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Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

ashley.rolfmore.com

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Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#111

Post by nottorp »

yetihehe wrote: post #107
nottorp wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is, neither the software engineers nor the users know wtf should be done completely. Communication across domains is hard. Let's try a physical items example: have you ever ordered a piece of furniture or other home improvement thing, got exactly what you asked for, professionally done... and then later found out there were better ways to do it (at similar cost) that you hadn't even imagined? Was it because…

> Communication is damn hard, again. Yes, but it is necessary to achieve better results. > Was it because you didn't know what to ask for? Was it because the experts in home improvement didn't volunteer that there are other options? That's bad communication from both sides. Having good information on each of the sides leads to better communication. Client with better communication will have better results for himself…

> Yeah, when I don't know what to ask for, I search for expert who will know what I should ask and will help me with expanding my knowledge of the options.

> Yes, I speak from experience of such moments.

And did you actually look for an expert or did you just get something from Ikea? Do you even know how to identify an expert furniture designer?

One of my points is we think we're damn unique but we aren't. And my example has us as customers.

Real world example: I was in $RANDOM_HOTEL last month. Now I want to redo the attachment system for all my curtains in the house because theirs was smarter than what I knew to ask for.

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#112

Post by yetihehe »

b3lvedere wrote: post #78
6P58r3MXJSLi wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To truly listen means to place yourself mentally and physically in a vulnerable state if it's not two ways, stop trying, stand up and leave.

What a privilige it must be to be able to have a job where you can stand up and leave when your psyche can't handle it. Ever done tech support for ten hours a day? :)

Either leave or make your psyche able to handle it. If your psyche won't be able to handle it, you will have a mental breakdown and leave anyway. Which outcome would you like more, leaving before or after mental breakdown?

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#113

Post by Imanari »

digi59404 wrote: post #54

Even here in the comments you see people who have read this article and fall victim to the very things it’s pointing out. It’s ironic. Let me add a couple to this list. 1. No amount of knowledge or discussion will make a person accept something they don’t want to accept. 2. To truly listen means to place yourself mentally and physically in a vulnerable state. Because you will likely hear things that run contrary to y…

> Listening often means not jumping to a solution; but absorbing and processing someone’s pain

> When in actuality, they should [...] finding a way to solve the pain points

Honest question, how do I 'absorb someones pain'? And how do I transition from that into eventually formulating the feature/ticket?

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#114

Post by kraai »

6P58r3MXJSLi wrote: post #104
b3lvedere wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a privilige it must be to be able to have a job where you can stand up and leave when your psyche can't handle it. Ever done tech support for ten hours a day? :)

I've done tech support for years, since 1996. Your assumptions are also very wrong, my psyche could kill you, I simply know what I want on my side and you on your side, we have to meet somewhere in the middle, otherwise it's not listening, it's abuse. If you don't stand up for yourself, nobody will. Your view is US centric, I live in Europe, we have rights, we can't be fired for having opinions. We don't work 10 hour…

Yes this clearly illustrates the difference in labour laws and basic human rights between US and Europe. "to have a job where you can stand up and leave when your psyche can't handle it."

This just sounds nuts to me, not being able to have the right for sick days/leave when your mentally unwell...

It's also counter-productive, people that are unwell won't be very efficient. Happy and healthy people work better.

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#116

Post by freeone3000 »

faangguyindia wrote: post #18

Most of the problem is that talking to non technical people is frustrating, they often start like 1. Can u add X 2. Can u change Y Without understanding cost of doing all this. Yes, i can do all and everything you ask for, but each action has a cost, which you fail to understand. We cannot do everything if we need to launch a reliable product.

So you estimate costs in months and dollars, and give that in response to each. Very solvable issue.

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#117

Post by watwut »

serial_dev wrote: post #59
generic92034 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is why it's important to write things down in details and as-unambiguous-as-you-can forms. While that might be a prerequisite for a deep shared understanding, I have made the experience in the last few years that the number of people really reading more than the starting sentence of any message/ticket/email is consistently decreasing. I often have to feed them the information in very small and easy to digest p…

Nobody reads the docs, tickets, or comments under a task, nobody really checks the code they are reviewing, and nowadays thanks to AI, some people don’t even read the code they “write”. People love to ask for documentation, as long as it doesn’t exist. It lets them off the hook, “oh I would have known what to do, I wish we had this documented”. Then you point it out that you have it documented with video walkthrough,…

In fact, people do read documentation when they know it exists and when it is reasonably written.

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#118

Post by roenxi »

b3lvedere wrote: post #76
digi59404 wrote: post #54

Even here in the comments you see people who have read this article and fall victim to the very things it’s pointing out. It’s ironic. Let me add a couple to this list. 1. No amount of knowledge or discussion will make a person accept something they don’t want to accept. 2. To truly listen means to place yourself mentally and physically in a vulnerable state. Because you will likely hear things that run contrary to y…

"To truly listen means to place yourself mentally and physically in a vulnerable state." If you can guarantuee me this will not be abused in every situation ever and/or come back to haunt me, i will gladly always give up as much time as i can to actually listen. :)

Yeah. As phrased it is bad advice - nobody actually needs to be "vulnerable". Everyone should be in a headspace where they might actually change their mind rather than persuade the counterparty, which feels like vulnerability to people who define themselves by their own beliefs. The trick is not to do that; a person isn't their beliefs. People have beliefs, but those can change. They're still a person both before and after the change (which sounds a bit ridiculous to have to say, but by observation some people don't seem to believe it to be true).

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#119

Post by interstice »

> "A lot of people say they say what they mean but actually aren't doing that."

Funniest experience I've had with this is paraphrasing someone almost exactly in a reply to check I understood, and emphatically being told that was absolutely not what was being said.

Re: Stop trying to engineer your way out of listening to people

#120

Post by ImHereToVote »

digi59404 wrote: post #54

Even here in the comments you see people who have read this article and fall victim to the very things it’s pointing out. It’s ironic. Let me add a couple to this list. 1. No amount of knowledge or discussion will make a person accept something they don’t want to accept. 2. To truly listen means to place yourself mentally and physically in a vulnerable state. Because you will likely hear things that run contrary to y…

You must be in a position to be convinced yourself, in order to be convincing.
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