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> You confidently redirect them to the proper channel. For example I often respond to chat messages that are not urgent with a simple “Thanks, please email this

> You confidently redirect them to the proper channel. For example I often respond to chat messages that are not urgent with a simple “Thanks, please email this to me and I’ll take a look.” Cut to me, in my house, flipping off your Slack message. Respond, or mark as unread, don't confidently ask me to do extra, completely redundant work for you.

lazyasciiart 2y ago
You’re the one asking him a question. Why do you even think you are owed a response?
- karaterobot 2y ago
  I'm tempted not to respond.
alexwebb2 2y ago
Yeah, this jumped out to me as especially insane. That's what the Save feature is for! When someone Slacks me something that's clearly non-urgent, I just hit Save on it and come back to it later. No big deal. It's actually a wildly useful and probably underutilized feature. Requiring others to message you _just so_ to match your own particular idiosyncrasies, because you insist on bending reality to your will rather than working in the same plane as everyone else, makes for a colleague that others dread interacting with.
- mattw2121 2y ago
  Why do your idiosyncrasies trump his?
  - kmoser 2y ago
    Your question raises the important point that communication involves constant negotiation of different attributes (time, medium of preference, tone, etc.). Those who are good at it will read the room, and sometimes make exceptions so they don't come across as draconian or out of touch. Did somebody gently redirect you to email instead of Slack when you felt Slack was your medium of choice? You can always respond with, "Sorry, email doesn't work for me because [reasons], please reply here, thanks!" Everything is a negotiation. Get good at negotiating and these issues become trivial.
- throw272834 2y ago
  At most of the companies I've worked at, requests need to be submitted to a Ticketing system and we're told to remind people to submit a ticket if they didn't. Looks like the author has a similar approach.
pxc 2y ago
I strongly prefer realtime chat platforms, so I encourage people to DM me rather than email me as much as possible. But I could hardly begrudge someone making the opposite request!
ajfriend 2y ago
If you're asking someone for help, it would be nice if you asked in a way that's most convenient for them.
- Spivak 2y ago
  If you are coworkers and your office uses Slack then you're just being a dick. This is one of those cultural norm things that would be normal if it was the Discord of an OSS project -- hey we don't do support here, email project@dev.omg.lol but rude in an office. If you don't like the office norm of Slack and wish it was email then too bad, same if it was the other way around too. It's now your problem to bridge Slack->email or email->Slack.
  - Cyphase 2y ago
    Do you know details about the norms at Meta, where the author is the CTO?
    - Spivak 2y ago
      Ma'am this is Wendy's. We're talking about an article where someone is holding up their behavior as an example to others -- behavior that for nearly every office you can only get away with if you're the CTO. And even then it's probably still a dick move, but you can be a dick when you're the CTO. This is terrible woefully out-of-touch advice if the audience is anything other than executives who have enough clout to make the world move around them. If you're one of those people that is important enough that you can make everyone who wants to talk to you use your preferred communication medium then this might be actionable advice for you. I swear we as a society didn't understand, didn't value the work administrative assistants and secretaries did (organizing all your communication being one of them) and we've been trying and failing to replace them ever since.
  - DANmode 2y ago
    No - you're expecting a busy person to stop - now - and create a calendar or to do item indicating when they're able they should help you, or risk forgetting to help you. ...or needing to scroll back through hours/days of messsges (ones that actually could be immediately answered or discussed, hopefully), to find all the times they've agreed to help someone, instead of you putting your (intricate, and/or technical request, from the context) into an email, ticket, or whatever you've all agreed upon. I think that is the inflection point. If you don't have a system in place, as an org, many people just don't think about it - find the closest, easiest text box, Send-Tweet. Or holler across the aisle of cubes at someone who is trying to concentrate...
Cyphase 2y ago
A bit lower in the article he says: > If someone sends me a chat that isn’t time sensitive, I redirect them to email Also, to parent and siblings: does it change your mind if you factor in that the author is CTO at Meta? Not in a simpering "ooh he's so important" way, in a practical "he gets a lot of communication and having a system helps" way.
- karaterobot 2y ago
  I'm the parent commenter. No, it doesn't make a difference in this case. The "mark as unread" feature in every chat program takes less time to use than it does to tell someone to paste the same text they've already written into an email. The time it takes to ask is effectively time lost on the CTO's part, and the time it takes to resend the message via email is time lost on the worker's part. If the CTO wants to convey the message that, in the future, such requests should come through email in the first place, it's still better to wait, then respond through Slack, and then leave a note about protocol in the future. Why is it better? Because they're leaving this note when they aren't so busy, rather than interrupting whatever they were doing to write it.
  - ottumm 2y ago
    If I was working with someone who had been working in the organization for 18 years and was also the CTO, and they replied promptly with a better communication channel to use, I would personally really appreciate that.
    - bravetraveler 2y ago
      I feel you have an inflated sense of CTOs or I've somehow snuck into circles I really shouldn't be hanging out in! They're people. Get them out of the ivory tower! Not to imply I have a Rolodex full of these types, but I'm on first name basis with at least three. I'm just an SRE/Architect. Whoopee! The CTOs in my paths all have managed to exist among us peons creating that information. I find the idea of them being overwhelmed with it hilarious. We're supposed to believe they're so busy they can't answer your question right now, but they can later - if only you ask them somewhere else? No. Ridiculous performative exercise. Being so particular to begin with is probably why they have to be so particular. If anything, those I've known had to go fishing for the truth! They spend/t time with people. Those layers between pose a challenge. I guess there's some advantage in being the firefighter... the CTOs want to know the sore spots, my positions would know. I'd be amenable if the suggestion was to post the question in the open for everyone to hear/see. Or open a ticket for a question that's really a project. Going from DM to email is simply bikeshedding. Just a footnote, I'm a totally random person - not the original poster
gav 2y ago
I make heavy use of Slack's Later feature as due to timezone differences the first half of my day is significantly busier than the second. Asking people to move to email feels like a passive aggressive way to add enough friction to discourage question asking.
choppaface 2y ago
The blog author is a very early facebook employee, the current head of the metaverse division, and one of the self-proclaimed inventors of News Feed. (I’ve seen five different ex-fb people claim they invented News Feed so who knows?) Given the author’s net worth and close relationship with zuck, this line from the post (and the whole post honestly) is his way of telling you how he’s going to dictate communication processes. So there are lots of things that might sound reasonable or interesting but at the end of the day the author just rabidly wants to monetize you.
rendall 2y ago
Seems to me Slack has a plugin or two that can email Slack messages. If it's a big enough issue, install one of those?

