“It’s just a job.”<p>It's just 8 hours a day. 5 days a week. Roughly 25% of your life. Another 33.3% is spent asleep. Maybe you commute to work; maybe that takes you 45 minutes each way. That's 4.4% of your life spent driving, walking, on trains or buses to get to your job. You're going to spend a small percentage of your life on the toilet; another small percentage in supermarkets buying food, in a kitchen preparing it, or in a dining room eating it.<p>All the 'big events' in your life will be squeezed into the precious little time you have left after survival's necessary subtractions. Going to school. Getting drunk. Being hungover. Getting married. Buying a house. Attending funerals.<p>Perhaps we were thinking in similar terms. You took those thoughts—nay, facts—and channeled them into a manifesto which guides your relationship with your employer.<p>Here's what I did with the same facts. I decided I'm not spending over 25% of my life (37.5% of my <i>waking</i> life) doing something I don’t LOVE. For comparison, if I find a spouse, it's likely I won't spend 25% of my life in their company. So if I'm going to spend more time at work than I will with my future husband, I need to love my job at least as much as I do him. That's the conviction which caused me, just a few hours ago, to hand in my notice of resignation to my current employer. Because when I find myself watching the clock <i>waiting</i> for 5:01, I must concede that 25% of me (37.5% of the waking me) has already died.<p>This isn't a judgement. I respect you for your decision. There's probably some pity in there too, but honestly, it's mostly respect.
I thought this was going to be another one of those 'Internet Manifestos.'<p>I was very pleasantly surprised. This is something I am definitely behind, even though for me it isn't just a job. I love programming, but for years my programming at home has languished because my programming at work is a soul-sucking endeavor that leads me to have a sinking feeling every time I look at the Komodo icon on my home PC.<p>I think the core problem here is not about an us versus them when it comes to the guys who go home to their wife and kids and the guys that go home to their git and vim. It's more about the fact that <i>both</i> groups probably spend too much time away from their homes, and right now the programming scene is incredibly fractured. Programmers are certainly not a homogenous group. Off the top of my head, I can think of about a dozen different flavors of programmer, all with their own innate perceptions about things both programming related and not.<p>What we really need is a coming together of the programmers-by-trade and the programmers-at-heart to declare war on all of the silly little stereotypes that have created a workplace unfairness in IT in the last fifteen to twenty years. You need a communion of individuals to create a semi-fraternal organization that looks like a union on the outside but inside is a diverse collective of brilliant minds.<p>It wont be easy, but many smart people (and a very few ridiculously articulate people) have been passively advocating for it in the last ten years or so, and I think that as the post-dotcom generation starts to move into their 30s we'll see a drastic change in the employee relationship within the next five to ten years.
Funny thing is that I prefer to go home @ 5 as well... but when I do get home I often read books about programming, catch up on articles and papers, or work on some amusing side-project.<p>Often I'll learn some maths, experiment with some new approaches to solving problems, or watch screen casts to learn how other people approach the craft.<p>I don't do it because I'm some corporate shill. I just really love programming.<p>I also have a wife, a child on the way, and my life seems pretty balanced to me.<p>I just look at overtime and think: well I only have so many minutes left to live, what's in it for me if I do this? Sometimes the answer is just money because that's probably what I needed at that moment... more often than not in recent years I don't bother unless there's equity on the line (which has never been on the table anyway). If my employers ever had a problem with it I just moved on. Things got tight but they never hit rock bottom.<p>It's all just about priorities and sticking up for yourself.
I don't classify myself as a 501 developer. I'm probably the opposite that they're rallying against. But I don't dismiss 501ers. Two things strike me from the manifesto.<p>Since I've become a parent, I've noticed 5:00 has become more important to me. We put our kids down to bed around 8:00, so I only have a few hours of quality time with them each day.<p>Secondly, there are just things you won't learn on the job. And that doesn't mean it's a bad job. My new shiny is currently Haskell. I shouldn't get huffy if my work doesn't allow me to time to explore it. It'd be nice, but I'm not entitled to it. And further, it doesn't mean I should start hunting for a "better job". So in my opinion, 501ers are left with three alternatives:<p>1) They only learn/play/explore things that apply directly to their 9-5 job. Or are limited to whatever time their work allows for exploration.<p>2) They find a job that aligns with their interests.<p>3) They make an business case to the company to incorporate the technology. (However this is best done after you have a level of experience with it)<p>People could argue which of those are better. But if you're someone like me and like to play with a large number of technologies, sometimes removing the job out of the equation is much easier...and maybe even more fun.
