Warren Buffett just responded to a "Dilbert" comic strip which challenges the importance of passion in work. "Having passion for something is far from an automatic guarantee of success, but I think it helps...” he told his hometown newspaper in Omaha. He advises college students that life is more enjoyable with interesting work, "And, on balance, I believe they will enjoy more success." But in the comic strip, Dilbert's secretary argued "I'll have to fake the passion because everything I do in this job is mindless and boring." And with the release of a new book Tuesday, Dilbert's creator is still arguing that passion is irrelevant, and that when starting a new job or business, "the last thing you want to do is become passionate...!"
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Warren Buffett Responds to Dilbert Comic Strip
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(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Thursday January 01 2015, @05:43PM
I will leave this little bit here, from Chad Loder. He's a really good guy, who started up a great infosec software company.
http://blog.dangerous.net/2014/04/culture-eats-strategy-for-breakfast.html [dangerous.net]
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by TrumpetPower! on Thursday January 01 2015, @06:21PM
There are jobs that are so mindless that passion is a joke. Mail room sorter, for example. What's there to be passionate about? And what difference is passion going to make to your work or your prospects of getting the fuck away from such a mind-blowingly awful job? If anything, lack of passion on the job is going to make you passionate about escaping the job to something less miserable.
But, in a creative job, passion can make all the difference in the world, both to your job performance and to yourself and your outlook on life. If you're not passionate about being a symphony musician, why are you wasting your time there? You'll make boatloads more money in real estate.
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Thursday January 01 2015, @06:25PM
Well, passion keeps you from realizing how deadend your mail sorting job is and flipping out and murdering someone/yourself....
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 1) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 01 2015, @06:47PM
As a current job seeker... It kills me the number of times I see
"looking for someone who is passionate and motivated"
What moron is putting that in every resume. I freeking swear. No I am looking for "a soulless individual who is an asshole to all those around him and hinders everything they do".
For real... My family shoves these job postings at me and it seems every one of them say something like that. Is there a cookie cutter template built into word or something that says this?!
It is like seeing "we will beat the competitions price or the item is free". *NO* one will do that...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 01 2015, @08:07PM
"someone who is passionate and motivated" is newspeak for some one desperate
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday January 02 2015, @03:41AM
"looking for someone who is passionate and motivated"
Translation: Someone that work for pennies and work regardless the stupidities thrown at the employee. While bringing profitable ideas to the corporation.
Then we can always downsize..
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Thursday January 01 2015, @08:06PM
Sometimes it is not the mindblowingly awful jobs that suck the passion out of you. Sometimes it is the day after day after day of fighting the battles, winning some and losing some, and just finally getting tired of the fight with the same people over and over and over again.
Workplace politics, constantly watching the people that you try to do your best work for to go over your head when something doesn't go their way (happens a lot where I work), and the realization that despite getting good raises, there is no upward movement without going elsewhere. All these things will suck the passion for a job right out of you.
I like my job, and in that way I'm pretty lucky. But I have definitely lost the passion for it over the last 6 months. Finding a new opportunity that can give you a change of environment is sometimes what is required to get the passion back. In a small company, that change of environment often doesn't exist. And so you move on to someplace new, or at least you try to without letting the people in charge know that you are looking to go.
In truth, I think I have already mentally left, but I'm keeping my seat warm until I find something to replace my paycheck.
I understand the loss of passion for the job. What I don't know is if it can be gotten back while staying in the same place.
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 01 2015, @11:03PM
despite getting good raises, there is no upward movement
dude, that sounds like the ideal job :D
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Friday January 02 2015, @03:19AM
I know... sounds like a dream. But after a while, it is just drudgery. Same shit every day. Makes you bored and like things a lot less.
