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Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

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Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#221

Post by kabdib »

verall wrote: post #209
kabdib wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i was at a startup where meetings were stifling. i had code to write, but i was stuck in HOURS long meetings half the week while marketing and sales types droned on and on about stuff that was meaningless unless we had a product to sell. uh, guys? we have code to write walking back from lunch with my cow-orkers one day, i realized we were passing a clock store. i went inside and bought a not-too-expensive cuckoo cloc…

This is a dadhacker post, including (especially) the "cow-orker". Are you just reposting or are you the real dadhacker? Because if you are, I was reading your blog since I was like 14. Sad it's down now. But absolutely great stuff that helped prepare me for today's industry :)

i'm dadhacker, yes

i may bring the site back, but it's not a priority, and i'm not sure i can write much at the moment without getting into trouble :-)

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#222

Post by xp84 »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #45
dcre wrote: post #9

This is not really malicious compliance because it is not aimed at the boss who ordered the policy. It’s more like chaotic neutral compliance.

I didn't even see it as that. I saw it as perfectly rational behavior - you only need 10 minutes for a short standup, then squeezing it in between the tail end of meetings makes perfect sense. Perhaps I'm a tad on the spectrum which is why I have zero problem with this, either from the perspective of the people who booked it for 50 mins or those who booked it for 10.

I'm completely NT here and I agree with you 100%. Maybe it's also that I've usually worked in buildings where finding a free conference room (either on short notice or even in advance) was a nontrivial amount of trouble. So, using an open 10 minutes instead of essentially burning at minimum a half-hour by starting at :00, is doing the whole floor a big favor.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#223

Post by DrammBA »

gnfargbl wrote: post #210
dunham wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At Michigan State, I had a math prof (Wade Ramey) who would lock the door after class started. If you were late, you couldn't attend. He also insisted students purchase a stapler and staple their homework. And he would give negative points on assignments. You could say "I don't know how to do X" for a step in a proof (0 pts), but if you put in something wrong, you would get negative points on that part. He was a good…

I have a medical condition (autoimmune hypothyroid, extreme edition) which I wasn't aware of, but was suffering from severely, during my University years. Waking up was extremely difficult for me and as a result I was often late. At the time I couldn't understand why I seemingly had a problem that nobody else did, and presumed I just lacked self control. Nope, I just needed (a lot) of medication. Your Prof Ramsey wou…

> Your Prof Ramsey would have penalised me for this unknown condition. This isn't behaviour to be celebrated.

On the contrary, your anecdote is evidence of how this seemingly arbitrary behaviour can actually uncover real issues and prompt people to question and investigate.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#224

Post by brummm »

buzer wrote: post #101
gwd wrote: post #85

> When 2:50 rolled around and your meeting was supposed to end, do you think people actually ended the meeting? Noooooo. Absolutely not! At U of M, they solved this problem by having classes officially start 10 minutes after the time they were advertised as. That is, a class listed as being 10-11am was actually 10:10-11am; nobody showed up until 10:10. Sure, technically it's the same thing, but there's a pretty massi…

In Finland the universities (and I believe in many other European universities have/had this as well) there was "academic quarter" which meant that if something was scheduled for 10am it would actually start at 10:15am. IIRC if they used precise time (10:00) then it would actually start at that time. I've heard it dates back to when people didn't have easy access to precise time. It would allow students to hear the h…

Same in Germany. Times are usually assumed to be ct (cum tempore) and start XY:15. When something starts sharp, it's specified as st (sine tempore).

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#225

Post by llm_nerd »

RHSeeger wrote: post #143
stkni wrote: post #119

Think I'm with Larry on this one. Someone should chair the meeting and there should be some expected outcome (decision) from it within the alotted time. If we're 45 mins in and no closer to an answer it's time to assign some investigative actions and regroup? Malicious compliance in this context is good, because it creates an environment where meetings end and everyone gets to pee?

