A TRUE Software Project Horror Story

[@HealthyDev]

Have you ever been blamed for a software project being sold or scoped wrong? How did you deal with it?

[@lasselasse5215]

Documenting what we said, what management responded, keeping that documentation as a Get Out Of Jail card. Oh and also referring to violations of the company's core values.

[@Erik_The_Viking]

Document, document, document - then shove it in their faces when they blame you

[@ChrisAthanas]

This has been the only reason I am hired at companies

[@debugmeplease]

Sort of. I was blamed for that after I was laid off and my team leader / hiring manager told me on my last day that everybody was pissed about my performance / not delivering on time blablabla (which was not true at all).

[@ffatheranderson]

This industry is run by “clients” who do not understand how development is done and their only goal is to make financial profit out of software (out of people who are going to use that software). Usually (only a little percentage of people) people are not trying to introduce good into this world - but only to get resources (money) out of it.

[@ohdude6643]

"This was a waterfall project, but it was sold as agile" -- this is way too personal now.

[@HealthyDev]

Oh man...sorry to hear you ran into this too.

[@CallousCoder]

Isn’t that a common thing? My banking software is agile but every 3 months we plan ahead what needed to be done in that quarter…. And basically when new insights come they are pushed back even if that holds other people back. Breaking the agile mindset.

[@HealthyDev]

@@CallousCoder yes it is common! What it isn’t though, is agile.

[@CallousCoder]

@@HealthyDev indeed it’s not 😃

[@nuvotion-live]

This kind of video is where your channel really shines. I’m here for story time!

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed the wild story.

[@Erik_The_Viking]

Blaming the programmers is business as usual. One of the reasons I left software engineering. I was sick and tired of being blamed for management failures and their gross incompetence. When the SWAT team as to come in, you know that's a very bad situation. Yikes!

[@JorgetePanete]

"as to come in"?

[@briand1337]

It's incredibly frustrating and painfully stressful to be forced to lead a project where your concerns are not taken into account and thus the project is likely doomed to fail. You know the train wreck is coming and you're powerless to stop it. The timesheet was a very convenient cop out for them but it does teach an important lesson. If you have major concerns that aren't being taken seriously by leadership, always follow up with an email to the group to recap those verbal discussions of your concerns so that they will be documented. Don't let them turn you into an easy target to be thrown under the bus when things inevitably go awry.

[@HealthyDev]

Yep I thought I had documenting things under my belt at about 17 years of experience at that point - never thought that little detail would bite me. Lessons learned to be sure!

[@jkho8365]

I prbly wld hv cussed at the VP on the spot 😬

[@HealthyDev]

@@jkho8365 oh I thought about it... luckily the thought went past my animal brain in time for me not to react!

[@sarahfox8837]

I was a developer at a small company when they hired a new CEO. CEO hired his buddy to be the new CTO. New CTO wanted to hire his buddy to be a full-time dev. Everyone on the dev team said no, this guy is a bad dev and all around jerk (he was a contractor, so we'd all experienced his women can't code, I don't need no QA, I don't need no source control, I don't need no specs, lying about work done attitude). So CTO set about making the existing team's lives miserable until they left. Unreasonable deadlines, no specs, changing specs at the last minute and blaming the team for missed deadlines, plus bonus misogyny. It didn't help going above the guy to complain, since he's buddies with the CEO. I stuck it out for a few months, but finally found another job and left. So did everyone else in the department. So CTO finally succeeded in hiring his buddy. Heard from someone still at the company a few years back, that the board finally admitted they made a mistake, and got the original CEO to come back and fix the hole this lot had dug. I just wish it'd happened before they drove out the entire team.

[@HealthyDev]

WOW. That reminds me of the other story I told on here, about how the 3 brother's got my boss fired. They all covered each other and when one made a big mistake, they used my boss as the fall guy.

[@rachelrunner8948]

What the actual fuck.

[@Joe-ku1ko]

Software engineers need to understand the rat race. Understand that once everyone knows that you take ownership, people will include you in the project, where if you refuse, you aren't collaborating, and if you join and don't get any authority on the plan, and the plan fails, you are the one taking the blame. Regardless, if your management is incompetent, just know they will throw you under the bus long before they throw themselves. Always be levelling up so you can get the next job.

