In HackerNews, I read yet another write-up on daily standups and how they suck. Periodically, a post pops up on daily standup and how it is a nuisance. This entry of mine is an attempt at importing the importance of daily standups and how it adds value. We will also look at some of the … Continue reading Critique of Critiques of Daily Standups
Tag: productivity
Zen and the Art of Mind Tricks
All of us wish to be in a state of zen. We desire to be cheerful and have a positive frame of mind. We aspire to be clean of bad habits. We want to calm our monkey mind and experience a higher conscious. Let alone achieving these, we find it tough to start. Below are … Continue reading Zen and the Art of Mind Tricks
Designing A Great Meeting Room Experience
This post is a thought experiment in designing a great meeting room experience. This post will not go into the productive ways to conduct meetings but will deal with the mundane yet essential logistics part of meetings. We will try to design the experience based on a couple of simple, timeless principles: 1. Nudging people … Continue reading Designing A Great Meeting Room Experience
Deviation From Expected
Someone sitting at a distance asks for the water bottle near me. I pick up the bottle and throw it at that person. Surprisingly, the cap is not screwed. Water splashes all over. When a bottle has its cap on, we usually expect it to be tightly screwed. When something deviates from the expected, unless … Continue reading Deviation From Expected
Resolving disagreements
When you disagree with something or someone, either you do it because you think your idea is better, or you want to keep your ego intact. Let us ignore the latter and focus on the former where the intention is to let the best idea win. When a group of people sit down and try … Continue reading Resolving disagreements
My View
I was looking at Jimi wallets online. Someone peeked at my laptop and asked what it is? I explained it is a rugged waterproof wallet. The other person’s immediate reaction was – Why would anyone need this? This person has never faced the fury of rain while cycling outside. Whenever I explain startups spending marketing … Continue reading My View
Micro Versus Macro Solutions
Imagine a person who walks from her home to the office. Frequently she is late to work as she takes time to cover the distance. She wants to improve her pace. She goes to a walking expert to get tips on increasing her walking speed. A radical solution to the problem is to use some … Continue reading Micro Versus Macro Solutions
Process Introduction
Whenever a new process is introduced, there is always going to be some discomfort. The cause can be categorized into: 1. Uneasiness due to newness. 2. There is a problem with the process itself. Category one is due to human nature. Deviation from an established routine causes queasiness and a yearning for the old way. … Continue reading Process Introduction
Checklist
Checklists have been in vogue for quite some time now. Probably Atul Gawde's book The Checklist Manifesto kickstarted this. I have been late to the party but once I arrived, I never left. A checklist is an amazing tool to organize personal as well as professional life. Hospitals have figured out that by following … Continue reading Checklist
Self-infliction
I recently watched the movie Hichki. The Plot of the film revolves around a group of kids from less privileged strata of society who get a chance to attend an elite school. With time, these kids feel that the school and the more privileged students there do not give them the respect they deserve. They … Continue reading Self-infliction
Solving Problems
When faced with a problem, the way we should think is: 1. What is the quick and dirty solution? 2. What is the long-term solution? Most of the time, one tends to do only one conveniently ignoring the other. Our mind goes into overdrive and quickly implements a hacky solution and then we forget the … Continue reading Solving Problems
Pay The Price
Obstacle racer Amelia Boone says that she is not able to devote enough time to friends and family due to the demands of her tough training regime. That is the price she pays for being on top of her sports. In the movie HEAT, Robert De Niro says - "Don't let yourself get attached to … Continue reading Pay The Price
Oops, I did it again
It is a packed elevator. Occupants are rubbing shoulders. Stops at a floor. Door opens. A lady wants to get in but there is no room. Annoyance plays on her face. Elevator moves on. We all know that worrying over things that we cannot control is a pointless exercise. We are aware of the many … Continue reading Oops, I did it again
Anti Features
When evaluating new technology, framework or library; a lot of importance is given to the salient features. While it is very important to know the positives, the negatives usually tend to be glossed over. Being aware of the shortcomings of a framework gives one the ability to anticipate problems down the road. For example, let … Continue reading Anti Features
Taking Calls
Making decisions is part and parcel of being a leader. It might feel empowering to take calls, but the hallmark of authentic leadership is in enabling others to do this. The smoother the decision-making process and the lesser the blockers, the better it is for the organization. One route to get there is to create … Continue reading Taking Calls
Context
Sapiens, the book, gives a fantastic perspective of the context in which today's religions, society, and social practices evolved and how in the current context, a lot of these are irrelevant. One of the core ideas presented in the book is that humanity, during evolution, favored social stability over individual liberty because trust was necessary … Continue reading Context
Altruism FTW
Have you observed the way Google maps asks for info about local joints and places? They word it in such a manner that it sounds like you are helping others to make an informed decision along the lines of "Give us more info to help others". What they are doing in effect is appealing to … Continue reading Altruism FTW
Release early, release often
Releasing early and often can make the difference between life and death for new age internet companies. Most of the successful dotcoms like Amazon, Google, Etsy do hundreds of deployments per day. If you are a small organization, your magnitude and frequency of deployments might not rival these big organizations, but it is always a … Continue reading Release early, release often
Requirements
We had an admin interface from which people could download an Excel report. One day, we got a mail saying that the report format is Excel version so and so and it does not work with new Excel versions. The scramble began to find out which version of Excel was used, which version our app … Continue reading Requirements
The disconnect
I used to sit next to the CS(Customer Service) team for sometime and I heard them instructing certain steps to customers to redeem campaign codes the second time. The dev team had put some extended efforts to exactly prevent this sort of scenario, these campaign codes were not to be redeemed twice. Why this sort … Continue reading The disconnect
Hands On Manager
When I was new to the software industry, I always used to wonder why managers and leads delegate and ask for updates instead of being hands-on. This article is dedicated to the young novice naive me. Let us take a hypothetical manager in an organization who has taken upon herself to deliver a feature. … Continue reading Hands On Manager
Appraisals
Employee appraisals are a cause of butt ache in almost every organization. Majority of the people I have known/worked with hate this time of the year. In most of the places, appraisals are done in an ass backward way, where in, during some pre defined interval, you fill a form with all the potions you … Continue reading Appraisals
Collaboration tools
Anyone who has been part of a team, be it as an individual contributor or as a lead/manager, would sense a feeling of deja vu after reading this succinct post. I personally have seen this being played in almost every organization I have been a part of. Having been on both sides of the table, … Continue reading Collaboration tools
To move or not to move
In the initial days, when I was trying to bootstrap the FreeCharge tech team, my team members were always trying to make me move us away from svn to git. For the past couple of years, if you have not been living in a cave somewhere without a net connection, you for sure know that … Continue reading To move or not to move
