Good for them. And great of the Patagonia mgmt to give them off.
I am myself off - the company I work for gives us paid time off (not deducted from our paid vacation) from Dec 22 to January 8. Each year. Apart from our 35 days of PTO. Plus 4 days to attend school events. Apart from German public holidays. Oh, and we work less during the spring and summer months. We go down from 38 hours per week to 35. German engineering manufacturing company - 250 employees. Family owned - 5 generations.
US startup I work for is also shut down this week and has a very liberal unlimited PTO policy. I took about 6 weeks of PTO this year, for a variety of reasons, and no one asked a question about it.
A lot of folks in the office work 35 hour weeks, sometimes less, but we are meeting or exceeding our company goals (which were already aggressive).
I think this as really good way to run a company... everyone is always firing on all cylinders when we're working... and when we need a break, we take one.
It's weird to me that this isn't more common in tech. Because we're working with our minds there is not a good direct link to hours worked and output. Certainly No one is constantly able to have 8hr highly productive days (or any) so why not optimize towards high efficiency? Doesn't running "your machine" down just end up creating more, often compounding, (usually small) mistakes that only then need to be fixed later? Isn't what makes humans particularly unique is the ability to do complex and long term planning?
Now everyone sees just layoffs again. But there are so many companies thriving and keeping their workforce. As they are in balance. And are also happy to grow at a smaller pace.
This is so important, growing at a small and healthier pace.
Some companies try to make the reason of their existence to grow as fast as possible, no matter what.... and in the process they destroy the value they originally offered to its customers, processes, people and quality controls.. for what?
Yeah, I was surprised to see this on hacker news. I mean it’s a great study and it’s good to know that heated yoga also works, but when I had my run in with depression (which turned out to be ADHD and stress) one of the key things in the recovery program was exercise. Specifically it was to talk walks in one of our forests. So while it’s definitely good to broaden the range or activities that are proven to reduce depression through science, it’s also a little… what is the word for something that is obvious because it’s been proven many times before?
I do find it interesting that they only focused on heather yoga and non-action. I get that it’s about resources, but given that we already know that “getting out there to exercise” works it seems a little strange to not compare with different sorts of activities. It would be much more interesting to me if regular? Yoga also worked as I’m not too interested in doing heathers yoga but have considered the regular stuff. I’ll probably end up climbing though since we have a climbing hall nearby and my daughter is a regular monkey so we can probably go together.
But it doesn't mean that one form or exercise can't be more effective than the other.
Intense sweating and higher cardio through heat, stretching, compression etc. on top of exercise may have better effect on ie. lymphatic system, circulation etc.
Many (Most) of the rivers and lakes are swimmable in Switzerland, the standards for water are incredibly high, more dangerous is not knowing the currents.
Going down the Aare river from Thun/Uttigen to Bern is a hugely popular activity to do in summer, but every year a few people drown. Even so, I'd recommend it.
Swimming in Sydney Harbour is also possible. They did it for a leg of the triathalon in the olympics a couple of decades back. Wouldn't recommend though, there's a lot of bull sharks in there and they're kinda aggressive. Netted beaches and bays are the go.
I live in the eastern docklands of Amsterdam, and there's always lots of swimming here. Amsterdam has invested a lot in cleaning up its canals and other waterways and water quality has improved a lot over the past couple of decades. And there's no sharks.
I saw that, a bit further along from Kastrup sea bath, with the planes coming in to land at the airport.
I guess it's open water unlike the Seine, but it did surprise me, I felt like I was sat in quite an industrial area when a couple walked past in swimming costumes and towels.
In the 1990s, water quality in Amsterdam was pretty bad, but it's improved enormously since then. I live in the eastern docklands area and people swim a lot in the old harbour.
So is swimming in the Aare river in Bern, Limmat and Sihl rivers in Zürich, and the Arve and Rhône in Geneva. Floating down in tubes is a popular summer pastime.
Arve + Rhone in Geneva Jonction = pretty spectacle from Jonction bridge, where two distinct waters meet - crystal-clear Rhone which comes down from limestone (majority) part of Alps, has time settle any silt in Geneva lake, so it has easily 15m visibility, jut like most seas.
On the other side, Arve coming down from France is muddied right at the source by Mont blanc range, which is mostly granite. You can see the exact spot where specific stream comes into play, very gray, and it doesn't get much better afterwards.
Its enough to get big river like Rhone dirty all the way to Mediterranean sea. Also, after Jonction Rhone becomes pretty cold to just swim in even in warmest summer days. But yes many tkae it down during summer on inflatables, including us.
while the thames can be swam upriver of Putney Bridge, there are conditions as the Thames is a busy river. but there are other spots in London where one can do wild swimming.
Rotterdam here. People swim in the Maas all the time. Just be careful of the container ships and other water traffic.
There are lots of canals and rivers all across The Netherlands and people are swimming in them more and more. When I used to live in Utrecht the idea of swimming in the Oudegracht was disgusting. But I was visiting last month and saw people doing it. I still wouldn't swim in that canal.
10x being real or not aside, if there's a 1x-type they certainly don't do many of the things in this list in my experience and certainly not:
>Writes code that others can read.
>Reads the Docs.
>Updates the Docs.
In my experience, half of the differentiation between above average and solidly "1x" or middling devs is reading documentation and obtaining a deeper understanding of the tools, language, platform they're developing on top of.
I am myself off - the company I work for gives us paid time off (not deducted from our paid vacation) from Dec 22 to January 8. Each year. Apart from our 35 days of PTO. Plus 4 days to attend school events. Apart from German public holidays. Oh, and we work less during the spring and summer months. We go down from 38 hours per week to 35. German engineering manufacturing company - 250 employees. Family owned - 5 generations.