[@Extremaduur]

Software engineer here. The expression "Throwing under the bus" always makes me chuckle a bit. I have driven school bus and motor coach for a few years. I never ran over a person with my 62,000 lbs bus, but for sure some people would cause my air brakes to spontaneously malfunction.

[@FourOf92000]

your job is always to get a better job

[@thomas6502]

You aren't alone sir. Thanks for sharing your experience.

[@_ncko]

I love these stories. Thanks for sharing them. I'm on a project right now that I am pretty sure is not going to go well. We're building a lot of new infrastructure from scratch and it is taking a long time while we are not really delivering value. There is also a lot of large, upfront design and planning almost a year's worth of building and coding before anything sees the real world so I'm worried we're going to run into unpredicted problems once our systems are actually being used. I anticipate the business will eventually lose it's patience and axe the project (and possibly the CTO). But I'm learning to just be content with the job as it is. It has it's advantages.

[@vinhcomputer]

Bad things are often dumped to the most bully-inviting people in a group, and that's often the engineers - introvert, do not talk bold, talk back little, and not good at self-defending. I've been through this situation recently as a dev manager who tries to defend my subordinates from my director and product manager unsuccessfully. The result: I left the company, and been jumping into entrepreneurship. Thanks for sharing this with us, Jayme.

[@viophile]

That's what happens when people knowing absolutely nothing about software development get into the management or leadership level making the decisions. Seen that.

[@VagrantCode]

One time I got a job at a small company. As an app developer. Then about a week in they told me they expect me to be the sole developer for an app they were envisioning. Ok that’s not necessarily a problem. Then they proceeded to explain an app that could have been 3 separate billion dollar SAAS companies. And then started with the “just tell us how long it’s gonna take” and then told me they expected 3 months. Needless to say I left.

[@HealthyDev]

LOL good move!

[@nedaltrebor8553]

😮😅 How am I not surprised. What's funny is when they think they can negotiate the timeline/estimate. As if you're just being lazy telling them so long.

[@andrewhansen1859]

This was an incredibly fun story to listen to - love when you deep dive into specific projects!

[@HealthyDev]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@seinfan9]

I'm on a project that is in desperate need of a systems engineer that would help define and drive requirements. Instead we have agile where I would describe the project as a bridge to nowhere that is being constructed and management is being told that cars are ready to drive on it despite not having anything truly finalized and built. It is the most bizarre experience I've ever been part of in my tech career.

[@HealthyDev]

It's popular to say no architect or technical expert is needed to lay the groundwork for projects before they start anymore. In my experience, that's pretty bogus. Now some senior devs are truly capable of it. But they should be given the time and authority.

[@kevinkirchner8839]

There is never enough time to do it right, but somehow we always find the time to do it over.

[@gorlug]

Wow, thanks for sharing this really wild story. As to the "issue reporting" on time sheets at the end: I shows yet again that if you have concerns about a project, you have to leave a paper trail. Write those concerns out and have the people in charge also respond in writing that they're going forward anyway. Verbally alone just doesn't cut it.

[@HealthyDev]

Yep. I knew this too, and somehow this tiny little detail escaped me. Dang.

[@Elkmor2]

When you start seeing things go south, the first reaction should be is to resign immediately. Let them suffer failure, but without you. Leave before they have the chance to blame you for anything. I am in software development for 25 years, and leaving before siht happens became my main instinct. Smells bad - just resign and spare yourself from bad management and save your nerves. No workplace can stay great for several years straight - management changes, projects change, CEOs change - things going south is an inevitability, and you rarely can change that, just need to keep your eyes open and react asap. And... always keep a mail trail you could show during an internal investigation "here I said that I cannot execute the task in time because a new task popped up" should be a regular occurrence, and it may even help managers to have better planning practices.

[@HealthyDev]

I see where you're coming from. I'd been at the company for 7 years and had a lot of friends there. So it was harder to do that than usual. But you're absolutely correct, it was an option.

[@kassios]

This is sound advice. If things are obviously going wrong you can be the hard nut that doesn't back down. You can resign, get repositioned or taken out of the project.

