[HN Gopher] Best Practices for Remote Software Engineering ___________________________________________________________________ Best Practices for Remote Software Engineering Author : RuffleGordon Score : 248 points Date : 2021-04-26 16:41 UTC (6 hours ago) (HTM) web link (cacm.acm.org) (TXT) w3m dump (cacm.acm.org) | dboreham wrote: | * Shower first | | * Put on clothes | | * Deliver tangible things often | mym1990 wrote: | I prefer: | | * Put on clothes | | * Shower | | * Deliver tangible things often | barbazoo wrote: | Midday showers are one of my favorite things about WFH. | wccrawford wrote: | I have to agree. Not just showers, but any type of personal | cleansing. I've gotten in the habit of waiting until well | after my wife is awake and out of bed before I shave and | brush my teeth, and it's perfectly fine. | znpy wrote: | Since we're commenting a piece from the ACM: would you people | recommend an ACM membership subscription and reading the | communication of the ACM magazine? | | What if you're not directly a software engineer but more like a | system engineer / system administrator / DevOps engineer? | mavelikara wrote: | The Oreilly library access alone is totally worth the price of | ACM membership. | lolinder wrote: | Is the Oreilly access that comes with the ACM membership full | access? The same level of access you'd get for $500/yr from | Oreilly directly? | collaborative wrote: | Lots of whiteboards. Clean, tidy desk. No visible cables. | Sunlight. Fresh air. Caffeine | vladojsem wrote: | I believe asynchronous communication is the key for remote work. | It is super-hard to learn and requires a trust, however, I find | it the most efficient style of work. Of course there will still | be some regular meetings / synchronous communication, but more | asynchronous you can do more focus time remains. | dragosmocrii wrote: | What a great article! I specifically like the emphasis on the | human touch, like showing empathy and trying to build a | connection with the customer and the team, despite the remote | aspect. | | I also believe that correct use of communication media plays a | huge role in the effectiveness of remote work. But personally, | unlike the author, I believe that written communication is much | better for remote teams. Shameless plug, I've wrote an article | specifically on the topic of communication for remote work | https://dragoshmocrii.com/remote-work-and-efficient-communic... | yrgulation wrote: | Barking at the wrong tree. In my view, most experienced software | engineers can self organise and self manage. Not saying everyone | can or that everyone should do remote work but many that enjoy | and prefer remote work can. | | "This Viewpoint is intended for remote software engineers who are | facing new challenges to thinking about routine, responsibility, | and goal setting." | | This viewpoint should be intended for non technical managers as | they are the ones who tend to clutter project delivery with time | management tools and meetings. This applies to onsite work as | well. I feel like there is a lot of effort put in educating devs | on doing the right thing while management is educated in the | opposite direction. | morelisp wrote: | Most software engineers are not experienced software engineers. | notJim wrote: | Hmm, is that true? Just from a numbers perspective, it seems | like there would be far more experienced software engineers | than brand new ones. | ectopod wrote: | There would be far more experienced software engineers than | brand new ones if the field was stable, but it has been | growing exponentially for years. | | The answer to the original question depends on the rate of | growth, how you define more experienced, etc. So it's not | obviously true or false. | wnevets wrote: | According to Robert Martin 50% of developers at any given | time have less than 5 years of experience. [1] | | [1] https://youtu.be/ecIWPzGEbFc?t=3055 | lostcolony wrote: | Most software engineers become experienced software engineers | (enough to self-manage) very quickly in the right | environment, I've found. | codingdave wrote: | Most software environments are not the right environment. | morelisp wrote: | Excellent point. Small details about your working | environment, or lack of a routine, can hugely throw off | your workday, and thus your productivity. You should | generally pay attention to the lighting, noise level, and | comfort of a work space. If you find yourself distracted | by anything, you might consider changing your | environment. Habitual repetition by way of thinking about | your environment or making explicit choices can lead to | the establishment of longer-term habits. | | Someone should write an article with that advice in it... | jzoch wrote: | That's probably survivor's bias and not true at scale. | "Right environment" is shaky - we should strive towards | defining what makes an environment the "right" one and how | can we increase the number of engineers that successfully | acclimate to their new way of working. | morelisp wrote: | I disagree (my anecdotal estimate would be around 1/3 do | quickly, and 1/3 do "slowly" i.e. within 3-5 years), but | those who do can still accelerate the process by reading | documents like this, no? People who can self-teach still | benefit from learning materials. | jzoch wrote: | I think its pretty clear there are problems on both sides. | Managers need to learn the correct approach to facilitate | acclimating their team to remote work but each individual also | could improve how they work so that remote settings are more | optimal. Nothing is so black and white. | solosoyokaze wrote: | I feel like most engineers are pretty good at working remotely | (c.f. all of open source). | | Managers however seem to have a very hard time adjusting. If I | were to give some "best practices" for remote management, they | would be: | | * Don't worry about how your reports are spending their time. If | someone doesn't get back to you, they are busy. | | * Don't factor an employee's location into their compensation. | | * Minimize meetings (this is for non-wfh too, but it's much | easier when people are remote). | | * Allow people to leave their cameras off during calls. | | * Don't worry so much about flying people to meet IRL. It's | expensive and disruptive. It may also introduce politics that | won't exist if everyone stays remote. | | * Realize that a lot of what people think of as "management" is | actually unneeded babysitting that's a vestigial cargo-cult from | the industrial revolution. Your job is to hire, motivate and | unblock. That's pretty much it. | | I wonder if the role of manager will go away and be replaced with | more specialized roles. I actually think it might be nice for a | company to provide a therapist for people to to privately talk | to. That's always been a weird roll that managers often play. It | would be nice to vent to someone who doesn't get to decide your | next raise. Between some level of HR outlet, product management | and mentorship, I don't really see a dedicated role for what we | now call "manager". | morelisp wrote: | > I feel like most engineers are pretty good at working | remotely (c.f. all of open source). | | Most engineers are not on GitHub or any of the other social | coding sites, let alone contributing to or managing an open | source project. And anyone who is managing an open source | project can tell you how much _work_ it is to help other | engineers contribute constructively. | | Your idea of a managerial role doesn't seem to leave much room | for technical or team leads, only "product management". | Sometimes your role is to hire/motivate/unblock - and sometimes | the motivational role is make sure someone spends those three | hours writing unit tests everyone agreed were important even | though no one wants to. | solosoyokaze wrote: | Open source is just one example. In general I would say | engineers work well in a quite place with no distractions and | minimal bureaucracy. It is creative work after all. | | > _Your idea of a managerial role doesn 't seem to leave much | room for technical or team leads, only "product management". | Sometimes your role is to hire/motivate/unblock - and | sometimes the motivational role is make sure someone spends | those three hours writing unit tests everyone agreed were | important even though no one wants to._ | | I did include mentorship in my list of things needed to help | engineers grow. I'd also add "everyone agreed" in a | traditional management setting is pretty much identical to | "the person who decides how much people get paid, said so". | Good devs will typically write the appropriate amount of | testing unprodded. | morelisp wrote: | Engineers (and everybody else) _like working_ in places | with no distractions and minimal bureaucracy. But that | doesn 't mean they all _work well_ them. | | > I'd also add "everyone agreed" in a traditional | management setting is pretty much identical to "the person | who decides how much people get paid, said so". | | Absolutely no one on our team deciding what people get paid | has any say in how many tests we write. The engineering | manager has some say (mostly as a tie-breaker) in technical | decisions but does not "decide" how much anyone gets paid | (outside of salary range for new job postings), but can | choose to advocate (or not) for a particular person's | salary with higher management. The senior developers have | the most say, and they determine no one's salary. | | > Good devs will typically write the appropriate amount of | testing unprodded. | | Qualifying this with "good devs" somewhat begs the | question. I would rather avoid judging the developers and | just say, no, _most_ developers will not typically write | the appropriate amounts of tests by without some friendly | reminders. | solosoyokaze wrote: | > _Engineers (and everybody else) like working in places | with no distractions and minimal bureaucracy. But that | doesn 't mean they all work well them._ | | I don't think evidence exists to suggest they don't. From | a burnout perspective alone, making