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Career & Management
The most popular blog posts about career & management on Hacker News. 4,747 posts.
When the job search becomes impossible
I have the good fortune to have a job right now, but many of my friends are out of work. Most have been searching for a while. Some are encountering a problem that has my full sympathy, something I’ve experienced myself at various times. I’m not sure I can solve it, but maybe I can help put words to what some are…
We need young programmers; We need old programmers
The software industry loves young people, but old-timers serve an important purpose, too.
How long it takes to know if a job is right for you or not
Every job makes a strong first impression within days. At great jobs, the anxiety is "I hope I can measure up to these amazing people." At bad jobs, it's "oh god I hope this isn't what every day will be like."
Deming Paradox: Operationally rigorous companies aren't nice places to work
Is it possible to be data driven and operationally rigorous and still be human centric at the same time? Deming — who came up with these data techniques — believe that it is possible. I'm not so sure.
Programming Isn't Special
Artists understand that AI is bad for art. Why don’t programmers understand that we are artists?
The cost of interrupted work (2023)
You’ve likely read lots of blog posts stating that it takes 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back to work after an interruption, context switch, or meeting. Thus, “do you have five minutes” ends up not only costing those few minutes, but instead about half an hour. But where does that number come from?
Less is more agile
Dave Farley and Allen Holub are two people that I respect hugely when it comes to Software Development. I’ve been following them on twitter for quite a while, and am always taken in about their takes on driving continuous delivery and “lowercase agile” forward. So when both came together for Dave’s Engineering Room…
Hell is other people: performance management at Big Tech
The lofty theory and the sordid reality of "perf".
Start your meetings at 5 minutes past
I work as an Engineering Manager at Google, and my teams practice a simple habit - we book all meetings to start at five minutes past the hour (or half hour). This works better than trying to finish five minutes early. Meetings often don't finish on time, and the impact is highest with back-to-back meetings.…
Retiring Python as a Teaching Language
It's not about technology for its own sake. It's about being able to implement your ideas.
Against Best Practices
I have come to believe that by and large “best practices” are doing more harm than good. Not necessarily because they’re bad advice as such, but because they’re mostly pounded by either 1) various types of zealots, idiots, and assholes who abuse these kind of “best practices” as an argument from authority, or 2)…
Don’t hire top talent; hire for weaknesses
Design your hiring process to find the right people to strengthen your teams' weaknesses, rather than trying to find the best people. Instead of "how can we find the smartest people?" think about "how can we find the people who will make our team stronger?"
It's Time to Start Writing (2019)
A blog by Alex Nixon on programming and software
AI coding tools can reduce productivity
Study Shows That Even Experienced Developers Dramatically Overestimate Gains
I have officially retired from Emacs
This past Tuesday I typed C-x C-c in Emacs for the last time after 20 years of daily use. Though nearly half that time was gradually retiring it, switching to modal editing, then to Vim. Emacs is a platform, and I’d grown accustomed to its applications, especially those I built myself. There was no particular hurry…
How to Boost Self Esteem and Stop Procrastinating
Cognitive exercises to shift your self-image and overcome procrastination through evidence-based reframing.
Systems Thinking
A blog about software development and programming.
Sleeping through the technical interview (2022)
Xe Iaso's personal website.
Subverting the software interview (2021)
Writing code for online games, particularly for mobile or web-based slot games like this one , involves a mix of advanced graphics rendering, real-time networking, security implementations, and intricate game logic. Developers need to balance between performance optimization, cross-platform compatibility, and the…
Senior Developers Are Getting Rejected for Jobs
Some really great software developers have been passed...
A shift in developer culture is impacting innovation and creativity
From tinkerers to metric seekers: How the shift in developer culture is impacting innovation and creativity.