Besides which, you missed my other comment - workers in the US seem, on average and from an executive viewpoint - to be LESS productive than their european counterparts, despite giving up far more of their lives.
AFAICT it makes it the better for the workers in question, which is what concerns us here in soviet EUia. Balance in all things. Making money is good, but not at the expense of everyone else's quality of life.
"Yes, I think he/she/it is supposed to be 'managing' you and the work you do. ( not micromanaging ) Certainly being aware of what you are doing to move the company agenda forward should be a requirement of a manager."
Without you talking to them? Without you telling them what you've been doing?
I don't think so, I think if you're not communicating you can expect to sit in your corner for as long as you're prepared to, and that's the only way it can happen because other people are not psychic.
I also have the option to "buy" (i.e. take unpaid leave) for up to a further two weeks.
A (now defunct) US based company I used to work for gave us 20 + public holidays, I think because that was the legal minimum. They gave their US employees 12.
The jailbreaks on the first model and the "Thin 'n' Light" (PSP2000?) are rock solid and bust wide open, using the built in service mode. Hell, the one I have can even reboot to stock firmware so that downloaded content can work.
Now, android might not help, but getting android on to the PS might well be possible. What the point would be is another question I'd ask.
What happens across all of europe - people would enjoy life more.
If you have a team of twenty people then you only need one more to cover all the extra time, and if they're anything more than a body in a seat to you and your business then you'll get more out of that 21 than your 20 overworked office-zombies.
My dad is an exec in a large multinational and he agrees with me that the US is doing it wrong. US workers are not more productive than european workers. Despite getting half the vacation allowance and being present in the office for far longer each week, they achieve LESS, in his experience.
You want more than a month because life and work are different things. You want more than a month because if you're working hard most of the time then you need it.
I took a month in one chunk last year, if I wasn't taking a six month career break starting december I'd be doing the same again this year.
You only get one life, feel free to spend yours in an office. I'll be diving in the caribbean.
In both of your cases there the one not getting the raise is an idiot.
Constant crowing about how great you are is not a good idea really, but you need to let people know what you're doing or how the hell do you expect to be recognised for it? ESP? Is your manager supposed to just figure out that everything is running so much better because you're here?
It IS the managers job to get people to talk about what they're doing, sure.
As for the raise situation, yeah, it's down to being pushy, of course it is. If you think you're worth more you ask for more money or you move.
Here's the real secret though - you need to be pushy AND talented. Just being ambitious, pushy and having good soft skills whilst sucking at the actual engineering, is not enough. Those people get laughed out of town and probably ought to be elsewhere.
Managers are not psychic, if they don't know what you're doing because you seem just to sit there and not talk about anything then you can't expect to be held up as the demi-god of computer wizardry you think you are.
"Its a myth, there is no shortage of good people in the UK."
Then they weren't applying for jobs with us in the 35-45K range. I don't know if you consider that salary a joke or not. The places I've worked were less concerned about IDEs.
If you actually had decent skills in databases you could be pulling down six figures. My friends who are Oracle DBAs get farkloads of cash and seem to always be in demand.
Perhaps your attitude is the problem. I walked straight into a good software job and have continued to advance by showing ability and enthusiasm for my work.
Wow, you can design microchips. I can design and implement complex software without being condescending to test and support staff or ranting about how much better I am at everything.
No, you seem to be doing it right. I'd be slightly worried if the work was dropping off too much though. And what do you mean by "built up"?
I'm sure it's not everyone, but I do get the impression that in much of the US there is much more of a long hours culture, and much less paid leave. That said, I've been working 11 hour days for the last three weeks or so because something needs to be finished. I have no objection to putting in the extra work when it's needed, just not routinely.
It means she will make vastly more money than you, work half the time and have twice as much paid vacation.
I doubt that very much I'm British, she's American.
I already get five weeks paid leave and work 37 hour weeks. From what I understand of the US I'd probably be fired for not being present enough. Here, I just go promoted.
You ask questions about resources, about parallelism, efficient data structures, platform related difficulties etc.
It's not even necessary that they get the "right" answers, especially when talking about data structures, just that it sparks off a discussion and you can tell whether they're trying to pull the wool over your eyes or not.
I'll admit it's more difficult at a graduate level, where you're trying to assess someone's potential to become a good resource-usage tracking obsessive:)
Or at least it does if you do a degree related to a particular profession. There was a time when a degree, any degree, would have put you several rungs up the career ladder but that doesn't seem to be the case now. Especially as the career "ladder" itself is more like an assault course, where the best chance of advancement is usually to move jobs every few years.
"I'm a geek, and I wont even go into a computer sciences or information tech, field, there are 10 times as many applicants than their are job openings in that field."
Umm, no, there's a shortage of good people. At least here in the UK. Not that we're recruiting right now, but last time we were it took months to find a decent C programmer. And there's always a premium and a shortage of Database folks.
