A Whimsical Approach to Work

To speak of having a "whimsical attitude" towards one's job is in itself an exercise in privilege; for those who work as software engineers at a major tech company they are well paid and enjoy comforts that many people do not. For millions of people a job is a high-stakes means of pure survival.

However, after you go beyond the stage of immediate survival, a strange paradox arises: the actual consequences in the real world decrease, but the corporate environment creates new, performative ones to take their place. Once survival is no longer the main issue, we come to the conclusion that things such as promo cycles, project ownership, and complete alignment have become the new criteria that determine whether you live or die.

The outcome is a huge level of background anxiety. Besides being worried about whether their code will compile, people are also concerned about the story that surrounds their code. We reside in a world where metrics can easily drown out the real pleasure of building things. Engineers frequently worry about, visibility, project ownership, metrics, impact, performance ratings.

Now, since AI is quickly altering the way that engineers write, review, and release software, the very idea of what constitutes "good engineering work" appears to be shifting beneath our feet. We turn a creative and technical discipline into one that is filled with performative anxiety.

I'm aware of this since I've myself been caught in the same situations. I recall spending a great deal of mental energy questioning whether the project I was in charge of had sufficient "leadership visibility". Back then it seemed extremely important, as if my career depended on it. However, when looking back, I can hardly remember the project at all, let alone the metric that had caused me such concern.

If you base your sense of self on such constantly factors, the environment will eventually exhaust you.

Whimsy Is Not Apathy

The idea I have of bringing a "whimsical attitude" to work is not one of apathy and by no means does it involve cynicism; cynicism is merely burnout disguised as intellect.

Whimsy is not giving the corporate environment a greater psychological importance than it ought to have. That is the understanding that one can care deeply about one's work while at the same time keeping an intentional emotional distance from the systems surrounding it.

I have always had a great deal of concern for the craft of software engineering; I enjoy constructing clean systems, tackling difficult technical problems, and actually performing at my best in my work. It is important to have craftsmanship.

There is a great deal to distinguish between taking your craft seriously and taking the corporate ecosystem seriously.

This reminds me of a idea that creator Quinlan Walther presented on Instagram about the “art of detachment” - that is, the ability to feel intensely without letting these feelings determine you, and to remain connected to life without being burdened by it.

It is possible to write elegant and resilient code since you have a deep respect for your profession and at the same time find the bureaucracy surrounding it completely amusing.

The Rules of the Game

Well, then, how do you put this into practice?

The most useful mental model that I've discovered is this: regard corporate life as if it were a multiplayer video game.

Once you start viewing the environment through this frame, some of its paralyzing weight begins to lift:

Bureaucracy follows the rules of a game: If a code freeze occurs or if an infrastructure bottleneck delays the release, try not to become angry - that's simply how the game engine works. Just as you don't get upset with gravity when you fall off a ledge in Mario and instead just reset to try again, you shouldn't get angry in this situation.
Corporate jargon is like NPC dialogue: the constant flow of buzzwords in alignment talks - such as “moving the needle”, “circle back”, “low-hanging fruit”, or “offline this conversation” - ceases to be annoying and instead begins to sound like the scripted dialogue in a game. It's just the background noise of the level you're playing.
Performance Reviews are Scoreboards: By separating your rating from your self-worth, you find it much easier to cope with the anxiety. It doesn't mean ignoring the feedback; it just means treating it as information. Like game data that you can use to improve your strategy. The fact that I am less overwhelmed by the fear of making a mistake enables me to make more calm decisions - and, based on my experience, better engineering decisions.
Organisations Are Patch Updates: Strategic changes and rearrangements of teams aren't personal crises; they're simply the developers putting out a new patch that alters the map. You then adjust your equipment and continue playing :)

Closing the Laptop

Keeping things a bit looser has nothing to do with checking out or carrying out careless work; it is a form of psychological self-protection used by those who wish to guard their inner enthusiasm.

Treat your work with seriousness and be doubtful about the environment. Make sure you care about the thing you're building and about the people you build it with, but don't regard a performance review, a reorganization, or an alignment meeting as equivalent to the significance of your life.

It will still be there tomorrow.

For tonight, close the laptop.

This is a personal essay and the opinions expressed are entirely mine and not those of my employer.