Not all meetings have decisions to be made. Some are just discussions of a topic; generally to make sure everyone is on the same page.

If we're being totally honest, a good percentage of meetings in many workplaces are work surrogates. Lots of people happily meeting and accomplishing nothing for the purposes of having the accomplishment that they attended a variety of meetings.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#226

Post by cadamsdotcom »

"Meetings" should've never been the term.

There are team updates & all-hands that are one-to-many. They are often basically a seminar so can be recorded, sent out online, and Q&A delivered in a follow up 24-72 hours later after everyone has submitted & voted on questions. any interactive bits the only bits left.

There are 1:1s. These can be in person in a meeting room, online, or taken on-the-go.

Then there are decision & planning meetings; these are what was being optimized.

But if the other types of meetings were changed as above there’d have been no need.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#227

Post by bumby »

gnfargbl wrote: post #210
dunham wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At Michigan State, I had a math prof (Wade Ramey) who would lock the door after class started. If you were late, you couldn't attend. He also insisted students purchase a stapler and staple their homework. And he would give negative points on assignments. You could say "I don't know how to do X" for a step in a proof (0 pts), but if you put in something wrong, you would get negative points on that part. He was a good…

I have a medical condition (autoimmune hypothyroid, extreme edition) which I wasn't aware of, but was suffering from severely, during my University years. Waking up was extremely difficult for me and as a result I was often late. At the time I couldn't understand why I seemingly had a problem that nobody else did, and presumed I just lacked self control. Nope, I just needed (a lot) of medication. Your Prof Ramsey wou…

You seem to expect the professor to give you a reasonable accommodation for an affliction you didn’t even realize you had. If you want to hold him accountable for his (unfair?) rules, you need to first hold yourself accountable for getting the disease diagnosed.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#228

Post by kzrdude »

BurningFrog wrote: post #163
buzer wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Finland the universities (and I believe in many other European universities have/had this as well) there was "academic quarter" which meant that if something was scheduled for 10am it would actually start at 10:15am. IIRC if they used precise time (10:00) then it would actually start at that time. I've heard it dates back to when people didn't have easy access to precise time. It would allow students to hear the h…

Same thing in Sweden in the 1980s

Still is, standard lecture is scheduled for example for 10-12. It starts at 10.15, pause 11.00-11.15, continues until 12.00. So it's neatly split in two 45 minute halves.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#229

Post by mrguyorama »

n4r9 wrote: post #61
malfist wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly how I run my standups. Everyone answers 3 questions: * Do I need something? * What is my _top_ priority for the day? * Am I blocked? The answers for the first and third question should always be "No" because you should have raised them before standup, but it's a relief valve if you didn't. What is your top priority should be short and focused. If you let people talk about what they did or didn't do yes…

> What is my _top_ priority for the day? How do you manage (if you have to) more research-heavy/blue-sky tasks that may take a few days or weeks without linear daily progress? Like, some days may just involve doing some sketches and playing around with code in order to internalise some data structure. Does that person just say "I'm continuing with task X" several days in a row?

>Does that person just say "I'm continuing with task X" several days in a row?

Absolutely. If other devs or even a manager or project lead or someone feel they've been doing the "same" task too long, they should be reaching out and checking in. "Hey, running into any problems? How are you doing?"

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#230

Post by DontchaKnowit »

bumby wrote: post #227
gnfargbl wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a medical condition (autoimmune hypothyroid, extreme edition) which I wasn't aware of, but was suffering from severely, during my University years. Waking up was extremely difficult for me and as a result I was often late. At the time I couldn't understand why I seemingly had a problem that nobody else did, and presumed I just lacked self control. Nope, I just needed (a lot) of medication. Your Prof Ramsey wou…

You seem to expect the professor to give you a reasonable accommodation for an affliction you didn’t even realize you had. If you want to hold him accountable for his (unfair?) rules, you need to first hold yourself accountable for getting the disease diagnosed.

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