~~~
goblin89
Indeed. One should refer to the rules when one's in doubt. However, this
assumes that everyone in company is equally humble, excellent at
communication, and proficient at their job. Since most companies are unable to
hire that well (maybe it's impossible), no one would admit that rules are not
mandatory.

This leaves an expert in a complex situation: everyone says you have to follow
the rules, but you also know that The Right Thing is not in 100% compliance
with them.

If you're humble enough, you choose to follow the rules, because—well—you
naturally assume that people who wrote these rules are more proficient. Then,
after a while, you become very disappointed when you see that you didn't do
The Right Thing only because people who hire and make the rules didn't do
their job properly.

If you choose to break the rules, you wait to get fired. If you don't, that
may mean simply that nobody has noticed you. Or maybe they have, but chose not
to speak to you about it—you can't tell, but you feel like you're an outlaw.
And if you do get fired in the end, you become not so inclined to break the
rules from now on (unless you have OP's self-confidence).

------
ohyes
Rules of thumb are there to prevent error.

If you know the reasons behind the rules of thumb, you can ignore the rules
and work from the reasons for the rules. This is expertise.

When someone questions your 'breaking of the rule,' you can then cite the
reasons for the rule, and show how you did not break the rule in terms of it's
deeper meaning.

However, it is polite (and prudent) to CYA with discussion of your
justifications with your colleagues. Either way, this makes you look good. If
discussion renders you correct, you appear ever so smart and expert. If
discussion renders you incorrect, you appear thoughtful, prudent and working
in good faith in everyone's best interest. This is the essence of healthy
collaboration.

All too many people are unable to grasp that working on teams is never about
being 'right,' it is about having the discipline to actively seek out
collaboration.

Being 'right' helps in that people will actively seek your opinion. Being
'wrong' doesn't actually hurt you, because you went ahead and behaved properly
with regard to collaboration. Either someone else was right, and you used
their idea, or everyone else was just as wrong, and in that case... ya know,
fuck it. :)

I'd add to this that if people are unable or unwilling to collaborate maturely
(including admitting their own failings), it is time to quit.

Waiting around to get fired is stupid, petty and passive-aggressive. If you
are that sure of your correctness, you should be able to make a jusitfication.

------
rachelbythebay
There are worse things than being fired. You could be routed to a series of
useless assignments, or worse, actively destructive ones. Then you wind up
having to fire yourself for your own sanity.

Of course, this all assumes you have sufficient privilege to be able to carry
it off. There's a reason it's called FU money.

~~~
hkmurakami
Welcome to the world of "banishment rooms" in Japanese companies, made for
employees they'd like to fire but would prefer to "coerce" into willing
resignation.

[http://ajw.asahi.com/article/economy/business/AJ201305300011](http://ajw.asahi.com/article/economy/business/AJ201305300011)

Not unlike the NYC school district's rubber rooms.

------
btipling
Disagree and commit is a better strategy. Having done a short stint as an
engineering manager, sometimes there's disagreement, not everyone agrees on
what the right thing is, hopefully not everyone goes and does their own thing
and waits to get fired. This is not a good strategy for collaboration and
compromise. If you say the right thing is to know when to collaborate and when
not to, you've created a tautology.

------
foobarbazqux
> You’ve got to recognize that companies are schizophrenic. They build
> process, and rules, and structure and they ask you to follow them:

> [...]

> But greatness rarely happens by following rules, process and structure. That
> is why companies also want to find employees ready to take risks, make
> decisions, try new things, move fast and even break things.

The inconsistencies and contradictions you describe are not symptoms of
schizophrenia. If you need a medical label, how about dissociative identity
disorder?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizophrenia#Positive_and_neg...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizophrenia#Positive_and_negative_symptoms)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociative_identity_disorder...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociative_identity_disorder#Signs_and_symptoms)

That said, I believe that these opposing goals are normal, expected, and
desirable, so your mental illness model doesn't really work for me.

~~~
nbouscal
It was clear from the context that he was not using 'schizophrenic' as a
medical label (since he was not applying it to a human), but rather as a
metaphor that most people would easily understand. Picking nits does not
contribute to the conversation, but rather diverts from it (as we can observe
happening in this very comment). Since you seem to have an opinion on the
conversation, namely that the goals he lists are desirable, it would benefit
everyone significantly more for you to explain your basis for that opinion
rather than go off on completely irrelevant tangents about mental health.