people work in an | environment they don't like will cause attrition. | Especially now that there are plenty of WFH options. | That's not even touching on how stress impacts | creativity. | | > _Qualifying this with "good devs" somewhat begs the | question. I would rather avoid judging the developers and | just say, no, most developers will not typically write | the appropriate amounts of tests by without some friendly | reminders._ | | Our personal experiences are diametrically opposed to | each other then. I've never seen lack of tests be an | issue on any team I've worked with. I have however seen | unproductive teams create tests in place of being | productive. | TigeriusKirk wrote: | >I actually think it might be nice for a company to provide a | therapist for people to to privately talk to. That's always | been a weird roll that managers often play. | | It would be interesting to break down what percentage of 1:1 | time with employees is spent in therapy-like discussions. It | feels like this role isn't recognized enough, except perhaps by | the managers themselves. | ketzo wrote: | Two great managers I've had both regarded this as one of | their highest duties. | | As an engineer, having someone above you in the chain of | command who regularly asks things like "how are you feeling | about work? Bad? Good? Are you stressed or content?" is a big | deal. Even if the answer is a totally noncommittal | "everything's fine" 99% of the time, that 1% is absolutely | critical to be aware of. | littlestymaar wrote: | #0: a standing desk | | #0': external monitors & desk mount | | #0": an ergonomic keyboard | | Do work on a laptop on your kitchen table, you're harming | yourself! | [deleted] | philangist wrote: | I was just having a discussion about this with my manager during | 1:1. I'm curious how any fellow devs with ADHD have managed the | transition to remote work over the last year? I love the freedom | and ability to focus that working from home provides, but I often | find myself taking advantage of that freedom and focusing instead | on podcasts or reddit for 3 days to avoid 3 hours of writing unit | tests. | joncp wrote: | I'll do your unit tests if you'll take my build scripts! :) | brotherofsteel wrote: | Pair and mob programming | edabobojr wrote: | In my experience, pair and mob programming are just yet | another scenario where neuro-atypical people are punished for | approaching their work differently. | whateveracct wrote: | I just recently started working at a place where mob | programming is commonplace. | | It is easily the most wasteful use of time I have ever seen | in my professional career. | | 1.5hr session * 6 devs = 9 hours down the drain. | | Only one person can speak during a Zoom call! It's a | single-threaded, low throughout, low latency communication | medium. | | So it always ends up being one or two people talking - the | one or two driving what is being mobbed on. | | Due to this, I try to only jump in when I have something | valuable to add. Which isn't often given the situation I | described. If I'm driving or directly involved with the | design or w/e of the mob session's focus .. sure of course | I'll talk. But I'm not going to sit around trying to get a | fluffy word in edgewise for 90 min just for its own sake. | | And yet a frequent driver of this mob culture (a | "principal" engineer if you can believe it) loves to | mention how I'm not "engaged." | | ??? I sit in your dumbass meetings and pay attention for 90 | minutes! My time is 100% focused on the meeting! | mym1990 wrote: | Being a junior previously I derived a lot of benefit from | light pair coding every now and then to learn something | from a more senior developer. I have also been in code | reviews where 2+ people are of equal relative skill, but | have different approaches to a problem, and it almost | becomes a stalemate or some kind of power struggle to 'be | right'. 6 devs seems very excessive and an expensive use | of time heh. | ipaddr wrote: | I had an admob interview once. I don't understand why | this would ever be used. It seems so costly, slow and | disrespectful of everyone's time. | sodapopcan wrote: | It's slow at the beginning, but the payoffs are huge. | With mobbing, everyone knows how to do everything. Far | less design mistakes are made. No one ends up "owning" | certain parts of the system. It's also very humbling as | everyone succeeds and fails together, discouraging | "heroics". Pairing is also great for this (but you have | to switch every day). | | Obviously, if you're working in a feature factory, | pairing and mobbing are pointless. If you care about code | quality and de-siloing, they're incredibly valuable. | | Obviously, it's not for everyone, but it works incredibly | well where I work and I will never accept another job | that doesn't encourage pairing by default. | nitrogen wrote: | Think of it as a chance to pick up editor and language | tricks you might not have known, or to socialize "best | practices". The metagame is still part of the game. If | you can't change