13 ms·

I'm OK, the bull is dead (2004)

• vander_elst 3y ago
  This might be also a cultural difference and might cause some friction in the communication. If I remember correctly in general in the US it is preferred the style "what; why" while in Europe generally it is more "why; what". If the appropriate style works it's not used you might be perceived arrogant or condescending. Very high level generalization here but I think you get the point.
  • 317070 3y ago
    Yes, there is more on this in "The Culture Map" by Erin Meyer. If I recall, it is not all of Europe that does that, but mainly Latin Europe. This is one of the things I learned moving to the UK working at an American company. Lead with the conclusion, not the problem statement. The style I was more used to would say: "I am late because the car got hit by a bull. I stepped out, took pictures, noticed the bull was dead and someone local came to help out. The police is underway. I am fine but will be a little later. No need to worry."
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• wodenokoto 3y ago
  > I was greatly impressed by Raj's succinct way of giving me the right information in the right detail without going into unnecessary explanations. Did he though? "I'm okay" is a good start, but then maybe "there has been an accident", followed by "the car is fine" or "I hit/got hit by a bull, which is now dead".
  • tpoacher 3y ago
    He never said "I got hit by a bull" It could be the case that he crashed into a farm and killed a bull and now the farmer is about to kill him with a shotgun. Which according to the author is secondary information.
  • aftergibson 3y ago
    Maybe this is a cultural difference but I find this method of communication very confusing. Without context “the bull is dead” is so useless as to be meaningless. I’m OK and safe, there’s been a car accident, I am at this location, there’s no rush. This the most important and actionable detail for a parent. Bulls and their mortal status are irrelevant. This just reads like two robots trying to sound succinct but failing to communicate. Again might be a cultural difference.
    • gostsamo 3y ago
      Quite agree. The example given is bad because we don't know about the bull and we don't care about it. Lots more, we are not given the final details about the accident, so the report looks rather incomplete at the end.
      • philipswood 3y ago
        The example is good storytelling, but bad reporting. When telling a story you want to introduce the maximum meaningful uncertainty into your telling to attract the listener into listening attentively to try to resolve it. "The bull is dead." immediately introduces clearly important information that tells the listener they need to focus, but at the same time makes it clear that more context is needed. i.e the subtext is "listen up important details to follow". For status reporting you want to allow the listener to stop as soon as possible to free up his/her/its limited management focus "bandwidth". "I was in an accident, but I'm fine" would fit his paradigm better. (But would make a less notable/memorable story)
      • piecerough 3y ago
        The example is brilliant and leaving it hanging for the reader is the intended purpose (e.g. a far-away third-party like me reading a team's report doesn't have a reason to care past that)
    • WesolyKubeczek 3y ago
      > Bulls and their mortal status are irrelevant. But it’s India where they are pretty big on bovines in general and their mortal status in particular.
  • j_french 3y ago
    To be fair to Raj (the guy who had just accidentally killed a bull), from his perspective "the bull is dead" is a very important part of the story. It's maybe a question of perspective. His ability to consider his parents' perspective might have been somewhat limited by the fact that he was 17, it was late at night and he'd just been in a car crash which resulted in the death of a bull. I think he did a great job and it's a great story. Glad to hear he's ok, he's lucky! RIP the bull though :(
    • wodenokoto 3y ago
      I didn't mean to criticize the kid, although I can see how it came out as such. I'm criticizing the dads ability to showcase a great example of the "right information in the right detail without going into unnecessary explanations." And I think a big part of the authors choice of example is exactly because it is "tantalizing" - it piques your curiosity because there isn't enough information to make sense of the situation.
  • nathell 3y ago
    Yeah. You need to form a graph of pieces of information where edges are ‘X is a prerequisite for Y’ (or ‘without X, Y makes no sense’), and sort that topologically.
  • Spooky23 3y ago
    Dad isn’t an insurance adjuster. The point of the whole piece is to just get to the point. How the bull met his fate is a story, but who cares. All dad needs to know is Raj is fine.
    • pseudalopex 3y ago
      Why mention the bull at all then?
