4 ms·

iirc when I attended there were at least 2 separate communications after acceptance that stated missing the orientation meant you'd have to defer and do a diffe

iirc when I attended there were at least 2 separate communications after acceptance that stated missing the orientation meant you'd have to defer and do a different batch instead. They make extremely rare exceptions for delayed flights, family emergencies, etc but it means they basically have to hand-hold you through a 1:1 orientation to get you caught up, which would be unsustainable if more people missed the first day. A big part of day #1 (and the first orientation in particular) is learning the social rules and seeing example of them in use, and they have a hardline policy against allowing people into the chat system, physical space, and forums until they've learned the social rules thoroughly. If I had to guess I'd say this policy is mostly for the protection of other attendees and discourse in the internal communication streams. They don't want people going all loose-cannon on the internal Zulip until they're made aware of the rules and their responsibilities to abide by them.

PragmaticPulp 6y ago
> They make extremely rare exceptions for delayed flights, family emergencies, etc but it means they basically have to hand-hold you through a 1:1 orientation to get you caught up, which would be unsustainable if more people missed the first day. It's hard to understand the impact of granting exceptions and cutting people slack until you've been on the organizers' side of this situation. It sounds harsh, but drawing a strict line in the sand results in a better situation for everyone. Once you go down the path of catering to everyone's exceptions or oversights, you start allocating disproportionately large amounts of time to the people who can't follow schedules or manage their time. A 1:1 catchup meeting is far less efficient than a 1:20 orientation meeting. Do just one of these 1:1 meetings and you've doubled your time commitment. Ironically, the person who didn't read their e-mail gets individual 1:1 attention and has more flexibility on the scheduling. It's almost like rewarding those who fail to follow the rules. When I handled onboarding/orientations, I thought cutting people slack for missed meetings and deadlines would build rapport and encourage them to be more considerate next time around. Instead, it has the opposite effect. Once you start signaling that meeting obligations are semi-optional and that deadlines are more suggestions than cutoffs, a lot of people start taking advantage of the situation. Sort of a broken windows theory for time management. On the other hand, if the rules are strict and the consequences are clear, people start paying attention, prioritizing organizational order, and reading their e-mails. You do a lot less hand-holding, and you can spend your time focusing on catering to those who follow the rules instead of doing 1:1 meetings with the people who can't or won't read their e-mail. Don't let the tail wag the dog. Set clear expectations and stick to them. Grant exceptions when people communicate in advance (e.g. can't get a flight, flight delayed) or have truly unpredictable exceptions (car accident), but don't set the precedent that reading e-mail is optional because you can count on someone else to fix it for you later.
- gpm 6y ago
  If you value your time so highly that you can't take 30 minutes to save a participant weeks of their life, I probably don't want to be a participant in your organization. My time as a participant is worth more than that. Your claim that a single 1:1 meeting doubles their time commitment is incorrect considering the number of other time commitments involved. Indeed, it seems that they already organized 1:1 meetings that occurred before this. And they had multiple 1:1 (or worse, n:1) interviews. And so on.
  - nikisweeting 6y ago
    I think as the parent comment says, it's hard to understand the impact of such exceptions until you've been on the other side of the fence. I've witnessed other organizations go through this process in the past, where a new policy was initially lax with many exceptions granted, then as the consequences of the exceptions become more apparent over time (claims of unfairness, uneven enforcement, lower attendance, etc.), they eventually make the policy stricter and draw explicit lines in the sand, even if it makes a small minority of cases more painful when exceptions aren't granted.
    - PragmaticPulp 6y ago
      Exactly. Have you ever been frustrated when your boss stops by your desk and asks "Can you just take 5 minutes and do this simple thing for me?" without any regard to all of the other work you have to do, or the fact that the task is really going to take 1-2 hours once you consider all of the nuance and downstream consequences? This is the same situation. It's a "can't you just..." expectation of the organization without any regard to the other people or the consequences for the rest of the organization. And like nikisweeting said, it sets a precedent. Once you start granting exceptions for not reading an e-mail to one person, you'd better be prepared to grant that same exception to everyone, otherwise you're going to end up with accusations of unfairness or prejudice very quickly. Now that you're granting exceptions to everyone, multiply that 30 minute disruption across all of the people in the organization, and then multiply that across all of the different items on your schedule. Before you know it, you're spending half your time working with the people who can follow the rules as a group, and the other half of your time doing 1:1s with the people who would rather match the schedule to their personal convenience because they know doing so doesn't have any negative consequences.