Sure, there are a lot of folks in IT. There are also a lot of folks in web design. But trying to find a decent coder for fast, efficient, well designed distributed and parallel systems is hard.
As in all things in life, there are opportunities if you're good, and if you look in the right places.
"just because they've done nothing more than show up for class and turn in assignments most of the time."
That was what I did.
But then I have natural wit and charm, a willingness to admit I slacked off at university, plus I did computer science. Little miss entitlement got a "Bachelor of Business Administration" in "IT". What the hell does that even mean?
BP is "BP p.l.c" and "BP America Inc" and various other things. That's the registered name. It may still unofficially stand for British Petroleum but that's not the company name any more.
Their slogan, which is what you're probably thinking of, is "Beyond Petroleum".
I'm not sure that IBM is "International Business Machines" any more. I think it's just IBM.
BP used to stand for British Petroleum, but now it's just BP. BAE Systems, likewise, used to be British Aerospace Engineering Systems, but now are just BAE.
"Liberalism rarely survives ones first paycheck and the discovery of how much of your money the Government is taking from you. To borrow a quote, "If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain."
What is this "liberalism" you're talking about?
Because there's nothing incompatible between liberalism, social freedom and fiscal responsibility. There's nothing illiberal about insisting on a small government that doesn't interfere in people's lives. Hell, classical liberalism is basically a milder form of libertarianism. The fact that it's not represented in politics has no bearing on what it is.
Oh, did you mean the big bad american boogie-man, the liberal who's coming for your guns and wants to give all your money to poor, gay minorities?
Yeah, that's about as much to do with liberalism as the abstinence-only, fundamentalist, intelligent-design teaching US christian right is conservative.
It nearly always comes up here and elsewhere - Linux can't run application X, therefore it is useless. Windows on ARM would suffer from exactly the same.
Slashdot Mirror
Hmmmm....
BULLSHIT!
Besides which, you missed my other comment - workers in the US seem, on average and from an executive viewpoint - to be LESS productive than their european counterparts, despite giving up far more of their lives.
Really?
I don't know anyone that uses DNS servers that aren't provided by their ISP, unless they have some specific need to do otherwise.
I mean, other than in cases like this, what does it get you?
AFAICT it makes it the better for the workers in question, which is what concerns us here in soviet EUia. Balance in all things. Making money is good, but not at the expense of everyone else's quality of life.
She's got a degree that says nothing and she's whining that nobody handed her a job. I'll be as snide as I like, thanks.
I too have worked with very talented people, some of whom have no qualifications at all. But her degree sounds like bullshit to me.
Someone with a 4 year degree in Comp Sci ought to be aiming far higher than helpdesk...
Jesus.
That depends very, very much on what you're talking about. In most of the (non-software) engineering disciplines, no degree means no job, no how.
"Yes, I think he/she/it is supposed to be 'managing' you and the work you do. ( not micromanaging ) Certainly being aware of what you are doing to move the company agenda forward should be a requirement of a manager."
Without you talking to them? Without you telling them what you've been doing?
I don't think so, I think if you're not communicating you can expect to sit in your corner for as long as you're prepared to, and that's the only way it can happen because other people are not psychic.
Grand total is 33 days including public holidays.
I also have the option to "buy" (i.e. take unpaid leave) for up to a further two weeks.
A (now defunct) US based company I used to work for gave us 20 + public holidays, I think because that was the legal minimum. They gave their US employees 12.
What?
The jailbreaks on the first model and the "Thin 'n' Light" (PSP2000?) are rock solid and bust wide open, using the built in service mode. Hell, the one I have can even reboot to stock firmware so that downloaded content can work.
Now, android might not help, but getting android on to the PS might well be possible. What the point would be is another question I'd ask.
What happens across all of europe - people would enjoy life more.
If you have a team of twenty people then you only need one more to cover all the extra time, and if they're anything more than a body in a seat to you and your business then you'll get more out of that 21 than your 20 overworked office-zombies.
You know what?
My dad is an exec in a large multinational and he agrees with me that the US is doing it wrong. US workers are not more productive than european workers. Despite getting half the vacation allowance and being present in the office for far longer each week, they achieve LESS, in his experience.
You want more than a month because life and work are different things. You want more than a month because if you're working hard most of the time then you need it.
I took a month in one chunk last year, if I wasn't taking a six month career break starting december I'd be doing the same again this year.
You only get one life, feel free to spend yours in an office. I'll be diving in the caribbean.
In both of your cases there the one not getting the raise is an idiot.
Constant crowing about how great you are is not a good idea really, but you need to let people know what you're doing or how the hell do you expect to be recognised for it? ESP? Is your manager supposed to just figure out that everything is running so much better because you're here?