      • another-dave 3y ago
        Exactly — by front loading the bull, it's saying that this is the next most important bit of info after "I'm OK"
  • 0xBA5ED 3y ago
    Yes, the anecdote is not a good example. "The bull is dead" is tragic but irrelevant. It would be like "Milestone 4 missed. Joel is gone". Who's Joel? Is he on vacation? Did he quit? Was he fired for causing the missed milestone? Is he dead?
  • mrkeen 3y ago
    It's fine. The shorter the first sentence is, the sooner you can move onto the second sentence. Neither party expected the conversation to end after "the bull is dead".
  • Wowfunhappy 3y ago
    Agreed. Personally, I would have gone for: > "I'm OK, my car hit a bull." What happened to the bull isn't the most important information; the author wants to know why his son didn't come home. Saying "the bull is dead" kind of answers that question, but only via inference ("oh, the bull must have been killed by his car"), which is why the father was initially confused. And then "the" should be "a" because the bull hasn't been introduced yet.
  • KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
    No he didn't, it was needlessly confusing and the fact that it introduced uninformed and unresolved intrigue for him and his wife goes entirely against the point he was trying to make. The reason being that: context is everything. When we structure a project status report this way, context is high and the audience desires new information over and above further context unless the balance changes. Starting with "I'm okay" was the right thing to do in context: an unexpected call from a child at an ominous time of day is the context, and knowledge of their safety is therefore paramount. But following it with a riddle about bulls is useless nonsense in the same context. Putting that aside, I didnt really appreciate this either: >Though a bit angry Angry at your son for being in a car accident? Was this before or after finding out the reason for the accident? Where is this context and why isn't it provided in the same structure you just outlined several paragraphs earlier?
• elihu 3y ago
  That sounds like an interesting and useful technique, but he never gets around to explaining how the bull dies.
  • kebman 3y ago
    That's a great observation. Though on the other hand, you can probably deduce that it was some kind of accident involving the car. Which begs the question; what happened to the car, which might even be more important than the fact that the bull dies. This question is of course answered, but IMHO not very well, and while leaving out more than a few questions that might help assess the damage.
• simmerup 3y ago
  I think putting the punchline first will be gamed to make the punchline sound worse than the situation is, so you sound better than you are for dealing with it. What you need is a good culture rather than any reporting strategy in my opinion
  • quickthrower2 3y ago
    Yeah a lot of companies have stacks of these kinds of rules then it gets tiresome. I rarely find a problem where people waffle on too much and if they do it can be addressed in an individual review.
• rkangel 3y ago
  He compares it to the "academic approach" of starting with background etc. But that's not what an academic paper actually starts with - it starts with an abstract that very briefly lays out the whole thing.
  • a1o 3y ago
    Yeah, that's true, a good abstract is usually similar to an executive summary, it's very short and easy to read.
    • enriquto 3y ago
      And a good abstract, precisely, starts with the punch line. If anything, modern academic writing style is guilty of using overly whimsical and exaggerated titles and claims to grab attention.
      • tough 3y ago
        Attention is all you need?
  • sn41 3y ago
    Yup. And in CS papers, we are told to very early on (within the first 2 or 3 paragraphs, never later), to introduce our contribution. It may use some undefined terms and so on, but we should give the reader enough to go on. The "punchline" cannot be 3 pages in. Of course, the rest of the paper is to flesh out the details. There's also the pragmatic advice given to most graduate students: read the abstract, then the conclusion, then the introduction, then the rest of the paper.
    • marcosdumay 3y ago
      Funny, I usually find it best to jump from the abstract to the methodology. Or, maybe pass through the introduction in between if there's any word I do not understand. The only papers I think the conclusion is more useful than the methodology are on the social sciences and software engineering.
• rkangel 3y ago
  I don't use the whole reverse order thing, but I do start with the main point "I think we should prioritise refactoring the scheduling component", then build up the argument to justify it. I'm generally thinking about persuading though rather than just communicating. The consultancy I used to work for called this Top Down Thinking but it's basically just the Barbara Minto Pyramid Principle.
