Programmer Automates Data Entry Job, Ponders Whether to Tell Employer

Brian_B said:
Where I work, we have operators who take care of heavy equipment.

Most of the operation of the heavy equipment is automated. They just need to check on things, keep it up to date on maintenance and keep it clean, and fix things when they go wrong.

I pay our guys full time salary. They are on call 24/7. Most weeks, when things are running well and all they have to do is check the oil and take out the trash, they maybe put in about 15 hours of actual time at work.

I don't mind it at all. In fact, the more weeks that are like that, the better, because it means things are running well. I know it's not quite the same as money, but I consider the extra time off a well deserved bonus for the operators for keeping things that way.

But when shit breaks, I expect them to do what needs to be done to make it work again, and to take the time to do it right the first time.
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Oh. How I wish more people though about doing it right and doing it the first time.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
I did this once years ago. Unfortunately I was young, naive and to eager to outperform my counterparts so I showed the company what I made . they rewarded me by cutting my position a week later and since I was in a "right to work" state, laid me off without a severance. I had been with the company for 5 years at that pont and had worked my way up from the call center to Business Analyst.
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That seems like a pretty edge case. Any company worth your time would have recognized the value in your work and promoted you or at least applauded your work. Don't get too hung up on their failure to recognize initiative. No business in the USA will survive for long with that sort of behavior (unless they are propped up by the gov'mt with lots of funding). There are plenty that do appreciate your initiative and will hire you in an instant.

I've been lucky to work for a small business the most of my electronics engineering career and I can tell you that I absolutely love sharing efficiency solutions with my co-workers. We get things done faster and with higher quality. This leads to more business and better pay for everyone. Nothing abhors me worse than seeing an employee (educated or not) doing mindless work that could be automated with a few hours of specialized expertise. I get paid to work 40 hours a week, and I feel obligated to make sure those hours include my best work to allow my company to succeed.

If I was in the original poster's position I'd be actively seeking a new job that used my talents to good use, rather than trying to milk an ignorant employer. The goal of humanity should be to improve and surpass previous generation's accomplishments, not stagnate and "just survive". As JFK famously said..."We do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard."
 
My thought is this: I automate things I don't like doing, so I can do things I do like doing. My advice to him, lose the bugs and start working on some other project that seems interesting. When the employer inevitably notices how the work has improved, tell them you automated the task and started working on fixing this other problem too. This is called DRIVE, and it's often what separates those who excel from those that remain in data entry their whole careers.
 
spugm1r3 said:
My thought is this: I automate things I don't like doing, so I can do things I do like doing. My advice to him, lose the bugs and start working on some other project that seems interesting. When the employer inevitably notices how the work has improved, tell them you automated the task and started working on fixing this other problem too. This is called DRIVE, and it's often what separates those who excel from those that remain in data entry their whole careers.
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Hihihi hohohoh hehehe
THAT involves a lot of luck.
First, you need a very well run company.
Second you need a non-jerk boss.
Third you need non jerk co-workers to take on other projects.
Fourth the reward structure for you boss is not based on cutting man-hours or some such.

You either have been very lucky or you are very young.
 
I'd have to work at the place to know more about it. However, at places I've worked at in the past, I would use something like this as a way to get a promotion and take on more responsibility. Eventually, won't the goose that lays the Golden Egg dry up? What is this person going to do then?
I also wonder what they are doing during the day. I have to imagine they would be bored out of their mind. If your boss constantly sees you on the Internet (non-work related stuff), that will not be good for your review.
If your skills are not getting used, they are also getting dull. What happens when you look for your next job? You can't really say you wrote a script and only did a few hours of work a day (well, depends on how you spin the story...) I'd rather go to an interview and tell them how I wrote an automation script that saved the company X hours of effort a month. If you somehow can tie that to a promotion, even better.
On the other hand, I have had jobs in the past where no one cared. I've worked many 80 hour weeks only to be bitched at when we still missed a deadline (not my code - just insane deadlines). Even if we made the deadline, you might get a $50 gift card and a kick in the nuts. The job I'm thinking of, they made everyone come in to the office - even if you part was done. You know, just in case something went wrong with your part of the project.
 
