March 17, 2006

Getting the most out of Software

When I wrote about the inherent laziness of the Indian Software Industry, there were tens of hundreds of people who wanted to flame me for it. (ofcourse, I never published thier silly comments). Most of them told me that my Underworld theory was completely ridiculous. I never thought that it would turn out to be such a bad joke. Anyways, as we all know, it is extremely difficult to tell a bad joke and then it is impossible to explain it to someone, so I never cared to answer to any of them.

But what I realized was that even though there were a lot of people who were against the idea that working in this industry wasn't as high tech as it should have been or as we had thought it to be while we were still in college. One of my flamers told me that he's been working his ass off for the last one year and everybody in his company did the same. All I could manage was pity for the poor guy. I seriously hoped that I could help him out of that sorry state of mind he had got himself into. One of them called me a bastard, and was sure that we are a nation are degressing because of people like me. All because I think that software is crap for the average joe.

I fail to take my life too seriously. Which is why adaptation is necessary to help people live a happier life by performing better in office, and doing all that is essential for their progress. And this is how people are doing it.

Tip #1: Sit on your ass.
The first thing to do, is to sit on your ass till the Manager assigns you some work. It is suicide to move around the office and chat with everybody else. So the first point to remember for a healty life is that, for the manager, sitting on your chair is equivalent to working.
Update: As E suggests, you could just go to fark.com and pretend you are working.

Tip #2: Don't ask for work.
The second thing is that don't ask your manager for work . Wait until he comes to you and asks you to do something. If you ask for work, it is bad for your reputation, because the manager thinks that right now you were just sitting around. Secondly if you don't have any work but the rest of them do, it logically means that you must have been excessively bad or amazingly good at it. Managers being the pessimistic pricks they are, they always assume the worst. Also, if you ask him for work, it shows him in a bad light too, since he is not utilizing his available resources efficiently.

Tip #3: When he does give you work, don't jump on it.
All managers are risk-averse beings. They would like to be omnipresent so that they are absolutely sure in everything that they, or for the matter their team, do (or does). So when you get a new job, don't pounce on it, rather make an efficient, hard working face and tell him that you'd need a day or two to assess how well you can do the job You'd help him by taking over his worries and look dignified for a while too. But finally remember, don't work your ass off trying to work everything out on the first day. Rome wasn't built in a day. When you take up a new assignment, you are just supposed to be working, not really doing anything.

Now you can go ahead with all of the above, and when you've asked the manager for some time, come back to my blog and read what is to be done next. Till then, fare well.

Update: Annie Fisher, Fortune senior writer, suggests "To be smarter at work, slack off"

Update: American Top Ten lists 22 ways to kill time in office.

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