[@pmberry]

Go with your instincts. If something feels off, it almost always is... Having said that, you're there to do a job and earn a living, and it's so very hard to walk the hell away from a work situation that has all the signs that it's going to be an epic failure.

[@xlerb2286]

What I would have done differently is get the heck out of there ASAP. I've worked for two dysfunctional companies. One a large corporation, the other a little startup. I figured out that the startup had troubles and got out of there pretty quick. The large corporation however I stayed there way too long. Never again.

[@krisspinney4515]

Oof, I can't believe the VP dropped blame like that and then says "let's not be frustrated and just move on". Dude, if it doesn't matter then why did you even bring it up? It clearly matters to *someone*, and that likely being someone who has some influence over the progression of your career. All he does by bringing that up is undermine morale and hurt the company. I'd have no filter if someone pulled something like that on me now that I have 15+ years of experience; I'd remind them that I spoke directly and loudly to everyone involved about the risks. If they didn't immediately backpedal on it I'd have one foot out the door because I wouldn't have any trust left in the company.

[@HealthyDev]

Yeah we all knew exactly what was going on in that moment. Sweeping it all under the rug with zero desire to learn. So frustrating!

[@niksatan]

This is so interesting, you should act in some Netflix sitcom, give them this script - give it a try, not kidding.

[@camgere]

"Halt and Catch Fire" made me a bit nostalgic for the 1980's. There is lots of interpersonal conflict to be shown. Just add a bunch of sex. There's lawyering and then there's "LA Law". General audiences don't understand any technical stuff. My sister, the lawyer, says she had never used algebra since leaving high school. Lawsuits are chock full of finance. Go figure.

[@IARRCSim]

Yes. IT Crowd and Silicon Valley are sort of related.

[@HealthyDev]

I LOVED Halt and Catch Fire!

[@MrRyanlintag]

I think at some point in time, we'll have that similar situations.. I can still remember the time when I had a project that has a hard deadline of 6 months and needs 6 senior developer (as requested by the client). When I started, the resources that were available was myself (somewhat mid-level developer that time) and 2 newly graduates that I needed to teach how to code. I was tasked to be the lead developer then deciding on every details to implement working overtime and everything for about 2 months. Someone else estimated the timeline. There was an existing system already for the client but needs additional functionality but we cannot use their existing source code to add into it. There was an additional resource added (a mid-level developer as well) 3 months into the development and another senior level developer 4 months into the development. We were already late in the deliverables based on the items to be delivered on a hard launch date. In the end, we were not able to finish the project on time.

[@murrayr100]

You had terrible management dominated by sales and account management people who told the client what they wanted to hear without listening to the technologists and then blamed the developers when things went wrong. This is common in digital agencies and consulting companies. Many of them go bust, downsize or get sold because of it. But I disagree that you can't do a fixed-price agile project. A fixed-price, fixed-time agile bid works well if the scope is variable. Effectively, the client buys a fixed team for a fixed time with a fixed budget to iteratively deliver as much business value as possible in the available time and budget.

[@HealthyDev]

Couldn't have said it better myself!

[@manishm9478]

A silver lining to this story, as you described, is that it laid the pieces for you to become a Thriving Technologist and inspire us with stories and music 😊

[@ByanGwok]

This is the story why I left my last company. The company which private manufacturing software to large customers around the world, bought by a private equity firm, the top managements seems to be new to the industry. After a week with the new management, they told us 65% of employee will be reductant, later on find out testers 90% redundant rate. Testers in the company was always in shortage, while they are the key people to setup environment not only for them to do testing, also for us to develop on. While the few remaining testers send out resignation letters, my development team basically has no tester left, business process completely paralysed. Later on they hire some oversea on demand testers to work with the team, but nothing is helpful if they don't have decade of experience with the software and business process. I got push to become a tech lead, listening to the team compliant about manager blaming them about things not progress through. Which is why I have to move on.

[@HealthyDev]

Ouch, they really gutted that company! Sorry you had to experience that. With that high of a reduction in staff, it sounds like they probably just wanted to dissolve it. Was your company's product or services in competition with the company that bought them out?

[@ByanGwok]

@@HealthyDev Oh I want to be clear one point. The top management is new, but the management which blaming the team is the lower level management, they probably fresh in the industry but at least been in the company for few years. The mother company is one of the biggest private equity firm in the US, they bought this company, and merged with 5 other smaller companies in the industry and formed a new company. I personally don't think the cross over works out well as the others company served the small and medium size customer while my previous company served all the biggest billion dollars size companies and the scale and customization requirements are so much different. The day I left, I heard from an experienced sales manager been with the company over 30 years saying the company already owned 80% of the industry in the US. Their ate competitors in the markets, but I don't think the other 5 companies are one of them. I recently look at the review of this new company in Google and straight 1/5 ratings over 30 reviews. A lot of them are complaining about one of the 5 other companies product. That means not only my past company was performed badly the other few may also be victim.

[@HealthyDev]

So it sounds like the market segments of the companies that were merging were totally different? Man, yes that would make things really complicated.

[@jceddy1]

This is why I save so much of my money. No mater how good you are, or how hard you work, someone in upper management can ultimately make you the fall guy at anytime for anything. I haven't had anything this bad, but I have had things like "but you merged the code, how come you didn't find this in a review". Accountability is so whacked in SW

[@steveftoth]

You should have asked for more money and when they said no just walked. That’s insane behavior from your management.

[@steveftoth]

I feel for you man. This story is real burnout fuel.

[@bogdyee]

I mean... You kinda have to be agile to dodge responsibility as a manager.

[@PerpetualAbidance]

The problem from the beginning (been developing software since 1995) with agile (one of the first adopters) is that it was driven by us developers but really it is a management philosophy of having a fixed team (budget) and timeline and a flexible scope to iteratively build, get feedback, course correct, build the best product you can in the time you have with the team you have. The problem was right away that there is no role for Project managers and Architects. This is when the title Principal Engineer took off to replace Architect. But project managers did what project managers do, which is to standardize and mandate process on top of what should be agile. This is where we got scrum, burn down charts, velocity calculations, etc. this was all in reaction to the main problem which was that the Business was not on board. They have annual planning and want to know what am I going to get, how much is it going to cost, and when am I going to get it. In your case your sales person answered those three questions to make the sale. We need/needed a process that takes these realities into account rather than just wishing them away. And no, that process is not SAFE.

[@mcben42]

Thank you for sharing. I love your channel, it's very helpful to me. Kudos to the cursed consulting firm I guess... 😅

[@HealthyDev]

They got bought out twice and eventually dissolved. Some people learned their lessons. And it set me on the path to doing this. So in the end, I guess it worked out!

[@WillEhrendreich]

Wild tales. Well man, I'm glad you found Jesus, and that you've turned it all around to help others. Keep it up.

[@HealthyDev]

Thank you!

[@a544jh]

I've seen a lot of things during my career. I've left jobs and even gotten fired for calling out BS. Thankfully I now work with capable people that I've only could have dreamt of. Taylorism has no place in the software industry.

[@AttiDavidson]

Unfortunately, software industry suffers of too many pretenders pretending experienced managers. I experienced people playing well-crafted performances on interviews, having meanwhile zero experience.

[@adamlaszlo91]

Not checking the contents of the zip must have been a valuable lesson.

[@ZachOgilvie]

This hits really close to home. I went through something very similar and I swear, this video felt like a group therapy session 😅

[@ayoubdkhissi]

what a wild story Jayme!

[@eioluseyi]

I really love your guitar breaks

[@HealthyDev]

Thank you! I'm trying to practice more, a little rusty in this one.

[@ulrichborchers5632]

Thanks for sharing this horror story and personal experience. IMO it is often not the smartest people who are in charge, even when being technical folks themselves. Sometimes I think that the typical hierarchy in our working environments is exactly reversed to the distribution of intelligence. Or, some people in more influential positions are misusing their intellectual capacity to their personal advantage, while they would better contribute to the shared "experience". "Patterns" like honesty and objectivity can be completely out of scope unfortunately. It should not be like that. These situations are usually impossible to resolve, I think, even when you notice very early that something goes wrong. Probably the person whom you talked to early on and who then blamed the team afterwards for not reporting problems did not understand or did not listen or only "listened" based on what he wanted to hear or what he made up in front of himself, and likely also in front of others. That behaviour reads like a narcisist person, unable or unwilling to face reality outside of the "cage" in his head. It obviously can become harmful. The problem is that those people are so experienced in twisting the truth and to usually always escape from their own fallout. To speak the truth about these things is important. Only we ourselves can decide how to make healthy decisions in life, to speak up in self defense and to change the circumstances if possible. But experiencing such serious trouble is not our fault when faced with such ugly situations. Oh, I am just about to sell my precious Gibson SG which I have not played for ages. Makes me think twice :-) Keep it up!