It IS the managers job to get people to talk about what they're doing, sure.
As for the raise situation, yeah, it's down to being pushy, of course it is. If you think you're worth more you ask for more money or you move.
Here's the real secret though - you need to be pushy AND talented. Just being ambitious, pushy and having good soft skills whilst sucking at the actual engineering, is not enough. Those people get laughed out of town and probably ought to be elsewhere.
Managers are not psychic, if they don't know what you're doing because you seem just to sit there and not talk about anything then you can't expect to be held up as the demi-god of computer wizardry you think you are.
"Its a myth, there is no shortage of good people in the UK."
Then they weren't applying for jobs with us in the 35-45K range. I don't know if you consider that salary a joke or not. The places I've worked were less concerned about IDEs.
If you actually had decent skills in databases you could be pulling down six figures. My friends who are Oracle DBAs get farkloads of cash and seem to always be in demand.
I'm one of those Comp Sci BSc's you sneer at.
Perhaps your attitude is the problem. I walked straight into a good software job and have continued to advance by showing ability and enthusiasm for my work.
Wow, you can design microchips. I can design and implement complex software without being condescending to test and support staff or ranting about how much better I am at everything.
No, you seem to be doing it right. I'd be slightly worried if the work was dropping off too much though. And what do you mean by "built up"?
I'm sure it's not everyone, but I do get the impression that in much of the US there is much more of a long hours culture, and much less paid leave. That said, I've been working 11 hour days for the last three weeks or so because something needs to be finished. I have no objection to putting in the extra work when it's needed, just not routinely.
I doubt that very much I'm British, she's American.
I already get five weeks paid leave and work 37 hour weeks. From what I understand of the US I'd probably be fired for not being present enough. Here, I just go promoted.
America - you're doing it wrong.
You ask questions about resources, about parallelism, efficient data structures, platform related difficulties etc.
It's not even necessary that they get the "right" answers, especially when talking about data structures, just that it sparks off a discussion and you can tell whether they're trying to pull the wool over your eyes or not.
I'll admit it's more difficult at a graduate level, where you're trying to assess someone's potential to become a good resource-usage tracking obsessive :)
A degree gets you in the door.
Or at least it does if you do a degree related to a particular profession. There was a time when a degree, any degree, would have put you several rungs up the career ladder but that doesn't seem to be the case now. Especially as the career "ladder" itself is more like an assault course, where the best chance of advancement is usually to move jobs every few years.
"I'm a geek, and I wont even go into a computer sciences or information tech, field, there are 10 times as many
applicants than their are job openings in that field."
Umm, no, there's a shortage of good people. At least here in the UK. Not that we're recruiting right now, but last time we were it took months to find a decent C programmer. And there's always a premium and a shortage of Database folks.
Sure, there are a lot of folks in IT. There are also a lot of folks in web design. But trying to find a decent coder for fast, efficient, well designed distributed and parallel systems is hard.
As in all things in life, there are opportunities if you're good, and if you look in the right places.
"just because they've done nothing more than show up for class and turn in assignments most of the time."
That was what I did.
But then I have natural wit and charm, a willingness to admit I slacked off at university, plus I did computer science. Little miss entitlement got a "Bachelor of Business Administration" in "IT". What the hell does that even mean?
BP is "BP p.l.c" and "BP America Inc" and various other things. That's the registered name. It may still unofficially stand for British Petroleum but that's not the company name any more.
Their slogan, which is what you're probably thinking of, is "Beyond Petroleum".
However it looks like you're right about IBM.
I'm not sure that IBM is "International Business Machines" any more. I think it's just IBM.
BP used to stand for British Petroleum, but now it's just BP. BAE Systems, likewise, used to be British Aerospace Engineering Systems, but now are just BAE.
It's weird.
"Liberalism rarely survives ones first paycheck and the discovery of how much of your money the Government is taking from you. To borrow a quote, "If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain."
What is this "liberalism" you're talking about?
Because there's nothing incompatible between liberalism, social freedom and fiscal responsibility. There's nothing illiberal about insisting on a small government that doesn't interfere in people's lives. Hell, classical liberalism is basically a milder form of libertarianism. The fact that it's not represented in politics has no bearing on what it is.
Oh, did you mean the big bad american boogie-man, the liberal who's coming for your guns and wants to give all your money to poor, gay minorities?
Yeah, that's about as much to do with liberalism as the abstinence-only, fundamentalist, intelligent-design teaching US christian right is conservative.
The poor do more "honest" work than the rich?
What's honest work pray tell?
And if they're so hard working why are they still poor?
I have a lot of friends from a variety of backgrounds. The ones that work hard and honestly are not poor any more.
How so, anonymous coward?
It nearly always comes up here and elsewhere - Linux can't run application X, therefore it is useless. Windows on ARM would suffer from exactly the same.