I just had a 1-on-1 where my boss told me I’m too efficient and it’s making the rest of the team look bad. I finish my points in three days and then spend the rest of the week working on side projects, and apparently, that’s disrupting the sprint velocity expectations. I’m being told to slow down and be more of a team player. Should I sandbag my work to fit in, or is this a sign I’m in the wrong pond?

What is the most pointless thing you have to do on a week by week basis? For me, I just think about how much time I waste in some of my team meetings that I feel provide no value to the group. Sometimes it feels like the 30 minute meeting I have every thursday could just be an email

Engineers should probably form unions.

I just referred my brother in law to the same team I’m on. HR told me that was against policy. I was shocked. Has anyone heard that before? Again, I just sent a referral link and email. I didn’t demand them to hire him. I won’t even be on the hiring process.

The work culture on my team is pretty bad. There is high burn out, lots of fighting, finger pointing, working 24/7. When I bring this up, the leaders mention that this is just how tech culture is. It is worse at other companies. I haven’t worked at another company so I feel like I can’t counter. What should I say?