[@HealthyDev]

I think when you've got narcissist leadership, the inverse competence hierarchy makes a lot of sense. With "real" leadership I have experienced that isn't the case, but it's becoming rarer these days to be sure. Why selling the SG, just don't get time to play anymore, lost interest, or need cash?

[@artemodintsov8675]

I thought my job was bad. Now, I realize it's awesome! 😁 But I totally agree, we are 'hired brains.' We have certain responsibilities, and we should focus on doing them well without carrying the burden, blame, or stress caused by managers or others making poor decisions that we have no influence over.

[@subhazard4297]

Beautiful guitar solo today Jayme. Question for you if you see this. I know estimates are mostly bullshit. I know that. You know that. But I keep getting THAT as advice, and I don't think it's realistic to try to convince every PM and manager I come across that estimates are bullshit. Do you think you could make a video that gives us a toolset for dealing with this problem? We're going to have to give estimates anyways. Thanks, appreciate your videos, they've helped me a lot.

[@HealthyDev]

In my experience, at a company with leadership that already is dependent on estimates, the best we can do is use some strategies to limit the damage. I shared some in this episode (you may have already seen): kzbin.info/www/bejne/o2akYoqdbc2MfdE

[@bitshopstever]

There's clients, and managers, that you must fire in order to grow. It's scary to do but it's a requirement at some point in your seniority to realize this and actually go thru with it. If it's your manager, and the VP was, then firing the manager means you get a job elsewhere before your burnout. As others have pointed out the rat race and how it works that timesheet box for problems gives a written record for HR managers etc. to point out that you didn't give them the information the proper way - everyone is trying to shift blame as best they can. That's unfortunate but how it works more often than not.

[@HealthyDev]

I forgot to mention the San Antonio office was another consulting company before it was acquired. The VP and that manager worked together before the acquisition. So yeah, there's that...

[@yuriy5376]

In a parallel universe that restaurant is called Los Pollos Hermanos and the fired guy is running servers from an RV

[@HealthyDev]

LOL!!!

[@LukeAvedon]

This is an amazing story!

[@ericpmoss]

A kiosk to charge cell phones -- you mean, a strip of outlets so people can use their own USB adapters?

[@HealthyDev]

No, it was a different design than that. I can't get into details because I don't want to draw attention to the specific company.

[@JohnSmith-op7ls]

They have lots of designs for these, some free, some you have to pay for X amount of time charging. I’ve never seen any of them get used, even in south east Asia. Maybe in Japan and some Chinese cities people use them but most of the world they don’t work.

[@ShadowMind312]

The VP made a profound error by not heeding your initial warnings. He then lied about your team's failure to complete timesheets correctly as a tactic to save his job. I suspect C suite would've fired him.

[@HealthyDev]

He was eventually fired about a year after I eventually left.

[@kazeryuu3603]

Very nice story, please we need more stories like this

[@HealthyDev]

You may already know this, but if not I've got an entire playlist on channel with other stories I've told: kzbin.info/aero/PL32pD389V8xucc_4oDLyRYoLOnWyur0EG

[@kazeryuu3603]

@@HealthyDev Thaks for the reply, I'll check that :)

[@HealthyDev]

@@kazeryuu3603 for sure. If you liked this one, I think you'll find some more wild ones there you may enjoy, lol!

[@jcy089]

Got hired by a Chinese state owned company for an AI engineer role. Three initial weeks of no assignment and then suddenly a weekend requirement for two tasks that's dependent one on the other. I only have time for one and picked the most dependent one. Management was angry I didn't pick the other one and I got fired on Monday😂 Btw the company's business model is taking over other company's infrastructure and living off government grants / loans / tax revenue.

