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Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

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Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#71

Post by Fire-Dragon-DoL »

steelframe wrote: post #70
Fire-Dragon-DoL wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does it split the time from the risk? My main problem with points is the impossibility to represent: - A long task of 5 days that's very well known, it's 5 days of work - A short task that's very uncertain. It could be a one line change or many days of work With time range, you can represent that and it's very visible. With points, you can represent that as the same points, but that does not reflect reality, one…

My team uses story points to estimate large projects over long periods of time. Sometimes things are overestimated, and other times things are underestimated. However, when you sum them all together, the errors tend to cancel each other out. I've found that upper management doesn't care whether any given task actually takes 3 days when we estimate it at 3 days. They just want to see a schedule where each task is esti…

I didn't say anything about drilling, just that you can have a minimum and maximum range.

This can also give you a minimum and a maximum for when the project is done. This is actually very useful in large projects, because it lets you identify upfront what are the greatest factor of risks of a project.

It didn't want to be a discussion of how management is done, just to highlight that having a time range seems to provide more information to management, which is usually what's desired.

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#72

Post by moltar »

rwnspace wrote: post #64
ghaff wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that there are very few jobs where you can basically ignore the rest of the world (or even the rest of the world in nearby timezones). If you're a solo writer or programmer sure. But if you work with other people, not wanting to have meetings before 2pm is often a problem. (As would someone who wanted to work midnight to 8am.) Even jobs that are quite flexible are going to want some overlap time and, eve…

You're absolutely right, I'm always tired when I have to schedule around other people's preference of working 9-5. It's not like schools should be scheduling for 9AM or earlier starts either, it's bad for the kids, particularly teenagers.

Huge disservice for kids. Ton of studies show a bunch of negative consequences for kids who don’t sleep enough, which is pretty much all kids who wake up to school early.

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#73

Post by sidlls »

steelframe wrote: post #66
sidlls wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d argue the predictive power of story point methodology has not been established. There are simply too many variables to make estimates more accurate than “best guess”: 1/ the team’s composition at a point in time (and all the variability that comes with this) 2/ the team’s dependencies (a kind of exponential effect is at work here: the team’s dependencies also have all these issues in variability and so do their d…

I completely agree with the impact of the variables you listed. However it's often the case that you need a starting point to estimate timelines. It's never acceptable to tell the decision makers, "We really have no idea how long this will take." Nor is it acceptable to say, "Sure, we'll have it ready in 8 weeks! Everyone get to work and make that happen (or else)!" Having a concrete plan ("micromanagement?") for get…

Having a concrete plan with estimates is important. Assigning some "point value" to them, which variously means "complexity", "man-day-equivalent", "man-sprint-equivalent", and possibly others depending on (arbitrarily applied) context and individuals involved, is the gateway to micromanagement.

It's entirely possible to provide meaningful estimates of both complexity and time-to-implement without resorting to story point formulations or any particular PM framework. "This will take about 6 weeks and has a few dependencies and unknowns that make it moderately risky to take longer." Rephrasing that as "This will take 3 sprints and has a story point value of 8 points per print" doesn't add any value, except from management's perspective as a way to put some "objective" quantification to the problem of estimates and deliverables.

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#74

Post by dgaudet »

boulos wrote: post #61
dgaudet wrote: post #23

i would prefer sunny days off, and bad weather days for meetings.

(Hi Dean!?) But how would you synchronize the poor weather days of Seattle with the nice days the Bay Area? Then again, it’s definitely something I miss from doing research at school. Nice day, go for a hike. Bad day, time to finally rerun those experiments. Sadly, I have way more meetings than those days...

yeah i dunno how people live in the PNW, i was totally depressed the 8 months i spent in vancouver BC!

it would be kind of cool to have calendar software which has a "bad weather" feature: correlate the 10-day forecasts of the required attendees, and pick the least sunny timeslot. mind you i'd also want the software to keep track of how frequently i've hiked, because even a sunny day of meetings is OK after a couple days of hiking. gotta mix it up. i'm sure this bin-packing problem has a reasonable enough solution :)

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#75

Post by em-bee »

Freak_NL wrote: post #33
skohan wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Wednesday off is not so bad for this; 2 vacation days and you're looking at a 5 day holiday

That goes for any weekday though, so not really a benefit except that you can have a five day holiday with only two extra days off that can include any specific weekday in it, but this holds true for Monday and Friday as the fixed day off as well. Only if you have Tuesdays and Thursdays off you won't be able to get a contiguous five day holiday with only two days extra off that can include any weekday (e.g., with a f…

you can take friday before the weekend and monday after the weekend, with your tuesday to get five days. moreover, just tsking off one day gives you 4 days. the latter is true if your regular day off is any day except wednesday.

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#76

Post by zepto »

ghaff wrote: post #7
skohan wrote: post #4

I currently work a 4 day week with Wednesdays off and it's like magic

And to show how much of this is personal, during normal times, I'd consider a singleton day in the middle of the week an incredible waste relative to 3-day weekend (or even better a 4-day weekend once every two weeks) so that I could travel places.

Have you actually tried this?

I’ve tried both, for extended periods and I ended up much preferring the Wednesday off.

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#77

Post by ghaff »

zepto wrote: post #76
ghaff wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And to show how much of this is personal, during normal times, I'd consider a singleton day in the middle of the week an incredible waste relative to 3-day weekend (or even better a 4-day weekend once every two weeks) so that I could travel places.

Have you actually tried this? I’ve tried both, for extended periods and I ended up much preferring the Wednesday off.

Not systematically but when I take an odd day off it's essentially always Friday for a 3-day weekend. Taking a day off in the middle of a week because of an appointment or whatever tends to dump me out of the work week routine a bit. I can deal with it--I have to when I travel--but it isn't my preference if I'm in all week.

Re: Unpopular opinion: Weekdays/weekend split isn't for everyone

#78

Post by zepto »

ghaff wrote: post #77
zepto wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you actually tried this? I’ve tried both, for extended periods and I ended up much preferring the Wednesday off.

Not systematically but when I take an odd day off it's essentially always Friday for a 3-day weekend. Taking a day off in the middle of a week because of an appointment or whatever tends to dump me out of the work week routine a bit. I can deal with it--I have to when I travel--but it isn't my preference if I'm in all week.

I think that makes a big difference. I would (and did) make the same choice as you when it was a sporadic thing, but when I had the ability to do it every week, I quickly realized I felt (and performed) a lot better with the Wednesday off.
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