Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

I don't really disagree with anything here, except that I think "not my job, not my problem" is at best a sign of unhealthy dysfunction, and not something to aspire to. Well, for most people; probably certain annoying activist meddlers could settle down and focus more on their own areas. And I suppose it can be a rational self-protective mechanism when you're stuck in a really dysfunctional place, as doing too much "not in the exact letter of my job contract" types of work can quickly lead to burnout, but it'd still be better to look for something new... As the thread's current top comment mentions, when you disincentivize things like "Helping a colleague" or "Digging into what looks like a security vulnerability", that's just incredibly corrosive and makes dysfunction even worse. It doesn't matter whether you disincentive such things with bad management dashboards or with encouraging an attitude of "not my official job duties, don't care".

It's not quite a matter of "professionalism", and I very much don't want programming to turn into something that requires a professional engineer stamp like other engineering disciplines, but professionalism might be the best proxy term. I want to work with people who do good work. Even excepting the cases where someone else's bad performance or work actually can directly impact me or the rest of the team's work or reputation, I'd rather work at a place that discourages bad performance. If management appears blind to a particular instance, it may well be worth saying something to try and correct it, even if performance of the system is ultimately their responsibility. Each place is different, maybe saying something will actually improve things, or maybe it just ends up being another one of the hundreds of cuts that eventually make you conclude the place sucks with management not interested in improving it or themselves, and you go elsewhere.

There's a similar notion with introducing better technical practices like version control. Another comment mentioned struggling to get git adoption, but there are plenty of other stories of the opposite, where you do get a team to adopt something without the threat of management forcing it on everyone. Those experiences are great, I'm glad to have had several of them.

For sure, if you're being asked to be "tech lead", you should at least be getting paid as much as any of the direct managers of the team. In the age of "parallel promotion tracks", there's enough truth to that convenient fiction that this shouldn't be too difficult to achieve. (There is the downside of dumb processes like having to perform "at level" for several months to prove you deserve a promotion. You're basically taking a pay cut for that time, so better argue for sufficient compensation increase/bonuses when that promo comes.. and justifiably ragequit if passed over.)




I think we mostly agree. I do think that this part:

> is at best a sign of unhealthy dysfunction, and not something to aspire to.

Should be disclaimed by saying that I’m Danish and we have a different view of workplace authority than people in the USA might.




Consider applying for YC's Summer 2025 batch! Applications are open till May 13

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: