Join devRant
Do all the things like
++ or -- rants, post your own rants, comment on others' rants and build your customized dev avatar
Sign Up
Pipeless API
From the creators of devRant, Pipeless lets you power real-time personalized recommendations and activity feeds using a simple API
Learn More
Search - "productivity over the top"
-
What is the most ridiculous over-the-top "startup" thing you've been the victim of as a developer?
Alternatively, what kind of weird startup luxury would you absolutely love to have at your company?
For me, at various companies I've worked at/visited:
1. Hammocks & fatboy beanbags. Current employer has a "Netflix & Chill" corner with nice couches, and a small gym. I have encountered isolation/flotation tanks at the office of one of our partners... which is cool, but over the top in my opinion.
2. A fully automated aquaponics garden in the lunchroom. Was awesome, until some fish died and started to rot.
3. One hoverboard per employee, at previous employer. I splashed hot chocolate milk in an arc over three desks. A coworker broke his ankle while watching me spill chocolate milk.
4. Daily scrum standup meetings, on socks, in a big bouncy castle. Not kidding. Fucking ridiculous... (but secretly fun). That employer also had spiral slides between all floors, a tiny half-pipe with tiny skateboards, and someone who rode a unicycle way too much. It was a fucking circus. Stuck in the office of a Fintech company.
5. Soldering bench (at my current company), with drawers full of breadboards, servos and electronics components. Completely unrelated to my work, but it was my idea. It's just great to build a simple kits together with another random coworker while brainstorming platform features & refining specs... much better than meetings with bullshit slides.
6. Unlimited energy drink. Developed a serious caffeine habit (15-20 cans a day), and almost got a stomach ulcer. Not beneficial to employee health.
7. I really do love working from home + unlimited holidays. Just being able to honestly say "fuck you guys, I'm gonna get drunk and play games today", and at other times working until 4am and sleeping in the next day, or taking a week to work in a park in Rome... It makes work truly feel like my favorite hobby. Combined with a good sprints and curious/ambitious people, you can easily track productivity anyway.19 -
So this happen on my previous workplace. I worked there for 4 years and quitting was the best decision I made while was there.
One manager/owner there was the most toxic, piece of shit, disrespectful cunt I have ever worked with. The type of guy that comes in and every person's productivity goes down in a heartbeat.
As he was a owner he usually came in later. This one morning it was 11-ish and a meeting with a client was happening and it was an open space.
He comes in.
He puts his laptop down.
He sits.
He screams of the top of his lungs:
- WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?
- ANTS ALL OVER MY DESK!!!
- I CAN'T WORK LIKE THIS.
He leaves for about 30 min.
He came back with a can of spray, and literally intoxicated the office and everybody had to stop working.
And there you go one of my last place's beautiful stories.5 -
Had a very productive day today:
1. Fixed a small bug
2. Ordered Tab S6
3. Watched the entire season of a Netflix show4 -
I started my career almost 20 years ago now.
I had the chance to work in really good environments, and with people trying to be performant. In my first company, the CTO pushed a lot the new/shiny XP method. Then I used the first iterations of Scrum as a Team Leader.
As I became a Service Manager, I found my love in kanban/lean (and my worst nightmare in sigma six).
I crashed startups created with friends and cashed out sometimes.
I also did a lot of "agile consulting", around productivity, product methods, organization (even got certified SaFe, the Agile framework that states" process over people").
When I came back to Europe, I just wanted to get back to the level I was in North America.
I have done a lot of mentoring, but now I lack the motivation (and time) to keep doing it, the way I did. So I stopped.
And now I have to answer the question "do I leave delivery?". Also, it seems that a lot of actual organizations are starting to put the product under " tech top management" ( companies I like at least).
So I wonder, what my next evolution should be...
Should I leave tech delivery to be fully Top-Management...
Do I want to structure/handle/organize the Product Teams...
Covid has given me time to start thinking a lot more about my situation... And it sucks...