Music for the programmer
I go into the office, go up to the third floor, go up to my wife, who looks like a bunny-lapushka. To hear me, he takes an earpiece out of his ear, and I hear a wild roar and Ohr piercing to the bones from a small speaker! Oh, looks, how can you be deceiving ...
If you look around, you can see that most of our people are sitting in headphones. I was wondering what our developers are listening to and why, and whether this prevents them from working.
At one of my former works, we almost reached the ban on music in the workplace.
The main indicator of the quality of our work was error-free data entry into the system: numbers, letters, personal data. In short, we were operationists: on one monitor a document scan, on a second SAP monitor, where you are figuring data. Errors were fraught with incorrect accruals of salaries, vacation pay, business trips, and so on.
We sat, as usual, in a giant open space, where the mouse farts at one end of the floor, and the echo reaches the other. There were errors in the work (dofiga). The authorities were actively thinking about measures to level the jambs. The decision was not long in coming: eliminate all sources of noise. The noise was recognized as the main terrorist, and all subspecies of noise (conversations, the sound of heels, loud clanging on the keyboard, etc.) were his devoted associates.
A couple of months passed, the appointed event did not succeed - people continued to make mistakes while fulfilling their work tasks. Then the steel leading hand swung at the sacred - the music that employees listened to in individual headphones.
We had several meetings where the fate of music was decided:
I am not joking or exaggerating. At about this stage of the discussion, my nervous tick reached such proportions that it was no longer possible to ignore the obvious - it was time to get out of this office. Well, I dumped.
Music is annoying - it's a fact. When we listen to music, nucleus accumbens (the nucleus accumbens) are irritated in the brain. This part of the brain is responsible for the formation of pleasure, laughter, addiction, aggression, fear and the placebo effect.
What's next? Further in this core dopamine is produced. It is believed that dopamine is a hormone of joy, however, this is not entirely true. Dopamine is a mood hormone. It depends on his level in the body whether we are happy or sad.
If while listening to music you have increased levels of dopamine in your blood, then your mood will rise along the way. From the pleasure you receive, you can become happier and more relaxed, which will adversely affect the productivity of the work.
If, while listening to music, your blood dopamine level drops, you will be knocked out of working condition through the other pole - a suddenly surging spline.
Now in Dodo, I see that almost everyone listens to music. After talking with many developers, I came to the conclusion that everything is individual (¯ \ _ (ツ) _ / ¯). But there are two trends:
We filmed a survey among our developers and found out that they work perfectly for a variety of exciting rhythmic game, metal, electronic, drum & bass, as well as hits of the 70s pop.
I regularly listen to music while working for focus, defocus, trance, and sometimes as an alternative silence. Sometimes it seems to me that I work only to listen to music.
At work, I mostly encounter solvable puzzles. Those. I give all the best, but 80% percent. So here, music for me is a driver.
I feel something similar when I roll to the music on the board. If you ride aggressive invigorating music, even when you fall, then jump and move on. Music calls you forward. Something similar can be seen at work. We have many such tasks in development: kind of simple, but kind of with nuances, when you need to fix everything, clean it up. About how to ride from a slope on a board. And music helps.
But in cases when the research process is in progress, more relaxed music is needed. In such situations, a swotting is no longer needed, on the contrary - you need to relax.
Why am I listening to music at work? Because there is a lot of noise in open space. You shut it up and with the help of music you enter the work flow.
Every day I have a different attitude in terms of the music I want to listen to. But this is only the trigger that is needed to quickly enter the stream. I work in the SRE team, where 10 angry men shout at each other, where there is no music ... Favorite music and music for work are two sets that intersect strongly with each other. Music can contribute to mood: keeping it good or vice versa helps immerse it in its own darkness.
Now we program a lot in pairs, so it’s not always possible to listen to music, but previously I practiced stably. You sit at work, tinted glass, it becomes sad, a breakdown, and music encourages. And alternative silence when a neighboring team starts screaming. You put on your headphones and nobody is there.
Ideally, I listen to something that I don’t really understand and delve into: funny foreign, a little heavy. For the sake of raising the mood: reporter, Basta, Noggano, to sing along, to sit on a peppy. This is for more or less clear business.