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 2) by Common Joe on Friday January 02 2015, @05:36AM
For me, it wasn't quite this, but very similar. What sucked the passion out of the job for me was corporate BS. It took me 2 full work days of my time to properly go through just the ticketing process to move up the stack from development to production. And it couldn't be done all at once. It was usually spread out over one to two weeks interrupting those "deep zone" moments. (Not that I was allowed to sit and actually work on a problem long to get into those moments often.) When I got handed several 5 minute jobs, I was miserable.
Having to battle stupid decisions by pointy haired bosses, HR, legal, QA, and IT security just about killed me. Under the right conditions, I don't mind any of those groups and think they can be very beneficial to a company, but there was nothing I could do but feel my career and passion sucked from me by a bunch of vampires.
(Score: 2) by Daiv on Friday January 02 2015, @03:20PM
After 15 years in my last job, I felt exactly how you described. Roughly every 4-5 years, I would get a great boss that would help for a while but they would always be replaced by something much, much worse. IMHO there is nothing that's going to help you get passion back for what you are doing now. Bail now, and be be open to something new and different.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday January 01 2015, @08:11PM
I suspect, Buffett was referring to starting your own business (work) rather than working for someone else.
There are a lot of jobs that are not meant to be permanent places of employment. In some places these serve as a sieve.
On the other hand, I've also known many of these entry-level jobs, including mail room sorter, that have become something of a permanent job for people that could handle little else in life. Usually in these situations, everyone in the company is clued into the situation and all but the most callous go out of their way to make the job bearable.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Thursday January 01 2015, @11:08PM
I completely agree with you. The issue I find with this situation is that for all the entry level jobs, there are only so many mid-level positions available. If you're talking mail room level especially, people are probably going to make sideways career moves and after too long in the 'mail room' at different employers it must be very hard to move on from that decade of mail room experience.
This could be purely because they are not good enough to advance for any number of reasons, objective and subjective but that doesn't necessarily matter. The labour market would become extremely 'top heavy' if everyone did advance as we hope they would. More managers and consultants for the majority of industries. The current market also presents a problem for the people who do not want to focus on their career for their whole lives but are proud to work hard and even appreciate monotony.
These people prepared to do the work, they fulfill their obligations to their employer (or they would be fired). The 'foot on the ladder' employment theory is not applicable to everyone and increasingly does not offer any security to the 'average at best' in the population centers of even the most advanced economies. These places have ample demand for entry level employees in various sectors. If they do achieve some level of economic security, it seems that it is often due to state subsidies the employees receive to 'top-up' their wages.
Buffett says that passion does not guarantee success, I agree no matter if a person is an employee or employer. Anecdotal evidence suggests to me that passion for making money can replace passion for the business itself, which also seems to be the opinion of Adams. I suggest that both of them have achieved their level of success as a result of endevours in which passion for making money has been the primary motivator.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 02 2015, @12:18AM
> I suspect, Buffett was referring to starting your own business (work) rather than working for someone else.
He might have been, but Mr Dilbert is definitely anti-passion for your own work. He thinks it makes you impractical and prone to bad business decisions. In effect he thinks passion should be reserved for the business of business. He's made his opinion on this topic well known for many years. it is very utilitarian and it probably does accurately reflect how a lot of successful businessmen think. It probably reflects how a lot of unsuccessful businessmen think, but you don't hear from those guys.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 02 2015, @04:11AM
...that have become something of a permanent job for people that could handle little else in life.
In the middle of a discussion with a wise friend, he reminded me that the average IQ is 100 -- by definition. I don't have a lot of respect for IQ tests, but this does say something pretty powerful about the whole population.
Anyone know what the average IQ is among SN readers? How about a poll?