lazyasciiart 2y ago

You’re the one asking him a question. Why do you even think you are owed a response?

karaterobot 2y ago
I'm tempted not to respond.

alexwebb2 2y ago

Yeah, this jumped out to me as especially insane. That's what the Save feature is for! When someone Slacks me something that's clearly non-urgent, I just hit Save on it and come back to it later. No big deal. It's actually a wildly useful and probably underutilized feature. Requiring others to message you _just so_ to match your own particular idiosyncrasies, because you insist on bending reality to your will rather than working in the same plane as everyone else, makes for a colleague that others dread interacting with.

mattw2121 2y ago
Why do your idiosyncrasies trump his?
- kmoser 2y ago
  Your question raises the important point that communication involves constant negotiation of different attributes (time, medium of preference, tone, etc.). Those who are good at it will read the room, and sometimes make exceptions so they don't come across as draconian or out of touch. Did somebody gently redirect you to email instead of Slack when you felt Slack was your medium of choice? You can always respond with, "Sorry, email doesn't work for me because [reasons], please reply here, thanks!" Everything is a negotiation. Get good at negotiating and these issues become trivial.
throw272834 2y ago
At most of the companies I've worked at, requests need to be submitted to a Ticketing system and we're told to remind people to submit a ticket if they didn't. Looks like the author has a similar approach.

pxc 2y ago

I strongly prefer realtime chat platforms, so I encourage people to DM me rather than email me as much as possible. But I could hardly begrudge someone making the opposite request!

ajfriend 2y ago

If you're asking someone for help, it would be nice if you asked in a way that's most convenient for them.

