Ask HN: Who here feels their work is relevant and what do you do?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16650805

by mezod • 8 years ago

7 6 8 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

cimmanom• 8 years ago

What does "relevant" mean? Relevant to what?

cuchoi• 8 years ago

Maybe she meant meaningful?

ajeet_dhaliwal• 8 years ago

I think you’re right. Also I’m guessing the answer changes depending on whether the boss is asking or a friend.

David Graeber isn’t right about everything but look up his book ‘bullshit jobs’, spoiler alert, a lot of people think their jobs are meaningless or even totally useless. The more meaningless it feels the more the pay.

vfulco• 8 years ago

After 24 years on Wall Street in various capacities, I am now in Shanghai, China. It took a personal tragedy for me to re-invent myself but currently I am assisting people globally by resume editing, LinkedIn Profile creation, interview coaching and final edit and review of academic applications to overseas universities. The work is deeply satisfying vs. my prior role making rich people a little richer. And I guesstimate, with proper use of technology, I still have 4-5x revenue potential until I need to find more staff and layer on some new biz lines.

muzani• 8 years ago

System analyst. It's the sweet spot between manager and developer.

I think the most important role is someone who can say to the client that they can't do something impossible. This person can't be the developer themselves. And they need to back it with facts.

It was really hard to do this as a developer because it would take a week to gather the facts to explain that something can't be done in a week. So they'd be unhappy that we spent the week on meetings instead of work.

This work also directly makes it easier for developers to do work and easier for managers to schedule tasks. It's also a near irreplaceable role - it would take at least a month to train a new SA's technical skills and a few months for them to understand the user wishlist as well as why the limitations are limitations.

Ask HN: Who here feels their work is relevant and what do you do?

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