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Why public chats are better than direct messages

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Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#31

Post by astrobe_ »

jrootabega wrote: post #4

This is why, when a colleague has a question about a pull request, or my feedback on THEIR pull request, I push us to have the discussion in the PR comments, instead of the pernicious "I just have a few questions, it will only take a few minutes" that always adds up to more time and attention than people claim. There ARE often situations where opening a synchronous communication channel is necessary, but even then, y…

Actually, I suspect some people don't like to write and/or read; for some it might even be stressful. Not everyone is an author, and at a smaller scale not everyone is comfortable with written communication. It is true that is more difficult than interactive Q&R.

Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#32

Post by zibby8 »

jrootabega wrote: post #4

This is why, when a colleague has a question about a pull request, or my feedback on THEIR pull request, I push us to have the discussion in the PR comments, instead of the pernicious "I just have a few questions, it will only take a few minutes" that always adds up to more time and attention than people claim. There ARE often situations where opening a synchronous communication channel is necessary, but even then, y…

Honestly, that does sound difficult. I get what you're trying to achieve, but if I'm trying to land a change, having a synchronous conversation (ideally in person) will resolve any misunderstandings between us on the order of minutes. Having an asynchronous back-and-forth takes on the order of hours or even days. And what do you get for your time? A nice record you can look back on? What are you going to use that for? Most changes likely aren't ever referenced again. Even if you, by some small chance, look back on a specific change and find the record missing, you just go "oh well, I guess we won't know exactly why that was done" and move on your with your life.

Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#34

Post by jrootabega »

zibby8 wrote: post #32
jrootabega wrote: post #4

This is why, when a colleague has a question about a pull request, or my feedback on THEIR pull request, I push us to have the discussion in the PR comments, instead of the pernicious "I just have a few questions, it will only take a few minutes" that always adds up to more time and attention than people claim. There ARE often situations where opening a synchronous communication channel is necessary, but even then, y…

Honestly, that does sound difficult. I get what you're trying to achieve, but if I'm trying to land a change, having a synchronous conversation (ideally in person) will resolve any misunderstandings between us on the order of minutes. Having an asynchronous back-and-forth takes on the order of hours or even days. And what do you get for your time? A nice record you can look back on? What are you going to use that for…

Let's not forget that you can go in both directions. If you capture what you want to talk about publicly, you still have the option of having a private direct conversation about that. I agree that blindly following public-only-async-only all the time is not good. I just happen to think that the balance is unfairly and unhealthily tipped towards the direct interruption pattern.

I think a lot of the effort that people perceive has to go towards async discussions is actually just resistance effort, too. When multiple people embrace it it can be surprisingly easy.

And a lot of times people push the async method because the environment is already difficult -- for them. Sometimes certain team members get bogged down in focus work and want to get that done as much as others want to have a discussion. How to have good conversations in the ideal workplace is one thing; how to have them in more dysfunctional situations is another.

Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#35

Post by dsr_ »

zibby8 wrote: post #32
jrootabega wrote: post #4

This is why, when a colleague has a question about a pull request, or my feedback on THEIR pull request, I push us to have the discussion in the PR comments, instead of the pernicious "I just have a few questions, it will only take a few minutes" that always adds up to more time and attention than people claim. There ARE often situations where opening a synchronous communication channel is necessary, but even then, y…

Honestly, that does sound difficult. I get what you're trying to achieve, but if I'm trying to land a change, having a synchronous conversation (ideally in person) will resolve any misunderstandings between us on the order of minutes. Having an asynchronous back-and-forth takes on the order of hours or even days. And what do you get for your time? A nice record you can look back on? What are you going to use that for…

It is certainly the case that in most archives, most messages will never be looked at again.

This is the price we pay for not knowing what's going to be important in the future. If we knew that, we could mark the messages immediately and have them pushed into the FAQ or the wiki or whatever.

By obvious corollary, message archives need good full-text searching or else they are useless.

Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#36

Post by BlargMcLarg »

astrobe_ wrote: post #31
jrootabega wrote: post #4

This is why, when a colleague has a question about a pull request, or my feedback on THEIR pull request, I push us to have the discussion in the PR comments, instead of the pernicious "I just have a few questions, it will only take a few minutes" that always adds up to more time and attention than people claim. There ARE often situations where opening a synchronous communication channel is necessary, but even then, y…

Actually, I suspect some people don't like to write and/or read; for some it might even be stressful. Not everyone is an author, and at a smaller scale not everyone is comfortable with written communication. It is true that is more difficult than interactive Q&R.

That goes for speaking too, though. A lot of people are bad at/uncomfortable with speaking/listening. This just highlights using one's strengths rather than forcing the usual one-size-fits-all.

Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#37

Post by halotrope »

The fundamental issue is that companies often employ people that are just meh about working. Then it is tried to make it work with tools and methologies and whatnot. If your team is alligned and motivated, they will figure out how to efficiently collaborate. If not, no amound of Scrum BS, ceremony, standups and chat-tools will save you.

Re: Why public chats are better than direct messages

#39

Post by westurner »

doctor_eval wrote: post #21

As I read this, I got the sinking feeling that I'd read it all before. But then I realised, it's just another case of someone thinking that their specific solution is best, solely on the basis that it worked for them, in their specific circumstances. But here's the thing: every group is different, has different needs, and will respond differently to different styles of communication. Some people (especially people no…

Yes, but so is which is best for which situation still the question?

Presuming that information asymmetry will hold over time is a bad assumption, regardless of cost of information security controls.

Why have these new collaborative innovative services succeeded where NNTP and > > indented, text-wrapped email forwards for new onboards have not?

Instead of Chat or IM, hopefully working on Issues with checkbox Tasks and Edges; and Pull Requests composed of Commits, Comments, and Code Reviews; with conditional Branch modification rules; will produce Products: deliverables of value to the customer, per the schema:Organization's Mission.

What style of communication is appropriate for a team in which phase of development, regardless of communications channel?

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