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To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

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Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#301

Post by jariel »

theshrike79 wrote: post #161
jariel wrote: post #7

It's not really about 'writing skills', it's 'communication skills'. 'Writing' usually implies the ability to be creatively articulate, for example, like writing a long form news article. People can be great writers and poor communicators. For coherent team communications you even don't need proper grammar - what you need the ability to be clear, succinct, appropriate, provide context, timely etc.. It's not about 'wr…

I hate long form writing with a passion. I barely got my decree because I hated writing that trite crap they call a thesis so much. On the other hand I consider myself a good communicator, I can type a succinct email with a clear structure, I can create a damn fine Wiki page with indexes and all and I also communicate pretty well over text-based chats (started with IRC in the 90's). Still, I couldn't write a 10 page…

"I hate long form writing with a passion. I barely got my decree" - HN Classic.

Yes, I think there is such a thing as 'Engineering Speak' - organizing thoughts in structured and coherent way - it requires thinking a little bit differently though. I'm not impressed by most API documentation, it's just so terrible it makes me wonder about the people in tech.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#302

Post by cratermoon »

Ansil849 wrote: post #272
cratermoon wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given how many of my fellow students in college studying math/science were convinced that the required english lit/composition course was a waste of time, and disdained the liberal arts generally, this is a problem that arises early in education somehow. How did we end up here? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxjT7veKi9c

Honestly, I feel like the maths and science lecturers are the source for reinforcing the paradigm that their job is simply to teach maths and science, not effective communications of the topics. Many of them likely feel the same way as their students. At the bare minimum, they should explicitly and repeatedly mention in their courses the importance of taking writing classes, if not have an entire part of their own cu…

The number of educators with terrible communications skills is a real problem, and I'm not talking about language/cultural differences, either. In higher education, with the focus on research and publish-or-perish over teaching, there are many disincentives to effective communication and writing is constrained to the academic style.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#303

Post by Consultant32452 »

celeritascelery wrote: post #297
AceyMan wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've started using an equivalent pattern and my implementation has generally been a success, so I'll share: My email body has everything the "optimal" reader (i.e., someone who is already familiar with the topic item) needs to |action_verb| regarding what I've written. Then I "conclude" with my usual sign-off (e.g., Cheers, [CRLF] "/Aceyman"). BELOW that—but above my default signature/contact info block—I place all t…

I have started to question the value of sign-off text. It seems that is just wastes screen space. The only time it would be useful is when you are emailing someone who might not know who you are. What value do you see in it?

It's a signal that you're in the "in" group of the cultural norms, like shaking hands or the superfluous "Hi" in text chats. The value is social signaling and emotional, not informational.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#304

Post by Vinnl »

Nevaeh wrote: post #81

How do you feel about acronyms? Do they improve or hurt communication? From time to time, Musk will send out an e-mail to the entire company to enforce a new policy or let them know about something that's bothering him. One of the more famous e-mails arrived in May 2010 with the subject line: Acronyms Seriously Suck: There is a creeping tendency to use made up acronyms at SpaceX. Excessive use of made up acronyms is…

It's not the hill I'm going to die on, but I've referred to this email a lot: I'd love for people to stop using acronyms.

A somewhat related pet peeve: generic "descriptive" names of projects, which often end up being acronymised eventually too. They're either too generic to be informative, or tend to become inaccurate as requirements change. Additionally, by some kind of regression to the mean they all start to look alike.

If there's not a logical short name that applies, then just think of some random name that you think sounds funny, or fits some category that you use for all your products (a coworker of mine suggested French cheeses). Still give as little information about what they are as the "generic" names, but at least they're easily distinguishable and easy to pronounce.

(This, too, is not a hill I'll die on, but I'd love to wave a magic wand that would convince everyone of this.)

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#305

Post by Consultant32452 »

Nagyman wrote: post #246
Consultant32452 wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I often do is split an email into two parts, I'll even label them. High Level Summary: 1-3 sentences that cover the main ideas, kind of an executive summary. Details: the nitty gritty, full context, screenshots, etc. People seem to really like this, each reader has the option to dive as deep as they need/want.