~~~
foobarbazqux
[http://www.thefreedictionary.com/schizophrenic](http://www.thefreedictionary.com/schizophrenic)

What can I say, the informal usage of the word irritates me.

I'm sure if he said that companies are kind of gay, and then proceeded to list
a bunch of qualities that had nothing to do with homosexuality but rather the
informal usage of the term (as we all know all too well from high school), it
would be a problem. Same thing.

~~~
marrs
Would it also be a problem if they listed qualities like happy and frivolous?
Or is that a legitimate definition of gay in your eyes?

~~~
foobarbazqux
Totally illegitimate and you won't find those meanings in any respectable
dictionary.

------
ChuckMcM
To his credit though Chade-Meng Tan earned some infamy by intercepting
celebrities walking through the door and getting his picture taken with them
:-) Not exactly "Good for Google" but not something that generally got you
fired either.

I'm all in favor of encouraging self empowerment but recognize that it means
you will get fired more. It is the cost of doing what you believe. Not
everyone is ok with that and I respect that.

~~~
groby_b
Say what? I've always followed that course of action, and so far - knock on
wood - I have not been fired for it. And that spans about 25 years.

If what you believe in and what the company believes in are not aligned, you
realize that usually _well_ before there's any talk of firing. Just go look
for a new job that is more aligned with what you believe in.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Its the challenge of the argument in the large vs the argument in the small.
Specifically not everyone has taste.

I have met people who follow this mantra and have been fired repeatedly, I
know folks like the one in the parent who have operated this way their entire
career and have been quite successful at it.

Think of it as the "Don't try this at home" admonition. They say that because
_not everyone_ will understand both the risks and the implication of the
risks, not because as reasonably cautious and intelligent person could not
pull off exactly the same stunt "at home."

As with all things, if you find yourself getting fired a lot for doing the
"right thing" in your estimation, then its time to take a look at your
compass.

~~~
groby_b
Well said. And lest we forget, "doing the right thing" _does_ include
compromise. It's not a synonym for "my way or the highway".

------
boyter
Beware of "also want to find employees ready to take risks, make decisions,
try new things, move fast and even break things."

Doing the above can be a sure say to get the bad kind of fired from a job,
especially for large corporate environments. I have worked at places where
they claimed that innovation was rewarded, when in practice they were so risk
adverse any out of the box thinking was punished.

By all means push the boundaries but don't claim that your issues of climbing
the ranks or being overlooked for interesting tasks is because you are a
square peg in a round hole.

~~~
nostrademons
Meng's point is that getting fired is a _good_ thing, if it happens because
you did the right thing. It shows you that the company you work for does not
share your values, and hence you shouldn't be working for them.

His point isn't that you won't get fired, it's a different way of looking at
getting fired. A lot of people assume this is a universally bad occurrence.
He's telling you that it's an important opportunity to find the place where
you can act in accordance with your values _and_ climb the ranks.

------
georgemcbay
I've worked at a couple of companies where this was a winning strategy, but
I've worked at more companies where attempting this sort of thing on a regular
basis will cause problems that are more complex and "worse" than being fired.

At a lot of places you'll have a small group of really talented engineers who
would all support the idea of doing "the right thing" even if it flies in the
face of established process, and then you have everyone else, particularly
people on other teams (sales, QA, project management, general management --
but sometimes also engineers that have grown accustomed to the familiar
process, even if it is objectively broken), who will fight you tooth and nail
on any deviation from the process simply because "that isn't how we do it
here" and the end result is usually that you end up in a situation where you
don't get fired outright (if you're recognized as a great developer, it
usually takes quite a lot of boat rocking for you to actually get sacked), but
things get politically poisonous to the point where even the engineers who
support you in theory just want you to stop to ease the tension being created.

As others have mentioned, this advice is very situation and probably serves
people much better in companies that are smaller or that at least have a more
dynamic company culture. At many companies you'd save everyone (including
yourself) a bunch of time and heartache by just quitting when the process
becomes unreasonable and entrenched.

~~~
hkmurakami
If you're using this strategy with the secondary purpose of determining
whether the company is beyond the point of repair and that it is time to move
on, then even if the employment of the strategy results in the situation you
describe, it can still be used for its intended effect.

