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Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

tomcritchlow.com

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Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#51

Post by SlowRobotAhead »

zaphod4prez wrote: post #18
gormo2 wrote: post #8

Very interesting to see this at the top of HN literally just after reading "Human Capital: a Horror Story" https://amgreatness.com/2019/11/27/human-capital-a-horror-st...

That piece is really bizarre and poorly written. It feels like they're trying to shoehorn a bunch of right-wing talking points into a piece about corporate boringness. This quote is laughably bad: > The male toilet has disappeared overnight. Now there is an “All-Gender Toilet” and the door is decorated in rainbow hearts. > You go through three stalls before you find one that hasn’t got a used tampon floating in the b…

With you on the first sentence, it is written poorly. It came off as smug and trying to be a scientific explanation for an opinion.

On your second sentence, I have no idea what you are talking about. Right wing talking points? Leave your politics at the door sometimes.

Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#54

Post by xrd »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #46
xrd wrote: post #40

Lots of comments here come off as very resistant to accepting the ideas presented here: that success at work is as much about the quality of your work as the effort made to connect with the humans in an organization evaluating the work. Improv is a perfect frame for this: entertaining but doing deep preparation for that entertainment. What I'm really fascinated by is how this can be translated to remote working. I do…

> I don't think water-cooler talk is possible in Slack. Probably not quite to the same level as in-person conversation, but nearly every place I've worked had a variety of off-topic channels (both for specific topics, and totally random discussion), and plenty of my 1:1 slack conversations end up evolving into personal discussions (e.g., "Hey, btw, I saw a cool-looking book on your shelf when you dialed into the meet…

After I wrote that, I thought: maybe lots of people think that slack is for that. I think you are right.

But, I do also think that a crucial distinction is that most people assume water cooler talk isn't recorded. I have several co-workers who have said something in slack, then noted this is probably available to the boss, and then deleted the comment (who really knows if it is actually deleted and not available to the boss as a paid upgrade!). The point is water cooler talk is risk free, and I think at least an important part of those conversations with your coworkers should be experimental and searching, and having a surveillance layer over there prohibits (or inhibits) that.

Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#55

Post by [deleted] »

yamrzou wrote: post #4

« Many people aspire to “silent success” at work - to do work that “speaks for itself”. Unfortunately this is the wrong move in the theatre of work. Instead we should aspire to the opposite - for knowledge work, the performance of the work is the work. » Not sure what the author means by “knowledge work”, but I find this very true, for any type of work.

[deleted]

Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#56

Post by kristianc »

xrd wrote: post #40

Lots of comments here come off as very resistant to accepting the ideas presented here: that success at work is as much about the quality of your work as the effort made to connect with the humans in an organization evaluating the work. Improv is a perfect frame for this: entertaining but doing deep preparation for that entertainment. What I'm really fascinated by is how this can be translated to remote working. I do…

> Lots of comments here come off as very resistant to accepting the ideas presented here: that success at work is as much about the quality of your work as the effort made to connect with the humans in an organization evaluating the work.

It's not just a case of making an effort to connect with the individuals evaluating the work - it's that siloing your individual contribution, however strong, actually makes you more difficult to work with and your contributions less impactful.

Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#57

Post by phkahler »

analog31 wrote: post #48
phkahler wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While writing embedded code I realized a major problem with code relative to the rest of the product. You can't see it, can't touch it, and it doesnt appear on the bill of material. To most people it doesnt even exist. This would be somewhat different if your product IS software, but the same still applies to the actual code - the author is the only one who will ever see what they wrote.

Count your blessings. My job involves typically big pieces that are visible to anybody who looks under the hood. And they are often expensive custom pieces, so it's painful to add or modify one. When stuff is visible and tactile, folks assume that they should intuitively understand it. So my work is subjected to endless critique and brainstorming from everybody, including managers. Sometimes I envy the embedded syste…

>> Sometimes I envy the embedded systems people because nobody ever looks at the innards of their designs.

True, but the flip side is that nobody understands the complexity. Some will assume it must be easy, especially if you keep quiet about the challenges and just deliver mostly good stuff.

To your point, I was working on a hybrid system and one meeting dragged on because marketing was upset that the font was changed on the inverter. It was machined into the case, and they couldn't make the sharp interior angles needed. So yeah, even when you can see it, there may be hidden complexity.

Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#58

Post by pavel_lishin »

xrd wrote: post #54
pavel_lishin wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think water-cooler talk is possible in Slack. Probably not quite to the same level as in-person conversation, but nearly every place I've worked had a variety of off-topic channels (both for specific topics, and totally random discussion), and plenty of my 1:1 slack conversations end up evolving into personal discussions (e.g., "Hey, btw, I saw a cool-looking book on your shelf when you dialed into the meet…

After I wrote that, I thought: maybe lots of people think that slack is for that. I think you are right. But, I do also think that a crucial distinction is that most people assume water cooler talk isn't recorded. I have several co-workers who have said something in slack, then noted this is probably available to the boss, and then deleted the comment (who really knows if it is actually deleted and not available to t…

Well, I wouldn't say "risk-free", but I hear what you mean - HR isn't going to pull up a print-out of your exact words at the watercooler, with certain words and phrases circled in red sharpie.

You're right - there are definitely things I've explicitly not said in Slack and saved for in-person discussions. I forgot about that aspect of it. :/

Re: Yes, And – How to be effective in the theatre of work

#59

Post by phlakaton »

xrd wrote: post #40

Lots of comments here come off as very resistant to accepting the ideas presented here: that success at work is as much about the quality of your work as the effort made to connect with the humans in an organization evaluating the work. Improv is a perfect frame for this: entertaining but doing deep preparation for that entertainment. What I'm really fascinated by is how this can be translated to remote working. I do…

Nonsense. At least 30% of the chat I do on Slack is "water cooler talk" of one sort or another. Music, games, city happenings, a smattering of politics, random Internet cuteness, the all-important channel devoted to mechanical keyboards, etc. etc. Haven't started up a channel on D&D podcasts yet but it's probably not far behind. ;-)
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