Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 188 posts

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#161

Post by rukuu001 »

dboreham wrote: post #154
rukuu001 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. As a lead with a team spread across time zones, I’m constantly reminding (nagging) people to check in. I don’t want to have to corral people into a ‘least inconvenient’ meeting slot to get updates.

This is because demanding that people spout what they did since yesterday is not how to manage humans. You need to engage with them. Call them up (voice ideally, but a slack DM thread is ok) and ask questions like they're another human being (not : what did you do since yesterday?).

> demanding that people spout what they did since yesterday is not how to manage humans

Yeah I made it sound that way a bit right? Happy to say that's not what's happening.

It's more that if I don't ask, they'll tend not to volunteer anything. We only have a few hours cross-over every day, and it's hard to generate a good sense of 'team!'

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#162

Post by m88m »

mudrockbestgirl wrote: post #146

Has anyone else noticed the number of comments (and upvotes) that are very likely fake/misleading? Many 1-karma accounts that I doubt made their first comment only because they love this product so much, and other founders/colleagues/cohort that are probably just friends. I get this is the "growth hacking" mindset, but it really sucks. I wish this wasn't allowed on HN. This product clearly wouldn't be anywhere near t…

maybe /u/dang can take a look at it.

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#163

Post by mickimnet »

vertis wrote: post #24

Firstly, congrats on launching. Hard work is hard. I don't want to be negative on your launch day, but at the same time feedback is important. 1. I couldn't see myself or the many agile/lean teams I've been part of using this. I don't feel enough of a burden when walking the board for this to be worth the money. 2. A user in spinach.io costs effectively the same amount as a user in Slack, the difference is that I'm g…

I completely second this! And I would like to extend the view from an Agile angle:

In Scrum, the Daily Standup is to inspect and adapt to reach the Sprint goal. We always do a "Walk the board", where the complete team focus on what do we need to do, to get an item to progress towards done. Which is a discussion using the swarm intelligence.

When only focusing on the (outdated) three questions (What have you done yesterday, what do you plan to do today and do you have any impediments), that not only feels like a status meeting, but also ignores the goal and collaboration.

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#164

Post by quickthrower2 »

adave wrote: post #41

Or we could just do our work and not deal with a daily standup. Can we get an App for that please? or maybe a JIRA replacement? or AI that can go instead of ME?

I can sell you a tool for avoiding standups. It is called an espresso machine. Make sure you are using it at 9:30am or whenever the standup is.

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#165

Post by senko »

dboreham wrote: post #154
rukuu001 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. As a lead with a team spread across time zones, I’m constantly reminding (nagging) people to check in. I don’t want to have to corral people into a ‘least inconvenient’ meeting slot to get updates.

This is because demanding that people spout what they did since yesterday is not how to manage humans. You need to engage with them. Call them up (voice ideally, but a slack DM thread is ok) and ask questions like they're another human being (not : what did you do since yesterday?).

> Call them up (voice ideally, but a slack DM thread is ok) and ask questions

What? This is what developers hate the most. Leave me be, and I'll update you when there's something to update. A gentle slack nudge "remember to update trello/jira/post here/whatever" is fine since I can do that whatever.

If you call me with "hey, how's it going" while I'm in the zone and holding 7 things in my mind, you've just ruined my day and wasted at least an hour of my time.

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#166

Post by quickthrower2 »

In don’t get the problem but I think that is because I have worked at more traditionally managed (less startuppy?) companies that wouldn’t let standups drag out. A simple fix for long standups is “no tech details”. If remembering yesterday takes time then don’t ask about yesterday just catch up per task on the board. I think a good blog post about how to run a standup might be the MVP for this. If no one wants to run it maybe ditch standups? Standups are useful as a forcing function. Before they were popular you had the “team leader doing the rounds” which may or may not be better but is also a good check in. The benefit is catching people getting lost, stuck or working on something they don’t need to.

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#169

Post by Terretta »

> we charge $6 per month per user

For comparison, this is the same price as O365 (Microsoft Office) or Google Workspaces.

If you can't profitably grow this tool for, say, $1.00/user, you may want to rethink your approach. Realistically a stack to do this should cost almost nothing per user/month to create or maintain.

Re: Launch HN: Spinach.io (YC W22) – Better daily standups

#170

Post by Terretta »

majikandy wrote: post #140
talmi wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're working on enabling dynamic prompts so teams can customize. What's your standup format?

Something like… 1. Bit of banter. 2. Talk about aging cards/blockers 3. Talk about the cards on the board, from right to left. Since further right is most important. 3. Share things with each other that came up since last standup that you think is worth sharing. 4. Ask for help. Offer help. How can I help you get that card over the line? 5. Final bants.

But why talk about the actual work cards when you can pay the cost of a full office suite to talk about a completely different set of cards?

// Sounds like you're doing it right. Carry on. :-)

Post reply on HN