on http://slashdot.org/askslashdot/00/07/25/0329226.shtml Cliff wrote:
“What do you do if your productivity drops to two lines of code a day, and you just sit and stare at the code and feel like you don’t know how to do it anymore?…”
this is just like something I’ve been going through for a while. and it has been troubling me.
there’s this long thread on the topic, with some good advice, like take a break, drink more caffeinated beverages, and one poster writes:
The c0der cocktail: (use at your own risk)
——————————————-
Once Daily:
*5-HTP – 100mg
*Vitamin/Mineral supplement
With a meal: (3 times daily)
*DHEA – 25mg
*Ginko Biloba – 80mg – 24%GF
*One of:
– Ephedrine – 20mg
– Adderall/Ritalin – 1 dose
– Ginseng – 2 doses
Another writes:
Give yourself some credit: you are probably not some lazy lowlife.
There are easier ways to make a living than this. So what’s the
problem? I have no idea, but you do.
There’s obviously SOMETHING that’s actively preventing you from
focusing properly on the job at hand, and you probably know what it
is.
this is good, and true and important to consider..
my own take is that there’s at least two aspects to the problem.
lots of respondents to the original posting focused on one aspect — the psychological and technical aspect — and ways to address those issues.
the second aspect of this problem rests on the structural basis of the work. is it a personal project for fun, research or perhaps life-long learning? is it work in which you hold equity? is it work for hire? paid by the hour, by the job or salaried?
the reason this is important is that in the case where the work is being done for a personal project, or for a business enterprise in which you hold significant equity, there is no ethical dilemma. you will be rewarded to the extent the work done is valued by whoever you need to sell it to. no more, no less. the problem will take as long as it takes, or you may just drop it in favor of some other more interesting task, perhaps returning when you are ready. you are free.
but in the case of work for hire, there is a business ethics question around one’s failure to provide services (or at least inefficiency and delay). the implicit contract between employer and employee rests on the concept of programming work being some sort of “labor” and the exchange analogous to buying and selling a commodity in some sense.
but obviously in cases like this, the thought product is different in some important way from any commodity in general and conventional labor in particular. there is a creative element, and it is a deficiency of the work-for-hire employment model that creates the ethical dilemma.
if the problem is simply that you don’t know what you’re doing, then get trained up fast! on your own time, thank you! this career requires life-long learning. there is no shame in that, as long as you do nothing under false pretences. if you just can’t get trained, for whatever reason, consider changing careers.
there is also this gray area called marketing. individuals selling their skills are no different from any other vendors, and are entitled to emphasize their strengths and minimize their weaknesses. we don’t have to like it in any objective sense, that’s just the way business works, and there’s nothing wrong in that. but when you find yourself in a bind, unable to deliver work already promised, then I guess you have some fast talking to do, there’s no two ways around it.