I had a long and intresting conversation with my therapist just now. I’m not comfortable sharing exactly what we were talking about but I can rephrase it: basically I was complaining that tech companies don’t want to innovate.
I’ve been trying to bring new technologies to my boss because I thought it would give him a better opportunity to realize value from the products I’m creating/maintaining for him. That’s what I understand is my purpose in the workforce. I’m a programmer not a salesman I can’t go out to the market and get him the money so he can pay me with something, I can only make things put things in his hands for him (or hire someone to) to go out and collect the money we deserve (deserve within the limits of market demands and the nature of the product, not the labor invested). But he doesn’t want them… well he does when he needs them but I miss way more times than I hit which is making my professional feelings feel less valuable. And if I’m not valuable enough then I can’t work doing what I love.
When I started working I went in with a plan to upgrade and modernize everything I touch. I still believe that to be the case, or like… my “purpose”(as an employee not a person). But every company I’ve worked for so far has been running old ass shit. Springboot apps, create-react-apps, codebases in c and c++, no kubernetes, little to no cloud. And it feels like everything that tech companies want me to do is maintain and expand old existing codebases. And I understand why, I know that its expensive to rewrite entire code bases just for a 20% efficiency boost and to make it easier to add upgrades every once in awhile. But noone is taking advantage of innovative technology anymore and that’s what’s concerning me.
In my therapist’s opinion he thinks we as a soceity are not taking 100% advantage of technology we have. I can’t go into too many details bc our conversations are private but at the end I agreed with him. I’m seeing it now in my working day but he convinced me that it’s everywhere. Are people actually benefitting from technology enough such that nobody actually needs to work to maintain a long and healthy life?
Lets say that no, technology is underutilized in our soceity. Does that mean that if we use technology more we’d have enough value in the economy to pay everyone a UBI? Could we phase out the human workforce to some extent? Or do we actually need more workers to do work to make the value, in which case we can’t realistically do UBI because people need to get paid competitivily to do the work.
Lets say that yes, we are taking all advantages of technology. If so than there should be enough value to pay a UBI. But we don’t have a UBI, so why? If the value exists than where is it? I don’t believe its being funnelled into the pockets of some shadowy deep-state private 4th branch of government. If it was than there’d be something to take, is there? Are we sure that its enough?
Basically I don’t know if technology generates value.
Think about it like this
If its cheaper to use technology to grow an acre of corn than to use people, is that subsequent output of corn more valuable or less valuable because of the technology. And if you believe that scaling up corn production to make the corn just as valuable as if we didn’t have technology then you agree that the corn is now less valuable. If self-checkout machines are replacing cashiers, does that mean that the cashiering work being done by the machine is more valuable to soceity or less?
This is basically end stage capitalism. We need to recognize if the work we do for soceity (whether you derive personal fulfillment or not) is actually adding to soceity or not. I’d rather not give up my job as a programmer just so I can do something more valuable, but I might have to if that’s the case. And I feel like most people in the world are thinking like that too. Is soceity trying to hang on to the past, or do we just not understand the future?
Sorry for the wall of text. I feel like this might be to philosophical for this community but I couldn’t find a better place to post this. If you know of a better community for this discussion to take place then I’ll consider moving this post based on the comments already posted. Thank you for reading this and I’d love to answer any question you’d have about my opinions/feelings.
There’s a lot here. Some I can comment on and some I can’t. Some bits are simply how you are viewing the world, and differ to how others view it. There is no possibility for objectivity there, and are better suited to discussions with mental health professionals.
For my sins, I’m a Product Manager. While I have a background in engineering (having done a CS degree and taught myself to code in my teens), I have never held a job as a developer.
As such, I have conversations pretty much every day with developers, dev leads, people with “architect” in their title, CTOs, etc, all of whom are considerably more technically literate than I am, about what new technologies we can take advantage of. Some times it’s me asking them, sometimes it’s them asking me, but one thing is always constant. Time, risk, and cost of implementation is what matters most.
The majority of the time, when I am approached by Devs, the conversation goes along the lines of:
In short, the benefits have not been quantified, and the costs ignored.