When it is necessary to penetrate hard, the rest must be rejected so as not to listen, not to sing along, not to dance.
I listen to music in order to isolate myself from noise: with us, those who talk, who make noise, the brain clings to it a lot. If you listen to the same thing regularly, then the music begins to pass by the brain, rather it sets the rhythm for you. Yes, I listen to the hardcore, but if you listen to him a hundred times, then he already doesn’t seem like that. Rather, it becomes melodic.
Friends, Khabrovsk residents, I’ve given a playlist below, compiled from the comments on this article. If I mess up something with the direction of music, don’t swear, just write to me and I will do everything in beauty.
If you look around, you can see that most of our people are sitting in headphones. I was wondering what our developers are listening to and why, and whether this prevents them from working.
My Vietnamese flashbacks about music at work
At one of my former works, we almost reached the ban on music in the workplace.
The main indicator of the quality of our work was error-free data entry into the system: numbers, letters, personal data. In short, we were operationists: on one monitor a document scan, on a second SAP monitor, where you are figuring data. Errors were fraught with incorrect accruals of salaries, vacation pay, business trips, and so on.
We sat, as usual, in a giant open space, where the mouse farts at one end of the floor, and the echo reaches the other. There were errors in the work (dofiga). The authorities were actively thinking about measures to level the jambs. The decision was not long in coming: eliminate all sources of noise. The noise was recognized as the main terrorist, and all subspecies of noise (conversations, the sound of heels, loud clanging on the keyboard, etc.) were his devoted associates.
A couple of months passed, the appointed event did not succeed - people continued to make mistakes while fulfilling their work tasks. Then the steel leading hand swung at the sacred - the music that employees listened to in individual headphones.
We had several meetings where the fate of music was decided:
- ban or leave;
- and if you leave it, then create a list of acceptable music;
- whether to listen to music with words;
- whether to allow listening to Russian music, where all the words are clear.
I am not joking or exaggerating. At about this stage of the discussion, my nervous tick reached such proportions that it was no longer possible to ignore the obvious - it was time to get out of this office. Well, I dumped.
Music and Dopamine
Music is annoying - it's a fact. When we listen to music, nucleus accumbens (the nucleus accumbens) are irritated in the brain. This part of the brain is responsible for the formation of pleasure, laughter, addiction, aggression, fear and the placebo effect.
What's next? Further in this core dopamine is produced. It is believed that dopamine is a hormone of joy, however, this is not entirely true. Dopamine is a mood hormone. It depends on his level in the body whether we are happy or sad.
If while listening to music you have increased levels of dopamine in your blood, then your mood will rise along the way. From the pleasure you receive, you can become happier and more relaxed, which will adversely affect the productivity of the work.
If, while listening to music, your blood dopamine level drops, you will be knocked out of working condition through the other pole - a suddenly surging spline.
Three truths about listening to music while you work
- An initiative group of British developers listened to millions of hours of music, tested it on their experimental programmers and made conclusions.
Music for productive work should contain: noise, din, vibration. And it should not contain: rhythm, words and drums.
Such music will lead you into a working trance and hypnotize areas of the brain that could begin sabotage with attempts to distract from work.
Here you can listen to the resulting playlists. - A number of studies suggest that the best music for concentration is the lack of music . Because consciousness (read “attention”) we have one, as a single resource, and sharing it between music and work, we will inevitably lose in the latter.
- Recent articles claim that music is the only savior of productive work in the office. The brain is trying to process all of the individual pieces of data in an office noise: scraps of colleagues talking, slamming doors, sounds coming from the street.
All this data processing requires energy that you could use to focus on your work. The level of the stress hormone cortisol rises and dopamine levels decrease. These hormonal changes negatively affect the prefrontal cortex, interfering with the executive function. Performance is declining.
Alternative silence and driver work
Now in Dodo, I see that almost everyone listens to music. After talking with many developers, I came to the conclusion that everything is individual (¯ \ _ (ツ) _ / ¯). But there are two trends:
- Music as an alternative silence.