• croes 3y ago
  Sound like the cow Elsa is dead. https://youtu.be/TRZefNEfMgI https://youtu.be/TRZefNEfMgI
• caeruleus 3y ago
  This succinct style of reporting reminds me of how surgeons are taught to report on a patient (to colleagues): 1. name/age/gender 2. current problem (+ potentially relevant preexisting condition) 3. relevant clinical/laboratory findings 4. suspected cause 5. recommended actions 6. If an operation is planned: general health assessment (ASA)/allergies 7. prognosis/miscellaneous notes As a rule of thumb, non-surgical medical professionals have a similar framework, but will report more in-depth and less focused on a singular logical path.
  • pizzafeelsright 3y ago
    Reading all the replies tells me communication is not taught well. We're taught to read, write, and speak yet are not taught to be understood.
• BaculumMeumEst 3y ago
  Yeah, no. "I'm okay, the bull is dead", followed by "the car is damaged but operable" is not an effective way to communicate what happened. The goal of communication is not to force the other party to fill in a bunch of blanks and solve a puzzle to understand what you are talking about.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • wittenbunk 3y ago
    But it is the quickest way to communicate the current state.
    • gardenhedge 3y ago
      There was no rush though
    • Talanes 3y ago
      "Car accident, I'm okay" is shorter and less vague.
  • scrollaway 3y ago
    It is, as a blog post, an effective way of communicating the idea though (because it’s very emotionally charged). I read this earlier today, liked it, and had a bit of fridge logic since. Obviously it’s dumb to communicate a datapoint upfront when you don’t bring it up again at all and follow up with “details later”. But it’s still very present in my mind because “the bull is dead” is so catchy. I’m a big fan of BLUF (bottom line upfront) when writing emails and this is an extension of that.
    • foundart 3y ago
      TIL fridge logic https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fridge_logic https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fridge_logic
• pflenker 3y ago
  This reminds me of the following: Of fictional crime investigators, mrs Marple collects all the clues and then invites everyone to the Great Summation at the end to reveal the murderer. Episodes of Inspector Columbo start with the very act of murder, and the perpetrator is clearly visible. We then follow Columbo collecting clues and discovering the motive. We tend to be like Mrs Marple when we should be more like Columbo.
  • steve_g 3y ago
    "We should be more like Columbo" is a great general rule for life.
  • maxboone 3y ago
    The Pyramid Principle is one of the (few) things emerged from McKinsey that I believe in.
• gcanyon 3y ago
  “I’m okay, the car is damaged but repairable, I need you to come get me.” — doesn’t make as good a title, but a better status.
• JoeAltmaier 3y ago
  In my family the line is "The good news is, nobody got hurt."
  • euroderf 3y ago
    In mine, calling home on the phone, it was "The good news is, I didn't fall on my head".
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• Aeolun 3y ago
  Am I the only one that feels like this article misses the final part? I need an explanation of how that bull died.
  • zidad 3y ago
    Definitely not the only one. What a cliffhanger. A punchline without the actual joke.
  • throwaway201606 3y ago
    felt strongly enough about this that I sent them an actual literal paper letter (or maybe an email, don't remember....) back in 2004 to ask the question. The question was asked in the magazine and the answer by Mr. Kapur was published in the magazine.... but my google-fu cannot find the answer he had posted back then... Unfortunately, I don't remember the answer so the cliffhanger continues. https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567061/no-bull-approach-gets-thumbs-up.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567061/no-bull-approa...
    • Sprocklem 3y ago
      For completeness sake, throwaway201606 linked to the resonse upthread: https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567290/no-more-bull.amp.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567290/no-more-bull.a...
      • Aeolun 3y ago
        Got to love that casual nepotism xD
• marginalia_nu 3y ago
  I think in a wider sense this is good for writing as well. A lot of texts (including the linked one) start with some elaborate yet tangential anecdote and then takes a meandering path toward some conclusion. I prefer to open with a single sentence that captures what I want to say, longer than the title but very much self-contained, and then to elaborate on why that is. It both serves to capture the reader and to turn away readers that weren't interested anyway.