the practice, try to make the most of | it. | bmm6o wrote: | For "normal" mobbing, 6 people is too many. If I had 6 | devs coding (which I often do) that's very rarely going | to be a single mob. It could split up 2/2/2, 3/3, 1/2/3 | or whatever, but a single group of 6 is really | inefficient. | jacques_chester wrote: | I won't say it's for everyone. But for ADHD specifically, | my personal experience is that pair programming is a | godsend. I am able to use half my regular dose of ritalin | while pairing. | edabobojr wrote: | I am glad it works for you. Maybe (hopefully?) I have | just had an abnormal experience. | wernercd wrote: | I'd say I can get behind pair-programming to a point... | it helps get new ideas, different view points and leads | to rubber-duck-programming like effects. | | I'm not sure I'm a fan of Mob programming... as others | mention, over a phone/video conference, it seems | inadequate. Turns more into an ad-hoc video lesson by the | stronger personalities (for better or worse - I happen to | be one of those in my small group at work). | | Do you have problems with both? 2 vs 3+? or is it one or | the other? | sodapopcan wrote: | To do mobbing effectively you should be switching the | driver very rapidly. It's a bit tough remotely, but it | can be done. There are probably other ways to make it | effective, but if only a few people are contributing, | then the mob has failed and should either be recalibrated | or stopped altogether. | jacques_chester wrote: | No, anecdotally a lot of people struggle. It is an | intensive experience and places different pressure on a | person than soloing does. For me it works great, for many | people it works great, but not for everybody. | koboll wrote: | I don't think you're going to find the best time management | tips from people who are on Hacker News in the middle of a | Monday afternoon. | avgDev wrote: | _slow clap_ | lliamander wrote: | Which is too bad, because those of us reading right now could | probably benefit the most from good advice. | domano wrote: | Well there is more than one timezone. | junga wrote: | It's not the middle of the afternoon all around the globe at | the same time. Some of us already spent eight hours slacking | off. | jolux wrote: | Ouch. | MattGaiser wrote: | Does it actually impact your relative productivity net of | everything? | | I have done that a few times even without ADHD (presumably). | But stripping away all the meetings (or at least the need to | stop work to be in them), the chatting, and the distracting | questions has made it net out to about the same. | devoutsalsa wrote: | If you can get away with going down a Reddit rathole for three | days, no one is watching you that closely. That gives you | freedom to chase other things. One option could be writing a | library to make your tests more interesting to write. Write the | boring tests first, and then look for a way to make the process | of writing them more interesting. | Bishop_ wrote: | This (might) help you, It helped me anyways. | | https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/01/06/fire-and-motion/ | misterremote wrote: | I often find myself looking at my website and trying to | figure out what is the most important thing I have to work on | right now. | | But hours can pass by like this. | | And I've learned that I need to start with something small. | Even a tiny improvement/fix I spend my first 15 minutes on | gets me going and into the flow state! | xkeysc0re wrote: | Is that ADHD or are you just procrastinating? You clearly | recognize the issue. Maybe try Screen Time limits or changing | your hosts file | nemetroid wrote: | Are you suggesting that people suffering from ADHD do not | recognize that there is an issue? | dboreham wrote: | Aren't these synonyms? | PragmaticPulp wrote: | No, far from it. The pop culture definition of ADHD has | become extremely vague and watered down, almost to the same | degree that "OCD" has become a pop-culture term for | attention to detail. | | Procrastination is a common behavior in people with _and_ | without ADHD. Procrastination alone is not an indicator of | ADHD. | | Likewise, someone who procrastinates does not fully | understand the struggles of someone with ADHD. | jjj1232 wrote: | Procrastination/lack of executive function is a symptom of | ADHD. | jonfw wrote: | Software is absolutely inadequate to prevent you from being | distracted... You can block a couple of things but it's an | uphill battle, because there are no limits to the number of | things more interesting in the short term than writing unit | tests. | | It's import to identify and address the root of the problem | rather than just the symptoms. Do you find your work | rewarding? Will these unit tests help you to complete the | goals you hold for yourself? Are you healthy enough to | faciliate productive work? | treeman79 wrote: | So I have ADHD. Official diagnosis. My kids have it. Official | diagnosis. My mom and sisters clearly have it, but refuse to be | tested. | | If something is sufficiently interesting