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GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#121

Post by overcast »

bgaluszka wrote: post #117
dandersh wrote: post #112

The most frustrating thing about working remote was the complete lack of documentation around anything -- meetings, requirements, internal frameworks/libraries, etc. Good for them for emphasizing documentation. I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Also fun was being assigned a feature and having it's functionality expla…

> I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Can you elaborate on this one? This is my preferred way.

You prefer just being handed a pile of code, rather than documentation on how to use it? please.

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#122

Post by sscarduzio »

Perihelion wrote: post #84
sotojuan wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It works at our company because the only remote guy is the only one in his "domain" (iOS). He probably doesn't care about the frontend watercooler chat and anything important about the backend will be mentioned in standup.

That definitely helps. I find there are other little cultural things you miss like inside jokes/shenanigans. They're not work-related but they're related to work and can make you feel like part of the team.

God, who cares of this work jokes shit? They're never funny, it's always the boss that makes them and everyone laughs way too much. FFS, We're not friends, we don't have to be, and it's OK!

I like what I do, take pride on it and everything, but at the end of the day, my private life (where I get to choose my friends) is OUTSIDE work hours. And I'm committed to close the laptop as soon as I'm done.

I guess this kind of "school feeling", "we're on the same boat" feeling, where groups of people linger together in long coffee breaks tends to belong to corporate, especially in USA where they work stupid hours to "show off" their commitment. Utter nonsense.

One more thing that I really feel I "broke free" from (after becoming full time remote) is the ALCOHOL CULTURE. Peer pressure into drinking: company credit card on the tab and unlimited drinks (no food, otherwise it's cheating). So degrading.

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#123

Post by wazanator »

bgaluszka wrote: post #117
dandersh wrote: post #112

The most frustrating thing about working remote was the complete lack of documentation around anything -- meetings, requirements, internal frameworks/libraries, etc. Good for them for emphasizing documentation. I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Also fun was being assigned a feature and having it's functionality expla…

> I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Can you elaborate on this one? This is my preferred way.

Proper documentation that explains what the code should do, how it does it, and if there are any known bugs is a lot faster (IMO) to read them to open a file to try and parse what the people who worked on it intended and what all its doing.

Add in cases where people go crazy with inheritance and you need it or else you have no way of knowing what all it is this new class can do.

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#125

Post by bpicolo »

pedroms wrote: post #114
bpicolo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, not a fan of how a readme-less repository just has an entirely useless main page. I much prefer having the file view a'la github on that page. That's the main UX complaint for me. Still use gitlab bunches. Main complaint overall is the incredibly sluggish git push speed.

Speed is one of our main priorities for GitLab this year. We've started Gitaly, a project dedicated to that: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitaly We expect it to become a standard component of GitLab in Q1 2017 and to reach full scope in Q3 2017.

Can't wait : )

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#126

Post by dandersh »

bgaluszka wrote: post #117
dandersh wrote: post #112

The most frustrating thing about working remote was the complete lack of documentation around anything -- meetings, requirements, internal frameworks/libraries, etc. Good for them for emphasizing documentation. I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Also fun was being assigned a feature and having it's functionality expla…

> I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Can you elaborate on this one? This is my preferred way.

Instead of being able to quickly peruse docs to see if a method existed and what it took/returned, I would be directed to dig through source code to see if it exists and what it did. This is basic API doc work. This meant something that should have been fairly quick took significantly longer.

Then there were times when I did dig through to understand why something worked. When I pointed out that something should be done differently (an id-lookup done hierarchal instead of flat) I was told "Oh that's deprecated, you're not supposed to be using that anyways". And how exactly am I supposed to know that?

Ultimately it was a frustrating way to spend a lot of time.

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#127

Post by sytse »

eknkc wrote: post #27
bpicolo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, not a fan of how a readme-less repository just has an entirely useless main page. I much prefer having the file view a'la github on that page. That's the main UX complaint for me. Still use gitlab bunches. Main complaint overall is the incredibly sluggish git push speed.

You can change that on your personal prefs to show the file list by default, with Readme on bottom: http://c.ekin.io/3z1V2v3P041b git push speed is fine on our own ce installation but gitlab.com is beyond shitty.

We're considering changing the default so people don't have to find the setting https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/26834

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#128

Post by cjbprime »

onion2k wrote: post #37
cjbprime wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, seems a little tone-deaf to publish a puff piece about GitLab at the moment.

Companies are run by people and consequently they're fallible. Every company makes mistakes occasionally. Gitlab handled theirs incredibly well. A more opaque company would have kept the problem, and the experience they earned handling it, to themselves. Gitlab's openness means we can all learn a little from their event. I think that's great. I wish more companies shared more when these things happen.

> A more opaque company would have kept the problem, and the experience they earned handling it, to themselves.

I liked their transparency a lot too! But it's neither possible nor acceptable to keep six hours of data loss and eighteen hours of continuous downtime "to yourself".

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#129

Post by amorphid »

Perihelion wrote: post #73
bryanh wrote: post #58

160 employees remote is impressive and commendable. Zapier is fully remote as well (but half the size in employee count). I'd say "write everything down" is a great shortcut to the sorts of practices you need to cultivate. We've also noticed that over-communicating is critical but hard - it is surprising the things that are "yeah yeah, we know" to some but are "oh we're doing that?" to others. This is only natural -…

Honestly, I haven't seen a company that does the hybrid remote/on-site thing well. I'm sure they exist, but every time I've worked at one the people who were remote were out of the loop on almost everything. Hybrid remote/on-site requires some great discipline. If you have a watercooler chat with someone about a feature, it's easy to forget that a remote colleague wasn't there for the discussion/not document what was…

You have to be diligent about researching a potential employer with multiple locations, too. My last job on "on site". I learned on Day 1 that all of my teammates were all remote (or at least not in my office).

Re: GitLab’s Secret to Managing Employees in 160 Locations: Write Everything Down

#130

Post by bgaluszka »

overcast wrote: post #121
bgaluszka wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I lost track of the amount of times I was told to "look at the source code" when asking about documentation for the internal framework. Can you elaborate on this one? This is my preferred way.

You prefer just being handed a pile of code, rather than documentation on how to use it? please.

In case where I work for a given company and it's internal tool, always.
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