• pluijzer 3y ago
  I learned to communicate like this from an early age. My otherwise lovely father could get angry quickly when he made a premature conclusion from what I was telling. I would for example say, 'I went to my friends and they were all smoking'. He would get angry because he concluded I also smoked and I wouldn't be able to convince him of the opposite until he calmed down. So I got into the habits of telling stories like; 'I didn't smoke, when I say my friends they did though.' and all would be well. Like in the article I communicate on my status in the same way. Though I am not really convinced it is some positive character trait. It seems more like a anxiety problem. With the example of the article I would find it much more normal, and useful, to say. 'I hit a bull, I am okay, the bull is not'.
  • danparsonson 3y ago
    [flagged]
    • throwoutway 3y ago
      > dealing with an (edit: occasionally?) abusive parent. Its unfounded to call their parent abusive without more information
      • tough 3y ago
        Psychologically? I dunno man, if you as a kid have to come up with strategies to -not piss off- your dad during -normal- regular conversation, maybe there's an issue there? Maybe the dad had some issues too, who knows
        • brookst 3y ago
          I think it’s just semantics of whether “abuse” requires intent. If yes, then the commenters parent was probably not abusive. If not and only the behavior matters without regard for intent or psychology, then it does seem abusive.
          • 3y ago
• TheSpiceIsLife 3y ago
  This is nonsense. Raj didn’t even tell his dad where he was. The optimal: “I need a lift, I’m at this address, no hurry, I’m okay, the car needs towing.” By the way “I need a lift” is said, the other party will know you’ve crashed the cad, and that your ok. This comes up again: Star Trek TNG S05E02 Darmok. Something like, “Clive and James at Sleaford”. I’ve ridden the Seaford to Wanna 4wd track on a dirt bike, so the implications of three consecutive nouns would be certain as the referent is the exact same scenario, only the names have been changed, different actors.
• kimburgess 3y ago
  This form should be the default for any async comms. Expressing the core statement up front allows proceeding content to serve as an optional framing, if required. If the recipient already has context they can skip the cruft. This structure is mirrored in larger org settings that use memo's. It's not a new idea, but definitely a well proven and effective one.
• wesleyd 3y ago
  Dad, good news! The airbags work!
• praptak 3y ago
  It's also called BLUF (Bottom line up front).
  • Brian_K_White 3y ago
    But the example isn't. The bottom line is that something happened at all. You at least have to say that much along with I'm OK. The example is actually anti-communication. It proves this itself by being the title, a curiosity-triggering title. That is the result of too much withheld context, and it's a thing that joke writers and newspaper editors do consciously for exactly that effect. If it were actually the best way to communicate this message, it would be a less clickbaity title. You wouldn't feel as much need for more info. "What the hell? Since when and why was your OKness even in question? BULL???" Article isn't as bad as the title claims it will be.
• nmeofthestate 3y ago
  What I take away from this anecdote is that great, succinct communication should leave you thinking "uh, wait, so WTF happened??".
• ZeroGravitas 3y ago
  I'm not sure of this specific example but it's a good policy when you are about to mention an accident/illness/school shooting or other situation where a loved one of theirs may have been badly injured or killed to preface that with "everyone (optional: that you know) is fine but..." to save them imaging the worst until you get to the details. I think of it as the opposite of those clickbait headlines where they try to trick you into believing it applies to you or your family by leaving out details. "Local school explodes" will get more clicks than clarifying it was empty at the time and/or giving the specific name.
• dkersten 3y ago
  In the four parts, surely “current status” is more important than “punch line” and should come first? As for the bull being dead, that seems like the least important piece of information from that situation.
• iandanforth 3y ago
  What happened with the bull?! The author undermines their thesis by leaving the audience hanging. The interesting bits have all been omitted. "James bond survived, foiled the villain's plot, and got the girl" is not a movie. I would hate to have to work or associate with someone who communicated like this.
  • throwaway201606 3y ago
    Jumping in here since this has floated to to the top and I responded to a similar comment below. Felt strongly enough about this that I actually took the time up write an actual literal paper letter (or maybe an email, don't remember... but paper letter , stamp, walk 20 miles uphill to post office works better for dramatic effect ) back in 2004 to ask the question. The question was asked in the magazine and the answer by Mr. Kapur was published in the magazine.... but my google-fu cannot find the answer he had posted back then... Unfortunately, I don't remember the answer so the cliffhanger continues. https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567061/no-bull-approa https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567061/no-bull-approa...
