Programmer Automates his job, gets fired for forgetting how to code - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Snoberry Tea;50517974]Yes but how much do you want to bet if he'd told his supervisors what he'd done, they'd have reassigned him or let him go? There's no way in hell they would have kept paying him $95,000/yr for 5 years of no work. It's still time theft.[/QUOTE] An employer can't really sue an employee for back wages, and employee can sue for unpaid wages though. I'm not familiar with CA worker laws, but I have the feeling that if this went on for 9 years there is little room for a case to be made which wouldn't result in a judge throwing it out. Additional if this wasn't brought up to management or HR, there is jack shit the company can do. The fault is more on management to react(or rather fault of inaction) with their employee. If it was an issue, was he written up? on a PIP? anything? The article doesn't say but I am willing to bet that if he was, his employment would have been much shorter than the claimed 9 years.

if he's in quality assurance sounds like he was writing unit tests or something. Once they're written just run them from time to time to establish that everything still works as expected

[QUOTE=Snoberry Tea;50517845]No one is going to hire him now, though. Even if he gets good at programming again everyone will ask him during interviews "Hey wait aren't you that guy that automated his job and spent 5 years raking in a near six figure salary doing literally nothing?" and he will probably never get hired because that is the EPITOME of time theft. TBH I'm surprised his company hasn't sued him to pay back wages.[/QUOTE] If his contract said he was to debug x amount programs/sections of code per week and he met that then even though he automated it then they probably don't have a case.

Why would any western company pay someone 100 000$ for QA ? I was literally on an interview in a company here founded by a guy who studied in US, where he made connections, opened a company there where he sells his software products, but outsources everything to a sister company he opened here where people are lucky to get 10000$ for the same job.

[QUOTE=AntonioR;50518112]Why would any western company pay someone 100 000$ for QA ? I was literally on an interview in a company here founded by a guy who studied in US, where he made connections, opened a company there where he sells his software products, but outsources everything to a sister company he opened here where people are lucky to get 10000$ for the same job.[/QUOTE] Outsourcing is usually much cheaper than hiring within the US, since the USD goes much farther in other countries. Depending on the level of quality for work and the amount of trust you need in your organization will determine a lot about how much you are willing to outsource.

[QUOTE=AntonioR;50518112]Why would any western company pay someone 100 000$ for QA ? I was literally on an interview in a company here founded by a guy who studied in US, where he made connections, opened a company there where he sells his software products, but outsources everything to a sister company he opened here where people are lucky to get 10000$ for the same job.[/QUOTE] If it's something classified (and you have to note there are a few [I]million[/I] people in the US with Top Secret security clearances) you wouldn't be able to outsource it.

Gonna go out on a limb here and guess this story is complete bullshit. In the case that it's real, though, he should have tried to sell his automated QA software to the company instead :v:

[QUOTE=geel9;50517681]Yeah $95k is not good in SF[/QUOTE] I would be happy to make 2/3rds that and live in SF

How could he automate testing? He wrote code that automated code writing?

[QUOTE=MuffinZerg;50518190]How could he automate testing? He wrote code that automated code writing?[/QUOTE] Reread the OP. He was a QA tester. He wrote software to automate his QA responsibilities. If automating writing code was that easy, way more people would be out of a job than just this guy.

[QUOTE=OvB;50518001]What you do, is you hire him. Give him a mundane job that can be automated. Have him automate it, then move him to the next. Once he's automated half your company and has exceeded his worth, you fire him. For the price of a temporary employee you get a handful of automated bots replacing other mundane positions.[/QUOTE] [img]http://i.imgur.com/ORakh37.png[/img]

[QUOTE=Dr. Evilcop;50518220]Reread the OP. He was a QA tester. He wrote software to automate his QA responsibilities. If automating writing code was that easy, way more people would be out of a job than just this guy.[/QUOTE] I thought QA testers still wrote code, at least one QA guy I know does write code to test the company's applications. Never understood the QA thing

[QUOTE=Snoberry Tea;50517845]No one is going to hire him now, though. Even if he gets good at programming again everyone will ask him during interviews "Hey wait aren't you that guy that automated his job and spent 5 years raking in a near six figure salary doing literally nothing?" and he will probably never get hired because that is the EPITOME of time theft. TBH I'm surprised his company hasn't sued him to pay back wages.[/QUOTE] What are you talking about, he was hired to do a job and he did the job... i dont see the issue.

I call bullshit :v: How do you write code that you don't have to reengineer every now and again over 6 whole years? PERFECT, bug free code?

[QUOTE=Llamalord;50515606]I'm sorry but if you're good enough to automate your own programming, you're not going to forget everything about coding in just 6 years.[/QUOTE] I forget coding in a couple of weeks, so yes it's completely possible.

It makes me wonder if they will hire anyone to replace him? Since they've got Automation now.

[QUOTE=Sims_doc;50518910]It makes me wonder if they will hire anyone to replace him? Since they've got Automation now.[/QUOTE] The tests he wrote would need updating for changes made and new tests would need to be written for any new developments.