“Playing fußball in the pub with our friends over playing fußball in the office with our team leader”<p>Talk about a false dichotomy. I evade this problem by being friends with the people I work with.<p>Overall, I think there are some good distinctions made here. And there is a good point to the thing: “To us it is just a job, but we still do it well.” I almost feel like the page should lead with that. That this isn't an indication that this approach is <i>better</i> than the other approach, simply that it's… Different.<p>Maybe I don't have a family nearby right now. Maybe I am at a point in my life where I can have free snacks and free time, where I can have sustainable pace AND muscle-man heroics AND still enjoy life outside of work. But that's beside the point of the page. The point here is to understand that not everyone has that perspective, and that it's important to respect those that leave their work at the office and dedicate more time to all the other things than you do (if you're one not one of the “501 developers”).
<p><pre><code> If you:
Write a technical blog
Contribute to open source projects
Attend user groups in your spare time
Mostly only read books about coding and productivity
Push to GitHub while sitting on the toilet
Are committed to maximum awesomeness at all times, or would have us believe it
</code></pre>
Much of this applies to me, and applies to me because I love programming. If you don't love programming, I am unlikely to ever respect you as a programmer. Doubly so if you confuse loving programming with being at the beck and call of a given employer, or confuse loving programming with what hours you spend in the workplace.<p>The 5:01 article it links to is insightful, though.
That sarcastic tone is so weird that it's clear there's more to this than working hours. I think it's about dead corporate culture, bad managers, and dysfunctional teams where people don't agree.<p>The more interesting part is the second half, in the smaller print where the author addresses his teammates. He uses words like "respect", but what he's saying feels contemptuous and passive-aggressive. That's the real tell here. Well, that and the suggestion that he doesn't believe in what he's working on. No wonder he feels like checking out every day.<p>Does it matter what time someone leaves? Only if people feel it does. What matters is that a team be aligned. If there's disharmony, work it out. If you can't work it out, change the team. Writing a "manifesto" is not working it out (though it might start a real conversation).<p>Personally, I want teammates who are passionate about doing great work. Come and go whenever works for you. But passion doesn't get turned off like a light switch at the same time every day.
Contributing to open source projects, attending user groups in my spare time, and mostly reading books about coding and productivity do NOT mean that I allow my employment to penetrate deeply into my personal life. I allow my interests and my passions to penetrate deeply into my personal life. If you don't have the good fortune to be paid for your passions, don't put down those who do as corporate shills.<p>I also make plenty of time for family and fun. Maybe it's all of those productivity books.
There's a gulf between a stereotypical "day job" developer and someone for whom programming is a core part of their self image, but in real life there's more of a subtle gradient.<p>People who write technical blogs, go to user groups, or endlessly read programming books seem to be in the "not us" group, but I know of day job developers who do (some/all of) those things. Drawing lines in the sand doesn't seem useful when, I think, the issue behind this seems to be "don't look down on us day job developers." :-)
This is excellent, and I'm fully behind it. Some of the best coworkers I've ever had were 5:01'ers - they got things done on time because they had to, and they didn't burn out.<p>Just don't break the build at 4:59. That's all I ask.
Some of these things relate to employers, and some of them relate to programming and craft. I'm all for keeping a sustainable pace on your project, and not letting your employer's priorities continually override yours. But some of this sounds too much like a defense of those whose dedication to learning stops at the office door.<p>I respect those people for the time they spend with their families and loved ones, and wish them the best, but I don't much enjoy working with them. I love what I do, and if you do too, I expect to see some evidence that you enjoy it in your spare time. Particularly for consultants or independent contractors, I find the notion that all of your professional learning should be on your client's dime to be ethically troublesome at best.