    • throwaway201606 3y ago
      OK, finally found the key words that let Google point me to the comment with Mr. Kapur's response giving a fuller explanation of what happened. https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567290/no-more-bull.amp.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2567290/no-more-bull.a...
      • faitswulff 3y ago
        It seems the author’s entire philosophy of communication is at odds with mine. Would it hurt to communicate what happened? No, it adds important detail. Especially on a phone call, there’s much more bandwidth for explaining “I’m ok” without explicitly saying it through tone of voice. As a parent, the bull being dead is entirely irrelevant. So, “I hit a bull on the way home but I’m fine” would have done the trick without any annoying cliffhangers. Similarly for the author’s lack of explanation of what happened.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• bee_rider 3y ago
  It seems fine for, like, project status reports (right to the point, very nice). In life, I’m less sure. People tend to underplay their injuries when talking to others, right? So in the case of “I’m OK, I got in a car accident” “OK” could mean anything from “I’m totally fine” to “I’m going to have lifelong back problems and legal problems but I’m alive.” Meanwhile “I’m OK, my girlfriend has dumped me, want to go get a beer,” the range of possibilities is much lower. And, if a person has decided to tell me that they are OK as the first thing, then clearly something pretty bad has happened. So, I think I’d prefer “I got in a little fender bender, but nobody got hurt, I’m just going to be a little late.”
• throwaway_ab 3y ago
  I'm ok, no one else is hurt. I hit a bull, the car is drivable but sustained damage. The bull is dead.
• photonerd 3y ago
  The irony here is that the authors example doesn’t fit his system. The bull is completely irrelevant. It’s a root cause of the car damage. Should have been: “I am OK. The car is not.” and continued from there.
  • mattkrause 3y ago
    Or even "I am OK, but I need a ride home."
• yakkomajuri 3y ago
  While this is a fun read, I'm not sure adding "the bull is dead" is actually a good example of effective communication that strips out the fluff. "The car is damaged but operable" is, but adding that the bull (which hasn't been explained) is dead is actually fluff, given it is now irrelevant, and since it wasn't explained, leaves the person on the receiving end confused and focused on this bit of technically irrelevant information (while no more details are provided). Nevertheless a nice read and the point of the piece still stands! Just think the example isn't perfect.
  • spiderfarmer 3y ago
    Like the author I immediately concluded he was in a car accident with a bull and that the bull was dead. It's like a 6 word story: http://www.sixwordstories.net http://www.sixwordstories.net
    • yakkomajuri 3y ago
      That's fair - I mean that's what I concluded as well but my point was that I think adding in the bull is more distracting than just: "Car accident, I'm ok". But, thinking back now if I were to arrive at the scene and not have known about the bull beforehand that'd be quite a shock, so I think I've changed my mind on this one!
    • gardenhedge 3y ago
      Surely noone would argue that communicating in a 6 word story style is a good idea?
      • spiderfarmer 3y ago
        If that’s the only six words you have, it’s not.
    • LodeOfCode 3y ago
      *Unlike the author >Thank God my son was fine, but the comment about the dead bull intrigued me. We didn't own a bull. Where was he? How did the bull die? And why was he telling me about it? >Then he said, "The car is damaged but operable." All right. He had gotten into some type of accident, the car wasn't a total loss, and there was a dead bull (still a great puzzle).
• BiteCode_dev 3y ago
  This is why I always start with a tl;dr for all articles on https://bitecode.dev https://bitecode.dev. There is too much BS out there. Let's save everybody's time.
• ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
  I really like that! When I worked for a Japanese company, we submitted weekly reports in "QCD" form (Quality, Cost, Deliverable). I like this format better.
• Brian_K_White 3y ago
  "You have to turn in your laptop." Way better than "IT is upgrading everyone."