[QUOTE=Sims_doc;50518910]It makes me wonder if they will hire anyone to replace him? Since they've got Automation now.[/QUOTE] Depends on his contract and so forth, if he programmed it in his spare time (he does not have to prove this, the company has to DISPROVE he did) then the program is his, and he can sue them for using his property.

[QUOTE=Giraffen93;50518907]I forget coding in a couple of weeks, so yes it's completely possible.[/QUOTE] Then it sounds like you have never coded for any length of time before, or don't actually know it at all. It's like riding a bike, you don't just forget a skill like knowing how to program, its not syntax or other trivia, its being able to solve problems with code, and that doesn't come easy but it also doesn't just fall out your brain in a couple weeks.

These are workers that I would want working for me. Lazy is just another word for efficient. Lazy workers can become the most efficient things in an employers arsenal if they are treated right.

Work Smart, and Hard > Work Smart, not Hard. What you want is people who won't waste their time on automatable and repetitive tasks but will work hard enough to come up with solutions and then move on to harder, bigger, better things. Laziness is not inherently useful, nor is it synonym for efficient.

[QUOTE=Socram;50519916]Work Smart, and Hard > Work Smart, not Hard. What you want is people who won't waste their time on automatable and repetitive tasks but will work hard enough to come up with solutions and then move on to harder, bigger, better things. Laziness is not inherently useful, nor is it another word for efficient.[/QUOTE] I want people who can accomplish whatever they are tasked with in the most efficient manner. Laziness is just a character trait more likely to incline you to find an "easy way" out. A hard worker would just do the job at hand the way he was trained.

[QUOTE=Revenge282;50519941]I want people who can accomplish whatever they are tasked with in the most efficient manner. Laziness is just a character trait more likely to incline you to find an "easy way" out. A hard worker would just do the job at hand the way he was trained.[/QUOTE] If someone writes tests and proceeds to do nothing for years those tests either become redundant or weren't sufficient in the first place.

[QUOTE=Revenge282;50519941]I want people who can accomplish whatever they are tasked with in the most efficient manner. Laziness is just a character trait more likely to incline you to find an "easy way" out. A hard worker would just do the job at hand the way he was trained.[/QUOTE] "Easy way out" implies quick and dirty, which is patently terrible particularly with programming, leading to more work later in maintaining this awful code base that was hacked together as lazily as possible. You have to be driven to improve your workflow and understand the implications of those improvements, and that's not laziness.

[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;50519960]If someone writes tests and proceeds to do nothing for years those tests either become redundant or weren't sufficient in the first place.[/QUOTE] This doesn't make sense to me. I don't understand what you are trying to say. If you are implying the fact that a worker could automate his position means the position is redundant, then yes. I would chose to automate that position, and move the man who made that automation up the ladder. In this instance, suppose there are 12 QA Testers. I can take two people and comfortably have them manage the workload of 12 automated QA Testers. They can supervise and update whatever processes take place in the automation. I have now cut my labor in half while retaining (or likely increasing) my productivity.

[QUOTE=Revenge282;50519891]These are workers that I would want working for me. Lazy is just another word for efficient. Lazy workers can become the most efficient things in an employers arsenal if they are treated right.[/QUOTE] Workers that solve one problem through automation and then proceeds to do no work whatsoever the following years?

[QUOTE=Socram;50519982]"Easy way out" implies quick and dirty, which is patently terrible particularly with programming, leading to more work later in maintaining this awful code base that was hacked together as lazily as possible. You have to be driven to improve your workflow and understand the implications of those improvements, and that's not laziness.[/QUOTE] I would never allow anyone to automate programming. This was in reference to automation of QA testing, which is likely just clicking shit and seeing if result = X. [editline]14th June 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=DeEz;50520005]Workers that solve one problem through automation and then proceeds to do no work whatsoever the following years?[/QUOTE] His job was to QA test. He created an automatic program to do that for him, within the specs required by his employer. I fail to see the issue. He was hired to accomplish a job, and that job was accomplished according to the specs. If that automation were to fail and produce bad results, and he passed those off to his supervisor, obviously he is solely at fault.

[QUOTE=Revenge282;50520011]His job was to QA test. He created an automatic program to do that for him, within the specs required by his employer. I fail to see the issue. He was hired to accomplish a job, and that job was accomplished according to the specs.[/QUOTE] Except since he wrote the program his role in the process became mostly redundant. His skills could've been better spent somewhere else while his program does its thing.

Maybe I should learn coding. 95k a year sounds really nice

[QUOTE=Revenge282;50520001]This doesn't make sense to me. I don't understand what you are trying to say. If you are implying the fact that a worker could automate his position means the position is redundant, then yes. I would chose to automate that position, and move the man who made that automation up the ladder. In this instance, suppose there are 12 QA Testers. I can take two people and comfortably have them manage the workload of 12 automated QA Testers. They can supervise and update whatever processes take place in the automation. I have now cut my labor in half while retaining (or likely increasing) my productivity.[/QUOTE] Well if the software never changed in that time when theres no reason for more testing, if software did change then the specifications it meets and things you are testing must also change so the tests must change so his tests would no longer be doing their job.