Spivak 2y ago
If you are coworkers and your office uses Slack then you're just being a dick. This is one of those cultural norm things that would be normal if it was the Discord of an OSS project -- hey we don't do support here, email project@dev.omg.lol but rude in an office. If you don't like the office norm of Slack and wish it was email then too bad, same if it was the other way around too. It's now your problem to bridge Slack->email or email->Slack.
- Cyphase 2y ago
  Do you know details about the norms at Meta, where the author is the CTO?
  - Spivak 2y ago
    Ma'am this is Wendy's. We're talking about an article where someone is holding up their behavior as an example to others -- behavior that for nearly every office you can only get away with if you're the CTO. And even then it's probably still a dick move, but you can be a dick when you're the CTO. This is terrible woefully out-of-touch advice if the audience is anything other than executives who have enough clout to make the world move around them. If you're one of those people that is important enough that you can make everyone who wants to talk to you use your preferred communication medium then this might be actionable advice for you. I swear we as a society didn't understand, didn't value the work administrative assistants and secretaries did (organizing all your communication being one of them) and we've been trying and failing to replace them ever since.
- DANmode 2y ago
  No - you're expecting a busy person to stop - now - and create a calendar or to do item indicating when they're able they should help you, or risk forgetting to help you. ...or needing to scroll back through hours/days of messsges (ones that actually could be immediately answered or discussed, hopefully), to find all the times they've agreed to help someone, instead of you putting your (intricate, and/or technical request, from the context) into an email, ticket, or whatever you've all agreed upon. I think that is the inflection point. If you don't have a system in place, as an org, many people just don't think about it - find the closest, easiest text box, Send-Tweet. Or holler across the aisle of cubes at someone who is trying to concentrate...

Cyphase 2y ago

A bit lower in the article he says: > If someone sends me a chat that isn’t time sensitive, I redirect them to email Also, to parent and siblings: does it change your mind if you factor in that the author is CTO at Meta? Not in a simpering "ooh he's so important" way, in a practical "he gets a lot of communication and having a system helps" way.

karaterobot 2y ago
I'm the parent commenter. No, it doesn't make a difference in this case. The "mark as unread" feature in every chat program takes less time to use than it does to tell someone to paste the same text they've already written into an email. The time it takes to ask is effectively time lost on the CTO's part, and the time it takes to resend the message via email is time lost on the worker's part. If the CTO wants to convey the message that, in the future, such requests should come through email in the first place, it's still better to wait, then respond through Slack, and then leave a note about protocol in the future. Why is it better? Because they're leaving this note when they aren't so busy, rather than interrupting whatever they were doing to write it.
- ottumm 2y ago
  If I was working with someone who had been working in the organization for 18 years and was also the CTO, and they replied promptly with a better communication channel to use, I would personally really appreciate that.
  - bravetraveler 2y ago
    I feel you have an inflated sense of CTOs or I've somehow snuck into circles I really shouldn't be hanging out in! They're people. Get them out of the ivory tower! Not to imply I have a Rolodex full of these types, but I'm on first name basis with at least three. I'm just an SRE/Architect. Whoopee! The CTOs in my paths all have managed to exist among us peons creating that information. I find the idea of them being overwhelmed with it hilarious. We're supposed to believe they're so busy they can't answer your question right now, but they can later - if only you ask them somewhere else? No. Ridiculous performative exercise. Being so particular to begin with is probably why they have to be so particular. If anything, those I've known had to go fishing for the truth! They spend/t time with people. Those layers between pose a challenge. I guess there's some advantage in being the firefighter... the CTOs want to know the sore spots, my positions would know. I'd be amenable if the suggestion was to post the question in the open for everyone to hear/see. Or open a ticket for a question that's really a project. Going from DM to email is simply bikeshedding. Just a footnote, I'm a totally random person - not the original poster

gav 2y ago

I make heavy use of Slack's Later feature as due to timezone differences the first half of my day is significantly busier than the second. Asking people to move to email feels like a passive aggressive way to add enough friction to discourage question asking.

choppaface 2y ago

The blog author is a very early facebook employee, the current head of the metaverse division, and one of the self-proclaimed inventors of News Feed. (I’ve seen five different ex-fb people claim they invented News Feed so who knows?) Given the author’s net worth and close relationship with zuck, this line from the post (and the whole post honestly) is his way of telling you how he’s going to dictate communication processes. So there are lots of things that might sound reasonable or interesting but at the end of the day the author just rabidly wants to monetize you.

rendall 2y ago

Seems to me Slack has a plugin or two that can email Slack messages. If it's a big enough issue, install one of those?