> If it’s 2pm and you’ve finished your work for the day and you have no meetings, just go home.
It never makes sense to me when people say this. As a Software Engineer, there's always work that can be done. How many people actually have a list of "work for the day"?
I generally pick a goal for the day, and then work hard towards it. If I've done it right, I don't have the energy to start another big rock mid day. Best I can do is think about what tomorrow's big rock is going to be, and get myself set up to hit the ground running. That feeling of never-ending work (and thus, work until your brain is toast) is anathema to being maximally productive. It just makes me take longer on each day's big rock so I'm not burning myself out in the long term anyway.
More precisely: There's no especially valuable work to be done at that moment, so go relax and save your effort for the valuable work that will be there later.
It never makes sense to me when people say this. As a Software Engineer, there's always work that can be done. How many people actually have a list of "work for the day"?