Only around 30 and feeling this mundane? Although I loved the technology I was working on, my last job became five work-days filled with meetings too. I can tell you that it turned what could have been my hobby (the technology) into a similarly mundane existence.
A day full of meetings poses three problems:
1) Poorly run meetings consume too much time without accomplishing anything.
2) Having a full day of meetings almost eliminates the possibility of getting real work done while you're fresh.
3) The meetings are often so dull (probably the small ratio of useful content to blather), that you'll be tired sooner.
I became quite a contrarian ... refusing meetings when there wasn't a clear-cut agenda and goals and in general trying to take back some of the time for actual work. It didn't work, but it did earn me some black marks with my managers.
Finally, I started a venture with two other guys and the three of us have clear-cut roles. Since we trust that the others are capable and willing to do their parts, we have only three calls a week, each scheduled to be 15 minutes (but generally they're closer to 30). Now we're starting to demo to customers and those meetings are exciting ... validation of some of our ideas, new ideas and occasional criticism that keeps us on the right track can be invigorating.
I hope you're able to find that kind of excitement soon ... I've rediscovered the adventure in my life!
> Poorly run meetings consume too much time without accomplishing anything.
Agreed that more often than not this is the case - however I am seeing a clear awareness now a days at my workplace - people are at least a bit conflicted about wasting time. I personally always try to politely steer the meeting to get something meaningful agreed to or done - even if I am not the organizer. My experience is that depending on how cleverly I am able to converse it either goes well or people don't respond and I have to retry.
Things like saying "Hmm. So looks like at this point without having person X in the room and without having data Y we can't really sort this out in <em> this </em> meeting." - it works well if you insert them infrequently with right tone and timing.
Seems so familiar. I just started to face this problem and I already hate the idea of spending the rest of my life like this. There must be some way out of here...
As a little side-point: on HN we often discuss the values of startup life, or various different alternatives to 'day job'. I can understand why many hate the idea of spending most of one's life as a nine-to-five worker doing things one doesn't exactly care about. I hate this idea too. But, if we applied this attitude on the scale of the whole society, would it not collapse? If every shop clerk, Starbucks barista, bus driver, electrician or other professional realized that there must be a better way of working, what would happen? Do we need to force people to have jobs (so that they can eat) for modern civilization to work?
If every shop clerk, Starbucks barista, bus driver, electrician or other professional realized that there must be a better way of working, what would happen?
The first three you listed are well on their way to being automated within a few decades. The last one seems out of place, since electricians are relatively well-paid and often self-employed. I think that we're seeing a gradual shift away from a service economy, mirroring earlier shifts from industrial and agricultural economies, as service jobs are automated or taken over by people in poorer countries. I'm not sure what to call the economy that's coming, though. A creative economy? A reputation economy? An economy where people work on the things they find interesting, and if other people find them interesting, too, they get paid. Many of the menial or boring jobs will be automated.
I call it the "Star Trek" economy, but I think something more like "The Matrix" is coming. Most people will have cookie-cutter lives where basic needs are supplied for them. Others will rebel against that life and do something they think has meaning (the red pill poppers). I'm willing to listen to alternatives, because my prediction depresses me. I just can't see us shifting back to a less automated world where skilled labor and basic labor is more valued than they are now.
I used to think of it in terms of Star Trek until I (recently, thanks to HN :)) read Cory Doctorow's "Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom" story about Bitchun Society, in which death and energy are not a problem, economy is based on reputation and today's luxuries are theirs basic rights. Interesting book, BTW :).
"If every shop clerk, Starbucks barista, bus driver, electrician or other professional realized that there must be a better way of working, what would happen?"
That point comes up often, and personally, I think it works itself out. There will always be people that seek the stars and there will always be people that are content with a different lifestyle, including those you mentioned.
I think a robot/automation revolution would allow us one day to not have to work, but I think that hope faces more political and socioeconomic obstacles than practical ones.
Or in other words, someone will try to profit from such a revolution, and probably to the detriment of the rest of society. In some ways, this is already happening.
Who would want a life without some work? I think it's more that we don't get to work on the things that are meaningful to us. Work can be one of life's adventures too!
BTW: I've met Baristas that are exactly where they want to be ... you can tell from their great smiles, and their propensity to call you by name and remember your regular order after only a couple visits.
Yes, that's exactly what I'm thinking about - 'working on the things meaningful to us' as opposed to 'working on whatever someone will feed us for doing'.
AD your BTW: I also know some Baristas who are like the ones you mentioned :).
The key might be variety. I'd hate "spending the rest of my life programming in front of a screen" as much as "spending the rest of my life making coffee" or "spending the rest of my life on a potato field". But trying your hands at various jobs for a few months or years? Sounds much more refreshing, doesn't it!
However, I'm afraid in this age we're condemned to our specific specialization for life. For every job, to get a job at all, years of experience ('XX years of YY specific recent buzzword experience') is generally required. Even for things a flexible, intelligent person could easily learn on the job given some time and hard work.
You could probably switch career once with a lot of hassle, but 'trying your hands at various jobs for a few months or years' sounds very optimistic...
