37signals: Fire the workaholics
If your start-up can only succeed by being a sweatshop, your idea is simply not good enough.(thanks, jaredm)
I’ve always hated the workaholic culture that’s so prevalent in software development. Doesn’t anyone else realize that a bunch of tired, sheltered, overworked labor doesn’t produce good output?
Even more depressing are the shops that have been in business for decades and still think the death march is the one true way of delivering software.
I think one perpetuating factor is the tendency of a certain percentage of death march victims to romanticize the experience as a sort of post-rationalization. They confuse the long sessions of hyperfocus most programmers will experience from time to time working with an interesting problem with the mandated overwork brought on by unrealistic scheduling.
The irony is that even if time and resource limitations truly dictate long hours, they’re best worked on the front end of the project, getting solid requirements and design (including tests) in place, but are instead spent madly coding as the deadline looms.
