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> I am however saying that the true reasons when and why it works better are misunderstood. There is no irony here. You provided a deeply dense document arguin

> I am however saying that the true reasons when and why it works better are misunderstood. There is no irony here. You provided a deeply dense document arguing in favor of slides. You're now stating it was more about "oversimplifications" in my post – and honestly, that's not my take away from your document. You did write in favor of slides and communicated they're as, or even more effective of a medium, than written documents. And the document that you provided did not provide evidence or substantial points to back that claim. The document you did provide has unnecessary context and excessive, distracting sentence structure. The same argument you made could be provided in 1/4th of the text. Doc writing is a "tool". If you're not able to use it effectively, it won't be any more helpful than slides or no written material at all. It just becomes a distraction. To restate my point, you offered a document with a different point of view, but the quality of your document, and your statements on expectations of a document (e.g. expectations of using more words) only prove that your definition of a document and its expectations are widely different than Amazons. They're not apples to apples. >There are flaws and oversimplifications in your previous arguments that I am pointing out. >Problems being intrinsically hard does not mandate requiring of a document vs. slides. The reasoning in the middle is important to cover, which is what I am trying to do. You are "trying to do" but you didn't, nor did you outline what those flaws or oversimplifications are. The only reasoning provided was that slides have worked as well or even better for you (anecdotal evidence). What I'm saying is that the necessary information – the amount of information that you must provide for the reader to truly grasp the issue and your thinking around it in 45-60 minutes – cannot be captured in a PowerPoint deck. And nor does the slide deck provide sections like appendices with varying levels of details. And finally, it doesn't facilitate readers leaving comments and questions directly inline. And no matter how you try to twist the slide medium into being more like a document by forcing an appendices section or recording notes manually – it doesn't replace the document writing process. As the author writes a document, they will get stumped on certain topics or struggle to find words to articulate a problem succinctly. This exercise helps the author discover gaps in their thinking and know immediately what areas still need to be disambiguated. >Deep dive is also one of the leadership principles at Amazon. :-) This comment comes off as trolling, but I'll give the benefit of the doubt and assume it was meant in good faith. To force your PowerPoint audience or document reader to actively "work hard" to understand YOU is not an example of having them dive deep. If anything, it comes off as being lazy – you the author didn't care to clean up your document so the reader can focus on the problem itself. Instead, they have to focus on the puzzle you've concocted. If I have to "dive deep" just to understand your ideas, then you haven't adequately prepared your ideas. The mere act of being able to follow your idea shouldn't require a deep dive. Once I read your document and form my questions, the deep dive comes in the discussion when the reader wants to dive deeper into specific parts of your thesis. >Your own arguments are not only non-evidential but also often oversimplified, incomplete or wrong. I'm sure my arguments come off as being "anecdotal". And that's fine. No disagreement there. I think we can end the discussion here – This is in no way a debate. Amazon has the secret weapon, and I'm literally giving you the blueprints. You can choose to use it or not use it. Amazon, an almost $2 trillion company operating across retail sales and logistics, cloud services, entertainment, streaming, consumer electronics, and myriad other industries, has decided that 1 pager and 5 pager documents are critical to its success. And so much so that slide decks are banned for any substantial discussion. Slide decks are only acceptable at "presentations", and "presentations" =/= business or tech reviews. What more evidence would you like? (Yes, this is a rhetorical question).