In this case, the thesis that silence is needed for work is confirmed. Due to the specifics of the nervous system of each of us + the perception of the world specifically today, people tend to be distracted by the rustle of a candy wrapper on the next table, a slamming door on another floor, the clatter of mice in the next building.
A person is in a state of increased susceptibility, and any sound is distracting / annoying. In such cases, music acts as an alternative silence that a person can control, in contrast to office sounds. - Music as a driver for work: helps you tune in to the right wave, keep yourself in good shape, helps to stay in the right state and just have fun during the work day.
In this case, a person needs a pace to maintain the rhythm of work. True, the pace is different for everyone.
We filmed a survey among our developers and found out that they work perfectly for a variety of exciting rhythmic game, metal, electronic, drum & bass, as well as hits of the 70s pop.
What Dodo developers are listening to
Zhenya Bikkinin (objectObject backend developer)
I regularly listen to music while working for focus, defocus, trance, and sometimes as an alternative silence. Sometimes it seems to me that I work only to listen to music.
At work, I mostly encounter solvable puzzles. Those. I give all the best, but 80% percent. So here, music for me is a driver.
I feel something similar when I roll to the music on the board. If you ride aggressive invigorating music, even when you fall, then jump and move on. Music calls you forward. Something similar can be seen at work. We have many such tasks in development: kind of simple, but kind of with nuances, when you need to fix everything, clean it up. About how to ride from a slope on a board. And music helps.
But in cases when the research process is in progress, more relaxed music is needed. In such situations, a swotting is no longer needed, on the contrary - you need to relax.
Topek from Evgeny Bikkinin:
Roman Bukin (SRE)
Why am I listening to music at work? Because there is a lot of noise in open space. You shut it up and with the help of music you enter the work flow.
Every day I have a different attitude in terms of the music I want to listen to. But this is only the trigger that is needed to quickly enter the stream. I work in the SRE team, where 10 angry men shout at each other, where there is no music ... Favorite music and music for work are two sets that intersect strongly with each other. Music can contribute to mood: keeping it good or vice versa helps immerse it in its own darkness.
Topek from Roman Bukin:
Vitaly Pomozov (Dodo IS Developer)
Now we program a lot in pairs, so it’s not always possible to listen to music, but previously I practiced stably. You sit at work, tinted glass, it becomes sad, a breakdown, and music encourages. And alternative silence when a neighboring team starts screaming. You put on your headphones and nobody is there.
Ideally, I listen to something that I don’t really understand and delve into: funny foreign, a little heavy. For the sake of raising the mood: reporter, Basta, Noggano, to sing along, to sit on a peppy. This is for more or less clear business.
When it is necessary to penetrate hard, the rest must be rejected so as not to listen, not to sing along, not to dance.
Topek from Vitaly Pomozov:
Zhenya Vasiliev (Dodo IS Developer)
I listen to music in order to isolate myself from noise: with us, those who talk, who make noise, the brain clings to it a lot. If you listen to the same thing regularly, then the music begins to pass by the brain, rather it sets the rhythm for you. Yes, I listen to the hardcore, but if you listen to him a hundred times, then he already doesn’t seem like that. Rather, it becomes melodic.
Topek from Evgeny Vasiliev:
Recommended playlist
Friends, Khabrovsk residents, I’ve given a playlist below, compiled from the comments on this article. If I mess up something with the direction of music, don’t swear, just write to me and I will do everything in beauty.
Metal (classic, progressive, epic, extreme, folk):
- Chimp spanner
- Angel vivaldi
- Scale the summit
- Marcin lis
- Widek
- Alluvial
- Conquering dystopia
- Keith merrow
- Jeff loomis
- Polyphia
- Shokran
- Korpiklaani
- Metallica
- Sepultura
- Heart of a coward
Rock (classic, fasting, progressive):
- Exxasens
- God is an astronaut
- Maybeshewill
- Flux conduct
- Blotted science
- Modern day babylon
- Seas of years
- AC / DC
- Scorpions
- Pink floyd
- Alan parsons
- Depeche mode
- Grave
- Asphix
Alternative:
Electronics:
Other directions:
- E-type (dance music)
- Abney park (industrial)
- George Benson (jazz)
Cool resources:
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