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> IMHO Don't blame the tools, it's about discipline I've been seeing this meme lately on HN. First it was "Facebook is a time sink". Now it became "If you thin

> IMHO Don't blame the tools, it's about discipline I've been seeing this meme lately on HN. First it was "Facebook is a time sink". Now it became "If you think Facebook is a time sink that just shows you lack discipline." No, sorry. Lack of discipline might be the explanation for your private time (Facebook). But as for Slack, you DO have to be a team player. If the entire companies uses Slack you can't just not. If people are pestering me because I'm not responding, that's not my lack of discipline.

madeofpalk 9y ago
You still use Slack, but you just be disciplined about how you use it. Mute noisy channels, disable notifications, etc. Again, Slack is just a tool. I have no problem with it, but maybe that's because I work in a company that has a healthy relationship with Slack, and I make generous use of its features to let me focus on what's relevant and interesting to me.
- gorm 9y ago
  You seems to miss the point of this brilliant article. Slack is just a tool but it changes the whole mentality of the organization. You can't mute the whole organization. Please read the article and not only the title.
  - mseebach 9y ago
    The article isn't brilliant, it's a sequence of unsubstantiated assertions, although ones that seem to resonate with a lot of people. But, getting to the core of the matter: > You can't mute the whole organization. No, you can't. And you shouldn't. That's literally the whole point of organisations. If the particular mode of communication a given organisation uses isn't good enough, think about how to make it better instead of just brushing the whole thing off. We worked this out with phones, email and mobile phones. The discussion here is ripe with people saying "if it's important, they'll call me". Well, 20 years ago, mobile phones were given the Slack treatment because it was horrible that anyone could just call you. Some bosses seem to reward underlings who respond to email at odd hours, yet nobody struggles to understand that it's toxic behaviour instead of writing diatribes about who we should stop using email altogether (although people did write those in the 90s). I heard of an organisation where the rumour was that some members of senior management would stalk employees' calendars to see if they were keeping busy. Good thing that organisation was able to end that kind of ridiculous Goodhart style management by ending the use of calendars!
  - madeofpalk 9y ago
    I disagree. My point is, that organisations that are going to have an unhealthy relationship with Slack are going to be unhealthy with another tool just as much.
mseebach 9y ago
Well, there's also organisational discipline to consider. If the company values "being a team player" (as measured by always being on Slack) over getting work done, then the organisation has a discipline problem. You don't fix such a problem by taking away Slack, some other non-productive measure of being a team player will just take it's place -- answering email at night, always answering your phone, playing enough ping pong, being in your seat at 9am sharp etc. Figuring out the correct balance between doing directly productive work and paying the overhead tax that goes with collaboration is hard. Just like no single tool will magically fix it (hello, Jira), no tool magically destroys it.
- fwdpropaganda 9y ago
  > If the company values "being a team player" (as measured by always being on Slack) over getting work done I don't know what kind of place you work at, but being a team player isn't measured by always being on Slack.
  - mseebach 9y ago
    Then I don't understand what you meant by this: > > But as for Slack, you DO have to be a team player.
    - fwdpropaganda 9y ago
      Being a team player is measured by communicating and working together. It just so happens that in some organizations communicating and working together happens on Slack. That was the point of my original comment: in one of these organizations, the fact that I struggle to work because I have noise coming from Slack that I'm expected to respond to is NOT my lack of discipline. The person I was responding to just took a fashionable meme on HN which was originally meant for Facebook and mindlessly applied it to Slack. Not applicable.
      - mseebach 9y ago
        > I have noise coming from Slack that I'm expected to respond It's the external expectation to respond that I interpreted as "being a team player as measured by always being on Slack". Being a team player, broadly defined, isn't incompatible with muting Slack or otherwise managing the noise, and that then comes back to the "discipline" idea. If a person don't mute Slack because they "like" the distractions, then they have a discipline problem, if the organisation doesn't let them mute Slack because a "team player" always responds in three seconds or less, they the organisation has a discipline problem.

madeofpalk 9y ago

You still use Slack, but you just be disciplined about how you use it. Mute noisy channels, disable notifications, etc. Again, Slack is just a tool. I have no problem with it, but maybe that's because I work in a company that has a healthy relationship with Slack, and I make generous use of its features to let me focus on what's relevant and interesting to me.

gorm 9y ago
You seems to miss the point of this brilliant article. Slack is just a tool but it changes the whole mentality of the organization. You can't mute the whole organization. Please read the article and not only the title.
- mseebach 9y ago
  The article isn't brilliant, it's a sequence of unsubstantiated assertions, although ones that seem to resonate with a lot of people. But, getting to the core of the matter: > You can't mute the whole organization. No, you can't. And you shouldn't. That's literally the whole point of organisations. If the particular mode of communication a given organisation uses isn't good enough, think about how to make it better instead of just brushing the whole thing off. We worked this out with phones, email and mobile phones. The discussion here is ripe with people saying "if it's important, they'll call me". Well, 20 years ago, mobile phones were given the Slack treatment because it was horrible that anyone could just call you. Some bosses seem to reward underlings who respond to email at odd hours, yet nobody struggles to understand that it's toxic behaviour instead of writing diatribes about who we should stop using email altogether (although people did write those in the 90s). I heard of an organisation where the rumour was that some members of senior management would stalk employees' calendars to see if they were keeping busy. Good thing that organisation was able to end that kind of ridiculous Goodhart style management by ending the use of calendars!
- madeofpalk 9y ago
  I disagree. My point is, that organisations that are going to have an unhealthy relationship with Slack are going to be unhealthy with another tool just as much.

mseebach 9y ago

Well, there's also organisational discipline to consider. If the company values "being a team player" (as measured by always being on Slack) over getting work done, then the organisation has a discipline problem. You don't fix such a problem by taking away Slack, some other non-productive measure of being a team player will just take it's place -- answering email at night, always answering your phone, playing enough ping pong, being in your seat at 9am sharp etc. Figuring out the correct balance between doing directly productive work and paying the overhead tax that goes with collaboration is hard. Just like no single tool will magically fix it (hello, Jira), no tool magically destroys it.

fwdpropaganda 9y ago
> If the company values "being a team player" (as measured by always being on Slack) over getting work done I don't know what kind of place you work at, but being a team player isn't measured by always being on Slack.
- mseebach 9y ago
  Then I don't understand what you meant by this: > > But as for Slack, you DO have to be a team player.
  - fwdpropaganda 9y ago
    Being a team player is measured by communicating and working together. It just so happens that in some organizations communicating and working together happens on Slack. That was the point of my original comment: in one of these organizations, the fact that I struggle to work because I have noise coming from Slack that I'm expected to respond to is NOT my lack of discipline. The person I was responding to just took a fashionable meme on HN which was originally meant for Facebook and mindlessly applied it to Slack. Not applicable.
    - mseebach 9y ago
      > I have noise coming from Slack that I'm expected to respond It's the external expectation to respond that I interpreted as "being a team player as measured by always being on Slack". Being a team player, broadly defined, isn't incompatible with muting Slack or otherwise managing the noise, and that then comes back to the "discipline" idea. If a person don't mute Slack because they "like" the distractions, then they have a discipline problem, if the organisation doesn't let them mute Slack because a "team player" always responds in three seconds or less, they the organisation has a discipline problem.