Blew it today.

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So I'm extremely passive aggressive with my (self-diagnosed) aspergers. I have a terrible time expressing my emotions in a healthy way so if I'm critical of someone, I'm more likely to complain about that person behind their back.

Now, there's a bit of a dysfunctional aspect to my team at work in that there's a lack of transparency between projects, but we all have to work on the same set of data. That means it's really difficult to do anything critical without stepping on toes, and it's even harder to get people to communicate ahead of time whether something will be a problem.

They also moved me from my nice big corner desk to a tiny cubicle devoid of privacy, and I've been out of the office for a week due to my wife's grandfather's funeral, and then a bad stomach bug that incapacitated me for a few days. So I'm playing catch-up in addition to all these changes, and I'm so overstimulated by the combination of the pressure, the changes, and my inability to get the information that I need, that my brain is just shutting down and I have to work 1000% as hard to put out work of 10% quality.

Problem is, the project I'm leading up is absolutely crucial to the business, and it represents a rewrite of the old system.

I've also got terrible time management skills. This adds up to one disgruntled programmer inches from burn-out.

I've been trying for weeks to get my hands on some production data so I can benchmark the application and ensure functional compatibility. When I get the first batch of data, I find that a lot of it is badly malformed due to the organic nature of how our system has grown.

I analyze the invalid data, attach the validation errors, dump to a file, and upload it to our skype chat asking for comment on the data I couldn't import.

But I'm also talking about the invalid data in a private chat with a couple coworkers I'm a little closer to. Forgetting what window I'm in, and not anticipating much response, I say: "Nobody here seems to care unless it affects their immediate task at hand", intending it for the private chat.

Oops. Passive aggressive bernerbrau has just become emotionally unstable, anger management problems, unable to cope with responsibility bernerbrau.

I immediately apologize, say I was out of line, admit my state of frustration, and apologize again. But the damage is done. Now I'm sitting here in a state of total self-loathing unable to think about anything else.

Two things are for sure, I gotta work on my passive aggressiveness, and I also need to work on my time management so I don't get so frazzled here all the time.

Maybe working on my ability to forgive myself, too.

Last edited by bernerbrau on 21 Jun 2012, 3:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I think you've got your personal target areas pretty well picked. Relaxing around the self-judgement, I've found, releases the energy to be applied in other, more useful directions.

I think that's one of the things that NTs really don't appreciate about us, how we torture ourselves for our screw ups. Now, of course, everyone hates themselves when they screw up, but I think the perseveration aspect of our mentality makes it more intrusive or long lasting in our case. A bit OCD maybe.

Developing personal skill in redirecting the thinking is REALLY useful, in my experience.

As complaints go, I've heard far worse! At least you didn't swear or single out any particular individual, so it's easier for people to brush it off as just frustration. You have a few very good reasons for being close to burn-out, so I'm sure people will be understanding if you don't do it regularily.

If anything, it may help clear the air; it's easy to tell when bosses/colleagues think you're not pulling your weight and it can be very demoralising, especially as a lot of the time they don't actually articulate what they want done; they just seethe and act like they're surrounded by morons. Personally, I'd prefer a grouchy boss who said straight up what annoyed them (without trying to humiliate) At least you know where you stand!

I would suggest you be careful to praise the effort people put in from now on, especially if they do do more than their job (and often people do, but the higher ups never realise), and lead by example (if you aren't already). They've also been down a man (you) because you were off work- which is perfectly fine, but does mean that they may have struggled a bit with being down a person or not having the team leader around.

What a great answer!

Fellow programmer here. Regarding time-management, most programmers have terrible time management skills, myself included. What helped me the most was keeping a simple task list in MS Word and making sure to open it every morning and to spend a few minutes revising it every day. Keep the tasks small enough you can knock out a few each day. At the beginning of a big project, you can make a few high-level tasks that you break down into subtasks later as you go, no need to do a lot of planning up front.

If you think there is a chance you are going to miss a deadline then tell your managers there is a risk and explain the unexpected challenges you are facing. This actually takes the pressure off you because now it is up to the managers to decide how to handle the risk, not you needing to meet a deadline at all costs and sacrificing quality or pissing everyone off when you miss it. FYI rewriting a system is usually a terrible idea:

http://timross.wordpress.com/2010/03/15 ... t-rewrite/

Good luck, everyone says things they regret at work. No one remembers these things for long.

I try to follow the Pomodoro technique (http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/) for personal time management, but some days I get in and I just feel so swamped that I totally ignore it. Also with regard to breaking down tasks, as a team we follow a Scrum project management methodology and cycle, which among other things helps to keep projects broken down into tasks, and large tasks broken down into smaller tasks, and so on.

In theory at least. The problem comes when you try to shoehorn visibility and productivity reporting into the process, and everything goes to crap. Suddenly "points" which are supposed to be fluid and a general impression get dictated by management and have specific time allotment values as upper management tries everything in their power to make the project burndown look like a Gantt Chart. Then when you realize a task needs to be broken down, or more points need to be assigned to it, the IT manager is forced to answer to the business as to why the project plan is changing, and you have to hold a meeting just to get things changed.



Yeah, I totally agree. This is one of those cases where it just really really really has to be rewritten. The architectural choices in the original system were made high up, in a vacuum, with no real-world experience, and it shows.