I've soon a great engineering manager get his team taken away from him after
continuing to stand up for "the right way to do things" (from a technical
perspective). He moved on and is at a much better place now.

------
6d0debc071
A fine approach, as long as you don't have bills to pay and no realistic
chance of securing another job in the time you have to pay them. Not everyone
has that sort of freedom that this sort of risk makes sense.

~~~
enraged_camel
This is HN, though. Most people here have technical skills that make them
valuable in the job market. It's easy to market this article to them.

Everyone else is in the mercy of their employer and don't have much choice but
to follow the rules to avoid being seen as a troublemaker.

------
DigitalSea
Everyone works differently especially in the world of programming. Whether
you're a web developer or code in C++, you most likely do not work the same
way as your counterparts. You have a different thought process, you are
unique, you know intricacies others don't, you're efficient at some things and
slow at others. You are human and if you get fired for doing the wrong thing,
you're damn straight you're in the wrong workplace and it's not your fault.

While I definitely believe you should follow tried and tested company policies
on deploying software, coding conventions and even naming conventions because
it's what has been working up until this point. I think sometimes a company
needs a fresh perspective or opinion on something that could work better,
maybe something has been working good enough, but could be better. You need to
take risks, don't play it safe, but always remember to know when you're
crossing the line between contribution and destruction. If you get fired for
taking risks you are damn right you should be fired, because the company you
are working for doesn't deserve an employee like you.

Doing the right thing doesn't mean be another follower. Doing the right thing
means you always have the best interests of your employer in mind when making
a decision that could affect your colleagues or direction of the company. I
believe ignoring broken processes isn't doing the right thing.

Some people prefer roads already paved and others prefer to make their own way
somewhere by paving their own way, taking risks to get there. Inevitably all
roads lead to Rome. Unless you're going sideways through an airport door, then
you're probably going to Bangkok.

------
frozenport
I have seen too many believe that refactoring code was "doing the right
thing." One guy I knew attempted to rewrite Boost's build system because it
wasn't "the right way".

~~~
charlieflowers
Heh heh, yeah, there's definitely a ditch on both sides of the road.

------
gaelenh
I follow a similar strategy when I'm interviewing for a job. I play it a
little loose and speak freely. If they don't have the good sense to realize
that questions about my resume or github code are more important than white
boarding and programming riddles, then I don't want work for or with them.
When I'm interviewing to hire someone, I reverse the situation and try to get
them to loosen up. The interview process is a window into company culture.

Same goes when I'm setting up partnerships for STEAM classes with schools.
Schools can be strict with their staff and their students. I don't ever want
to put forward a persona that suggest I will also be strict or by the book
because that will never work out. No one will be happy.

I suppose if I can't ever find a job and no one will let me teach, it's time
to re-examine my personality. Until then, no reason to keep my disregard for
bureaucratic norms and fake corporate civility a secret.

------
bittired
I completely and wholeheartedly disagree with this post.

Though Google might be the pinnacle of employment, at most jobs, if you leave,
you can often get a salary or rate increase. On top of that, some employers
will ask if you got fired and you have to explain that, even if you were only
laid off.

Terrible advice!

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Its a matter of temperament and skill set. If you fear getting rehired
somewhere else easily, then yes it may not work for you at all.

But if your skills are easily marketable then yes you can do a lot of good
this way, behaving fearlessly and with integrity.

------
AVTizzle
Somewhere about 3/4 of the way down the article, I drew the connection between
this line of thinking and what drove Snowden to whisteblow against the NSA's
surveillance techniques.

Some organizations, it seems, don't reward coloring outside the lines very
much at all...

~~~
Apocryphon
I thought it was quite ironic that this article brings up Google's point of
view in the wake of the surveillance scandals.

------
banachtarski
Or, you could just work for a company that won't fire you for doing the right
thing. I've turned things upside down a number of times, but if the outcome
was correct, I never felt even remotely that I would be fired.

~~~
triplesec
The point is that a good company won't fire you for making good or well-
informed decisions even if they turn out to be Wrong decision! And if they do,
it's their loss, not yours...

------
readme
> "Do the right thing and wait to get fired"

I use this strategy whenever I am given a bullshit deadline!

------
tlogan
In any big company, I'm sure that _anything_ you do which is not based on
manager's request is potential career killer. I understand that some new
initiatives might be good for the company as a whole but, from employee
perspective, upside is so small while downside can be disastrous.

