In my experience it is common. Here are some suggestions:
1. Ask a person who has cut you off in a recent conversation for a 1 on 1 conversation. Tell them about the recent conversation and what happened from your perspective. Ask them for advice on what you can do to have your voice heard more.
2. Ask a third party who is typically in those conversations that you get cut off in (but isn’t the one who cuts you off) for a 1 on 1 conversation. Explain to them what is happening and ask them for their advice. — not only will you get some advice but they might change their behavior to discourage others from cutting you off
3. Next time you get cut off remember what you just said, the details of how you said it, and the topic at hand and write it down. After you do that a few times take a look at the data you gathered and see if you can find any noticeable patterns — may you were getting off topic or maybe you had a snarky tone, etc.
4. Determine what your need is and explore other ways to have it met. If your need is to feel as if your opinions are heard, consider that in person technical conversations are just one way to meet that need. Another way might be a written proposal or Slack conversation. Or maybe you could run a more structured meeting that is run in a way that protects against people getting cut off (e.g. time assigned specifically for generating several different options)
For a bit over four years I worked a demanding full time job while also getting my Master's degree and maintaining a relationship with my spouse.
I don't really have any insightful tricks, I just found the time.
When friends would go out, I would choose to stay in and either get some rest or do work. My weekends were fully allocated to my graduate work. My spouse was understanding and supportive but ultimately I spent less time with her, my family and friends.
I felt most overwhelmed when I planned out what I needed to get done next - that feeling usually went away when I started working.
One semester, in an effort to finish my degree faster, I tried taking an additional class. A little over two weeks in I found myself physically and mentally overwhelmed and unable to keep up with the work. Upon reflection, I realized that in an effort to keep up with the work, I was putting in 95+ hours of work per week. For me, that was unsustainable, so I dropped a class.
Most importantly, in retrospect, I regret it. Looking back it's pretty obvious to me that the compromises I made were misaligned with what actually matters to me. The tricky part for me was that it was really hard to see when I was in the middle of it.
I also think that my excessive workload actually took a lot of the joy out of the work I was doing. And for me, I think I'd rather go 50mph and enjoy the ride adjusting the direction as I go than 150 mph holding on for dear life in who the hell knows which direction.
Does anyone know what kind of growth Reddit has seen over the past few years? I'm curious if the trend in number of disclosure requests over time looks any different when normalized for some sort of growth metric.
Sounds like it could be ADHD, take a look at the DSM-5 Criteria for ADHD[0] (the same criteria that a doctor would use to diagnose you).
Here are the criteria for Inattention:
- Often fails to give close attention to details or makes careless mistakes in schoolwork, at work, or with other activities.
- Often has trouble holding attention on tasks or play activities.
- Often does not seem to listen when spoken to directly.
- Often does not follow through on instructions and fails to finish schoolwork, chores, or duties in the workplace (e.g., loses focus, side-tracked).
- Often has trouble organizing tasks and activities.
- Often avoids, dislikes, or is reluctant to do tasks that require mental effort over a long period of time (such as schoolwork or homework).
- Often loses things necessary for tasks and activities (e.g. school materials, pencils, books, tools, wallets, keys, paperwork, eyeglasses, mobile telephones).
As someone who's been in a 9 year relationship, I profoundly disagree. In my experience sharing has helped build a foundation of trust and respect in our relationship.
Seeking out professional therapy and/or sharing your feelings with others is the opposite of weak, it's courageous.
Are you familiar with the concept of the False dilemma[0]? It seems as if you've limited yourself to an "either/or" situation when in fact there are countless other possible solutions to this problem.
Here are some possible alternatives:
- find a leadership coach and/or mentor
- delegate the parts of your job that you like the least
- find a way to reduce stress in your life (exercise, hobby, etc)
- try professional therapy
- share how you feel with your friends and/or family (maybe even leadership team)
- take a vacation
- work less
- define and respect clear work/life boundaries for yourself
- read about/learn how to manage stress more effectively
- create a project plan for yourself (what do _you_ want to accomplish for _yourself_ in the next 3,6,12 months)
I could go on and on.
Another thing I think that you should ask yourself is: would you really be happier working at WalMart? Is it really this specific job and role that's causing your unhappiness? Is there really nothing you can change to make you job more enjoyable? Is it possible that you're creating your own unhappiness?
From personal experience I highly recommend finding a great leadership coach. I had a leadership coach who really helped me tackle some potentially similar challenges I was having.
If you want to talk more feel free to ping me. Good luck!
I don't think it's so much of a false dilemma as it was the OP's inability to find other options. They're posting here to find those options, which you've given a bunch of.
The trick for the OP now is to not just dismiss them all out of hand. I hear so many people throw advice away on the flimsiest of excuses, when just a little massaging can make them work.
I feel that one of the most common pieces of advice to stressed people is to take a vacation. I am not sure how well that works. In my experience, stress is created not by the amount of work that I do but by the work that I feel that I don't get done.
Unless I would be able to comfortably disconnect completely on such a vacation, it would do little good or possibly make things worse.
Great advice, thanks, to add to this, don't worry about the state of your existing product, it's what it is, if you are acquired it is more likely for your presence, reputation and talent than for actual lines of code. [edit] spend some time forest bathing if you can!
Plated (New York, NY): Mid-Senior Level Ruby on Rails Developer
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Plated is a NYC startup that is redefining the way we eat by reconnecting people to their food. As our young company is entering a growth stage, we need to expand our developer team – that’s where you come in!
Why us? This is an excellent opportunity for a seasoned engineer to scale a product and work with a company early on that will be a household name in 1-2 years.
Beyond brute intelligence and problem solving skills, we are looking for hunger, passion, and a general craving to help build a successful company.
Plated (New York, NY): Mid-Senior Level Ruby on Rails Developer
---
Plated is a NYC startup that is redefining the way we eat by reconnecting people to their food. As our young company is entering a growth stage, we need to expand our developer team – that’s where you come in!
Why us?
This is an excellent opportunity for a seasoned engineer to scale a product and work with a company early on that will be a household name in 1-2 years. Beyond brute intelligence and problem solving skills, we are looking for hunger, passion, and a general craving to help build a successful company.
I'm in a VERY similar situation. Self taught 23 year old developer with a BS in business/marketing, Front End + Ruby experience, and interviewing for software engineering jobs.
Prior to my first technical interview I spent tons of time studying algorithms and data structures. Looking back I feel that my time would have been better spent selecting several sample questions (such as the ones you included) and solving them on a whiteboard over and over again (and checking and improving them along the way).
The more practice you have, the faster you will be able to: recognize what type of problem a particular question is, come to an initial solution, and improve upon that solution.
Feel free to reach out to me with any questions! (contact info in my profile)
The developer is also pretty responsive and actively looking for feedback (which is why it's currently free on TestFlight)