• hkon 3y ago
  I used to do this, however I have now reverted to the "traditional style". Reason being this punchline-first style demands "great patience" from the reader or listener. The reason for delaying the punch-line is to make sure the proper context and information is available before the reader or listener starts inferring the reasons why. Too many times the punchline carried enough punch to completely derail the conversation.
• mizzao 3y ago
  This reminds me of "military style communication" (https://hbr.org/2016/11/how-to-write-email-with-military-precision https://hbr.org/2016/11/how-to-write-email-with-military-pre...) and BLUF (bottom line up front).
• xwdv 3y ago
  I don’t think you really owe people anything to put the punchline first like this. Sure it helps ease some people’s anxiety, but there have been times where I’ve purposely taken an opposite approach, meandering through various vivid details, dropping some callbacks and winding up a story’s tension to the point where people were on the edge of their seat waiting to hear what finally happened. Maybe it’s sociopathic to prey on emotions this way.
  • passion__desire 3y ago
    > Maybe it’s sociopathic to prey on emotions this way. This is why greeks practised Rhetorics. Remarking on the practice, one philosopher said the exact same thing. He said, "You are using people's emotions to weigh in as against the facts of the case."
• lisper 3y ago
  Reporting the punch line first only works if your interlocutor knows what you are talking about. In this case there is no antecedent for "the bull" and so there is no way the person hearing this story could know what "the bull is dead" actually means, or even whether this is a literal bull who has actually died, or some metaphorical reference to something else. The Right Way to report this is something like, "I'm fine, but I got into an accident. I hit a bull and killed it." But that doesn't make nearly as captivating a headline.
  • elliottkember 3y ago
    I think the point of the story is that his son used the process instead of panicking. It’s easy to say he said the wrong thing, but compared with a panicked phone call, it’s pretty good. A process like this helps override the natural response to a situation. People often think they would be cool in a crisis. But panic makes you do weird things.
    • lisper 3y ago
      Yes, but my point is that it's a really bad example, chosen to optimize for marketing rather than illustrating actual effective communication. In and of itself there is nothing wrong with marketing, but intentionally sacrificing effective communication in a piece whose topic is effective communication strikes me as particularly ironic, and it really rubbed me the wrong way.
    • adammarples 3y ago
      His son literally didn't use the process. Status is supposed to be step 2 but he opened with "I'm ok". The correct report would be "I hit a bull but I'm OK". Which is boring, obvious, natural, and not a click bait style headline which leaves us wondering what it means. Whether the bull survived or not is also superfluous information which shouldn't even have been reported at all.
      • torstenvl 3y ago
        "I'm ok" is the punchline, not the status. The status is "police are on their way, car is operable, I can explain more soon (no rush)"
• somsak2 3y ago
  fun story. in general i find it preferable to have a brief TLDR section of 2-3 sentences before an email, and then use the more traditional approach below. i think it can be a bit jarring of a read otherwise -- having a summary on top still accomplishes the same thing
• mhb 3y ago
  If only our current new crop of journalists could relearn this.
• mhb 3y ago
  John was asked to watch Bob's family home while the family was on vacation, included was the dog, the cat and Bob's Grandma. After the first week, Bob called home and asked how things were going. John replied "Everything is okay, except the cat died." Bob says "Couldn't you be more diplomatic?" John asks "What do you mean?" Bob replies "Well, if I ask how the cat is, say the cat's on the roof" then the next time, you could tell me it died" The next week, Bob calls, John answers and after a short discussion, Bob asks how his Grandma is doing. John replies "She's on the roof"
• kvmet 3y ago
  I have a different but related rule for emails: Only one important thing per email and it has to be as close to the top as possible. If you're sending a list of questions, put them in priority order and don't be surprised if only the first one gets answered. Also avoid making statements on anything debatable if focusing on that will give them an excuse to ignore the rest. For example I was talking to my doctor's office asking if they could move my appointment to some time in the next two weeks rather than the 15th (8 weeks away at the time). The response I got was, "Your appointment is on the 12th." And then they stopped responding.
• bryancoxwell 3y ago
  This is an incredibly weird way to interact with people outside of work.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• sailfast 3y ago
  Don’t waste your time. Title is clickbait. Find the norms that work for you and your team.