alok-g 5y ago
I presented my understanding in a simple to understand way here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 The response from you on that comment is not sounding right to me, and so I present counter-arguments. >> For the kinds of problems that require document writing at Amazon, this statement simply just isn’t true. This needs details. I can take that what you wrote after the above are those details. :-) >> Presentations are about the presenter, often presenting as if they are the authority figure on a topic. Not necessarily true, as I stated in my response comment. And you haven't yet refuted my that comment. :-) >> As a matter of fact, they share documents to get feedback and find gaps in their thinking, or seek feedback on how they evaluated alternatives, and so on. This can apply equally well to slides as well, as I stated before. Hence it is not helping the argument you are making. >> The document should focus on the immediate topic, trade offs, solutions while supporting evidence or technical details, design artifacts, and FAQs etc are provided in appendices. This manner of information sharing is simply not possible in any PowerPoint or presentation slide format. Above too is a statement you've made without giving reasoning and which you repeated in the above comment too. Can you please explicitly say why "This manner of information sharing is simply not possible in any PowerPoint or presentation slide format." and why "the necessary information ... cannot be captured in a PowerPoint deck ..."? Why cannot sections like appendices be there in slides (assuming the information has been made short and crisp to fit in a slide or a few)? >> And the simple proof to back my statements — Amazon and everything it has accomplished at what people now call “Amazon scale”. This is literally the secret sauce. >> Amazon, an almost $2 trillion company ..., has decided that 1 pager and 5 pager documents are critical to its success. >> What more evidence would you like? (Yes, this is a rhetorical question). There are many aspects involved contributing to Amazon's success. Well-executed meetings using document-reviews would be one of them, however, that does not counters the points I made in my original comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 I am sure that you do not consider Amazon being successful itself as a proof that document-review is better than slides (that may involve fallacies like hasty generalization, post hoc fallacy, survivor bias, and even appeals to authority). >> for the kinds of problems we solve. Now not every problem requires a document. But many problems are intrinsically hard, and they absolutely do. As you are the one who made this statement, the onus is on you to supply the reasoning why intrinsically hard problems requires documents over slides. I am just questioning your statement. :-) And that's where I have said that the reasoning in the middle is important (for you) to cover. :-) >> You are "trying to do" but you didn't, nor did you outline what those flaws or oversimplifications are. >> The only reasoning provided was that slides have worked as well or even better for you (anecdotal evidence). I did lot more than that, did I not? :-) I have given many arguments, which you are finding irrelevant, but I am claiming to be relevant. :-) Only if you supply the reasoning behind your own arguments would you see the relevance of what I am saying. :-) >> And finally, it doesn't facilitate readers leaving comments and questions directly inline. PowerPoint has commenting feature too. :-) It does not have "Track Changes" feature. I would agree if you bring that as an argument for document vs. slides. :-) >> And no matter how you try to twist the slide medium into being more like a document by forcing an appendices section or recording notes manually – it doesn't replace the document writing process. As the author writes a document, they will get stumped on certain topics or struggle to find words to articulate a problem succinctly. This exercise helps the author discover gaps in their thinking and know immediately what areas still need to be disambiguated. Can you pls. provide the reasoning as to why the same does not apply when an author creates slides? Whether I create a document, slides, this happens. :-) >> I think we can end the discussion here As you wish. :-)

alok-g 5y ago

I presented my understanding in a simple to understand way here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 The response from you on that comment is not sounding right to me, and so I present counter-arguments. >> For the kinds of problems that require document writing at Amazon, this statement simply just isn’t true. This needs details. I can take that what you wrote after the above are those details. :-) >> Presentations are about the presenter, often presenting as if they are the authority figure on a topic. Not necessarily true, as I stated in my response comment. And you haven't yet refuted my that comment. :-) >> As a matter of fact, they share documents to get feedback and find gaps in their thinking, or seek feedback on how they evaluated alternatives, and so on. This can apply equally well to slides as well, as I stated before. Hence it is not helping the argument you are making. >> The document should focus on the immediate topic, trade offs, solutions while supporting evidence or technical details, design artifacts, and FAQs etc are provided in appendices. This manner of information sharing is simply not possible in any PowerPoint or presentation slide format. Above too is a statement you've made without giving reasoning and which you repeated in the above comment too. Can you please explicitly say why "This manner of information sharing is simply not possible in any PowerPoint or presentation slide format." and why "the necessary information ... cannot be captured in a PowerPoint deck ..."? Why cannot sections like appendices be there in slides (assuming the information has been made short and crisp to fit in a slide or a few)? >> And the simple proof to back my statements — Amazon and everything it has accomplished at what people now call “Amazon scale”. This is literally the secret sauce. >> Amazon, an almost $2 trillion company ..., has decided that 1 pager and 5 pager documents are critical to its success. >> What more evidence would you like? (Yes, this is a rhetorical question). There are many aspects involved contributing to Amazon's success. Well-executed meetings using document-reviews would be one of them, however, that does not counters the points I made in my original comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27551350 I am sure that you do not consider Amazon being successful itself as a proof that document-review is better than slides (that may involve fallacies like hasty generalization, post hoc fallacy, survivor bias, and even appeals to authority). >> for the kinds of problems we solve. Now not every problem requires a document. But many problems are intrinsically hard, and they absolutely do. As you are the one who made this statement, the onus is on you to supply the reasoning why intrinsically hard problems requires documents over slides. I am just questioning your statement. :-) And that's where I have said that the reasoning in the middle is important (for you) to cover. :-) >> You are "trying to do" but you didn't, nor did you outline what those flaws or oversimplifications are. >> The only reasoning provided was that slides have worked as well or even better for you (anecdotal evidence). I did lot more than that, did I not? :-) I have given many arguments, which you are finding irrelevant, but I am claiming to be relevant. :-) Only if you supply the reasoning behind your own arguments would you see the relevance of what I am saying. :-) >> And finally, it doesn't facilitate readers leaving comments and questions directly inline. PowerPoint has commenting feature too. :-) It does not have "Track Changes" feature. I would agree if you bring that as an argument for document vs. slides. :-) >> And no matter how you try to twist the slide medium into being more like a document by forcing an appendices section or recording notes manually – it doesn't replace the document writing process. As the author writes a document, they will get stumped on certain topics or struggle to find words to articulate a problem succinctly. This exercise helps the author discover gaps in their thinking and know immediately what areas still need to be disambiguated. Can you pls. provide the reasoning as to why the same does not apply when an author creates slides? Whether I create a document, slides, this happens. :-) >> I think we can end the discussion here As you wish. :-)