Don't answer the first question
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Don't answer the first question
1–10 of 57 posts
Re: Don't answer the first question
#2[deleted]
Re: Don't answer the first question
#3[deleted]
Re: Don't answer the first question
#4While this strategy is fine for clueless users, I suspect that it will lead to immense frustration for the ones with clues
Re: Don't answer the first question
#5“well the answer to your immediate question is X but that’s a pretty strange thing to ask for because of reason Y. Can you tell me more about the wider problem you’re trying to solve?”
This is the right way to answer these questions. SO was famous for the infuriating "You shouldn't do X, so as a favor to you I'm not going to tell you how." or "Before I answer thee, thou must first answer me these questions three!" kinds of answers.
Edit: Don't want to take credit for this. It's a quote from the article.
Re: Don't answer the first question
#6While this strategy is fine for clueless users, I suspect that it will lead to immense frustration for the ones with clues
Can confirm, I had a coworker doing that a while ago and it was incredibly frustrating. After going through the whole quizzing you still end up with no answer to your actual question, as if they were more interested engaging with their own process and not what you were actually asking
Re: Don't answer the first question
#7“well the answer to your immediate question is X but that’s a pretty strange thing to ask for because of reason Y. Can you tell me more about the wider problem you’re trying to solve?” This is the right way to answer these questions. SO was famous for the infuriating "You shouldn't do X, so as a favor to you I'm not going to tell you how." or "Before I answer thee, thou must first answer me these questions three!" ki…
Your way is good because it answers my question first. I've been wanting to do a weird thing X and had to first spend half an hour convincing people that yes, I really do know what I'm doing, so they'd give me the one-liner answer I came for.
Ultimately, it should be on me to choose whether I want to risk doing X or whether I want to take up your offer to explain Y, not the "as a favor to you, I'm not going to tell you how" way you described.
Re: Don't answer the first question
#8While this strategy is fine for clueless users, I suspect that it will lead to immense frustration for the ones with clues
Exactly.
Back when I worked at Google there was an internal page someone put up that denoted what they called "the YX problem": the observation that the XY problem, applied to a sufficiently great extent, creates an environment where more productivity is lost convincing one's interlocutor that X is in fact the correct problem to solve than would be lost by chasing X and having to later pivot to Y if that turned out to be wrong.
It's extraordinarily aggravating when it happens. I really wish it was something we talked about more.
Re: Don't answer the first question
#9While this strategy is fine for clueless users, I suspect that it will lead to immense frustration for the ones with clues
Can confirm, I had a coworker doing that a while ago and it was incredibly frustrating. After going through the whole quizzing you still end up with no answer to your actual question, as if they were more interested engaging with their own process and not what you were actually asking
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Re: Don't answer the first question
#10I believe this is the process that defines Julia Evans' writing (and cartooning)!