Much of the world needs to work two jobs. Chris Williams writes that managers should be careful in how they react to an employee working multiple jobs.
The double dipping is referring to doing both jobs simultaneously. Like two remote jobs and you have both work laptops open, so between two jobs you can work 40 hours per week but be paid for 80. It’s distinctly different from clocking in for one job, then clocking out and going to another job and clocking in for that job.
But are they? Generally in tech, it’s really hard to gauge people’s performance and most companies are conservative with firing people for performance reasons. So you could coast by on mediocre performance. You team won’t be happy with you, but you probably will keep your job simply because you’re given the benefit of doubt. Tech is one of those areas where someone can actually be 10x as effective as another person, because so much of the job can be spent on stuff like debugging and dealing with weird issues, where one person might spend all day on an issue that another person can resolve in minutes.
There’s also something to be said about the fact that companies are usually paying for your time, not output. Contractors are the ones who are paid for output, not employees. It’s also straight up expected in tech that you’re looking for ways to automate some tasks so they don’t have to be done anymore. It’s not like some mindless office job where you’re expected to do X reports per day. There’s a never ending list of bugs to fix and features requested. You’re generally paid to find ways to increase productivity, not merely do the same thing over and over.
At any rate, tech is usually also paid well enough for it. There’s still massive income disparity between regular workers and C-suite, but at least the pay is always well, well above living wages, stock options are commonly given to regular workers, and high performers often are rewarded for doing better than average. IMO, tech jobs aren’t really an area to focus on the kinda mindset you have, since it does so much better than most (not perfect, but still far better). Most jobs don’t get anything close to what tech jobs offer to regular employees.
It’s not just Tech. Two people I work with, One can format a Word document 5x faster. With the logic of some of these people, the slower person should be fired for it? I don’t get it.
Are you being honest with your second job that you’re only going to do your job during the stretches of job #1 that require long compile times?
It’s like dating two people but pretending to be monogamous with each. It might work for a bit but at some point you will need to choose one over the other.
at some point you will need to choose one over the other.
Maybe, maybe not. I’ve heard of people doing this stuff for a LONG time.
But it doesn’t matter, does it? If you are forced to choose one over the other, you’ve still made a lot of extra money on all the double-dipped hours you’ve accrued up to that point.
The double dipping is referring to doing both jobs simultaneously. Like two remote jobs and you have both work laptops open, so between two jobs you can work 40 hours per week but be paid for 80. It’s distinctly different from clocking in for one job, then clocking out and going to another job and clocking in for that job.
If both sets of 40 hours are meeting goals then the company can shut the fuck up, morally speaking.
You’re basically just criticizing capitalism for being stupid and inefficient, and I 100% agree with you.
But are they? Generally in tech, it’s really hard to gauge people’s performance and most companies are conservative with firing people for performance reasons. So you could coast by on mediocre performance. You team won’t be happy with you, but you probably will keep your job simply because you’re given the benefit of doubt. Tech is one of those areas where someone can actually be 10x as effective as another person, because so much of the job can be spent on stuff like debugging and dealing with weird issues, where one person might spend all day on an issue that another person can resolve in minutes.
There’s also something to be said about the fact that companies are usually paying for your time, not output. Contractors are the ones who are paid for output, not employees. It’s also straight up expected in tech that you’re looking for ways to automate some tasks so they don’t have to be done anymore. It’s not like some mindless office job where you’re expected to do X reports per day. There’s a never ending list of bugs to fix and features requested. You’re generally paid to find ways to increase productivity, not merely do the same thing over and over.
At any rate, tech is usually also paid well enough for it. There’s still massive income disparity between regular workers and C-suite, but at least the pay is always well, well above living wages, stock options are commonly given to regular workers, and high performers often are rewarded for doing better than average. IMO, tech jobs aren’t really an area to focus on the kinda mindset you have, since it does so much better than most (not perfect, but still far better). Most jobs don’t get anything close to what tech jobs offer to regular employees.
It’s not just Tech. Two people I work with, One can format a Word document 5x faster. With the logic of some of these people, the slower person should be fired for it? I don’t get it.
What if a compile job takes a long time? Would that be a good reason to context switch?
Are you being honest with your second job that you’re only going to do your job during the stretches of job #1 that require long compile times?
It’s like dating two people but pretending to be monogamous with each. It might work for a bit but at some point you will need to choose one over the other.
That’s a great analogy.
Maybe, maybe not. I’ve heard of people doing this stuff for a LONG time.
But it doesn’t matter, does it? If you are forced to choose one over the other, you’ve still made a lot of extra money on all the double-dipped hours you’ve accrued up to that point.
That’s true but that reflects more on how bloated and inefficient the tech sector is. And now the other shoe is dropping with mass layoffs.
Yeah but the alternative is that I spend the rest of the time on on here. If the company aren’t keeping me busy that’s their problem