SomeoneElse said:
What if he created the program outside of work while he was at home? Does he then own the IP?
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Probably not. I've worked for several software companies. You typically sign a document that basically gives your employer rights to anything you develop. I know this because a friend and I were starting to work on a video game (which was not the same industry as my employer). We had to write a letter to the legal counsel so they could revue and give/deny permission. What we learned - legal counsel has a stamp that says NO.
They even got funny about any outside employment you might have. I can see why - if I am developing code, it would be very natural and easy to borrow something I thought of at one of the companies.
 
steakman1971 said:
I'd have to work at the place to know more about it. However, at places I've worked at in the past, I would use something like this as a way to get a promotion and take on more responsibility. Eventually, won't the goose that lays the Golden Egg dry up? What is this person going to do then?
I also wonder what they are doing during the day. I have to imagine they would be bored out of their mind. If your boss constantly sees you on the Internet (non-work related stuff), that will not be good for your review.
If your skills are not getting used, they are also getting dull. What happens when you look for your next job? You can't really say you wrote a script and only did a few hours of work a day (well, depends on how you spin the story...) I'd rather go to an interview and tell them how I wrote an automation script that saved the company X hours of effort a month. If you somehow can tie that to a promotion, even better.
On the other hand, I have had jobs in the past where no one cared. I've worked many 80 hour weeks only to be bitched at when we still missed a deadline (not my code - just insane deadlines). Even if we made the deadline, you might get a $50 gift card and a kick in the nuts. The job I'm thinking of, they made everyone come in to the office - even if you part was done. You know, just in case something went wrong with your part of the project.
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Not a day though, he works 1 - 2 hours a week. So assuming 40 hour weeks that is 38 - 39 hours a week playing around in the internet and 1 - 2 hours of work. So yes very hard to spin that into a good light if he waits too long.
 
Fuck telling them anything
However he will get real bored real fast

Don't take on more work also. they will just screw him with workload or fire him when thy find they can automate it all

Do what hes doing, save like mad, try and do other things with the time. Maybe some outside automation jobs on the side
that kinda thing
 
steakman1971 said:
Probably not. I've worked for several software companies. You typically sign a document that basically gives your employer rights to anything you develop. I know this because a friend and I were starting to work on a video game (which was not the same industry as my employer). We had to write a letter to the legal counsel so they could revue and give/deny permission. What we learned - legal counsel has a stamp that says NO.
They even got funny about any outside employment you might have. I can see why - if I am developing code, it would be very natural and easy to borrow something I thought of at one of the companies.
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See i hate legal crap like that.....I understand to a point but if i created something completely separate from work they should be no reason why they get any part of it. Hate the copyright law and legal system as it exists today....
 
SomeoneElse said:
See i hate legal crap like that.....I understand to a point but if i created something completely separate from work they should be no reason why they get any part of it. Hate the copyright law and legal system as it exists today....
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Unfortunately, I was in this situation, and it brought up some legal issues. "But it has nothing to do with work!" Unfortunately, the agreements usually are along the line of anything done on company time or equipment, or are related to the company business, or use skills you pick up via the company, are sole ownership of the company. I mean, in some situations, it makes sense that if you're working for Microsoft and work on a game, even if you're on the mobile team, well, Microsoft also happens to also be in the game department, and how do they know you didn't steal IP from their game department?

And for situations where the company has no interest, why they might be interested in blocking you. Let's say you work for Corel on the WinZip team, and want to make a game. Now, perhaps you saw some useful code while you were there to help your game become more efficient. Sure, Corel doesn't make games, but you've used their IP with knowledge you obtained there.

It ends up being a legal hassle, similar to patent trolls, where you have to ask yourself, is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal representation worth it? If you decide to take it to court, you'll have juries who are not very technically competent. The only reason I managed to keep some of my code was that it was built off of a preexisting codebase I had written years earlier and was considered derived work. Don't ask me to explain this, I don't understand the legalities behind it.

In the end though, you're programming all day and get burnt out on programming, and the fact that it's not worth spending the time to program because you might not see any results makes it even harder to justify programming in your spare time. This is one reason I get annoyed with people who suggest picking up new languages in your spare time for your job and just quit and find a better job. It's not that easy, and half the time, the people making these suggestions are 19 with no real world experience.
 
Nytegard said:
Unfortunately, I was in this situation, and it brought up some legal issues. "But it has nothing to do with work!" Unfortunately, the agreements usually are along the line of anything done on company time or equipment, or are related to the company business, or use skills you pick up via the company, are sole ownership of the company. I mean, in some situations, it makes sense that if you're working for Microsoft and work on a game, even if you're on the mobile team, well, Microsoft also happens to also be in the game department, and how do they know you didn't steal IP from their game department?

And for situations where the company has no interest, why they might be interested in blocking you. Let's say you work for Corel on the WinZip team, and want to make a game. Now, perhaps you saw some useful code while you were there to help your game become more efficient. Sure, Corel doesn't make games, but you've used their IP with knowledge you obtained there.