I think we need more of this. In the context of employment (meaning you are not a 'true' owner), I genuinely have a hard time understanding why so many are so good at sabotaging themselves. Its as if we need a primer in worker economics before going into the workforce.<p>Obviously simple rule... the more you work for a flat rate (salary) the more you lower your pay. Second simple rule... the more you work for a flat rate (salary) the larger the opportunity cost. There are probably better things you could be doing for yourself after 5 - things like oh I don't know... have friends, family, start a business (that potentially does NOT have a salary cap), learn new skills, etc. etc.<p>I see this attitude pop up all the time where there are groups of folks who feel that everyone that is an employee who works normal hours should be thrown out of the profession. From my perspective, this is an unfortunately toxic attitude in that it degrades everyone as a whole and collectively detracts from our value.
I'm at the beginning of my career. I moved to a different country because I couldn't find a job I liked in my own country. I really like programming and I started doing it in my spare time in high school and I still do it in my spare time.<p>But, I wholeheartedly agree with this article. I need to go home at 5 in order to keep liking programming. Sometimes I go home to program on a pet project or to learn something new in the weekends. Most of the time I try to do that, but life gets in the way. In a <i>good</i> way. My gf wants to go out or I find some new hobby or I want to go running or just stroll around in the beautiful city I live in. I have problems that I want to solve in my life. I think about stuff and read about stuff. I want to learn to build things with my hands, ride a horse, play two musical instruments, paint etc.<p>I'm not an insect. I don't want to tell people I'm a programmer and have nothing else to talk about (like some of the people I know in this industry). I want to have friends who aren't programmers. In fact I usually appreciate these friends' company a lot more. Because we talk about being human, not about being programmers.<p>I'm really lucky to have a boss and colleagues who are like this, too. Some of them are really bright people. Most of us have a big number of programming books we've read. Just because I go home early it doesn't mean I'm not passionate about my craft. I am and I constantly invest in getting better, but I hope I'm not doing it at the expense of being a real human being and having meaningful relationships with the people around me.<p>It's amazing to see the number of counter-arguments to this manifesto on HN after a year ago everyone was praising things like the 4-hour work week and getting more done in less time. Has that failed? Did it instead turn out that we can be productive sitting on a chair for 12 hours a day?<p>Or maybe the people who really are passionate about programming are just programming right now, because they want to quench their thirst for programming in the 8 hours they have today and then get on with other pursuits. And I should go do that now.
During our latest "crunch project", we worked pretty crazy hours to ship on time. One guy in the team works 6 hour days, and continued doing so all the way, with a few exceptions.<p>As the rest of us turned to Zombies he remained calm, focused and sharp. Without him, we wouldn't have shipped as well as we did.
Something rings a bit off to me about this. Just because you aren't willing to grind yourself into the dirt working 70 hour weeks on someone else's project doesn't mean that you must lack an amazing passion for a craft that could be an enormous part of your life and your identity.<p>By the same token, working long hours doesn't intensify your accrual of experience, skill, or talent, nor does it automatically make you a better or more passionate developer.<p>Passion is passion. Craft is craft. Whether you spend 1 hour a day doing it or 17.
Nah, I don't buy it. Especially the last bits. I write a technical blog because it is your duty to educate nontechnical users about what you know. The old fable of teaching a man how to catch fish comes to mind. This is never a bad thing, and it makes your job easier!<p>Contributing to open source projects, user groups, reading books on coding and productivity? How CAN these be pitiable things? I personally think this is a step before being brogrammers, which I loathe.<p>Let's face it. Being a coder in this brave new world is akin to being a magus in the old times. You know things, you incantate words and verbs only which you and a chosen few understood and you create something out of nether, only real in your mind's eye. And if you deal with information, as they did, you have to convey it. This is something inherent to this craft. You encounter problems with something, you log it; you solve it, you log it. When you share it, many of the people who trod the path will solve the problem, sans the time you spent, and do more. When they encounter something and log it, you will know more. This is a balancing act, nothing more nothing less.<p>It may be just a job for you, but for me it is an act of creation and more than a job.