PragmaticPulp 6y ago

> They make extremely rare exceptions for delayed flights, family emergencies, etc but it means they basically have to hand-hold you through a 1:1 orientation to get you caught up, which would be unsustainable if more people missed the first day. It's hard to understand the impact of granting exceptions and cutting people slack until you've been on the organizers' side of this situation. It sounds harsh, but drawing a strict line in the sand results in a better situation for everyone. Once you go down the path of catering to everyone's exceptions or oversights, you start allocating disproportionately large amounts of time to the people who can't follow schedules or manage their time. A 1:1 catchup meeting is far less efficient than a 1:20 orientation meeting. Do just one of these 1:1 meetings and you've doubled your time commitment. Ironically, the person who didn't read their e-mail gets individual 1:1 attention and has more flexibility on the scheduling. It's almost like rewarding those who fail to follow the rules. When I handled onboarding/orientations, I thought cutting people slack for missed meetings and deadlines would build rapport and encourage them to be more considerate next time around. Instead, it has the opposite effect. Once you start signaling that meeting obligations are semi-optional and that deadlines are more suggestions than cutoffs, a lot of people start taking advantage of the situation. Sort of a broken windows theory for time management. On the other hand, if the rules are strict and the consequences are clear, people start paying attention, prioritizing organizational order, and reading their e-mails. You do a lot less hand-holding, and you can spend your time focusing on catering to those who follow the rules instead of doing 1:1 meetings with the people who can't or won't read their e-mail. Don't let the tail wag the dog. Set clear expectations and stick to them. Grant exceptions when people communicate in advance (e.g. can't get a flight, flight delayed) or have truly unpredictable exceptions (car accident), but don't set the precedent that reading e-mail is optional because you can count on someone else to fix it for you later.

gpm 6y ago
If you value your time so highly that you can't take 30 minutes to save a participant weeks of their life, I probably don't want to be a participant in your organization. My time as a participant is worth more than that. Your claim that a single 1:1 meeting doubles their time commitment is incorrect considering the number of other time commitments involved. Indeed, it seems that they already organized 1:1 meetings that occurred before this. And they had multiple 1:1 (or worse, n:1) interviews. And so on.
- nikisweeting 6y ago
  I think as the parent comment says, it's hard to understand the impact of such exceptions until you've been on the other side of the fence. I've witnessed other organizations go through this process in the past, where a new policy was initially lax with many exceptions granted, then as the consequences of the exceptions become more apparent over time (claims of unfairness, uneven enforcement, lower attendance, etc.), they eventually make the policy stricter and draw explicit lines in the sand, even if it makes a small minority of cases more painful when exceptions aren't granted.
  - PragmaticPulp 6y ago
    Exactly. Have you ever been frustrated when your boss stops by your desk and asks "Can you just take 5 minutes and do this simple thing for me?" without any regard to all of the other work you have to do, or the fact that the task is really going to take 1-2 hours once you consider all of the nuance and downstream consequences? This is the same situation. It's a "can't you just..." expectation of the organization without any regard to the other people or the consequences for the rest of the organization. And like nikisweeting said, it sets a precedent. Once you start granting exceptions for not reading an e-mail to one person, you'd better be prepared to grant that same exception to everyone, otherwise you're going to end up with accusations of unfairness or prejudice very quickly. Now that you're granting exceptions to everyone, multiply that 30 minute disruption across all of the people in the organization, and then multiply that across all of the different items on your schedule. Before you know it, you're spending half your time working with the people who can follow the rules as a group, and the other half of your time doing 1:1s with the people who would rather match the schedule to their personal convenience because they know doing so doesn't have any negative consequences.