This article reprinted from: www.iteye.com/blog/zwchen…
The author is a technology of predecessors, I am very admire this article is when at the age of 36 he wrote, and it was in 2015, now he is already a chengdu cloud information technology co., LTD., the CEO, the development of cross-border Saas software is already the industry, has made great success in business, but the process is actually quite difficult, This article was written in the early stage of his business, and at this time, he has been doing technology for 12 years. This is his micro blog, you can also follow it, there are a lot of dry goods thinking: weibo.com/u/154741685…
I came across this article in 2020, when I was 31 years old. When I was 31 years old, I read what this senior wrote five years ago about his thinking at the age of 36, which inspired me a lot. I also started my business in 2020, doing front-end early chat and front-end technology conference, and encountered a lot of difficulties in the process. However, the experience of this senior gave me great confidence, helped me to control my impetuousness more, with greater strategic patience to start the front-end early talk bit by bit.
I read at least 10 times in 2020, this article have benefited a lot from reading to them every time, also specially added WeChat predecessors, do the communication, and reproduced the original hereat, can help more children five years ahead of schedule, 10 years ahead of schedule, see your career possibilities, more early predictions to their possible problems, and to prepare for this in advance, Stupid birds fly early and play their professional competitiveness with the time difference.
Inspired by predecessors brings me so much, in addition to reprint this article, let everybody also saw, I also found the industry inside, originally is do the front of a lot of predecessors, through online live, also can bring you more vertical sharing and inspired, namely the 36 early chat conference of front-end engineer career path, live throughout the day You can sign up link stamp here
The following is the text of the elder’s article:
The text is as follows
2015, is my birth year, 36 years old.
Remember last year, 2003, I read a postgraduate in Nankai, I give my university tutor telephone, she said this year is my year, I still remember all the time.
Flash forward 12 years, a circle. In fact, there is no sadness and regret, good.
2015 should be the best year for me since I graduated from school. I have a good life in work, family and life.
2015 is also a new beginning. I have a good relationship with my work partner, the CEO of the company, with mutual trust and tacit understanding.
For years, I wanted to start my own business. The biggest driving force was not to earn more money, but to be happy and free from constraints. Now, this is where I want to be.
In 2016, I believe I will do better. Let’s get back to the topic and sum up my biggest feeling this year.
A midlife crisis
In three years, I will be officially middle-aged: 40.
But my awareness of a midlife crisis seems to have arrived prematurely.
In late March this year, a friend from Shanghai asked me to receive several partners who came to Chengdu. As I drove one of them back to his hotel, I struck up a conversation with him about a midlife crisis, as he was just over 40 (a former English radio presenter with a perfectly pure voice).
I said THAT I found a lot of post-90s around me, the technical backbone of our company is post-85, I write code has been unable to write them. Of course he’ll go along with me, things will come, but he has the optimism and confidence of a 40-year-old man, and he shows no signs of aging.
Later, in late April, I worked as a technical consultant for the face swipe card. The people who assisted me in my work were all the post-90s who had just graduated and were mainly born in 1992. I found that I was not of the same age with them.
They are polite, warm, hard-working and, in fact, better educated than my generation, including their parents.
But I am gratified that the mainstream group of the Internet today, the company behind them, in fact, we are still dominated by the post-70s and post-80s.
Sometimes, I will also observe the crowd in the city, crowded bus, subway, spring city, there are very few uncle.
But I also found that those who have been peers, whether many have reached the career ceiling, has no blood in those days, doomed to this life of mediocrity.
Once, I suddenly remembered my leader in Neusoft, director of The Business Department of Neusoft Foundation. When I joined the company, he talked to me and said that he was nearly 40 years old. Now, he should be 50 years old. Liu Jiren, the boss of the company, saw him on TV a few months ago, with white hair.
In fact, my crisis, not social competitiveness, but the relentless passage of time.
responsibility
When I say duty, I mean duty to my family.
This year, I brought both my parents to Chengdu. His parents are 63 years old, and last year they worked in the dark in the fields.
I invited them here for two reasons. First, I didn’t want them to be so tired at their age. (Remembering the scene 20 years ago when the farm was busy, I had a kind of fear: holding rice in the scorching sun of 40 degrees Celsius and getting up at 4 am to plant rice seedlings.) Second, help me take care of the kids.
