[aeturnum]

This, I think, is the pitfall of doing your own thing. When I was younger I did a lot of extra and I suppose it went fine. I did expand our features and I added more functionality and sometimes it ended up being useful. But the truth is that I'm not a strong enough engineer to see what extra I could do that would consistently add value.

I think a lot of people who find success in doing extra are either lucky or at a level above most engineers. I think a lot of the horror stories that you find on dailyWTF and other sites are the result of less skilled (or more isolated) engineers doing extra in a way that makes sense to them. Doesn't mean you shouldn't do it - but I wait longer and am more cautious when I do it now. I think it's more helpful overall.

[dkarl]

I agree. I think doing Extra for personal development is rarely aligned with job performance, and you have to be very, very good and conscientious about creating that alignment. More often people get away with it by tanking the productivity of their coworkers and making the business increasingly reliant on their personal productivity. But to do this you need weak or absent technical management.

I think doing Extra, More, or "Nothing" are all fine choices, if by "Nothing" you include spending time on family, community, health, and non-professional education. For professional advancement, I think "More" is a fine choice if you have good management. Management should have the perspective to appreciate you making the right choice for the business. If they don't, well, in that situation, I find that advancement depends on selling yourself to people who only care if you're delivering good news for them and can't appreciate anything else.

[ornornor]

I read that graph differently where doing the work + more/extra/nothing is your 8h day. And so if you do the work + any of these it will amount to 8h. If you do nothing, you’ll still be stuck at the office anyway because if you do the work and leave early you’ll be asked to do more since you have leftover time. You won’t get to spend that time on your family.

[dkarl]

If you're working from home and getting your job done to the satisfaction of your employer in six hours, I think you can do what you like with the extra two hours. You may need to be available to your coworkers, but the rest is up to you.