• Scubabear68 3y ago
  I have seen this style work really well when it is practiced in a safe environment. By “safe”, I mean everyone is striving for transparency, you don’t shoot the messenger, and you support each other (not back stab). This can go off the rails quickly if it collides with other groups that are not as safe and have serious issues. In these more common environments, successful people learn the delicate balance of what to say, what not to say, and what order to say it in.
• kylezgq 3y ago
  I'm curious about why an article from 2004, is being discussed by so many people at this current point in time?
  • firefoxd 3y ago
    That's the beauty of writing a timeless article.
• firefoxd 3y ago
  A lot of people ask about the bull. But if you take it as a metaphor for status update, it does translate well. Whether he explains the situation about the bull or not, does not matter, the next action is to have someone pick him up. That's the only thing they can do. The bull story is just extra information. In the status update, when my devs tell me the new api failed, my role is to check the results and figure out if we need an alternative. The product owner and scrum master do not need to know those results, in fact they can move on to the next status update. The person who can help is informed. The challenges I face in a daily stand up are: 1. The developer trying to over explain their current situation. 2. The non devs asking questions trying to fully understand a situation that is irrelevant to them. i.e. why is the bull dead. 3. The dev keeping their mouth shut for fear of being interrogated.
  • kouru225 3y ago
    Ngl sounds like it’s really boring to work there. No one ever learns from other sections? That’s boring.
  • another-dave 3y ago
    > The non devs asking questions trying to fully understand a situation that is irrelevant to them. i.e. why is the bull dead. That kinda shows that it isn't a good metaphor, because if the bull is irrelevant & dragging people off on a tangent it shouldn't be mentioned at all
• lwhi 3y ago
  This is all very well, but not providing us with the details of why the bull was dead is just plain mean.
• unosama 3y ago
  "The bull is dead" is completely useless information. This story seems to be an example of poor parenting to me... There is a time and place for conveying information quickly and concisely, and there is a time and a place for storytelling and human connection. Seems the latter has been lost on this child's upbringing.
  • bastawhiz 3y ago
    I mean, is it useless? You crash your car into a bull in the road. Your okay. The car is damaged. The bull is dead. The receiver of the information in this case already knew something was wrong. The most important detail came first: I'm okay. Nothing wrong with this. Some folks might say the second most important piece of information is "the car is damaged" but really it doesn't matter. One might wonder how damaged. This detail doesn't reinforce the first piece of information. And the extent of the damage is important at that moment. "The bull is dead" might seem unimportant, but it gets across the worst outcome from what's transpired. And in fact, it implies that the car is damaged. Maybe more relatable if you're in North America: if your child called you and says "I'm okay, but the deer is dead" that actually does a perfect job of summarizing exactly what happened. It's an unusual situation that a bull got hit by a car, but it's plausible. When you've been in an accident, trying to explain everything over the phone often isn't the best thing to do, especially if the authorities are trying to take a statement or you're getting your vehicle towed. Arguably, it's bad parenting to dwell on really any other details besides "where are you?" or "do you need anything?" Like I'm really struggling to think of another thing the kid could have said that would have been more efficient or would have made the outcome better. "The bull is dead" leaves you with questions but frankly none of the questions really matter, and the information that it conveys is exactly what I'd want to get across.
• smeej 3y ago
  I used to do this with questions at work, but I realized nobody actually read to the end. My format was: --- *Question.* I previously thought the answer was X, but X is not working. I have tried troubleshooting steps A, B, C, D, and E, with A1, B1 (etc.) results. --- EVERY SINGLE TIME, the sequence of replies would be, "The answer is X." No, it isn't. I thought it was, but it doesn't work, as mentioned in the initial post. "You need to try A." I already tried A. My results are in the initial post. "What about B?" I also tried B. My results are in the initial post. "C? D? E?" :facepalm: Please read the initial post. I wrote it for a reason.
• xivzgrev 3y ago
  I’m ok the bull is dead? Maybe it calmed the author down but not me. A much better punchline is “Im ok, I got into a car accident, I hit a bull and wrecked the car”