I've posted this here before, but I think it bears restating.<p>If you work as a software engineer in California and have a salary of less than about 81K, you are entitled to overtime pay.<p>See the law here: <a href="http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=lab.." rel="nofollow">http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=lab..</a>. (section 515.5), with 2011 and 2012 numbers here: <a href="http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlsr/ComputerSoftware.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlsr/ComputerSoftware.pdf</a><p>I am not a lawyer, so do your own research please. But the gist is, if you want developers who will work lots of free overtime, you have to pay them as such.
> Our personal creative projects over commercial products the world doesn't need<p>This invalidates the whole manifesto. Why are you working?<p>I think it's bad to polarize things like this - being a 501 developer vs not having a life. Balance is key, and you should work on things that matter to you. Don't blame the world.
A lot of people in the comments here miss the context: this was written by Microsoft ecosystem developers.<p>Some of the items on the list specifically target Microsoft MVPs and Regional Directors, the shots at "snacks" and "T-shirts" aim at Microsoft community events, and the rest target standard corporate development dysfunction.<p>If there's one positive takeaway from this post, it's the bit of the end that warns you to treat your 501 teammates well.
I don't really want to work with people who are unmotivated and just "Do their time and go". I've done it; I've worked in crappy jobs. Those jobs were, e.g., cashier at fast food joint. Or stocker at department store. <i>Everyone</i> wanted to leave. No one wanted to be there.<p>I am not really up to dealing with the harsh cynicism and assumptions of uselessness of our work with someone who leaves as soon as possible. Doesn't mean I don't like going home early. I do... But if your goal is to clock in at 8:30 and exit at 5:01, just to do the <i>bare minimum</i>, I can't jibe with that. I've worked with people like that... and I don't want to do it again.<p>Regards, pity, etc.
My opinion tends toward the idea that professionals, by definition, participate in continuing education. This can be sponsored by an employer, but it seems that in the software industry it is more often than not up to the individual.<p>On the other hand, I also have passions that extend outside the realm of software development. I'm not sure that this makes me any less passionate about my profession - and in many ways likely enhances my 'personal brand'. For those who are consumed entirely by software engineering - more power to them.
This reminds me of Scott Adams "New Company Model OA5 Out at 5pm" model from the last chapter of his "Dilbert Principle" <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Dilbert-Principle-Cubicles-Eye-Afflictions/dp/0887308589" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/The-Dilbert-Principle-Cubicles-Eye-Aff...</a> on-line at <a href="http://mdsalunkhe.tripod.com/dilbert.htm" rel="nofollow">http://mdsalunkhe.tripod.com/dilbert.htm</a><p><pre><code> Out at Five
I developed a conceptual model for a perfect company.
The primary objective of this company is to make employees as effective
as possible. The best products usually come from the most effective employees,
so employee effectiveness is the most fundamental of the fundamentals.
The goal of the hypothetical company is to get the best work out of
the employees and make sure they leave work by five o’ clock. Finishing by
five o’clock is so central to everything that follows that I named the
company OA5 (Out at five) to reinforce the point.
If you let his part of the concept slip, the rest of it falls apart.
The goal of OA5 is to guarantee that the employee who leaves at 5 PM
has done a full share of work and everybody realizes it. For that to
happen an OA5 company has to do things differently than an ordinary company.
</code></pre>
also discussed in <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3309820" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3309820</a> and submitted as <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=140712" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=140712</a> four years ago
This is conflating so many unrelated things. Leaving work at 5:01 is great - leaving work whenever you need to is great. But spending your life working at "just a job" is a waste. If you're only doing your job to make money you're doing yourself a disservice.
