4 ms·

> It’s not wasted time, and even if you don’t care what I’m working on I still care that you know so that we don’t spend two weeks building something only for y

by ardy42 6y ago

> It’s not wasted time, and even if you don’t care what I’m working on I still care that you know so that we don’t spend two weeks building something only for you to go “Oh, that won’t work after the changes I made to the core.... why didn’t you come by my desk and ask me “are you intending to change the core code in a way that invalidates all assumptions we had two weeks ago when we started working on this?” And do so like clockwork every day, even though I’d answer no 6 times before suddenly answering yes? I thought the whole point of orthodox standups (and one of the brain-dead things about them), was that you weren't supposed to have discussions at that level of detail.

lovehashbrowns 6y ago
You are absolutely correct and people not knowing this results in a "standup" that balloons into a one-hour verbal trash bin. This is the issue my company has. Daily "standups" that can take 30-60 minutes. BUT WAIT HOLD ON, it's 15 minutes of "standup" and 45 minutes of "parking lot." eye-roll This is every single day, by the way. Our previous manager got the picture and reduced these to three times a week with hard time limits. Then a new manager came on and put daily "standups" back on, after apologizing that he was adding a meeting to our no-meeting day, lol. I'm dead inside. It also psychologically feels bad when you have the same update every day (e.g. working on a long-term project) or if you have no update. It's also really fucking stupid to have a "standup" on Friday morning and another on Monday morning. I'm dead inside. I'm dead inside. I'm dead inside. Also I take any opportunity to vent about these stupid "agile" methods, sorry.
- jVinc 6y ago
  I know this isn't your place to fix, but honestly align with your scrum master and just stage a walk-out of the "parking-lot" meeting for you and the team. You should not be required to attend this. After doing this a couple of times people will realize that there is something wrong if you have to spend 45 minutes a day digging deeper into issues. Poorly planned spring backlog? A non-existing product backlog? There could be many issues, but trying to "patch" them by doing things wrong. > Also I take any opportunity to vent about these stupid "agile" methods, sorry. So I'm sure you've raised these concerns at the end of every iteration at the retrospective right? Please tell me that you didn't throw out the retrospective and the process for venting frustrations to facilitate change and then start changing the process completely and then end up being bad at this thing you are doing which definitely wouldn't be scrum then.
  - lovehashbrowns 6y ago
    Currently, a lot of the members on our team just miss standup entirely. For example, I missed the last 3 days of standup. Showed up today to re-iterate that I'm making some prod changes. Our sprint backlog and sprint planning meetings are a disaster, too. Watching our manager struggle every single time with jira is just.... mind-numbing. We complained about those and did get some changes made. For example, our sprint planning "meeting" went from two 1.5 hr meetings (one before lunch, one after) to one 1.5 hr meeting before lunch. I sometimes miss those, too. I raised these concerns with this manager when they first started (specifically about the number of meetings AND the daily standup). I raise them in the retrospective every time we have one. I raised them with my engineering team manager. I raised them in those anonymous feedback things. We're currently in the process of getting this manager out of our team. Our manager went on vacation and our productivity went up by some crazy amount, lol. The only thing keeping us stuck at this point is the current covid situation (long story). But normally, I'm pretty sure they would have been gone as of a month ago or so. It's an organizational thing, though, not just that manager specifically. Half the battle is getting upper management to listen to our concerns and do something about it. But the reason our last manager was so good about these things is because he had clout within the company and the assertiveness to say "no, that isn't ok."
nicoburns 6y ago
Yeah, standups are for triage. If someone raises an issue then you work out who they need to talk to about that and arrange for that to happen. The details get hashed out in the separate smaller meetings (or 1:1 conversations).
- ardy42 6y ago
  > Yeah, standups are for triage. If someone raises an issue then you work out who they need to talk to about that and arrange for that to happen. The details get hashed out in the separate smaller meetings (or 1:1 conversations). Honestly, I expect competent developers to be able to do that on their own, without needing someone to make arrangements or having to wait for a standup.
  - nicoburns 6y ago
    It can be convenient to have a set time each day. Because it means non-urgent issues can be taken care of without disrupting people while they're in the middle of something.

by ardy42 6y ago

lovehashbrowns 6y ago

You are absolutely correct and people not knowing this results in a "standup" that balloons into a one-hour verbal trash bin. This is the issue my company has. Daily "standups" that can take 30-60 minutes. BUT WAIT HOLD ON, it's 15 minutes of "standup" and 45 minutes of "parking lot." eye-roll This is every single day, by the way. Our previous manager got the picture and reduced these to three times a week with hard time limits. Then a new manager came on and put daily "standups" back on, after apologizing that he was adding a meeting to our no-meeting day, lol. I'm dead inside. It also psychologically feels bad when you have the same update every day (e.g. working on a long-term project) or if you have no update. It's also really fucking stupid to have a "standup" on Friday morning and another on Monday morning. I'm dead inside. I'm dead inside. I'm dead inside. Also I take any opportunity to vent about these stupid "agile" methods, sorry.

jVinc 6y ago
I know this isn't your place to fix, but honestly align with your scrum master and just stage a walk-out of the "parking-lot" meeting for you and the team. You should not be required to attend this. After doing this a couple of times people will realize that there is something wrong if you have to spend 45 minutes a day digging deeper into issues. Poorly planned spring backlog? A non-existing product backlog? There could be many issues, but trying to "patch" them by doing things wrong. > Also I take any opportunity to vent about these stupid "agile" methods, sorry. So I'm sure you've raised these concerns at the end of every iteration at the retrospective right? Please tell me that you didn't throw out the retrospective and the process for venting frustrations to facilitate change and then start changing the process completely and then end up being bad at this thing you are doing which definitely wouldn't be scrum then.
- lovehashbrowns 6y ago
  Currently, a lot of the members on our team just miss standup entirely. For example, I missed the last 3 days of standup. Showed up today to re-iterate that I'm making some prod changes. Our sprint backlog and sprint planning meetings are a disaster, too. Watching our manager struggle every single time with jira is just.... mind-numbing. We complained about those and did get some changes made. For example, our sprint planning "meeting" went from two 1.5 hr meetings (one before lunch, one after) to one 1.5 hr meeting before lunch. I sometimes miss those, too. I raised these concerns with this manager when they first started (specifically about the number of meetings AND the daily standup). I raise them in the retrospective every time we have one. I raised them with my engineering team manager. I raised them in those anonymous feedback things. We're currently in the process of getting this manager out of our team. Our manager went on vacation and our productivity went up by some crazy amount, lol. The only thing keeping us stuck at this point is the current covid situation (long story). But normally, I'm pretty sure they would have been gone as of a month ago or so. It's an organizational thing, though, not just that manager specifically. Half the battle is getting upper management to listen to our concerns and do something about it. But the reason our last manager was so good about these things is because he had clout within the company and the assertiveness to say "no, that isn't ok."

nicoburns 6y ago

Yeah, standups are for triage. If someone raises an issue then you work out who they need to talk to about that and arrange for that to happen. The details get hashed out in the separate smaller meetings (or 1:1 conversations).

ardy42 6y ago
> Yeah, standups are for triage. If someone raises an issue then you work out who they need to talk to about that and arrange for that to happen. The details get hashed out in the separate smaller meetings (or 1:1 conversations). Honestly, I expect competent developers to be able to do that on their own, without needing someone to make arrangements or having to wait for a standup.
- nicoburns 6y ago
  It can be convenient to have a set time each day. Because it means non-urgent issues can be taken care of without disrupting people while they're in the middle of something.