[@HealthyDev]

Man! Talk about an arbitrary firing. Sorry to hear this...

[@chris.dillon]

I have a few war stories like this. They wouldn't fit here. I don't even know if they would be good for a lightning talk at a tech meetup. I think juniors should know that many projects and places are horrible and really, it's hard to tell when you are in the thick of it or starting out (I know you said you were 15 years in). Honestly, I wish I had an equal number of great stories. For every shit show, I had a high performing team story. But I don't.. I have fun and interesting moments stories but they are not management, process or business profits related.

[@DuRoehre90210]

Agile is hardly the problem here. Dark patterns and black boxes are the problem here. Whenever you see a critical path which depends on some software where you do not get the source code (and fair access to all dependencies to use that code), RUN AWAY! 19:00 Yeah, sounds familiar... developers are called to work the whole weekend and be "on stand-by" to be called by managers... straight from their bullshit meeting... where they suddenly require explicit 100% reliable information on the spot.

[@afhostie]

When you're raising a big red flag for a project, that's usually something that you need to document in writing as well. That might be a good video, when do you need to make sure that something is captured in writing.

[@HealthyDev]

Absolutely. I talked about this quite a bit in the episode on building confidence with management, but I haven't dedicated an entire video to it. Not sure if you've already seen that one, but here it is if not: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jWjWp2SjYrplqs0

[@tedsaylor6016]

Although we all disliked SOX audits, the PCI ones (credit card processing) were way tougher. They wanted OS patch lists for all the systems that "touched" the card info - it was no joke. And funny how you should mention "the underworld" as alot of these bad projects follow a similar arc, and a similar ending. "you just knew people were gonna get clipped".

[@dshestakov]

Thank you for sharing 👍 Well, it'd be nice to hear the story by the eyes of the client as well as by the account manager of your company 🙂 E.g. why this potential legal action was such a threat? Was the delivery amount, time and budget directly specified in the contract? Also, I wonder if such communication (about issues and problems in a project) through work hours report spreadsheets (or any system used for that) is a common practice in your consulting company. Because if it is, then the VP could be formally right. Well, you did communicate to him but I guess it could be considered as being informal (like not documented, kind of non-existing). I mean perhaps from the VP point of view there were poor work done on (formal, documented) communicating all the problems/concerns that were clear to the dev/tech team

[@HealthyDev]

I hear you. Unfortunately, in an episode like this I can't cover every interaction. There was regular communication with the agile project manager, the manager who sold the project, my friend (who was a delivery manager) and eventually the VP when it reached his level. With 5 people (including myself) all raising concern to blame it on a timesheet seemed incredibly ridiculous to me. But that's just my take, of course.

[@shanehoustein]

That was such an epic story.

[@kassios]

I've been to boards and meetings of projects about to blow up (and loose millions of dollars) and kept quite until they ask me. While everyone's trying to be diplomatic to save their position I give them the bad news raw. This is not going to work. (no explanation) Why they would ask? For such and such reason. Then everyone else would have to justify why the project would work (and I would probably be silently removed from any future meetings). Be a hard nose and wear that reputation with pride.

[@HealthyDev]

I've had a tendency over the years in meetings getting into trouble saying the wrong thing. I got a lot better at it once I became a consultant. But you're right, it's dangerous when they straight ask you for a reason.

[@ChrisAthanas]

13:00 Decompile pascal to source ???? LMAO Complete disaster - START OVER FROM SCRATCH, this is at least 1-2 year project at that point TOTAL DISASTER this clown show was only possible under the RIDICULOUS ZIRP environment thats over now and not coming back so all those B and C players will not make it and GOOD RIDDANCE

[@ChrisAthanas]

20:12 Totally abusive situation and borderline FRAUD These people were in charge of so many companies because of the ZIRP environment put these people in charge All that software needs to be rewritten and this will bring a whole new wave of companies that will have none of these issues and we will all look back and laugh

[@HealthyDev]

You got me googling "ZIRP" ;)

[@AsdrubaleRossi]

I guess welcome to the US... I worked for two consulting companies and never heard anything even remotely close to this in Europe... I think the lesson from this is not to only to learn to protect your ass, but also to leave these toxic places and enjoy a less stressful life with maybe a lower salary, but without this bs...