It ends up being a legal hassle, similar to patent trolls, where you have to ask yourself, is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal representation worth it? If you decide to take it to court, you'll have juries who are not very technically competent. The only reason I managed to keep some of my code was that it was built off of a preexisting codebase I had written years earlier and was considered derived work. Don't ask me to explain this, I don't understand the legalities behind it.

In the end though, you're programming all day and get burnt out on programming, and the fact that it's not worth spending the time to program because you might not see any results makes it even harder to justify programming in your spare time. This is one reason I get annoyed with people who suggest picking up new languages in your spare time for your job and just quit and find a better job. It's not that easy, and half the time, the people making these suggestions are 19 with no real world experience.
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I see what they are saying legally, but it can only reach to a certain point. Once you leave a company and create you own code "as a result from working for said company" They can't persue legal action unless you actually stole code. Since you were the wone who created it thats where the grey area comes in and basically you are tied to the company for life because of the legal system is setup to screw you.
 
spugm1r3 said:
My thought is this: I automate things I don't like doing, so I can do things I do like doing. My advice to him, lose the bugs and start working on some other project that seems interesting. When the employer inevitably notices how the work has improved, tell them you automated the task and started working on fixing this other problem too. This is called DRIVE, and it's often what separates those who excel from those that remain in data entry their whole careers.
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Alternatively, he could spend his time at work learning new skills, taking online classes / self study for new certs, then go to the boss and tell him "look, I've done the job plus I have X cert now, promote me or this company I've already interviewed with will"
 
Angry said:
Wasn't there a similar story quiet awhile back about a guy doing the same thing, and ultimately goofing off at work.
And then when it came time to actually fix something, it had went on for so long he had forgotten how to fix his program?
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How do you forget how to program? You might forget how you've written a program that you did years ago, but you look at the code and it comes back in a few minutes depending on the size of the code.
 
I take a compromise approach.

Automate the crap out of everything I do, and release it incrementally over a few quarters, especially in Q4 near promotion / raise time.
"Look boss, I innovated!" -> "Look boss, I innovated some more!", etc.
Has worked out well for me so far! :)
Of course it's important to have actual technical competence, but even more so is managing expectations.

Also, there are "Godmode" hidden switches in a fair bit of the stuff I write. The "Godmode" features may or may not be released in the future,
but in the meantime, no sense in letting the lazy slobs around me sponge off the benefits.
 
cageymaru said:
More like automate more stuff related to the original and then sell the program to other corporations for a fee.
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You have to be very careful about that. The second you use any company resources, computer, compiler, time,even sit in their building, they will sink their claws into and claim it as theirs.

That's when I created some very clever code(About 75,000 lines) I did it all at home with source safe on my home computer so I have a full audit trail to prove it's mine.

I invented a MVVC filter mechanism that is to easy to use for check boxes, radio buttons, edit boxes, and combo boxes, that I replaced 15 years of code in 1 week. Everyone said it couldn't be done. I proved them wrong and made the code a lot easier to manage in the process. You have a presentation layer, a data layer/storage layer and a rule layer and you bind them together with dependency injection and you have the most flexible rule engine ever even if there are multiple cross dependencies on multiple hierarchies. You can change the presentation layer from .NET Forms to web and all it takes in changing the dependency injection on the constructor to make the presentation layer the web.
 
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M76 said:
How do you forget how to program? You might forget how you've written a program that you did years ago, but you look at the code and it comes back in a few minutes depending on the size of the code.
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Easier than you think. It's easy to forget a language you haven't programmed in 2 or 3 years, if you have to work with 3 or 4 unrelated others.
 
As a programmer your job is to automate things. Instead of doing a lot of mundane tasks (which I know I will likely have to repeat in the future) I usually will spend the time (probably will take longer the first time) to automate the process to save from the mundane task and also (more importantly) to reduce errors and have the chance of checking your work.
 
Possibly use the time left to learn tech stuff, like new language or framework, which could benefit employer as well. Win, win.
 
Someone once told me,
"If you do more than they expect of you, they will always expect more of you".
This has shown to be true whenever I work for someone else. Luckily, in many situations, I enjoy my work, so it's not that important. But over time, what has happened, was that I wound up running my tail off, on my feet for the whole 12 hour shift, and now I have worn out my knees, seven years before normal retirement age.
In retrospect, I made a colossal mistake.
Do the job they give you, do it well, and that's it.
When I was 25, I would have told my boss, given them the code, and taken on another project, and probably been assigned a different task that I would hate. When I was 55, I would keep my mouth shut, having been screwed over by employers time and time again. You're just a cog in the corporate wheel. They don't give a crap what happens to you; no more company physical exams, and they charge you more and more for the health insurance. That's why it's now called 'Human Resources' instead of 'Personnel'. We're no longer considered people. We're just supplies to be used up and discarded, like a toner cartridge or a light bulb. And that is exactly what's happening.
 