Good on you for thinking about the user experience of the person receiving the communication. It's a skill to know how to do this well. It requires practice and effort that many people don't bother with – because of a lack empathy, they're too busy, or they realize the recipient(s) won't recognize (or even read) the results. Edit: In my experience, a lot of people can't even bother to think of an appropriate subject…

Communication is a weak point in the entire software industry. It permeates everything from emails to variable names. I wonder if it's the same in other industries.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#306

Post by always_left »

Nevaeh wrote: post #81

How do you feel about acronyms? Do they improve or hurt communication? From time to time, Musk will send out an e-mail to the entire company to enforce a new policy or let them know about something that's bothering him. One of the more famous e-mails arrived in May 2010 with the subject line: Acronyms Seriously Suck: There is a creeping tendency to use made up acronyms at SpaceX. Excessive use of made up acronyms is…

Anyone know the article that was about how with acronyms it slows the reading comprehension for the whole team whereas it saves you a few seconds to type it out? I really liked it.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#307

Post by andrewflnr »

mLuby wrote: post #247
hanifc wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So does he propose that people always spell out the full name of all components? To me it comes across as selfish, he only wants people to use acronyms that he personally knows, even when they're not talking to him. I'm curious what makes you attribute that selfish motivation to him? I thought he was pretty clear in saying that it's particularly tough for new employees: "Individually, a few acronyms here and there…

"No one can actually remember all these acronyms and people don't want to seem dumb in a meeting, so they just sit there in ignorance. This is particularly tough on [me]." Selfishness is a bit too strong a word, but I'd bet he wrote this after a particularly acronym-heavy meeting where he was annoyed at feeling dumb for not following the conversation. So it's a good policy directive that's also self-serving. Also thi…

Not only are you ascribing ill motives without justification, you're doing it based on pure supposition. The whole story exists only in your head. Snap out of it.

It's not as if there aren't real reasons to think Musk is an ass. Wait for one of those to come up before you start the hate train.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#308

Post by dredmorbius »

OJFord wrote: post #153

It's not an issue for me, but how does this gel with discrimination laws? If the reason a candidate is a worse communicator is a protected characteristic, you can't (legally) reject them on that basis. (Not that I necessarily think that's net good, but it is the case.) I'm not so clear on where you stand if you just see poor communication and really honestly have no idea of the reason for it, they don't say and it do…

Literacy skill is not a protected class.

You can reject candidates for performance-related reasons. You cannot reject a candidate for status within a protected class. Structured patterns suggesting protected-class discrimination may raise issues, though typically require convincing evidence. Offsetting considerations (say, recruiting or mentoring programmes) might be considered mitigating.

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#309

Post by ayewo »

wonder_er wrote: post #17

> To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills I strongly agree! Looks like many other commenters agree too. how do I find companies that are hiring and agree with this statement? I've had a hard time finding those companies. I've had a slew of interviews recently, and none of them asked about my extensive online writing. None of them seemed to have clicked through to my website. A…

Off-topic:

I like the look of your blog. Is your theme a heavily customized instance of Jekyll?

Re: To find great remote employees, prioritize candidates with strong writing skills

#310

Post by anotherforsure »

BeetleB wrote: post #63
hodgesrm wrote: post #11

I've been working on remote teams for almost 20 years. The key to success is overcommunicating. In other words--don't assume people have full context or share assumptions. Write emails that lay out assumptions explicitly and detail problems completely. As a manager I sometimes feel like a Habsburg bureaucrat buried in the Chancery offices sending painstaking messages to a far flung empire. Come to think of it, remote…

As a manager, you can probably get away with this. As an IC, people rarely read my emails if it doesn't fit in their screen (so 3 paragraphs is the max). The only thing I've found that works is to send details, and then probe the recipient on each important item in there to make sure they understood what I wrote. If I'm too detailed, they will get lost. If I'm very concise (but still complete ), they'll misinterpret.…

Be mindful of how Outlook displays messages. Subject should be the topic, and the first line should be the ask. That way busy people see everything they need in the preview, without ever opening the email.
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