In fact, BEFORE THE age of 30, I do not want to stay with my parents, I fill in the college entrance examination, the biggest plan, is far away from home. Because WHEN I was young, I was a very rebellious child, fighting, stealing vegetables and doing bad things. I was beaten by my parents every day.
This year, my parents have been very happy here, the relationship between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law is also very harmonious.
I put a few thousand dollars in my drawer every month for them to spend on whatever they want, whatever they want. Although they don’t spend much, they feel at ease.
I’m thinking, they’re healthy now, but in five, ten years, they probably won’t be. Therefore, in the economy must have enough reserves. When I saw any insurance companies selling insurance, I would ask if there were any for parents and the elderly. Unfortunately, none of them had any, and their rural household registration and social security were not sound.
Also, is the child’s health, growth, these are to support the economy.
There are parents there relatives, in the eyes of relatives, our family looks promising, after the old man there seriously ill, I can not stand idly by.
Of course, the economy is not my concern, but in five years the problem will become more obvious, and aging and disease will not be solved by money. But I must have a sense of risk, and prepare for risk in advance.
family
I don’t seem to talk much about my family, which is my relationship. In fact, for so many years, all the time also harmonious, but I this virgo man, very rigid, do not understand romance, also do not have the idea to think about how to make fun.
Before in Dalian, LP always nag in front of me, she so-and-so classmate, LG will call to care about a few sentences every day.
I wonder if it occurred to her that for more than a year, every time she worked overtime, I would stand under their office building, often standing for an hour in the biting wind in the north. There was no smart phone to kill time at that time.
This year, the company moved to longquan economic zone, a little far away, need to drive to work. Before getting off work, I would call her and ask her if she got off work. If she didn’t, I would pick her up, although it was not on my way.
I didn’t know what to do. Now I suddenly understand: What am I calling you every day to say? What can I do? It’s too rational to say that virgo men are practical.
The 20 or so minutes we spent on the road, that’s when we actually communicated. I would run after dinner and study until about 11 o ‘clock, when she was putting the kids to bed.
All these years it’s like it’s been so flat.
I might have a fight once a year, and I have to spend a couple of days trying to calm it down, learn from it (it’s awkward to lose face), and defuse it as soon as it starts to get ugly.
The reason I don’t fight so much is probably because I don’t pay attention to the trivial things in life. I remember when I waited for her to leave work, not to wait, but to think about some technical problems.
health
Every year when I review, I make health my number one goal for the coming year.
Health is nothing more than the four points: a balanced diet, proper exercise, enough sleep and a balanced mind. And every one of them is actually conditional, diet and exercise, it takes a lot of self-discipline, a lot of temper, and a proper job.
On these four points, I think I am quite satisfied.
In the evening, I basically controlled in a bowl of noodle soup or porridge, although the amount of food will increase after exercise;
I’ve got into the habit of exercising. At the beginning of the year, 64KG, a few months later, I ran down to nearly 57KG, losing 6kg. Although I regained some weight later, I kept it up.
I find that with too much exercise, there’s a longer refractory period, and the body is fighting back, it’s very resistant to exercise. Now I keep running 3 times a week (30 minutes 5km) and can do it for a long time. Also, after running and taking a shower, you can study very well.
Every time I find myself in a bad mood, I run. It is a more effective way to deal with stress than any form of entertainment. Of course, this requires a lot of self-discipline, because people are most passive when they are feeling down.
I’ve been buying my family treadmill for three years. Lp was against it at the time, but I’m sure it was the right investment.
Now I have a dumbbell at home, which is nearly 50KG. I will lift 4 sets of weights every morning and eat after warming up. During this period, I don’t need to wear a coat.
self-knowledge
This year I often wondered, what kind of person do I want to be? First of all, I should look like this person.
Have an independent mind. Therefore, BEFORE the mainstream ideology, I should have my own opinion and think more deeply about the popular chicken soup: why do most people agree with it? Is it airtight?
Herd mentality, if it is normal before the age of 30, if it is my age, it is too low. There should be a lack of security behind herding.
Calmly. This is a kind of ability that I am practicing, and a little related to poise and grace. Of course, it is difficult to have this quality without experiencing the wind and waves, as well as the lack of fame and wealth. But even then, people will still be nervous, anxious and rude in the face of emotions, so practice it anyway.
The last time I had a nasty brush with a female driver, he was rude and followed me with a loud voice, but after a few minutes I managed to calm down: was this the image I wanted? Have I lost my identity?
