But... That's not an HR violation. If something a team is working on is a waste of resources, it's a waste. You can either realize that and pivot to something more useful (like an effort to take the improvements of the current OS project and apply them to existing OSes), or stubbornly insist on your value.
Why is complaining to HR even an option on the table?
One could argue that if it’s not in your swim lane, you just let it fail. And if you aren’t that person’s manager, you tell them the code or design that you are reviewing and thus the gatekeeper is not adequate. Politely. You said your part and no need to get yourself in trouble. Document and move on. If the company won’t listen then you move on. No need to turn it into a HR issue.
No matter how big or small one's "swim lane" is, an argument on technical merits without getting personal or discriminatory (assuming this was the case with J.C.) is never an HR issue. The whole "Weaponizing HR" thing is a nightmare and should not be acceptable.
Only light fun. I'm just a little perplexed at their progress and direction over the past 7-8 years. I don't understand how they can have so many high caliber people and put out...that.
First of all, AR/VR is a tough problem space, often for reasons not immediately obvious to common folk. Second, Facebook in my opinion is a wrong home for long-term efforts that may not bear fruit for many years, with its 6-month attention span of employee performance management and its "move fast and break things" culture (both of which clashed with the meticulous hardware-oriented Oculus culture). And finally, a significant portion of people working in AR/VR didn't believe in AR/VR as a product. Some were there for the gravy train, some were there for interesting OS work, some were there for bleeding-edge technology, but I'd say less than half would say "we're working on something that people will love and pay money for". To me it felt more like well-funded academia even and less like a startup (which it was supposed to be).
There were many, many influential software projects done in the past that are not games. Some of the people responsible worked in AR/VR and drove its vision and technical roadmaps.
Just because something isn't an HR violation doesn't mean it's not wrong, rude, or unprofessional. Society is not a computer program. Being tactful is important to well adjusted people.
Hard disagree. Being tactful is only relevant when dealing with people, criticise an idea, a project, a solution as much as you like. Intellectual debate is the fire from which genuinely good ideas are forged.
Unfortunately people have ideas, projects, and solutions that they care deeply about. Like it or not, some tact when dealing with these things goes a long way.
I mostly notice that those people aren't emotionally grown up enough to actually produce good results.
When your emotions over your work become more important than the quality of the work you're outputting, you become a problem for people who use your work.
> Unfortunately people have ideas, projects, and solutions that they care deeply about.
This is true of course, but this is also true for the “search for truth” in science. Do we fail to point out the flaw in the reasoning of someone’s life's work for fear of offence? The truth is the higher ideal that must be strived for!
In the same way, an idea is only good once it has been challenged. It may fail and dissolve, it may survive, it may morph into something that can no longer be assailed. This is the forgers fire, and it is necessary.
I know this isn’t as black and white as I’m painting it, but the ideal is still something worth striving for.
Yeah, yeah all that’s true. Ideas are better if they’re challenged, etc. but the fact is people don’t like being challenged.
Also, software engineering is a field where there’s rarely some ideal truth we’re trying to achieve, and indeed even in science, people do often fail to point out flaws in reasoning for fear of offense.
Why is complaining to HR even an option on the table?