I can hyper focus like | crazy. | | For decades any level of boredom was physically painful. | | Remote is the worse for me. Staying on task is a nightmare. | | What helped? Pair programming. This keeps you engaged and on | task. I try and pair as much as possible. | | Medication. I was on Adderal for awhile. It works great. I had | to stop due to serious side effects. (Strokes) | | However it got me past the mental block of "boring is painful" | | I function a good better without medication now. It's not where | it needs to be to cope with 8 hours of no human interaction, | but better. | | I tried another non stimulate med. my focus was fine, but I was | so sleepy my work was crap. | | I'm on Vyvanse now. My kids are on Vyanse. | | It works a lot better. | | I get some of the same side effects as adderall But not as | intense. | potta_coffee wrote: | I'm in the same boat and pair programming has been a godsend. | It's so much easier to think about and work on boring tasks | with a colleague. We both have the same problem so it's a | good match. | HumblyTossed wrote: | I use timers all the time. Basically a slightly modified tomato | timer. | znpy wrote: | I kinda made it explicit with myself (not with my colleagues of | course, duh). | | I'll fuck off most of the morning, well aware that I'm doing | so, and I'll work non stop in the afternoon. | | Some important things though: during the morning I mostly spend | time on stuff I find interesting, usually tech stuff not | directly related with my job. A few times non work stuff. But | seriously, it's a joy to be able to spend the morning to get | better at something about your job. | | I spent last week mornings playing with the kubernetes APIs and | the client-go libraries, with only vagues ideas. Turns out, a | colleague is findin one of the toy tools I've written useful. | Wasn't expecting that. Last month I spent another week mornings | diving into AWS IAM and now I finally finally understand stuff | and I'm reporting problems to our head of it security, and | we're fixing stuff before they become problems. | | The key, imho, is to be self-aware: I'll fuck off in the | morning, and I will work in the afternoon, no interruptions. | | Important edit: I might be slacking, technically, but I always | keep an eye on the company chat. If anyone or anything needs my | attention, I drop my slacking off and be readily available | (most often you only have to be able to hear the Slack client | beeping) | jwdunne wrote: | I have quite the story. | | I was terrified I wouldn't be able to focus. Terrified I'd get | distracted by home life. That my productivity would plummet. | | But it didn't happen. In fact, the opposite. I never realised | how much commuting and office noise harmed my productivity and | energy levels. I was buzzing. | | And I did what any ADDer would do. | | I got drunk on it. Then burnt out. | | In typical ADHD fashion, I thought all that new energy was | permanent and I could work insane hours. Sometimes from 7am | until 1am. | | I was warned. But I didn't listen - not to my mrs, not to my | old man, my sister and colleagues. | | And then, once the dust of lockdown settled, I burst. | | After making damn sure that the company I worked for and my | sisters business didn't go bust, I couldn't anymore. | | The code I wrote only a few weeks before? Hieroglyphs. But not | that I'd lost understanding. I knew I could read it if I wanted | to. | | But I _really_ didn't want to. Like my very being rejected any | attempt to focus on the task at hand. | | I was reduced to attending scrums. And playing video games. | | It took a weekend away, a week off and a bit of advice from Dr | Feynman. | | Thankfully, work was understanding. I was given a project where | I could play, and still deliver value. And so I played, got | something small done. Then I played some more. And so on. | | Now, a colleague works on the project with me. I played so much | that I was prone to rabbit holes. My hyperfocus was out of | tune. | | But then I took stock and was able to focus. We found a way | forward, took some advice, got speaking to the users and | focused development on fast iteration and feedback. | | The past few months have been the most productive of my life. | All remote. | | I learned a lot of hard lessons in lockdown. The lessons I | could not predict. | slaymaker1907 wrote: | It definitely helps me to have at least some working in the | office. I can work on something that is cool/exciting from home | no problem such as implementing new features, learning some new | API, etc. from home no problem, but going back to the office is | very helpful for stuff like going through email. | | Also, thank you for speaking up! I feel like a lot of the | discourse for ADHD folks has been how freeing it has been to | get away from the distractions at work. For me, and it sounds | like also for you, working from home often doesn't have enough | structure. | animesh wrote: | Are you me? One thing that led me to not turn on my desktop | workstation is to complete a