Grace. Once, out of the office door, there is a girl behind also just go out, I open the door, habitual and did not pull the door for her, then I regret for a good period of time. I was thinking about how I could practice my improvising, when, in fact, I meant to hold the door for her.
It wasn’t that I wanted to show her, it was just that IT was inelegant, and I resented my incompetence.
Aura. At least in our company of nearly 70 people, I’m not a junior or middle employee, and I’m not supposed to act like an average employee.
When I was practicing and puzzling about my aura, I suddenly realized a truth one day: when you have a sense of responsibility to the company, colleagues and subordinates, it will make you take the initiative to create a sunny environment and let others support and cooperate with you, so that you will never think of the stage fright when facing a group of people.
I remember someone asked me on Zhihu: How can I make a speech without stage fright? Someone replied: You should just think of the audience as your friends. It works, but you have to be religious.
One might wonder, since you’re a partner, shouldn’t you have been “lacking in energy” in the first place? The thing is, I didn’t put money in, just technology. In the company, whoever pays the bill is the boss, right?
The above points, for many young people, in college have this consciousness, and I began to realize after 30 years old. May have a certain relationship with my poor rural family environment, has been tired of relying on diligence to change their fate.
Urban adults, on the other hand, seem to be five years earlier in terms of social and personal independence.
A colleague in the company, after a few days of getting along with, I probably know whether he is from a big city, a small town, or a country. And the programmer industry, do good basically from the countryside, and they tend to have the advantages of farmers: diligent, simple, trustworthy, but also relatively strong sense of smallholder farmers.
Only rural parents and children think that they can learn math, physics and chemistry well and travel all over the world. And in this circle for a long time, the lack of sensitivity to their own identity and image, but also lost the motivation to change.
To face the difficulties
As anyone working on iOS knows, it takes 7 days for the AppStore to launch, which is really frustrating, and the domestic app market can often approve it in an hour. If there is a serious bug, you have to wait seven days for the user to fix it.
Later, I think this is a good thing: it requires careful consideration of bugs and rigorous testing before you release your APP, which means that the Limitations of the APP Store force you to improve your capabilities. Isn’t that a good thing?
Remember that Wal-mart was criticized by its suppliers for one reason: they kept the purchase price too low and made no profit for themselves. But imagine if the supplier improved its production process and reduced costs; Or make differentiated products, better than other suppliers, don’t you have bargaining power? Too weak to blame others?
Another thing in the company is that whenever there is a bug in our App, someone will report it to the company group, and everyone will know it. If we make it look like our technical team is weak, of course I will feel pressure.
In fact, the normal product operation process should be that the business personnel submit to the bug system, and we arrange the construction period after confirmation, instead of broadcasting in the group immediately. Furthermore, App bugs are generally not fixed immediately; They shout in the group, and if no one records bugs in the system, they are likely to be forgotten later, especially over the weekend.
Later, I introduced Dingding-enterprise wechat in the company to solve such problems to some extent. If the business department feedback problems point-to-point, it must add friends first, and they can only broadcast in the group, but Dingdingdoes not need to.
Later, I told the technical team that I would take the fall for you. They didn’t know who made this bug, but it was a chance to improve themselves. You would eventually face competition from other developers in the market, and your ability improvement was your only competitiveness.
For me, in fact, the same, face is not important, management ability is the fundamental improvement.
Relationship between
In the past six months, MY cooperation with the CEO has been quite tacit. Although it was based on his recognition of my technical management and my recognition of his business capabilities, it was a relationship that had to be managed.
For example, once, the APP suddenly failed to work, everyone was anxious, because the ground push team was promoting the site. I found that the reason lies in the DNS resolution of the domain name. There is something wrong with 360’s CDN. So I immediately went back to the company (it was the weekend), killed the CDN, and reconfigured the DNS and DNS. Ultimately, however, the problem cannot be solved immediately because DNS takes time to take effect.
In other words, all employees have to wait.
The next morning, everything was fine, and it turned out not to be a Bug.
Later, I told the Boss that the best solution was to do nothing and it would probably recover in an hour. Because the early warning system of 360 will prompt CDN node failure, they will solve it as soon as possible.
But the thing is, in that anxious situation, he must have wanted me to act quickly, and my best bet was to cooperate.
