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>I know for me, I solve problems much more quickly when I can walk over to my co-worker's desk and talk it over. Or have someone walk through a problem with me

• wenc 3y ago
  It’s fundamentally different. Barring the fact that it’s lower friction to approach someone in person because you can read if they’re busy (you can accomplish the same with a online status but they have to trigger it or you have to send a chat message asking is now is a good time to talk), calling someone is way more intrusive. It’s also lower bandwidth in terms of communication. Losing the ability to gesture and point and to write on a board in real life is significant. It feels like it shouldn’t be, but it is. > there is another person who is glad that they can get in a work flow without random coworkers coming over to talk about something they aren't currently working on. In corporate life, you lose a lot cumulatively if you’re not generally aware of goings on. People who keep their head down and do their work do ok for a while but over a lifetime they lose out on new ideas and don’t work on important problems. Richard Hamming (of Hamming window, Hamming distance fame) noted this in the 1980s and wrote about it in “you and your research” http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hamming.html Quote Another trait, it took me a while to notice. I noticed the following facts about people who work with the door open or the door closed. I notice that if you have the door to your office closed, you get more work done today and tomorrow, and you are more productive than most. But 10 years later somehow you don't know quite know what problems are worth working on; all the hard work you do is sort of tangential in importance. He who works with the door open gets all kinds of interruptions, but he also occasionally gets clues as to what the world is and what might be important. Now I cannot prove the cause and effect sequence because you might say, "The closed door is symbolic of a closed mind." I don't know. But I can say there is a pretty good correlation between those who work with the doors open and those who ultimately do important things, although people who work with doors closed often work harder. Somehow they seem to work on slightly the wrong thing — not much, but enough that they miss fame.
  • cmh89 3y ago
    >It’s fundamentally different. Barring the fact that it’s lower friction to approach someone in person because you can read if they’re busy I remember being approached all the time while I was busy. I don't think most people are "reading" anything. They are just interrupting."Lower friction" in this case means its harder for a person who is busy to ignore an interruption when it is standing at their desk. >In corporate life, you lose a lot cumulatively if you’re not generally aware of goings on. People who keep their head down and do their work do ok for a while but over a lifetime they lose out on new ideas and don’t work on important problems. I'm not sure how this relates to what we are talking about. You can be "generally aware of goings on" without being interrupted every 30 minutes. >Another trait, it took me a while to notice. I noticed the following facts about people who work with the door open or the door closed. I notice that if you have the door to your office closed, you get more work done today and tomorrow, and you are more productive than most. But 10 years later somehow you don't know quite know what problems are worth working on; all the hard work you do is sort of tangential in importance. He who works with the door open gets all kinds of interruptions, but he also occasionally gets clues as to what the world is and what might be important. Now I cannot prove the cause and effect sequence because you might say, "The closed door is symbolic of a closed mind." I don't know. But I can say there is a pretty good correlation between those who work with the doors open and those who ultimately do important things, although people who work with doors closed often work harder. Somehow they seem to work on slightly the wrong thing — not much, but enough that they miss fame. This reads as generic corporate leader woo. I regularly have discussions with my coworkers and i know what's going on. The 'stop by chat' crowd just doesn't understand how to communicate effectively and is upset that they can no longer use inefficient channels to get information.
    • wenc 3y ago
      I see where you’re coming from but I just have a different view borne out of a different experience. I’m not one to tolerate interruptions well either but it’s not corporate leader woo to entertain unstructured serendipitous conversations (low signal to noise but the occasional fortuitous signal is worth the pain).