personal project. For at least | half a week, I did not bother to reach out for instant | gratification via reading HN, proggit, podcasts etc. | | If I can only find the energy and appropriate time to do this, | I figure I can save my work and work ethic. | titanomachy wrote: | I stopped being able to get work done at all. It gradually | tipped me into a low-self-esteem death spiral. I tried lots of | different approaches to fix it: more accountability with my | manager, new medication, more regular exercise, therapy, a bit | of disability leave, even moved to a bigger apartment where I | could have my own office. Nothing got me past the block. | | I quit my job, spent six weeks studying and interviewing | aggressively, and got hired for a higher-level position at a | different company. I pushed back my start date enough that I'll | onboard in an office instead of remotely. In the meantime I'm | working on my health and personal projects, and spending lots | of time with friends and in nature. | | I gave up trying to work remotely this time around, but I'm | still hopeful that at some point I'll improve my coping skills | enough that it will be an option. | [deleted] | thestephen wrote: | ADHDer here. WFH was a nightmare the first six months, but the | past few months have been working out great. My findings from | this past year: | | * Finding the right medication, in the right dose. Biggest QoL | improvement. YMMV | | * Whenever I get lost in the sauce and start spinning my | wheels, I schedule a call with a colleague and ask them to help | sort my priorities out. This also helps me with accountability, | in a softer way than accountability-by-authority. This might | require some self-awareness. | | * Finding a note-taking/task management system that works for | me. So far, I've been having the most success with a | combination of Roam Research; Apple Notes and Muse for | drawing/diagramming on my iPad; and Todoist for hard reminders. | | * Getting enough physical activity. My headspace becomes awful | if I don't get at least 30 minutes of walking in during the | day. | | * Finding my context shift to work mode. Most days, 15 minutes | outdoors first thing in the morning after checking my task list | is enough. For rougher days, I work from the cafe down the | street. | | * Avoiding social media before lunch, as it stresses me out. | | * I found the eureka moments striking at odd times, like | evenings or in bed. I rarely regret following these strokes of | inspiration, but they can really throw my off my work/life | balance. Cutting my days shorter (most days), and allowing | myself to work when inspiration strikes (a couple times a | week), has really helped in lowering my stress levels. | | * A couple days a week without scheduled meetings. I can't | focus if I know I'm going to have a meeting in 1 hour. | | * Splurging on equipment. If I'm going to spend a lot of time | in front of my screen, I might as well get that 4K 32" and a | G915 TKL. | PragmaticPulp wrote: | Time management at home is a different ball game. | | A good first step is to understand what's fundamentally | different about working from home, alone, versus working from | the office. Some common differences: | | - Context shifting into the office can help context shift you | to work mode. At home, if you use the same workstation for | games and Reddit and work and entertainment, you lose the | physical context shift. If possible, try using your company- | provided computer for _only_ work, and your personal computer | for _only_ play. Even better if you can have them in different | rooms. Start training yourself to associate one context with | work, and one context with not-work. When you sit down in the | work context, it 's time to work. | | - Accountability can feel lessened when no one can see over | your shoulder. This can be misleading in the short term because | it's easy to get away with it for a while: You can tell people | you ran into unexpected difficulties, or you had to spend time | on something else, or any number of excuses that work in the | short term. Over the long term, the productivity difference | starts to show up in your output relative to peers, so avoid | falling into this trap. If your company isn't big on short-term | accountability, give yourself some daily accountability. A good | practice would be to write a short message to your team's Slack | channel with what you're going to be working on for the day. At | the end of the day, write a short summary of what you | accomplished. Once this is routine and public (within your | team) you will feel some of the same accountability you did | when your team was sitting in the same room and could see you | working (or not). | | - Offices provide a lot of social exposure that we take for | granted. Slack and Zoom can't fully replace it. Make sure you | get out of the house and see other people routinely, even if | it's just walking around the neighborhood. Simply seeing other, | real human beings goes a long way. | | - Track your time. Entering the office