Relationships are built on the value of each other, such as complementing each other’s abilities, coping with loneliness, exchanging information, seeking approval, staying together, etc. The reliability of a relationship depends on its own scarcity, replaceable costs, and risks.
How can you be so utilitarian? But think carefully about the affection, friendship, this not to stain the emotion, is not so? Best friends in high school, intimacy may be based on fighting loneliness.
The relationship comes to an end when a person has no use for it.
I think about that all the time with the CEO.
The technology department has so much spending this month, is this month’s deliverables worth the money?
Two months later, the product will enter the maintenance stage, and 30% of the resources will be idle. The boss will feel that the input and output are not high, so I need to find ways to turn idle resources into cash and reduce the cost. Or tap other needs of the product to enhance the saturation of work.
In addition, the product entered the maintenance period, and my utilization value was not enough to support my larger revenue expectations. I had to find new revenue sources. I want to earn more money, not from the Boss, but from a percentage of the value I create.
Of course, I can also think that the technology market is so expensive now, outsourcing costs will be higher, we are saving money on technology spending.
This is a self-centered way of thinking, which is good, but not helpful, for relationships.
Colleague relationships. Working overtime, for example, is certainly desirable to the leadership, diligence, responsibility and loyalty. But I said to the technical team: Overtime is a sign of incompetence and a disgrace. It’s either my management ability or your technical ability. Technical skills, either you find a way to improve, or I find someone else.
I do sound cold, but I think it’s responsible to them to improve their abilities.
I meet their expectations in terms of salary and drive them home after work. If it’s just for the benefit of colleagues, I definitely don’t want to enjoy listening to music alone without personal space on the way home from work.
My relationship with my subordinates is also based on mutual utilization value, and that value is mainly their deliverables, delivered on time and with quality. As a middleman, I first satisfy the interests of the Boss, and then their interests can be satisfied. My connivance will eventually hurt them and the Boss, which is lose-lose.
In fact, I am a technology businessman.
Because of this view of the workplace, I do not value the superficial relationships, such as loyalty and obedience. If they are unreliable, there is no culture of overtime, attendance and standing in line.
Why do I want to make the relationship between the leader and the subordinate so cold? Actually, not at all. I’m just respecting the laws of nature.
If the walk of Fame contestants, for example, had won their votes mainly by playing the emotional card, the show wouldn’t be alive today.
If the host is also moved to suggest that the audience vote, it is not fair to those who are not emotional and rely on their strength, it is harmful to the TV audience (the show is not high quality, it is all a show), and ultimately damages the avenue of Fame brand.
Sometimes I think that if I watch a team like me, it is actually quite helpless and painful, because I cannot make money by the brand. Just like the functional mobile phones are diaosi machine, cost-effective, but the premium is very low.
When rich people post on moments, they talk about golf, wine and cigars, while losers talk about inspiration and chicken soup.
Does my current focus reveal my current state of existence?
When the company grew to towering trees, attention by others, do not now like grass, humble alive. We can talk about values, ideals, office environment and canteen like Tencent.
I heard that eight years ago, a large number of ali’s annual salary is million, the new entry of cattle, a year can also cash out millions of shares.
Say Ma Yun’s character how how, think about yourself, have the ability to let employees live a rich life?
It’s kind of a digression.
Direction is more important than effort
There’s a mantra in startup circles this year: Don’t mask strategic laziness with tactical diligence. Direction is more important than effort.
Direction is essentially a decision. Decision-making power is the ultimate embodiment of a manager’s comprehensive ability, just as the value of goods is ultimately reflected in the price.
Changing direction is an uncertain thing that requires a risk, and most people like to take a certain path.
Similar to the direction of adjustment, for example, a technical personnel to management, the beginning of the least adaptable, is to make plans. It took me about a year to get used to it, because I was so addicted to writing code, and the sense of accomplishment that comes from being immersed in it, how productive it is.
In 2015, I made several decisions at work, and almost none of them failed. Let’s just say, every time, we fulfilled the promise we made to the boss at the beginning of the decision.
The only bad decision I made was not following the advice of a former colleague at the top of the market. Still, the stop-loss was pretty good – all bets were off right now, or you’d be stuck. After the crash in August, I stayed out of stocks and focused on work.
