They may not always survive the year, but everything I do matters to the company.
I've worked on several projects that were experimental and built to validate business theories that turned out not to be true, and the projects were scrapped. Does that mean they were bullshit? No, it means the business learned something about the market with the experimental project that was never certain to begin with.
People think they have bullshit jobs because they can't see the forest for the trees, and because of that viral book & thinkpieces surrounding it -- "Bullshit Jobs" -- that went around a few years ago (and that crops up again from time to time) and has convinced them that all labor without an immediate tangible effect is pointless.
That's a dangerous thing to believe in a highly developed economy, frankly. And it's just wrong.
> Bullshit Jobs" -- that went around a few years ago (and that crops up again from time to time) and has convinced them that all labor without an immediate tangible effect is pointless.
The book version, at least, isn’t so simplistic or stupid.
We got the whole thing done. They paid a lot more than $12k for it, plus whatever else they were spending.
After it was done, but before release, they bought another company that had the same stuff already, and scrapped the whole project.
I’d say 90+% of the development work I’ve done has never made anyone any money, and almost as much has never helped a single person. It’s a weird industry.