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Alternatively, I schedule 9-2 for every day as programming time. A company-wide policy though would be great, and having entire days blocked on or off for progr

Alternatively, I schedule 9-2 for every day as programming time. A company-wide policy though would be great, and having entire days blocked on or off for programming sounds like it would work much better than my method across timezones. However, having a couple of hours at the end of each day is super useful to keep collaboration with non engineers humming too.

pc86 8y ago
The vast majority of individual contributor developers do not have the freedom to simply block off two thirds of their time at work from meetings. Company cultures differ widely - I've worked places where each of the following were true: - Meeting organizers actively used the scheduling assistant to determine the best time and room for a meeting - Meeting organizers picked whatever time and/or location was most convenient for them and whoever made it made it - Meeting organizers picked whatever time and/or location was most convenient then threw a fit if you declined due to another commitment If you're a junior dev and your lead schedules a meeting for 11am you'd be hard pressed to tell them to pound sand because that's your programming time. Seniors have more leeway but I'm sure seniors at Facebook or Microsoft still probably aren't declining meetings with their boss because it's programming time.
- wpietri 8y ago
  I would submit that a) given the hot job market, ICs have more freedom to improve work practices than they think, and b) changes like this get much easier if they are done collectively. As we see in this case, it started with one team. A junior dev can't unilaterally change the schedule, but they can certainly point out the problem, see if others are feeling the pain of too many meetings, and propose an experiment to improve productivity. And then if a whole teams says, "Manager, we are eager to be more productive, so we are trying X," it's going to be pretty hard for a manager to say, "No, productivity isn't important here."
  - pc86 8y ago
    But it would also be easy for the manager to say "No, meetings are the tax you pay for being part of the organization." I am moving teams at the end of the month and I look forward to suggesting this to my new manager, perhaps just a day or two to start and review the VCS after a few weeks to see how much more gets done on those day(s). I just think it would be very easy for a manager, especially a non-technical one, to disregard this entirely.

pc86 8y ago

The vast majority of individual contributor developers do not have the freedom to simply block off two thirds of their time at work from meetings. Company cultures differ widely - I've worked places where each of the following were true: - Meeting organizers actively used the scheduling assistant to determine the best time and room for a meeting - Meeting organizers picked whatever time and/or location was most convenient for them and whoever made it made it - Meeting organizers picked whatever time and/or location was most convenient then threw a fit if you declined due to another commitment If you're a junior dev and your lead schedules a meeting for 11am you'd be hard pressed to tell them to pound sand because that's your programming time. Seniors have more leeway but I'm sure seniors at Facebook or Microsoft still probably aren't declining meetings with their boss because it's programming time.

wpietri 8y ago
I would submit that a) given the hot job market, ICs have more freedom to improve work practices than they think, and b) changes like this get much easier if they are done collectively. As we see in this case, it started with one team. A junior dev can't unilaterally change the schedule, but they can certainly point out the problem, see if others are feeling the pain of too many meetings, and propose an experiment to improve productivity. And then if a whole teams says, "Manager, we are eager to be more productive, so we are trying X," it's going to be pretty hard for a manager to say, "No, productivity isn't important here."
- pc86 8y ago
  But it would also be easy for the manager to say "No, meetings are the tax you pay for being part of the organization." I am moving teams at the end of the month and I look forward to suggesting this to my new manager, perhaps just a day or two to start and review the VCS after a few weeks to see how much more gets done on those day(s). I just think it would be very easy for a manager, especially a non-technical one, to disregard this entirely.