Other times, the change that is being suggested doesn’t align with the current business need. I’ve had to reject suggestions to refactor systems because we’ve literally been down to the last few pay cheques, and we need to focus on revenue generation. This massively undermines the person making the suggestion, because it shows they are not understanding the actual priority of the business.
And other times still, it can be simply a pipedream. I once had a dev lead stand up and scream at me across a desk because I didn’t agree with him that we immediately rewrite our entire app in Swift, on literally the day Apple released the beta back in 2014, and I had had the gaul to suggest that he needs to come up with a plan to iteratively develop some new, low risk, functionality in the language first, before saying he wants to spend “at least a year” doing a complete overhaul, and nothing else.
This is not to say that developers are idiots or anything. The vast majority of the discussions I have had with all my collegues across my career have been good, thought provoking, and helpful. But that doesn’t mean they always get what they want, and nor does it mean I get what I want. I have definitely rejected work where that was the wrong decision, and I’ve suffered the consequences of it. I’ve also definitely accepted work that ended up being a complete waste of time.
None of us are perfect.
If you are finding that your boss is always rejecting your suggestions, I would suggest you need to consider these things:
If you can explain the potential value, how it helps the business get to where it wants to be faster, and how you can identify unknown unknowns through low cost and quick to develop POCs, then you may be able to get buy in.
If you can’t, or don’t know how, then there are plenty of resources available. A good starting point would be to read The Lean Startup.
It is considerably more likely that the problem is with your skills of persuasion, and writing business cases, rather than all of technology being worthless.
Lastly, regarding discussions with professionals, one bit that did concern me is this
My experience with therapists, and in discussions with friends who are qualified pshrinks, is that a therapist should never try and convince you of anything. Their job is to structure conversations you are in essence having with yourself. They may repeat your previous statements back to you, in a way that requires you to reconcile potentially conflicting views or opinions. They may even challenge your assertions and get you to explain more thoroughly your views. These processes may well cause you to change your views on things.
But if your therapist is actually trying to convince you of their world view, you need to get a new therapist.
I’m glad you said this because I thought I was the only one.
Thank you for your perspective as a product manager. You gave me some insights that I have seen happen to me, but I never really understood why. I wish I had more visibility over my company so I can understand some of these things, it would be better than just accepting it as “boss knows best”.
I’m gonna take some notes from you before I try to convince my boss of a really cool idea I have for my company.
Ehhhh IIIII wanna defend my guy. My therapist is the greatest conversationalist I’ve ever had. All of my sessions revolve around me asking him to convince me of whats right in the world. If I agree that he’s right I make a change and more than 80% of the time I see a clear benefit. He’s not trying to convince me that he’s right because I asked him too, because when I did try that he’d refuse or just wouldn’t, and I’d count that as a loss from his end. He can’t always win for me but when he does, its a real good win. So I guess the word “convinced” might not be as accurate as saying “we walked through this conversation until I got to a place of understanding”.
I say this to my junior Product Owners a lot, don’t go in to that conversation with the view you are having to convince/pursaude them of anything. It sets it up as combative, has the implication that you are right and they are wrong, and that something in their plan needs to change. They will sense that, and will be much more defensive.
To be clear, I’m not talking about literal code changes here, but the current initiatives / projects / bets (whatever word you want to use) the company is planning on doing.
Instead you should demonstrate how your idea fits in with the current strategy of the business. Show them that you know where they are wanting to get to, and show how this idea gets them there. Go in to that conversation with a sincere intent of collaboration.
That way you don’t need to convince anyone to change anything because they are still getting to the same destination, and you’re showing them a quicker route through the bushes.
If they say no, ask them politely to explain their reasons so you can be on the same page. Do not argue, just listen to what they say. They will be telling you what is most important to them and the business in that reply. It literally doesn’t matter if you agree with them or not, they are telling you the constraints you need to operate in.
After the meeting, use that knowledge to reassess your proposal, and think of ways you could modify the idea, or what information you presented alongside it, to get it accepted. If you still don’t understand, then ask further questions about that bit.
Remember, it’s about collaboration.
I’d argue the same applies in therapy too. It may be worth exploring why you seem to have a pretty darwinian view of thoughts / opinions being demonstrably right or wrong. In my experience the world is much greyer.
I am glad however that your therapist is doing something that has been requested, rather than anything else (even if it does seem to be rather atypical).