Some words of advise for anyone doing this... Just don't use the spare time to load up some porn and rub one out in your office/cubicle. A dude did that where I work and got canned.
 
nightfly said:
Someone once told me,
"If you do more than they expect of you, they will always expect more of you".
This has shown to be true whenever I work for someone else. Luckily, in many situations, I enjoy my work, so it's not that important. But over time, what has happened, was that I wound up running my tail off, on my feet for the whole 12 hour shift, and now I have worn out my knees, seven years before normal retirement age.
In retrospect, I made a colossal mistake.
Do the job they give you, do it well, and that's it.
When I was 25, I would have told my boss, given them the code, and taken on another project, and probably been assigned a different task that I would hate. When I was 55, I would keep my mouth shut, having been screwed over by employers time and time again. You're just a cog in the corporate wheel. They don't give a crap what happens to you; no more company physical exams, and they charge you more and more for the health insurance. That's why it's now called 'Human Resources' instead of 'Personnel'. We're no longer considered people. We're just supplies to be used up and discarded, like a toner cartridge or a light bulb. And that is exactly what's happening.
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This, I just wonder (as I am not old enough, but older than some here that seem too naive -or as I said very lucky) as it ever been any different? 50s, 60s, 70s or so.
Good efficient work gets rewarded with more work, typical compensation structures I have lived give managers a very narrow distinction 1,2,3% or something like that so its not as if you are new, you can exceed in what you do, so then you can close the gap with those that have been there longer, or even close the gap with market value (if you are very new).. no no, you only get more work, while those that know better, make more money, plus they make even more than you 'cause they do less. And really that is all that happens. I guess the hope is, you don't get canned if cuts come.. but depending how badly things are managed, not even that, 'friends' and family get protected first... Oh yeah, and if your co-workers are jerks, if you are good, they hate you for it, in unison, so you have to live with backstabbing, and a whole shitload of politics behind your back.
 
Uvaman2 said:
This, I just wonder (as I am not old enough, but older than some here that seem too naive -or as I said very lucky) as it ever been any different? 50s, 60s, 70s or so.
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Nope, this is pretty much standard corporate operating procedure. As mentioned, if the time comes to lay off workers, they will keep friends, family first whenever cuts need to be made, even to the point of keeping lesser capable morons that will eventually make the company fall apart. As a teen, I fell for the nonsense they told me about 'merit raises', which turned out to be pure lies just to motivate those of us who didn't know it was all a scam (I worked three years before I realized I was working my ass off with no possibility of getting one of those 'merit raises', that type of money only went to family and women the management was having sex with, admitted to by one of those ladies who blatantly admitted she paid for her new car with her 'Christmas bonus').
 
On one side:

I will agree the best talent doesn't get properly paid. We worked our best talent to death. And we lost five of our best people in six months. No wonder, they have significant skills in web development AND the company didn't give them any significant pay raises for years. They just announced a 2% pay raise max even though that was less than inflation. And now the company managers are all panicking and can't figure out why people are leaving.

On the other side:

Humans will do the least work necessary to collect their paycheck and not get fired in the process. That is human nature.

You want to be happy at your job, change how your job works and what you do:
 
This is what i would do:

1) Tell the current company nothing, backup the scripts
2) Apply for jobs and use this is as the key bullet point and get a giant raise at my next position.
3) Once interview and such is complete and i had an offer letter in hand, i would take my scripts, remove the bug maker section and present to my boss.

I would demand a new IT group of automation making myself the manager, a larger bump in pay that my offer letter, a dead line of 2 weeks to accept my terms. If the current company did accept i would turn over the scripts to them with no instructions and bounce to the new jobbie.
 
percydaman said:
That's not necessarily the right thing to do at all. Why is everybody in a hurry to work themselves into their grave? Maybe he's fine with the level of responsibility he has now. Maybe he's fine with how much he's paid right now. I would love to have a way to work smarter, not harder; get paid the same and spend less time actually working, all while doing the job expected of me.
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That's called being the business owner, not the employee :)
 
The flip side of being on salary. They want you to work as many hours as it takes to finish your job.

The company thinks I'll be working nights and weekends. My plan was to head home after lunch.
 