[@andreweinhold7664]

I Like your videos a lot! I have some crazy stories, too. Maybe you will create a Podcast or the like?

[@HealthyDev]

I do have a podcast, but it's simply an audio version of this channel. I don't have the bandwidth time wise to create separate content. I have thought about it though, so I never know what the future holds!

[@andreweinhold7664]

@@HealthyDev I think a Podcast/KZbin Video where you are talking live with a client (or someone else) would be a nice format, too. 😊

[@HealthyDev]

@@andreweinhold7664 thanks for the suggestion! I’ve considered it. I find people have a hard time opening up about this stuff for fear of repercussions unless they’re self employed like I am. Still something I’m not completely opposed to.

[@ELREASON44]

There is one other lesson to learn. Don't volenteer space/electricity running a business you don't own to avoid SWAT.

[@HealthyDev]

LOL!!!

[@TraianoLiberatore]

All good as long as you get paid.

[@namanjain5763]

I might be to young and bold but if i was you and was said all reason was the timesheets and they just ignored all the callout and mails etc , i would be so pissed that i would have resigned then and their alone. Was i a very similar project like it was more of a microsoft based poc to pitch new things and man it was worst time to be a dev and best times to learn. Like i was in a situation where i was the main dev that know both front and backend as i have did most of the major feature , knowledge to present the client and answer the questions even after been the junior and the youngest developer. The client was like at last it was all good but we expected something else like everything was hyper dynamic so at last they do took the poc but was not my team who did as they liked the concept but what they wanted was more work of a different team like custom model etc etc and though i made a name in the company but i know from that day i need to run away asap and so i did after many negotiations with other company and my current one i changed in around 9 months as i started to prepare to switch after that project ended. As a good note the company i left was super nice to me like they tried to retain me to other extent like i was getting 200% hike just to be retained though i got 240%+ elsewhere and i know i would be sucked to brim as they know what lengths i can go to complete tasks.

[@HealthyDev]

Yep, I hear you. As I've shared in my burnout episode, I was in my mid 30s with a wife and 3 kids, and a marijuana addiction. I didn't make the clearest decision then. And I was scared of the loss of income. Plus I loved the people at the company for the most part, other than the bad actors at the top. This one really showed me what the upper management were like after being there for 7 years. Oh well, hindsight is 20/20!

[@esparda07]

19:56 is the red flag.

[@thegermantomoeser]

You had to rename the old one?

[@HealthyDev]

I decided to republish since nobody was watching on labor day.

[@DavidConnerCodeaholic]

Jimson Weed?! What the f ?!

[@HealthyDev]

That's what I said, lol.

[@syruplease]

Polvo's South 1st not downtown! important

[@HealthyDev]

I didn't even know they had a downtown location! Yessir, we always go to south.

[@bullinmd]

Extremely sketchy.

[@denyago]

Was it worth it to work overtime and on the weekends? Would you do it again?

[@HealthyDev]

Well, I was the sole breadwinner and wanted to keep my job. But if I knew then what I do now (that I can survive on much less than I thought, and had more savings than I thought I did) I would have quit.

[@denyago]

@@HealthyDev Thank you. I relate to that, although I didn't experience that at your level of magnitude.

[@HealthyDev]

@@denyago I thought you might. I'd love to say I had the courage to just bail when I knew I was being treated unfairly every time. Unfortunately I didn't always have the courage - or the clarity of vision.

[@denyago]

​@@HealthyDev I see. I usually have a problem with the clarity of vision. Or, instead, convincing myself that people are better than they are until it's really time to leave.

[@HealthyDev]

@@denyago all I could do is learn from each project a little better each time. I'd imagine you're learning a lot in each situation you find yourself in.

[@nii-san5485]

the only way to survive this industry is to build your own company or learn to live with being psychologically tortured on a weekly basis its really impressive that you made it out of all these insane circumstances without totally losing your mind, I dont deal with half the amount of crap and its starting to get to me LOL

[@HealthyDev]

For real! I knew I had to get out about a decade earlier. Eventually things forced my hand. I wish I would have just taken the leap to work for myself before things got so insane. Oh well! Lessons learned.

[@panosdotnet]

American stories.