Ask HN: New job but feel burnout and disappointed
Hello everyone,
I wanted to pose this question here as I know lots of people have probably experienced the same situation as I'm doing now and many others have success stories after having been stuck in a rut.
I'm 30, embedded sw engineer by trade, have been working for 4-ish year in this field and some more in my spare time; I've switched industry from consulting to flight software engineering for satellites, though I don't have an aerospace background, and I've just switched companies from a small startup to a bigger-but-still-startupish company. The switch has been done for several reasons, including high employee turnover, toxic workplace, relentless workloads at times that left me severely burnout for a while (I would feel sick at my stomach just looking at code in the morning) and worst of all a complete lack of sense of accomplishment and organization within the company.
Unfortunately I could not take a short sabbatical between my leave and the start of the new employment since I have to support some relatives and cannot afford risking to be unemployed right now, so I jumped ship as soon as I got an offer from this other satellite company.
Though it was described by some to be a more congenial environment, the new workplace has _some_ of the problems the old one had, in that it is very frantic and unorganized, documentation is sparse, turnover not quite so high but still there, and sometimes lack of communication that severely impairs advancement of projects. I've been there for only a month now, but the onboarding has basically been to leave me to my own devices to figure out stuff to do and basically reverse engineer horridly written (as said by OG devs themselves) firmware to simply gain a basic understanding on how things are supposed to work, even though the frantic nature of management is such that whatever thing I might do or any insight I might gain may prove completely useless in a short while as soon as all prototypes that have been done to this day could be scratched for [reasons].
Honestly I'm feeling extremely let down and fed up with this and feel no small amount of disappointment in my own choices; though I love working in embedded I'm questioning a lot of my life decisions up to this point and I can feel symptoms of the past burnout bubbling up again. I try my hardest to be useful everyday and to actually understand what's going on (though the hardware stack and ISA is very alien to me (though alluring i must admit) and extremely badly documented even by the OEM), but there are days in which I feel like I really can't do anything and basically idle until it's time to go home, and this last part is really killing me with guilt.
I've noticed it's mostly when I'm reading or trying to implement stuff that I halfheartedly know it's gonna mean jack shit in a short while and would rather do in my spare time and concentrate on something of more immediate usefulness, like an actual working prototype instead of just idle work, but I can't help it.
It may not seem much but I've also had some other personal issues that exacerbated this whole let-down sentiment and there are evenings like I feel at my wits end and don't know where to turn. Worse of all, I feel like that if I don't find a way to solve this, I might end up really badly burnout and be unable to work, which would be a disaster for my own family.
So after all this rant, I would like to know your honest opinions on this: am I just a whiny asshole? Should I simply quit and go somewhere else (though I'm horrified at the thought of it going from "bad" to worse), or grit my teeth and go on? How would you handle this situation?
Note: sorry for the linkedin-ish way of ranting and offering engagement questions at the end; I want to know your opinions, I really do, I've nowhere to ask or turn around.
Thanks a million.
I don't have much advice for you but I can tell you the statement, "I would feel sick at my stomach just looking at code in the morning" resonates quite strongly.
I just got laid off last week and was looking forward to taking some time, but someone last night strongly advised me not to wait as Spring is hiring season. I should probably start looking.
I'll tell you what I really hate, is when you get short on vacation during a burn out period. Then you really see how trapped you are.
I think a mistake I've made is sticking things out because I wanted to get my 3 years in. That's a long time for a LinkedIn badge.
I think 2ys is the "been here long enough to show commitment and deliver something sizeable, but now ready for something new" period of time. 3yrs seems a little too long to stick at something to signal the above.
I think you're right and that two Christmases and two Easters and almost 700 days is enough time, but there is the perspective out there that the 2-year mark is when you've finally learned enough to be productive and the 3rd year is when you're actually running on all cylinders.
I don't really understand? You stayed because you wanted a 3y linkedin badge? What does the badge give you that is so valuable?
The LinkedIn badge was satire, but I did some consulting in 2019-2021 and my employement history got a little fragmented. I thought it would be a good signal to a future employer that could play nice for a couple of years in a standard corporate environment.
But that signal came with a cost.
1. Tell these exact thoughts to your management. Don’t hold back because you have valid concerns there are catastrophic risks to the business.
2. If management is not setting explicit expectations for you then write your own expectations and make that part of your management conversation.
3. Determine who owns this mess by name. If nobody owns it then accept ownership and become the product owner of record. Business requirements may change rapidly but as the product owner you get to set parameters and write tools/processes to lower risks and increase code reuse.
4. No what happens just remember that at this point you are an individual contributor and you can only do the work assigned in the daylight hours. At the end of the day just go home.
You want to be a performer. Corporate work is performative, but it's not for performers.
Startups are nice because the environment you are describing quickly leads to a failed startup. I've identified recently that that's a preference of mine. The need for survival does wonderful things to organizational alignment.
You are very smart, you appear driven. You either need to piss your drive away, or find a role where you can perform to the degree that you desire.
Thank you for your compliments; I don't really think myself as either, especially not particularly smart, anyhow I think you really hit the nail on the head with your last point - I should maybe just accept the situation and forget about being strongly driven during the day job, maybe reserving that desire to perform better for my own projects, when I'll be able to get the time to do so.
Finding another role to perform is, I fear, a bit risky in this situation as the possibility of quickly getting in a worse state of burnout would be much higher...
Honest truth ? Most companies/teams have some level of dysfunction, chaos, lack of documentation and/or a combination of these. So the question is: how much is too much for you ?
If you are hoping for a fair tale world where it's almost perfect, I don't think that exists. You need to think about this differently. Instead of saying "everything sucks and I want the perfect situation before I can do my best", say this "I think there is an opportunity here for me to take on, fix some of the issues and hopefully grow with the team".
In my opinion, what really matters is how good and supportive your team is. Your management. Are they at least supportive or are their expectations too much without giving you anything in return ? Focus on that. If you have a good supportive environment with people you like working with, think twice before leaving.
This is the real world again. No matter where you go, dysfunction will be there. Good luck.
Many thanks for your words.
> Are they at least supportive or are their expectations too much without giving you anything in return ? Focus on that. If you have a good supportive environment with people you like working with, think twice before leaving.
I can very well give them that, in that they're pretty much ok with me learning on my own and not immediately contributing to the codebase (aside from the matter of this particular project having to wait months before things will start advancing in that direction), as long as I occupy my time with prototyping stuff for future use... you're right in saying that a supportive environment is more often than not a rarity to cherish rather than the norm. I will keep what you recommended in high regard, thank you.
> but there are days in which I feel like I really can't do anything and basically idle until it's time to go home, and this last part is really killing me with guilt.
This is internalized capitalist serfdom right there. You are in a business contract. If it’s not your fault you can’t do anything useful, why the F feel guilty? Best thing you can do - if I may suggest - is to use that time to find a better job. Sometimes a job doesn’t work out, don’t beat yourself up over it and learn the signs.
[dead]
reading the burnout society by byung chul han might help you.
has been under my radar for a while. I will, thank you.
It's really not that helpful. He's an interesting enough thinker, but it's not exactly proactive or empowering.
To me it seems like you may have broader issues with people pleasing and external validation. I don't know you, but this is what I got from your text. I think trying to resolve your identity and your role at work will help you out. Burnout only happens to people that are overly invested in things beyond their control.
[dead]