(Score: 2) by Common Joe on Friday January 02 2015, @05:46AM
Sorry, no answer from me. I don't know my IQ and don't care to have it measured. When asked about his IQ, Stephen Hawking answered [wikiquote.org], "I have no idea. People who boast about their IQ are losers." I agree with him because if I did know my IQ, I'd be tempted to answered the question "How high is your IQ?". And when I did answer, I'd feel it is a disservice to those who have better qualities from me in other areas where IQ couldn't possibly measure. I have an uncle who is absolute genius in fixing cars and practical life living, but I doubt an IQ test would successfully measure that and consider him a bonafide genius.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 01 2015, @06:21PM
Clearly, because he's been milking the same idea and crappy drawing style for decades.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 01 2015, @07:00PM
There is a good argument to be made that Adams is a corporate shill. That Dilbert cartoons provide a way for downtrodden employees to let off stream rather than take that frustration and put it into constructive change. I didn't really think much of that argument until about 15 years ago when I started seeing officially licensed dilbert characters all over standard HR materials at a couple of the fortune-500 corps I was doing some contracting work for. It was not unlike hearing Janis Joplin singing a commercial for Mercedes-Benz [youtube.com] and then finding out that it was their most effective commercial ever (not that she had any say in the matter).
(Score: 2) by Common Joe on Friday January 02 2015, @05:59AM
An interesting argument that I've heard before, but I don't think he is. I've tried the constructive change route -- three times in three different companies and it didn't work for me. I needed to let off steam and Dilbert is a good way to do that. At my last employment, a bunch of us at work started exchanging our favorite "steam relievers" to specific situations which included quotes and Dilbert cartoons. We weren't left with any other options. Most people in government jobs have no power to change things that are obviously wrong from their position.
I think most HR groups try to tickle our fancy and present us with things they will think we will like. They know IT and (many other groups) enjoy Dilbert. Purchasing Scott Adams material is the next logical step for them, though. At that point, if I were Scott Adams, and someone came up to me with an order for 1000 mugs, I'd say, "Sure!" instead of "Are you a corporate shill?" To me, that makes sense too.
(Score: 2) by Blackmoore on Friday January 02 2015, @08:15PM
I stopped reading Dilbert when crap that actually occurred in my office showed up in his comic not more than a week after the event.
yes i had a boss ask for a print out of the internet. but it was several other events too.
(Score: 2) by novak on Thursday January 01 2015, @11:26PM
I had to go through TFA because I assumed that since Dilbert is a strip wherein most of the jokes are a mockery and caricature of corporate culture, I was thinking Buffet was responding to an obviously sarcastic remark. Nope, Adams actually thinks that you should not be passionate. ...Ok then. I'd be interested to know what his reasoning is there.
novak
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Friday January 02 2015, @03:08AM
Allow me to respond with a quote from Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential :
(Score: 2) by Common Joe on Friday January 02 2015, @06:38AM
I turned on enough scripts to read the original article and here are the key points I see (followed by my take on it):
It is an interesting take by Scott Adams and I was mostly with him until he said "Passion is the best indicator of failure." If success is defined by how much money one makes, then yes, passion will lead to failure. Only psychopaths can get to the top of that game.
There are many forms of success, though. Without passion, I think highly "successful" programmers could never achieve their level of success -- but those programmers also know when to turn off their passion. To be very successful, the final product must appear to be void of passion, but it was passion that led it to be created in the first place. I think much of Windows was written by a bunch of passionate people and you can see it in polished edges in certain parts of the program. The unpolished edges are where the passion was sucked dry. Without passion, I don't think Linux would have ever been written, but we can also see Scott's argument where passion alone is not enough. Linux (in my opinion) fails as a desktop O.S. because there is too much passion by those in control of leading projects like KDE, Gnome, etc. It needs to be properly tempered with cold, hard logic and facts. (The server abilities of Linux has mostly the right mix of the two.)
And not being "at the top" doesn't necessarily mean failure either. I'm happy being a mere "Common Joe". Despite my failures, I think I can measure a lot of success in my life.
And finally, to drive the point home that you need both passion and cold, hard logic: children. A parent needs to use both their passion and logic to raise a child... and it's a different mix for each child a parent has. Passion or cold logic alone would not be good for a child.