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One of my go-to heuristics is: Belief drives behavior. It applies across the board, at all times, to all reasonable humans. The question here: - What does t

One of my go-to heuristics is: Belief drives behavior. It applies across the board, at all times, to all reasonable humans. The question here: - What does the team believe that makes other things a higher priority? - If all / most have felt the pain of lacking documentation when the infrastructure person is out, and they still don't see the value in their own documentation, what's superseding their belief in the value of documentation? - Do reviews consider documentation? - As anyone ever been recognized / rewarded for exceptional documentation? I don't have The Answer. I think you have it / those. The key here is to apply my heuristic.

nusl 3y ago
Hey. Thanks for the reply. Answers: - Active business work priorities take priority over everything else. We have a fair bit of tech debt that we’ll “need to get around to.” - See above. I was requested to assist with infrastructure things to help alleviate the problem as I am skilled in that area, though the infrastructure person mostly silos themselves and I have my own tasks such that I can’t spend much time on other things. The result is that the infrastructure person keeps going ahead but doesn’t include me at all, and I’m not able to allocate time to spend with them. So, no documentation is created and the bus factor remains. - We don’t do any reviews. Nor do we have tests for that matter. The company used mob programming in place of reviews though I disagree that it’s a real replacement. Tests are pretty much broken or aren’t run at all, and aren’t created. So we have a lot of bugs that result from seemingly benign changes. No priority is put on automated testing and it’s mostly all manual. - I’ve been mentioned for being a good help but no real recognition otherwise. Leaders aren’t emphasizing that we create any documentation as part of our typical workflows. The lack of documentation, testing, and reviews comes from the top down and hasn’t really ever existed. The company makes a point to use “boring tech” but implements very complicated software around said tech. I get that it isn’t at all ideal but I’m trying to make a dent at least. I’m thinking the only real way to make it a priority is for leaders to announce it as such ie. It’s active “real work”/business priorities above all else, at the expense of most accompanying things like tests, reviews, or documentation.
- chiefalchemist 3y ago
  > The lack of documentation, testing, and reviews comes from the top down and hasn’t really ever existed. There's youranswer. No one believes these things are important and - surprise - their behavior aligns. If these things matter to you then it feels like it's time to update your CV and look to move on.

nusl 3y ago

Hey. Thanks for the reply. Answers: - Active business work priorities take priority over everything else. We have a fair bit of tech debt that we’ll “need to get around to.” - See above. I was requested to assist with infrastructure things to help alleviate the problem as I am skilled in that area, though the infrastructure person mostly silos themselves and I have my own tasks such that I can’t spend much time on other things. The result is that the infrastructure person keeps going ahead but doesn’t include me at all, and I’m not able to allocate time to spend with them. So, no documentation is created and the bus factor remains. - We don’t do any reviews. Nor do we have tests for that matter. The company used mob programming in place of reviews though I disagree that it’s a real replacement. Tests are pretty much broken or aren’t run at all, and aren’t created. So we have a lot of bugs that result from seemingly benign changes. No priority is put on automated testing and it’s mostly all manual. - I’ve been mentioned for being a good help but no real recognition otherwise. Leaders aren’t emphasizing that we create any documentation as part of our typical workflows. The lack of documentation, testing, and reviews comes from the top down and hasn’t really ever existed. The company makes a point to use “boring tech” but implements very complicated software around said tech. I get that it isn’t at all ideal but I’m trying to make a dent at least. I’m thinking the only real way to make it a priority is for leaders to announce it as such ie. It’s active “real work”/business priorities above all else, at the expense of most accompanying things like tests, reviews, or documentation.

chiefalchemist 3y ago
> The lack of documentation, testing, and reviews comes from the top down and hasn’t really ever existed. There's youranswer. No one believes these things are important and - surprise - their behavior aligns. If these things matter to you then it feels like it's time to update your CV and look to move on.