[seangrogg]

Having formerly worked on 20% projects at Google and now working at a small company, I'd say that 20% time can be valuable at any size.

For smaller companies it's easy to essentially always have feature work which means never really having time for code health; anything that wasn't done right the first time will be hard pressed to justify getting done ever unless it's either breaking something or preventing features. 20% time can allow engineers to do something about issues they see and care about which could improve things for everyone else in a way "one more feature" may not.

[edoceo]

We do something like this: Maintenance Monday. The dev team is just working on the bits of code they think need it, cleanup, test case, formatting, all those little things - that have no direct customer facing value.

And then we do a Feature Friday so folks can work on the fun new stuff (of their choice). It's all company project related tho - sometimes loosely - we don't yet have a business case for AR/VR or using templates on a Remarkable 2 - but maybe - and they are used to spread knowledge around the team

[cosmodisk]

Where can I apply?

[lupire]

That's not "20% time" that's "normal engineering not in crunch time".

[randmeerkat]

I’m curious what motivated you to leave a big tech company for a small one?