While many decisions are intuitive, they are based on years of experience behind the scenes. For example, it is impossible to score the decision factors one by one, and finally make a total score to compare according to the weight. It seems very scientific, but actually it is ridiculous. Because scoring each item is subjective, based on your intuitive preferences.
In 2016, I will do more pioneering things, make some of the most important decisions and let the team execute the rest. A manager who is always focused on the details of the execution and gets himself tired, has a full schedule and no time to think about direction is very dangerous for the team. A manager’s performance is measured by his team performance, not his individual performance.
Because direction is more important than effort, I don’t have to show up to work busy or show up on time to prove my dedication. I think the most effective way to improve the performance of my subordinates is to let them devote their energy to the task with the highest output, which depends on my goal-setting ability — decision-making ability.
Choice is more important than effort
Because I am engaged in the IT industry, which is all knowledge workers, and the performance of knowledge workers is fundamentally determined by their personal ability, rather than management. A good technician may perform 3-5 times better than an average one.
It’s better to spend more energy on people than on management. If you have a bunch of good people, do you need to manage them?
If you’ve been working for more than three years, you can’t expect to change their work habits or increase their enthusiasm for technology unless they already are. All you can do is get him to follow software development procedures and project specifications, but that’s the bare minimum.
Keep going. I once, with great enthusiasm, tried to get my staff into the habit of reading and bought a bunch of technical books, only to discover that almost no one read them.
Now, I don’t really care about career plans or how people spend their spare time, as long as they get the work done on time, quality, and quantity.
Although I have been optimizing my time utilization, such as the optimization of reading media and the allocation of leisure time, such as the time on the way to work and the time to go to the toilet. I would never spend a lot of time checking moments, which is not productive.
I wrote a blog about this a few years ago: Dark Time.
If any young friends are reading this, I really hope they are at their best age and don’t put too much energy into things that solve loneliness and sense of existence, like checking wechat moments. It is a more effective way to solve loneliness and sense of existence. If it lasts for 5 years, your life will be magically changed.
In this society, in fact, there are many people want to know you, but we do not have the courage to step back in the circle of friends that a few familiar faces. In terms of the nature of your relationships, what’s the payoff if you’re always trying to retain customers instead of finding new ones? In other words, how much value do you create for your regular users by clicking on them every day?
Hair if you are in the circle of friends, where I will where to go next Saturday, if there is a group of friends want to receive you, not because they are more friendly, but your price or have you ever given, stand in each other’s point of view, the former is a kind of investment behavior, which is a repay behavior, don’t use some superficial understanding: because each other are more enthusiastic and hospitable, we compare the ripe…
Back to business.
Choice is more important than hard work, but also in the choice of partners, choose customers.
I’m going to do something groundbreaking this year, and one of the keys to success is customer screening.
I once worked for a period of time in the pre-sale customer service of the Three Gorges Cruise. Among them, 30% of the customers will definitely make a deal. They will ask you if you have a ticket and how much, and place an order immediately. 40 percent, if you are professional and sincere, it is also easy to close a deal; The other 30% is very tricky, ask you are not a fraud website, in fact, this time you do not have to explain, this kind of customer transaction costs are very high. If you can bring in more of the first 70% from your marketing, the 30% will just give up. You don’t need to satisfy all the customers, you just need to serve the customers who agree with you.
I suspect that many e-commerce people understand this truth. At the beginning of their business, they did not have so many resources, so they simply cut down online customer service and only accepted the consultation of telephone customers, and only engaged in this part of the selected customers who are more willing to deal.
Internal entrepreneurship
In 2016, I plan to innovate in team management and make team members become partners rather than subordinates. For example, before starting a project, give him a choice between a fixed salary — no risk — or a variable salary — risk. If I choose the latter, I will share the profit of the project with a proportion. They are free to work when they want, I just want what to deliver and what to deliver at a certain point in time.
The goal of 2016
This year, I will use The channel of Zhihu to build my personal influence through the most painful way of knowledge sharing.
In addition, I plan to write at least 10 in-depth articles.
This year, I plan to serve more than 10 clients and provide them with technology incubation for entrepreneurial projects.
Of course, the most basic, or to complete the existing product development tasks.
Over the years, I’ve been in a state of passive activism: trying to solve existing problems.
Starting from 2016, I will actively look for opportunities to transform our technology department from a cost department to a profit department and take the initiative in salary so that they can obtain higher profits than other companies. In fact, the real driving force behind this was my desire to take control.