Is this too much to ask?
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Well, if you wanted to keep the river metaphor going but make a point, you could make the name more interesting: Swamp, Alligator Food, River Blindness, Eerie Banjo Music... ;P
Yeah, but it takes so long to type
MudSuckingBottomFeeder...Software Zen:
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What would be the one, reasonable, change that could be made to your place of work to make it better? Particularly looking forward to Griff's response to this? I've asked the question, but don't have a ready answer for myself.
Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.
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Elimination of personal cell phones. I'd gladly give mine up for 8 hours a day! If relatives/friends had to call my work number (mostly complaining or needing something) they probably wouldn't bother! :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: It would also reduce the number of times I have to repeat myself due to a text message/email/phone call that interrupted a conversation! 'Sorry, what was that middle thing?' On a related note, I was told that it's rude to keep talking when the other person is obviously distracted by their phone. :confused:
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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A bright, open, inviting stairway rather than the dark, cramped, hidden one we have now.
If the stairway were more inviting, it would be easier to push those people down it? Oh, sorry didn't see the new branch.
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A place of work would be a good start. :sigh:
veni bibi saltavi
Workplace? I'd settle for an income.
The difficult may take time, the impossible a little longer.
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Pay me according to my work instead of according to how crappy your marketing strategies work out.
Computers have been intelligent for a long time now. It just so happens that the program writers are about as effective as a room full of monkeys trying to crank out a copy of Hamlet. The interesting thing about software is it can not reproduce, until it can.
Hmm. Incentive based pay based on the value added by your productive effort could result in your owing the company money. The crappy scheme pays your salary.
The difficult may take time, the impossible a little longer.
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Hmm. Incentive based pay based on the value added by your productive effort could result in your owing the company money. The crappy scheme pays your salary.
The difficult may take time, the impossible a little longer.
Member 10707677 wrote:
Hmm. Incentive based pay based on the value added by your productive effort could result in your owing the company money. The crappy scheme pays your salary.
Ahhhh no. I work on projects that have deadlines, scope, and a budget. We hit those deadlines, manage the scope, and keep it under budget. We succeeded. We should be rewarded. It is not engineering's fault that marketing is filled with no good MBA grads that do not know the difference between a viable product and their arse, and engineering should not be punished for it. Yes I know, profits pay the bills etc. But as it is, every company I have worked at tries to dangle some carrot in front of engineering that is meaningless. We have no control over it, so in the end it is actually demotivating. They should stop that. Instead, they should use risk management practices and ensure the correct projects are worked on at the correct time. ALSO, they should budget better to ensure they have funds to motivate engineering to crash projects to hit better deadlines etc. and fund the moral boost (bonuses) with said funds when the teams are able to pull it off or finish early. It should not matter if the product sells. That was not our job. We built what marketing asked.
Computers have been intelligent for a long time now. It just so happens that the program writers are about as effective as a room full of monkeys trying to crank out a copy of Hamlet. The interesting thing about software is it can not reproduce, until it can.
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If the stairway were more inviting, it would be easier to push those people down it? Oh, sorry didn't see the new branch.
I be all like "outa my way, slowpokes!" :-D
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What would be the one, reasonable, change that could be made to your place of work to make it better? Particularly looking forward to Griff's response to this? I've asked the question, but don't have a ready answer for myself.
Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.
As I am an independent, I have set up my place of work to suit me. Many years ago I had to go up into the ceiling space of my house to replace the battery for the alarm system, and realized there was a huge unused attic space up there. I got a builder to "convert" it into a 6 x 4 meter office, two large windows (plus stairs) for the equivalent of 6 weeks of my then rate. It is very quiet - it sits on top of the previously laid ceiling insulation. After the first flush of enthusiasm, other people in the house can't be bothered climbing the stairs unless they really need to. So I have very few interruptions. I have a 2 meter desk on one side, and a 1.7 meter work-bench on the other. There is about 20 meters of shelving in the room. When I was a wage slave I was always amused that large companies would pay in excess of $100,000 for 48 weeks of 40 hour weeks (1920 hours) of my time and then stick me in some kind of crazy open "bull-ring" to go do my work. A nice environment for a frenzied forex trader, but NFG for a software developer. Guaranteed 50% productivity decrease. IMHO, a serious developer needs a large, quiet space to work in. Yes, he must go and talk with other people - the rest of the team, users etc. But it is a good thing that to do so he must get up and move away from his work-place.
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Here are the changes that I made: 1) I labeled the coffee maker with instructions on how to make the friggin coffee! (It worked, consistent coffee, and the 2 of us who made it increased to most everyone!) 2) Dual Monitors (it was a while ago) 3) Moving 2 developers OUT of a shared office into their own "closet" offices. 4) A Herman Miller chair for my office (which I paid for myself) 5) Getting the phone system changed so programmers phones did not ring as a rollover! And I would say the first one gave me more joy, every day I found a fresh pot of coffee that someone else made! Ah... Make the changes.
In the late 1990's I was working for a software company who had the 41st floor of an office building as a huge open plan area (4 offices on one side for the four "partners" who owned the company. In the open plan area was around 25 developers, all on high salaries. In the reception foyer just by the lifts, sat the Receptionist, a New Zealand girl who aspired to be a professional Ballroom dancer. A consultant advised them to change the phone system so that incoming calls would ring on every single desk in the office, not just the Receptionist desk. All developers were instructed that no call should be allowed to wait more than three rings. So, maybe every 5 minutes, all the phones would ring. Every developer in the company would stop what they were doing so they could count the rings. This company featured in a business magazine of time in a story about "25 fastest growing companies". The next year they folded spectacularly.
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What would be the one, reasonable, change that could be made to your place of work to make it better? Particularly looking forward to Griff's response to this? I've asked the question, but don't have a ready answer for myself.
Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.