How To Behave At a Software Company? 842
dawilcox writes "I'm a recent grad and am going to begin work at a software company. I want to make a good impression on my boss and coworkers. I know that performance is usually tracked, but there are also innate personality traits of good software developers that bosses just want to have around. What are those personality traits? What should I be trying to do in order to make a good impression on the people at my work?" (Appropriate side question: What behavior traits would you like your co-workers to exhibit?)
Lunch (Score:4, Funny)
Do not bring any food containers that smell like something died inside to work and eat it at your desk.
advice from the onion (Score:2, Funny)
May not work for everyone
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/34387
Like an asshole, of course. (Score:3, Funny)
Really, everyone knows that the best hackers are all insufferable assholes. Chopping up your wife is optional, but at least refusing to release passwords is key. BOFH is a good primer, if you're having trouble wrapping your head around the concepts, but if you need a primer, you really should reevaluate -- maybe you just don't have what it takes.
throw fits over minor things (Score:5, Funny)
stop bathing
be awkward around the opposite gender
come in at noon and leave after midnight
be extremely condescending towards anyone at the company who is not an engineer
never admit that anything is your fault
drink 20 cans of free soda a day
claim to be a libertarian if you dont already
Re:Advice, Dawg (Score:5, Funny)
Suggesting Taco Bell is ok... it's the aftermath that can be alienating.
Re:Attitude (Score:5, Funny)
Now we see why they say, "Go not to Slashdot for counsel, for they will say both yes and no."
Re:Good hygiene, don't be a know it all. (Score:5, Funny)
That's going a bit overboard, and won't work anyway; dead bodies are quite unhygienic. WASHING yourself (i.e. showering -- use soap and shampoo) and brushing your teeth (toothpaste: tastes bad, works good) are the two most important things you can do. Put on clean clothes after showering; this generally means doing laundry now and again, but it's worth it.
Re:Lunch (Score:5, Funny)
Also, though this may be a catch-22, don't bring live things into work to eat either.
Re:Good hygiene, don't be a know it all. (Score:5, Funny)
Good hygiene and refraining from acting like a know-it-all are my two best pieces of advice. Nerd types are often (myself included) poor at those two things.
It's good to follow the dress code as well. I try to stick to an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, Bermuda shorts, sun glasses and a beer hat. On days when there are no meetings scheduled I dress more casually.
easy. (Score:5, Funny)
innate personality traits of good software developers that bosses just want to have around.
Have a positive can-do attitude, especially whenever the boss asks you to work evenings and weekends. What bosses love to have around are smart people who get things done and don't mind working 60 hour weeks standard (up from there whenever anything surprising happens or is badly panned) for a 40-hour salary.
Appropriate side question: What behavior traits would you like your co-workers to exhibit?
A little self-respect, and enough spine to refuse to be exploited into giving up your personal life to further your bosses ends. Every time you work long hours, you create expectations that your co-workers should work long hours too, and they will despise you for it.
Re:Lunch (Score:5, Funny)
Do not bring any food containers that smell like something died inside ...
But, but ... Almost all my food consists of something that died.
Yeah, there are exception, like the lettuce, tomato, etc., that are technically still alive. But, for example, the bread was made from a pile of baby wheat plants that were ground up (while still alive), then mixed with live yeast and a few other ingredients, then baked at a temperature guaranteed to kill everything in the loaf. Then we slice that up, fill it with slices of dead animals and other things. Only the lettuce leaves and the seeds inside the tomato slices are still alive; the rest is quite dead.
I've found that people tend to think that such food is very "fresh", whatever that might mean, but they're clearly wrong. It's mostly made up of things that have died in the recent past. Some of them, like the baby wheat plants, died a rather awful death by being tossed live into a grinder. Others, like the yeast in the bread, died a horrible death in a bath of steam slowly getting hotter.
First Day (Score:5, Funny)
The first day, what you need to do, is find the biggest, smartest, most awesome software developer they have... and kick his ass.
No one will screw with you after that.
Re:Lunch (Score:5, Funny)
My advice: Do not drop references to literature you've never read.
Re:Good impression? (Score:4, Funny)
As Office Linebacker Terry Tate says - "You kill the joe, you make some mo'"
Re:Lunch (Score:5, Funny)
That certainly would be a white whale, to be sure!
Re:Good hygiene, don't be a know it all. (Score:2, Funny)
That being said, when you are first starting out, and really anytime you are talking to someone higher in your chain of command, Just point out what you know and let others make the wrong decision. Don't ever clean up after someone else when you already told them what was the right way to do something, let people deal with their own messes.
Re:Good hygiene, don't be a know it all. (Score:3, Funny)
For those that don't know, "acting like a know-it-all" is just something that less knowledgeable people like to say about us more knowledgeable people, as if they are taking some moral high ground by being less knowledgeable.
A Know-it-all [google.com]
Do NOT break the build (Score:3, Funny)
Dont break the build... EVER!
If you break the build fix it immediately (yes its 11pm, fucking well fix it)!
Re:Advice, Dawg (Score:3, Funny)
So your suggestion is to give in to peer pressure?
Well, everyone else was doing it....
The Uniform (Score:3, Funny)
The uniform is:
* Sandals, with socks
* Shorts with pockets
* A T-Shirt preferably with a Tech related theme or something from popular culture. Sports themes are right out.
* Beard - if you don't have one, try to cultivate one. If you are unable to grow one, try to grow a "soul patch"
* Shaved head is optional
* Shower only on days which have a T in the name
Now, you may be too young for this approach, but aim towards it, start (I would guess, as I *am* too old) with sk8t3r-chic and work your way into the above as best you can.
Re:Lunch (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, stick to talking about milk during coffee breaks.
"What was the first person to drink milk thinking? 'I'm just gonna swallow whatever comes out of this cow when I pull on these things'?"
Re:Lunch (Score:3, Funny)
But above all else, to your own elf be true!
Re:easy. (Score:5, Funny)
SAVE MONEY!! Once you can afford to, buy a house. Marry someone sensible and like yourself.
And don't forget the sunscreen.
Re:Good hygiene, don't be a know it all. (Score:4, Funny)
You fucking know it all! That's what the GP was warning about
Re:Lunch (Score:3, Funny)
That's no way to be talking 'bout yo mama.
Professionals have *standards* (Score:4, Funny)
Be polite.
Be efficient.
Have a plan to kill everyone you meet!
Re:Good hygiene, don't be a know it all. (Score:5, Funny)
Naah, *never* stand up for what you believe in. Software is about passive aggression. Rather than telling someone to stop clicking, spend the afternoon arguing about why you won't tell him on Slashdot.
People that stand up for what they believe in a trouble makers. We need people people in this team. Oh, and I'm going to need you to come in on Saturday. Remember what I just said. Slashdot isn't blocked by the corporate firewall BTW.
Re:First Day (Score:3, Funny)
Well that's not hard. You can beat most software developers just by going up a flight of stairs without breathing hard.
~X~
Re:First Day (Score:3, Funny)
He didn't say he was going to prison, just that he was hired!
Isn't it the same thing?