On other hand, if you do have initiative to do things on your own then a big
company is probably not a place for you.

~~~
vorg
The skills required to _do_ a job and the skills required to _keep_ a job are
very different. Not many people possess both types of skills: one skillset
means you need be quite profound, while the other means you need to be quite
petty.

------
blantonl
I think his reasoning is a great way to get fired, regardless of how smart you
are technically. It is fun to think about how you could rage against the
machine and do things your way.

But the simple reality is there is always someone smarter than you. If you can
come to terms with that, and take the time and effort to be the guy that
someone looks up to, then you won't be fired.

~~~
charlieflowers
Well, hopefully. But there are some messed up situations out there, so you
still might be fired.

I think the original post's main point is to face that possibility
unflinchingly.

------
pasbesoin
I'd change the dynamic a bit. Do the right thing, and (continue to) network
and explore alternatives.

If "they" do come after you, they may think more before attempting to lower
the boom of "punishment" and "example". Particularly if your skills are still
needed/valuable. You're that much closer to "fuck off", and it can be useful
for them to know -- or intuit -- it.

TL;DR: Don't wait for "them" to "do something" vis à vis termination.

This also applies to some degree to waiting for them to address the original
problem; however, there is a chance you are wrong, and the commonly cited
problem that "people think they are smarter than they are".

Good outfits take the time to have open, involved discussions on such points.
It's _good_ to have your people proactively thinking about and attempting to
mitigate bad scenarios.

If that's not what you're getting, do yourself a favor and move on (assuming
you're lucky enough to have a career that allows this).

------
vacri
This is a variant of "it's easier to get forgiveness than permission", but
with a more positive bent. Getting all the right permissions from everyone can
be a monumental task, but just going ahead and doing things, then waiting to
be corrected as needs be... gets more done.

------
mark_integerdsv
As a consultant of 5 years, this guys sounds like the type of cat I'm called
in to clean up after.

"Make the call to assume some technical debt..." More like: "Build shit I know
will be expensive in the long term because I won't have to deal with the
fallout."

------
overgard
I wish more people would follow this philosophy. There's nothing more annoying
than people that follow the letter of the law without thinking about why it
was established in the first place. Most (good) companies will easily forgive
breaking the rules if you're doing it for the right reasons with good results.

The point of "the rules" is to protect the company in case someone does
something really stupid on their own ("oy! it was against our rules!"), but I
don't think competent executives are /that/ tied to them if people break them
for a good reason.

~~~
jthol
I've always found the "letter of the law" types to be the most dangerous sort
around, and that's not at all limited to programming. They're the ones who
make authoritarianism work, the ones who tattle at the first sign of "not
following the rules", the ones with absolutely no imagination, no curiosity,
and an unwillingness to think for themselves.

If there are too many of these around or too many in your management chain you
should get the hell out. But maybe that's just me.

~~~
overgard
Completely agree, the sort of person that puts process ahead of people in such
a mechanical way creeps me out.

------
charlieflowers
Wow, I _LOVE_ that. It is the only antidote I see to the kinds of dysfunction
that often exists in the business world.

Part of the time, it works -- you do the right thing, experience fulfillment,
AND despite some heat you come out smelling like a rose and get rewarded.

The other part of the time, you still experience fulfillment, and you leave
happily.

You basically become invulnerable to politics and dysfunction.

But ... to be able to do it without flinching, you have to have your finances
in order and your living expenses manageable.

------
k__
"I do the Right Thing for Google and the world, and then I sit back and wait
to get fired. If I don’t get fired, I’ve done the Right Thing for everyone. "

No, you just did the right thing for Google. Because the rest of the world
can't fire you.

------
guangnan
If you are not working on the right thing. It's offen a systemic issue with
the whole company. You need to figure out the deep reason and evaluate your
options from time to time.

------
doug4hn
Didn't Apple's Tim Cook say/recommend (to Duke MBAs) to "break the rules"?

------
sriram_sun
Is the implication that doing the right thing is almost always a firing
offence?

------
wissler
If you follow this strategy, then in a fairly decent environment, the first
thing that will happen is that you will eventually be promoted or be given
more responsibility. This sort of leadership is generally rewarded -- at least
at first, within certain limits, and at the lower levels of a company.

This strategy will not work at the higher levels of a largish company,
ultimately for reasons that would be politically incorrect to point out.