in the morning and | leaving in the evening are natural delineators for your work | day. Try to have some similar start and end times at home. | Consider using something like RescueTime so you can see where | your time is going during the day. | David wrote: | As an alternative to a daily chat message, a teammate and I | have been meeting for ~15 minutes at the end of the day to | talk about what we did and how productive we were. It's been | pretty helpful a few different ways. First, it forces me to | think about what it is I'm supposed to be doing and figure | out the next step. Not knowing how to approach my next task | is a huge cause of procrastination for me. Second, it's a | chance to notice when I've gone astray, and identify factors | that lead to low productivity. (Like that I procrastinate | when I haven't broken down my next task into small enough | pieces.) | | I think for this to work well, it needs to be with someone | you don't feel the need to impress. Maybe you have a teammate | you trust like that, or maybe you can find a coworker on a | different team who doesn't impact your performance | assessments. If you have that, this feels different than a | standup. Standups easily devolve into signaling to the team | that you've done work. Instead, a 1:1 meeting with a coworker | who you don't feel the need to impress makes it way easier to | be vulnerable and admit when you screwed around on the | internet for a lot of the day. | kingsuper20 wrote: | I used to live in a commercial building (the only living | space) that had a separate office suite. When in the office | doing billable hours sorts of things, 0% of time was spent on | non-work issues. Work computer = a big honkin' loud | workstation. Home computer = a laptop. | | It wasn't too hard a discipline to keep, I think it helped a | lot to use physically different space and hardware. | lostcolony wrote: | That accountability step is part of the intent for daily | standups in most agile disciplines. The five minutes it takes | for everyone to say what they worked on since the last one, | what they plan to work on, and what obstacles they have, is | great both for forcing people to focus a bit, as well as for | managers to help point out when someone is stuck (i.e., | "you've been working on that the past few days; is something | wrong?") | deckard1 wrote: | The flip side of this is what I would term standup-driven- | development. | | You work just enough to have something to say that day. | Rinse and repeat for the next day. The incentive isn't to | do more or better work. The incentive is to have something | impressive to say at the next meeting. | | The other issue with standups is if it's not "on the board" | then developers are disincentivized from doing certain | things (proper testing of code, code reviews, etc.) in | favor of things that show up. | PragmaticPulp wrote: | Standups can help close the short-term feedback loop, but | they don't replace long-term management involvement. | Teams with standups still need proper performance | management and performance reviews from a hands-on | manager, along with clear communication of goals and | expectations. | | > The other issue with standups is if it's not "on the | board" then developers are disincentivized from doing | certain things (proper testing of code, code reviews, | etc.) in favor of things that show up. | | If important things are missing from the board, that's a | problem with the planning process. | | It's easier than it sounds to simply put those things up | on the board. If engineers realize something important is | not on the board, they need to get it up on the board. | Communication needs to go both ways in planning sessions. | tikhonj wrote: | This is why I find standups (and other ceremonies) | patronizing and exhausting. It's like you have to publicly | defend yourself and your work every single day. There's a | massive difference between setting up accountability for | yourself and having your manager/team/etc impose a _public | accountability ritual_ on you. Doubly so because it 's | usually billed as being about "visibility" or "alignment" | or something else, as if it isn't about mico-level | "accountability". | cdogl wrote: | I couldn't agree more. The feeling you are describing is | felt particularly acutely by individuals who are junior, | or for one reason or another (low self esteem, flagging | mental health, membership of a group that experiences | disproportionate marginalisation in the workplace), and | in my experience it subtly but profoundly warps | developers' motivations and drives. Tasks can become all | about rushing to get some progress made so you have | something to say in stand-up or the weekly showcase, and | not about actually patiently thinking problems through at | whatever level of detail is appropriate at their org | scale or product lifecycle stage. | fartcannon wrote: | "Yes, I can't stop worrying about tomorrows standup and, as | a result, I'm incredibly inefficient." | danielvinson wrote: | This is amazing advice. Thank