6 ms·
Yep. That realization is a big part of what led to serious changes in habits and thinking about Slack. The stats now are around 1/2 of what they were, and that'
by egid 8y ago
Yep. That realization is a big part of what led to serious changes in habits and thinking about Slack. The stats now are around 1/2 of what they were, and that's in a different role as a team lead rather than a full-time remote engineer.
Given my communication style — basically a line per sentence and (for better or worse, probably worse) the byproduct of IRC — that 196/day average was likely more along the lines of 10 to 15 conversations per day. Probably some number less than half were truly wasted; they were still work-relevant, but the randomization is the concerning part.
- andrei_says_ 8y agoAs a programmer, it takes 10-20 min to fully “submerge” in the context and approach the state of flow. With this amount of conversations, and I presume double the amount of distraction through “checking” slack, entering that state would just not happen for me. What was your experience?
- egid 8y agoI didn't honestly find it ruinously distracting, but it was a handicap. Much of the work I did at the time relied on interacting with a team of developers while I was remote. Slack allowed me to ask and answer questions asynchronously, while scheduling a meeting or getting a video call together at least _felt_ like a greater burden. On average, at peak slack usage, I was probably interacting with it several times per hour, in bursts of messages per conversation. After reevaluating, I'd quit slack for hours at a time while focusing. I'm not really sure how to quantify the impact that had; it's mostly that I've forced myself to recognize when I'm in the zone on work and proactively shut down communication until I'm ready for a break. Before, I'd occasionally get an interruption or reach out to someone and lose some time and focus to Slack.