“A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.” —L.P. Jack.<p>Via Frank Chimero: <a href="http://blog.frankchimero.com/post/17609912323" rel="nofollow">http://blog.frankchimero.com/post/17609912323</a>
Why are so many people making this an either - or?<p>Yes, I love programming.<p>Yes, I (mostly) treat work as 501 even though I (usally) love the work I'm doing, but I'm not owned by any company.<p>Yes, I decide over a job similar to "love" precisely because it takes so much time of everyone's live and I spend more time in the office with my coworkers than I spend with my friends, family and spouses.<p>And I still want to see something else but my editor (and I do really like my editor :) - art, books, parties, the city I live in - which I also chose by "love" which is why I wouldn't move for a job to a city I do not like - other cities, good food and other people.<p>So, I look hard to find a workplace I like to do work I love doing which fits into "having a life outside".<p>And exactly that enables me to have a choice EVERY DAY wether I want to do some hacking privately or have a nice dinner with friends.<p>But for many life decisions I'm on the side of the 501 manifesto's spirit: I wouldn't leave my family/spouse for a programming job at $glorious_company, I wouldn't move into some boring smalltown and leave all my friends and the opportunities of my favorite city behind just to do programming at XYZ.<p>This doesn't keep me from having two thinkgeek shirts TOGETHER with 20 others, going to a nerd conference here and there AND take two hours off to go into this cool art exhibit which is at the nerdy_conference_town right now, read a programming book once in a while on top of the pile of other books I read.<p>I totally accept that I'll never become a rockstar in programming with this life-style - but I might have hung out and gotten drunk with real rockstars on some of the parties I had time to attend or even played some rock because I had time to be part of a rockband. ;) (God, I hate the rockstar metaphor a lot.. :)<p>In the end it's about looking down on my life and thinking "it's a good life" - and that changes from decade to decade anyways. What I considered a good life with 22 isn't anymore what I consider a good life now - and yet I wouldn't change a thing of my 22-year-old life.
Threatening with "there's a risk that we'll piss all over your fireworks" falsifies "Not being a dick over being a rockstar".<p>I really liked the manifesto items, but after that the whole thing gets a passive aggressive tone. That is unfortunate.
I've been programming a couple dozen years for a dozen companies, with side projects too. Some of that time I've been a 501 developer, and some of that time not. I think my natural tendency is to go beyond 501, and I'm happiest when the company environment positively reinforces that tendency. When the company seems to be indifferent to me going beyond (there can be a lot of reasons for this), then I fall back to being a 501 developer as a coping mechanism.
My major problem with 501 developers is that it's hard to tell those that say "it's just a job, but I take pride in my craft and do it well" from those that say "It's just a job. period." without pride and love for the craft. It's fine to leave by 5:01 or even 4:59 and I actually urge my coworkers to do so, but it's not fine to leave by 501 when you dropped the ball at 4:59 and leave the rest of the team to clean your mess.
Personally programming defines me. It is a discipline that can only be mastered through dedication and time. I go through the entire day thinking about programming, I go to sleep thinking about programming. Just because I do it as a job as well does not take away from that. I realize that I am extremely lucky to be so passionate about what I do but it isn't stopping you to do what you want to do...go do it.
Look, the people you are "pitying" are the people you depend on: we make your operating systems, your languages, your frameworks, your tools; we invent the things you use; we create your social networks; we abstract away the things you find too hard; we built the very internet you're using to mock us. Do not fuck with us, for without us, you would be a clerk in a dusty room writing out invoices with a pen.
In my opinion, people who love programming and spend they free time programming as a 'hobby' are normally a lot better developers with a thirst to better themselves. I see this at work. Plenty of our devs program as a job, but those who have a genuine interest in programming are capable of a lot more.
Does anybody really look down on employees who leave work at the time that they agreed to leave work when they took the job? I can't imagine this being a problem, although I can see the desire for employees who value the work more than they value keeping to a strict schedule. An interesting problem would often keep me working late, and I would feel guilty for billing the company for unauthorized overtime when I could have left on time. I've never encountered an expectation for employees to routinely stay later than 5:00, or by the same logic, an expectation for employees to come in a long while earlier than their starting time.
A timely post. I am a paying customer of Yahoo (yeah, I know), and they are badly broken today. It looks like the folks who got laid off are razing the landscape behind them (or pissing on the fireworks, to use the OP's metaphor). I pity their plight, but their actions, if my guess is correct, sure have me fucked at the moment. I can't reach anybody at all.