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There’s some value in capturing these conversations for the record. If eg the engineer engaged in these conversations decided to leave, it would preserve the re

by pm90 6y ago

There’s some value in capturing these conversations for the record. If eg the engineer engaged in these conversations decided to leave, it would preserve the record for the person replacing them. I do agree that if this process is used to score political points though, then it loses all value. Maybe a compromise is to capture the summary of these conversations somewhere. But honestly if an org has become this political.... I would start looking elsewhere.

TedDoesntTalk 6y ago
> If eg the engineer engaged in these conversations decided to leave, it would preserve the record for the person replacing them. How many of those recordings are ever played back? None, in my experience.
- pm90 6y ago
  I was referring primarily to slack conversations. Usually when searching for a unfamiliar service or tool, I first do a slack search, then look at a KB/Wiki, then at code etc. Public slack threads are pretty great since you can follow the decision making process when solving problems. Great slack threads may even include data on what the author tried/didn’t try etc. I agree with you that video recordings are for the most part useless. Until we find a way to get high quality automatic transcription of videos and add them to a good search index, they will have limited use.
andirk 6y ago
The idea of capturing ppl's conversations is weird. Details of that work are captured in the project stories and version control commits.
- pm90 6y ago
  In a perfect world yes. But the majority of JIRA stories that I’ve come across often don’t contain complete information. The best, well disciplined folks recognize that they will inevitably forget details and write careful summaries, most people write a few bullet point to satisfy the acceptance criteria for the story. Slack conversations often contain more data. It’s also easier for me to follow a human conversation than a poorly written summary with many missing details.
- PeterisP 6y ago
  There's a big difference between internal work and external work, where that discussion can matter a lot in antagonistic disputes (in court or outside of it) over whether a particular change (and its consequences) was requested or not, and if so, by whom and when.

by pm90 6y ago

TedDoesntTalk 6y ago

> If eg the engineer engaged in these conversations decided to leave, it would preserve the record for the person replacing them. How many of those recordings are ever played back? None, in my experience.

pm90 6y ago
I was referring primarily to slack conversations. Usually when searching for a unfamiliar service or tool, I first do a slack search, then look at a KB/Wiki, then at code etc. Public slack threads are pretty great since you can follow the decision making process when solving problems. Great slack threads may even include data on what the author tried/didn’t try etc. I agree with you that video recordings are for the most part useless. Until we find a way to get high quality automatic transcription of videos and add them to a good search index, they will have limited use.

andirk 6y ago

The idea of capturing ppl's conversations is weird. Details of that work are captured in the project stories and version control commits.

pm90 6y ago
In a perfect world yes. But the majority of JIRA stories that I’ve come across often don’t contain complete information. The best, well disciplined folks recognize that they will inevitably forget details and write careful summaries, most people write a few bullet point to satisfy the acceptance criteria for the story. Slack conversations often contain more data. It’s also easier for me to follow a human conversation than a poorly written summary with many missing details.
PeterisP 6y ago
There's a big difference between internal work and external work, where that discussion can matter a lot in antagonistic disputes (in court or outside of it) over whether a particular change (and its consequences) was requested or not, and if so, by whom and when.