Exavior said:
I know that I am the odd man out, while part of me wants to say good for him for finding a way to get out of doing his job while still getting the work done, I do have to view this as stealing. He says he isn't cheating the company but in fact he is. Lets flip this around a tad. lets say that your job is to get the donuts for a company meeting every week so every Monday you are given $100 to go pickup all the donuts for the company, every week for years the total is $96.00 so you give back $4 every week. Then lets say that place decided that since you are guys are such a great customer they are going to give you a discount and now it is only $86 for the donuts. But instead of giving your employer back $14 you decide to keep the $10 every week and just give them $4. After all they don't know that the price changed and are thinking that they are spending $96 a week on donuts. So that is fine that you are keeping $10 a week right?
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I don't think the donut comparison is quite right here. I think a better example would be this:
You run a donut shop, and customers are used to spending $1/donut, and each donut costs you $0.75 to make. You figure out how to make the donuts for $0.20 each. Are you morally obligated to lower your price by $0.55, or to even tell your customers that you're only spending $0.20 per donut in production costs?
 
tetris42 said:
I like how he's pondering the ethics of it when the reality is most employers at large companies would sell you into slavery if it could increase their profit margins.
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What exactly does someone else's ethics have to do with yours? Nothing as far as I'm concerned. The only person I must live with until I die is me. I can always walk away from those other unethical aholes if it bothers me too much, but I always have to face the same guy in the mirror.
 
Ok, so if I finger peck at a keyboard to enter data, then learn to 10 finger type that speeds my job up should I feel unethical because I'm now doing something more efficiently? When I enter grades for my students I alphabetize the papers first and it makes entering grades seamlessly easy. If you find a way to make you doing your job more efficient then more power to you, just make sure the code isn't on the company's computer so if they threaten to fire you you take the code with them.

That said, I wouldn't manufacture bugs into the code to make it look more like a human has done it, because if they do find out then you'll get in trouble because obviously your coding is "faulty" if it left all these mistakes.
 
PaulP said:
What exactly does someone else's ethics have to do with yours? Nothing as far as I'm concerned. The only person I must live with until I die is me. I can always walk away from those other unethical aholes if it bothers me too much, but I always have to face the same guy in the mirror.
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Because context matters. Part of ethics is if you're causing harm and to who. Say you come across a field and find some corn being grown, so you take some to eat. Is that ethical or unethical? Well if it's a farmer who depends on that crop to survive, you just stole from him and are causing him real harm. If the farmer is already dead, or it's an abandoned farm, then it's not unethical at all, yet, it's the exact same action in either case. Worrying about the first scenario is an ethical dilemma, worrying about the other is just being foolish.

There's a reason the tale of Robin Hood has survived so long. Part of the human spirit enjoys taking back from people who have already stolen from others. Not that I know the specifics of the company he works for, but considering how the average person in management behaves and wage theft tends to number in the billions, my guess is a company that allows for this level of ineptitude is so far detached from the concerns and needs of the employee that him only following the letter of the law in his case is hardly an unethical scenario.

I get what you're saying, but this scenario doesn't strike me as any more unethical than claiming a deduction on your taxes. He's found a legal advantage, and he's taking it.
 
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Mohonri said:
I don't think the donut comparison is quite right here. I think a better example would be this:
You run a donut shop, and customers are used to spending $1/donut, and each donut costs you $0.75 to make. You figure out how to make the donuts for $0.20 each. Are you morally obligated to lower your price by $0.55, or to even tell your customers that you're only spending $0.20 per donut in production costs?
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But he doesn't own the business. He is a low level employee. He is being paid to do a task.
 
Exavior said:
But he doesn't own the business. He is a low level employee. He is being paid to do a task.
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And he's still doing his task. Honestly it's about this simple. He can:

1. Keep doing what he's doing, get paid, the company gets their work done, he has plenty of free time. Both sides benefit.

2. Report that he's figured out how to automate his job, likely get laid off because the company doesn't need him any more, and his manager will probably get a bonus if not a promotion for taking credit for his work, and saving the company a bunch of money. He loses out completely, people who already have more money than he does benefit even more.

Can someone elaborate more on how #2 is the "right" thing to do? Right for who?
 
Depending on the employment agreement/contract, if he wrote the program during billable hours/working hours etc, the company may have a legal right to the code. If the contract doesn't include such provisions they don't.

Either way, you have to determine if its worth even mentioning it. The job is being done, by your hand/ingenuity, and you are taking responsibility for the work produced, so as long as all parties are happy, there isn't really an issue. Now if this program is something that would be valuable in other scenarios outside of your specific task, you have to decide if the company has a right to it, and if they do, if you should provide it, or if they don't have the rights, if you should package, market, and publish it for profit.
 
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