111–120 of 286 posts
This is a critical skill in big companies where everyone is swamped and busy and things get lost. I do this all the time when I’m dealing with people who don’t answer their email, or who tend to stall and delay approvals, or people who are just very busy. I’ll Email and describe the problem and then say the magic phrase “ If I don’t hear back from you in [N] days , I am going to do XYZ on [DAY N].” This way I’m not a…
Followed by test cases signature and then by user acceptance test documents.
This style could never work for me: "I'll push it to production on Day X, exactly as described here - unless you object" is not really applicable for me.
Maybe I haven't read all the comments but I would love to if somebody could give me certain examples where it doesn't sound confrontational and maybe as confrontational as asking for a yes.
I really like the approach but I think I would be looked as if rude , like look at that guy , he thinks he can do whatever he wants if I say nothing , Let me use politics to put him down unnecessarily.
Again , I really like this approach and am just asking for better / more examples. Something which I can apply practically.
This is a critical skill in big companies where everyone is swamped and busy and things get lost. I do this all the time when I’m dealing with people who don’t answer their email, or who tend to stall and delay approvals, or people who are just very busy. I’ll Email and describe the problem and then say the magic phrase “ If I don’t hear back from you in [N] days , I am going to do XYZ on [DAY N].” This way I’m not a…
How do you actually word this? "We plan to defragment the thingamajig on March 1st. We're reaching out to those who might have an interest in case this might cause problems. Please let us know if you have concerns about the defragment. If we don't hear from you by March 1st, the thingamajig will be defragged." Something like this?
This is a critical skill in big companies where everyone is swamped and busy and things get lost. I do this all the time when I’m dealing with people who don’t answer their email, or who tend to stall and delay approvals, or people who are just very busy. I’ll Email and describe the problem and then say the magic phrase “ If I don’t hear back from you in [N] days , I am going to do XYZ on [DAY N].” This way I’m not a…
This sounds a bit like a fantasy or the rules you’re breaking are completely irrelevant. “I’m going to do X in 5 days if you don’t respond” gives you absolutely no recourse if you do something that can result in reprimand. About the only place where this works is violating some internal design decisions that are irrelevant to the business.
This isn't for breaking rules. And definitely not for breaking ones that say "explicit approval needed".
Teamwork is complex and most of it is not covered by rules. If you are too biased towards asking vs just doing you get stuck.
Another take on this I like is "radiating intent". Broadcast what you want to do, when you plan to do it, and give stakeholders space to explicitly object, rather than explicitly chasing consensus / alignment / approval. Works in some scenarios, and generally requires baseline trust to have been earned. https://medium.com/@ElizAyer/dont-ask-forgiveness-radiate-in...
I also appreciate the author (Eliz Ayer) adding the below nuance:
"In all fairness, you might get less done by radiating intent. It does give obstructive or meddling folks a way into your thing. Also, advice like this is very situation- and organization-dependent and won’t be appropriate all the time."
Part of this "I'm going to do this unless you let me know otherwise" trick is not phrasing it like a question to reduce communication overhead. That way the receiver doesn't have to write a reply and you don't get another email to read (and for anyone CCed). Saying that, I like emoji reaction features like on GitHub and Google Docs where you can just give a thumbs up to acknowledge you read and agreed to something. S…
I think this is a sort of art in communication which I have just discovered. Though in emails I am not sure if there is an option just for thumbs up , but I do wish so.
I am going to start to learn this art , like this is such a good way of working but it also has to be a little subtle , not rude and may or may not work , IDK just my two cents.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This sounds a bit like a fantasy or the rules you’re breaking are completely irrelevant. “I’m going to do X in 5 days if you don’t respond” gives you absolutely no recourse if you do something that can result in reprimand. About the only place where this works is violating some internal design decisions that are irrelevant to the business.
Have been doing all my life and it has never backfired. It’s not about breaking rules. It’s that I already know what you want. If I buy you ice cream without asking you for the flavor, it’s because I already know what you want because I pay attention to you. And it doesn’t matter when I get it wrong because you appreciated the 500 other times I cared about you.
I think the context is different if you’ve shown you care twice a day for a year before screwing up. Most people interpret messages in light of their experience of you.
If you don’t have that track record, the words probably have a different flavor.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It really depends on the culture of your organisation and how effective management is. If there is nobody that can act like this at your org it shows that your leadership team suffers from failure to delegate.
> It really depends on the culture of your organisation and how effective management is. If there is nobody that can act like this at your org it shows that your leadership team suffers from failure to delegate. I think it's more than just that - upthread I posted that I used this technique for over a decade against a difficult party. This approach is, briefly, for CYA: It's for when you are in the following situatio…
"Make it as easy as possible for them to say yes"
Don't dump 14 paragraphs in front of someone expecting them to get onto the same level that you've been after many hours of studying a problem. If you're confident in your approach (and you should be, if you want an easy yes!), then be succinct, briefly describe the problem and why your solution is correct. Optionally link to a document that has more information if a reader wants to go deeper. Make sure you've already gained "approval" from your other team mates or product owners.
"We're going to solve X by doing Y. Team are all onboard. Proposal document is at [link] if you want the detail. Going to begin on Tuesday unless there's any more feedback we need to address."
Managers etc don't have time to get into the detail of every little thing, and appreciate when you've done the work, including gaining support from the wider team, so if they need to approve, they can just approve.