you. | gibrown wrote: | A coworker of mine (our company has always been "remote") has | written a lot about ADHD and working remote. | https://aaron.blog/?s=Work | | https://aaron.blog/2016/03/25/how-working-remote-probably-sa... | is a good place to start. | femiagbabiaka wrote: | I have. Some keys: | | - Lists. | | - Checkins for accountability. | | - Distinguish work space from other space. | | - Develop routine around work start and end times. Block off | heads down work as opposed to meeting time. | | - Use the time flexibility that remote gives me to my advantage | -- if I want to start later and work later that's fine. But | keep routine. | | In other words, all the same stuff as before. An office just | gives you a sociotechnical system in which doing all of the | above is easier. | nomy99 wrote: | I'm not sure if it's wise to publicly post this "taking | advantage of that freedom and focusing instead on podcasts or | reddit for 3 days to avoid 3 hours of writing unit tests." | weird-eye-issue wrote: | At least he is honest and wants to change. Better than 99% of | people out there. | nomy99 wrote: | Honesty doesn't replace accountability. Wasting three days | is a long time to just be "procrastinating" | weird-eye-issue wrote: | I can tell you've never suffered from ADHD. | nomy99 wrote: | So you are telling me a person suffering from ADHD is not | accountable for the $ lost in productivity. If I had | ADHD, just for survival, I wouldn't ever let my boss know | that I have this condition which is costing his company X | amount of dollars a year. | tikhonj wrote: | It sounds like you believe time and productivity are | fungible. That's the real problem, not people being on | Reddit during "work" hours. | titanomachy wrote: | Most knowledge workers are paid for impact, not hours | worked. | | If your results-based performance is deemed adequate, | that means either the company is getting good value for | the money they pay you, or they have a broken performance | management system. | | ADHD doesn't really factor into it. If ADHD leads an | employee to have subpar performance, they will be fired | just like anyone else. | | Caveat: the best companies think like this. Most don't. | sodapopcan wrote: | Yep. | | I've worked with people who come in late, leave early, | and make huge, disruptive, positive impact as well as | slow, positive change. | | I've also worked with people who work 15 hour days who | don't work well with others and are constantly picking up | after themselves as their silo'd work breaks daily (yet | from management's point of view, everything is running | smoothly not realizing they have a giant bus factor on | their hands). | | So ya, nothing to do with hours worked and, if you're | working for a decent company, there should be reason not | to be upfront about this. | weird-eye-issue wrote: | By not letting your boss know, you are making it harder | on yourself, and then leading to less productivity in the | future, as opposed to getting better. Also it isn't that | it actually costs the company money. They could very well | make up for that lost time by hyper focusing and | finishing it quickly later. So it could be the same | result for the company but much more stressful for the | person with ADHD. | mandeepj wrote: | > avoid 3 hours of writing unit tests | | Why? Unit tests are our closest allies | sublimefire wrote: | There are a couple of things that allow me to get past these | bottlenecks. First, let it go. Then do something else, get | outside, have a cup of something. Instead of thinking about "3 | hours of writing unit tests", start with "write just 1 unit | test". Then get back and try to find something interesting | about this depressing piece of work you need to do. Just one | tiny thing, like "how fast does it take to run a test" or "how | does this utility method is implemented". I do this a lot - | trick myself into something small, and then let myself go with | the same work, just like reading "one post in HN" leads me to | write this response LOL. | | In my case, it is just a pure absence of motivation and | interest that causes the attention to go somewhere else. And | this is all right, as it's a signal that the shit I do is not | worth it. I have to make it worth it in some way, worth it for | my soul sake. | bradstewart wrote: | Agreed. Creating small, achievable tasks to start my day | gives me some easy "little victories" which provide some | confidence to tackle harder problems. Often tiny things like | "send an email to X" or "write JIRA ticket for Y". | | Sounds stupid, but it really tricks my brain into not | procrastinating on the more important tasks. | nomel wrote: | I've been using Immersed VR with some good success. I use | different virtual environments for different tasks. The coffee | shop for deep work, space for emails, etc. | | Part of my problem is that my "office" is in my bedroom. I'm a | strong believer in "physical" mental spaces, so it really helps | me. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-04-26 23:00 UTC)