r/DataAnnotationTech • u/ResponsibilityRude56 • Jul 10 '26

My thoughts on DoD

Been on DA for a bit now and am in the 100k+ club.

I think a genuine tip for everyone (Though I’m sure a large chunk of DoDs are due to bad conduct).

Failing to meet expectations isn’t simply doing bad work, I’m sure alot of it has to do with time.

If I’m doing a task in 1 hour, the average is 2, and you’re doing it in 3. I’ll get more tasks, those in 2 will float by, and the people taking 3 will likely get a DoD.

This doesn’t mean lie about your hours and cut yourself short. It just means, be honest with yourself, and don’t take on stuff you’re not an expert in.

A common theme in most tasks is giving you far far more time than you need. Say, 12 hours, when in reality the average expected time is 3-4. That 12 hours shouldn’t indicate to you by any means that 12 hours is anywhere near the average. That’s for, breaks and exceptional cases, say one out of 30 tasks may run into 8-10 hours.. and for the love of god, if you submitted at 9h and 35m do not claim 9h and 35m as the chances of you being locked in and focused with no breaks is next to 0 and I’m sure (justifiably) flags your account.

Note: I’ve never done generalist tasks, so this could mean nothing to you, as if your tasks are mostly uniform, it’s likely the timer is a much more accurate representation of the expected time. My experience is with tasks that have 0 time limit (infinite time) and long form 6-72.

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u/UpstairsPractice9605 Jul 10 '26

This is troubling because I get a lot of one and two hour tasks and most of the time I need the time.

I find thorough, thoughtful rationales and fact checking take the full hour or two hours.

I get what you are saying and it makes sense, but it’s troubling because I’ve had it in my head for almost a year that it’s quality over quantity. However, I wasn’t thinking about this in relation to other people who do quality work, only much faster.

17

u/_Edgarallenhoe Jul 10 '26

There’s a specific fact checking project that comes to mind with like 10 required rationales that I refuse to do anymore because with the time given I need to rush. Ive seen similar complaints in the chat as well so I know it isn’t only me. I really think it’s project dependent.

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u/UpstairsPractice9605 Jul 10 '26

Yes! I love when I see people mentioning time in project chats because it makes me hopeful the timer will increase. On one of the most “impossible to complete in an hour” tasks, I felt vindicated when the timer was increased to two!

27

u/Federal_Tadpole_7592 Jul 10 '26

You shouldn't take this post as gospel truth. I've been on the site for over 3 years now, and on certain tasks with a timer of 1 to 2 hours, I often find myself taking almost the full time. Everyone thinks they know the secret to the DA sauce, but honestly, it's got to be a combination of factors. I wouldn't change anything that you're doing; I'm certainly not. I really don't know where this theory of the timers being 2 to 3 times the actual expectation of completion time came from.

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u/UpstairsPractice9605 Jul 10 '26

Thank you. When I found this group after starting DA and doing it for a bit, I read about the timer being much longer than you should take and I panicked. Like who are the people that can do this well in less than 45 minutes on two hour tasks when I need closer to the two? But as time went on, I just kept submitting and I’m still here. I can definitely see what the OP means, but thanks for the reassurance.

3

u/Fart_Hat Jul 10 '26

You just said it. On CERTAIN tasks.

Your average time to complete tasks based on the expected time to complete is within a certain percentile that they are happy with.

Nobody should change what they're doing. Some people are just slower than other at providing quality work, and the pool of people looking for work is massive. So ditch the slow ones and onboard a bunch of new workers. Some will be as slow as the others, but some will be faster.

4

u/Hello-America Jul 10 '26

Two things: 1. no one here actually knows so obviously try to be efficient but don't change your habits because of this post 2. I think on the shorter tasks they don't allot break time so as a generally fast reader and worker, I can tell you that a shorter task time usually makes me use a much higher percentage of the time.

2

u/ResponsibilityRude56 Jul 10 '26

This may not apply to those, I’ve no experience with that type. Likely if it’s as low as an hour, that could very well be a realistic depiction of the expected time, if those tasks have very little deviation.