For every job? Doubt it. There are always demand/supply imbalances somewhere in the caleidoscope of "all possible jobs" at any given moment and place. In a demand/supply imbalance you may not be the "perfect choice" but the second-best and totally-acceptable if you demonstrate that "I'll learn on the job and I have the basic core soft skills of enthusiasm sane-humility big-picture-view hands-on-brain" in your interview.
Well you just tell them "pay me 80-90% instead of 100% of your usual salaries for 1-2 months, then decide whether to keep me for another year or not. I always learn on the job and I always get good at it, fast."
Only if it's the truth of course.
(Of course, that's for "simpleton" jobs, not for programming. You better had been building stuff privately or at uni for at least a year, obviously.)
Can-do or can't? "It's your attitude, not your aptitude, that determines your altitude!" ;))
Right, that might have been true ten years ago, and was even more true if you go back further. These days it's hard to get a job even for people that have a lot of experience in some area (at least if it isn't computer-related... we're the lucky ones for now, but that's another story).
I mean, if you aim for the simpleton jobs, you'll be competing with more experienced people that'd happily take the 80%/90% offer just to get a job at all (if it isn't below subsistence level).
I'm not ready to say a lot about how I solved this problem other than:
I quit.
My job was killing me. If you looked at it from the outside, you would have said I should be perfectly happy: great pay, bonuses, respect at work. But seriously: I was unhappy with the endless meetings, bureaucracy, and a culture that didn't value creativity and passion for building really good software.
I'm still working all this out. I'm independent and learning a lot of great stuff that I've wanted to learn for years. I'm building some products that I hope will take off. But even if those fail in the sense that I don't make enough to live on, I know I will succeed in a bigger sense: I will find a place to work that has great people and values building really good software that makes people's lives better.
Why am I so confident about that? For the first time in years, I feel alive and full of curiosity and interest in the world.
I feel this myself and see it in others at work (large fortune 500 company)
The 3 paths that I've identified for myself are as follows:
1. Suck it up, stick with the job/career you've got. It pays well, there is "relative" job security and an upwards path. Enjoy your free time with your family, hobbies, etc.
2. Same as #1, except some part of your free time to bootstrap something that will give you financial freedom.
3. Throw caution to the wind and join a startup.
Per #1, it appears that some are able to partition their lives- e.g., they drag themselves through work to enable them and their families to live a certain lifestyle- I'm not sure this is sustainable longer term, but can be done if one adopts a certain mental attitude towards work. #3 isn't a good fit for me because I'm not ready to force my family to change their lifestyle to accommodate my wishes. So that leaves #2 for me.
Ideally, if I could sustain myself and my family at our current lifestyle or better through a side boot-strapped project, that'd be great. However, I wonder if I would be happier trading in my 1 boss for tens?, hundreds?, of customers of whatever it is that I would be selling or making, assuming that I could even get to that point. Even if my bootstrapped project is successful for a year or two, it is unlikely to succeed for a much longer term (10-20 years), whereas I could see myself easily employed in my current role over that longer time-frame.
This is horrible. Seriously, this will eat you alive, you must impose yourself to your environment, not the other way around or you'll be crushed.
You think this meeting is useless? Tell others, and don't attend it.
You have more work than you can reasonably do? simply say no. You won't get any advantage from working too much, anyway, you'll just be squeezed some more.
When others leave, leave too. You're not supposed to spend 12 hours a day at work. Will someone die if you don't finish this document/program/web page? Heck no.
Your boss is unhappy with your new attitude? Explain the situation. Tell that you won't be this nice guy that get exploited to death any more. Either you're respected or you're better be elsewhere.
That's another interesting side conversation. If you start out with the attitude that it's just a job and you leave when your time has been put in, it's far better than starting out as the nice guy (read that as dedicated) and then changing. You'll be massacred for changing your attitude.
Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them. - Henry David Thoreau
But less depressingly : I have learned, that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. - (also) Henry David Thoreau
I walk around all day with a frown on my face, worrying about one thing or another for no good reason.
There is a good reason - you practised worrying so you got good at it, so it became a tool you use frequently because you can, even when it doesn't help.
The answer is to not do that. It's an introspective answer, it's difficult to do, but the secret to it is that it's not stupid advice it's actually pretty good advice.
A day full of meetings poses three problems:
1) Poorly run meetings consume too much time without accomplishing anything.
2) Having a full day of meetings almost eliminates the possibility of getting real work done while you're fresh.
3) The meetings are often so dull (probably the small ratio of useful content to blather), that you'll be tired sooner.
I became quite a contrarian ... refusing meetings when there wasn't a clear-cut agenda and goals and in general trying to take back some of the time for actual work. It didn't work, but it did earn me some black marks with my managers.
Finally, I started a venture with two other guys and the three of us have clear-cut roles. Since we trust that the others are capable and willing to do their parts, we have only three calls a week, each scheduled to be 15 minutes (but generally they're closer to 30). Now we're starting to demo to customers and those meetings are exciting ... validation of some of our ideas, new ideas and occasional criticism that keeps us on the right track can be invigorating.
I hope you're able to find that kind of excitement soon ... I've rediscovered the adventure in my life!