Comment by fendale | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fendale | Hacker News Reader

This post arrived here today just after me getting told off for being honest, again. I still don't know if being too honest is right or wrong.

I work in a big company (100K employees worldwide), and as such there are company politics going on that few would believe unless you worked there.

This time I got scolded for telling some of our DBA team members that the database we were trying to fix was a schema design disaster from day 1 - I didn't call anyone out, just plainly stated the problems with the design so we don't make the same mistakes again. Apparently admitting that outside my local team could lead to bad things happening politically, and I should just say nothing.

What are you supposed to do? Lie, refuse to comment when asked, sweep the problems under the rug (which is generally what happens)? I really don't know, and as a hacker, I am not great at playing the big company games. Maybe I should say nothing a bit more often, but that doesn't exactly get the customers served any better. So far I have stuck with the honest approach, but I still don't know if its correct or not!

What are you supposed to do?

Make choices you won't regret later. For me, at least, that's being honest. Both honest and dishonest responses make some people angry, so I choose what I can live with.

Lying is bad. Never lie, it will only bite you back a thousand times.

Not making a comment on something that's delicate can be okay if it's only about politics but if someone asks, I don't want to refuse answering either nor can I not tell what I think.

Sweeping actual problems under the rug is worst: it will sweep your working morale under the rug as well. Assuming that you at all care about the company you're working for, if you see something wrong it should be your responsibility to bring it up on the table. If you don't then you will, in time, stop caring about your job and the company, eventually stop producing any significant value, and merely submitting to the never-ever-upset-anyone culture while cashing in paychecks. And that's a hell for anyone with even a tiniest bit of self-worth and integrity.

Be honest. Brutally so. Nothing will get better if you're not, and unless you're politicing to increase the greater good for your customer and your workspace, honesty is the path of greatest good.

so we don't make the same mistakes again - I can relate, but generally there's some element of ego involved. Better to save the critique for the planning phase of your next project.

Especially in large companies, you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the "good-enough" (bootstrapped startups usually have more flexibility here, but often use it to their detriment). Supervisors definitely value employees that get things done without lots of questions... even if the results are not perfect.

Generally, I think the ability to prioritize is definitely an under-appreciated skill. This is what makes the whole MVP philosophy so effective and I think the same thing goes for producing results in large corporations...

P.S. I think your experience is a pretty good example of what drives many people to build startups.

> P.S. I think your experience is a pretty good example of what drives many people to build startups.

Yea, this place drives me more and more mad. I have dabbled in my own side projects, but I am thinking more and more that the time to leave the mega-corporation will have to come soon, for my own sanity at least!

Um, no, there are very few people that will appreciate you telling them that the work they did is crap. If you really think the database us crap, you have to prove that your opinion is worth listening to on the subject. To prove that you're worth listening to, you are probably going to have to actually create your own version of the database, and demonstrate that it is better

The other path to getting the database improved is to propose specific changes, explaining the benefit of those changes. It's the same idea though, you have to show that you can do better before antone will listen to you.

Oh I know this. The team I was pointing this out to didn't design or build this system, they meerly have to support it, like me.

Agree the best way critize is by showing you can do better, but this is a muli-terrabyte system, so its not easy.

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