Why Development Teams Lose Motivation
2 mins
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We all lose motivation
Level of motivation is never a constant value. It is an always changing value which depends on numerous factors which I tried to gather in this article.
I do accept that there are times when my level of motivation goes tremendously down. Most of the factors below I have experienced myself or have seen in teams that I worked with.
See a related article about motivating employees.
Processes in company
- daily chores instead of automated process.
- never ending deadlines.
- stressful daily work.
- unclear requirements.
- ever changing requirements.
- no one listens to opinions of developer.
- frequent switch of context (tasks).
Management
- micro management.
- seagull management.
- unclear hierarchy and responsibilities - no one knows who is responsible for what.
Schedule
- rigid schedule.
- overtimes.
- frequent night duty calls.
- no opportunity to work remotely.
- difficulty of taking vacation/sick leave/day off.
Code
- poorly written code.
- poor architecture.
- no tests.
Items above lead to always breaking something what you didn’t expect to break :(
Finances
- salary below market value.
- no performance/salary reviews.
- unclear performance review criteria.
- no compensation for meeting deadline or going extra mile (overtimes).
Professional growth
- same repetitive routine tasks.
- boring features that make no sense.
- unprofessional team.
- no one else strives for better code quality.
- never ending bug fixing instead of development of new features.
- supporting system instead of developing.
Personal
- personal problems at home.
- health problems.
- no vacation.
- became insolent/arrogant (usually happens with Senior developers).
- burn out.
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no reason to finish on time or work extra mile because salary is same on months when you work 200 hours and when 100.
- no feedback about impact of feature.
- doesn’t feel like software has any purpose/impact/value.
- fear of losing job.
- have no positive feedback from peers.
- company cares more about hours spent in front of screen, than about delivery of results.