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We had a daily standup at my first job in apartment maintenance, too. Just five minutes of the whole team there at the start of the day to sync up; but it turn

We had a daily standup at my first job in apartment maintenance, too. Just five minutes of the whole team there at the start of the day to sync up; but it turned up lots of practical problems, like who would be in the shop to receive a planned delivery when most people would be in jobs they couldn’t pause during the day. We have them in software for the same reasons — and it’s a giant red flag to me when senior people treat it as some kind of horrible imposition we spend five minutes a day on teamwork.

hosh 2y ago
I have learned it is better to have a team that has gelled, than to be organized around a superstar or hero developer.
muzani 2y ago
It's not five minutes a day though. Work has to stop before, and work takes a while to start after. The manager's work may take 1 minute to start and 0 minutes to stop, but an engineer working on something tough that isn't well documented may need at least 3 hours. That means if standup starts at 10 AM, people are going to start work at 5 AM (if working from home) or end up starting work after lunch so that lunch isn't another interruption.
- pavel_lishin 2y ago
  So move stand-up to the afternoon, or to earlier in the morning. And if you know you have an interrupt in an hour, perhaps put off that 3-hour-long task until the afternoon.
  - muzani 2y ago
    That's the point. The "5 minute" disruption ends up with the team losing half a day of 'real' work. Tech leads seem to have it worst as they're expected to communicate but also write code. A common pattern is to be available 8 hours/day for disruptions like this, and then work 2-8 hours at night.
    - codr7 2y ago
      It's madness, most tech lead positions suck donkey balls.
    - zmgsabst 2y ago
      > The "5 minute" disruption ends up with the team losing half a day of 'real' work. This has never been my experience across a decade of being an SDE — and this sort of hyperbole undermines your case. > Tech leads seem to have it worst as they're expected to communicate but also write code. Your numbers don’t align with (eg) Amazon’s definition of SDE, where SDE1s are expected to spend 4 hours a day coding (50% of time) and SDE3 (tech lead) only 2 hours a day (25% of time). They literally adjust their expectations to account for the increase in meetings.
      - muzani 2y ago
        You call it hyperbole then literally in the next paragraph say that SDEs are expected to spend 2-4 hours coding.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

hosh 2y ago

I have learned it is better to have a team that has gelled, than to be organized around a superstar or hero developer.

muzani 2y ago

It's not five minutes a day though. Work has to stop before, and work takes a while to start after. The manager's work may take 1 minute to start and 0 minutes to stop, but an engineer working on something tough that isn't well documented may need at least 3 hours. That means if standup starts at 10 AM, people are going to start work at 5 AM (if working from home) or end up starting work after lunch so that lunch isn't another interruption.

pavel_lishin 2y ago
So move stand-up to the afternoon, or to earlier in the morning. And if you know you have an interrupt in an hour, perhaps put off that 3-hour-long task until the afternoon.
- muzani 2y ago
  That's the point. The "5 minute" disruption ends up with the team losing half a day of 'real' work. Tech leads seem to have it worst as they're expected to communicate but also write code. A common pattern is to be available 8 hours/day for disruptions like this, and then work 2-8 hours at night.
  - codr7 2y ago
    It's madness, most tech lead positions suck donkey balls.
  - zmgsabst 2y ago
    > The "5 minute" disruption ends up with the team losing half a day of 'real' work. This has never been my experience across a decade of being an SDE — and this sort of hyperbole undermines your case. > Tech leads seem to have it worst as they're expected to communicate but also write code. Your numbers don’t align with (eg) Amazon’s definition of SDE, where SDE1s are expected to spend 4 hours a day coding (50% of time) and SDE3 (tech lead) only 2 hours a day (25% of time). They literally adjust their expectations to account for the increase in meetings.
    - muzani 2y ago
      You call it hyperbole then literally in the next paragraph say that SDEs are expected to spend 2-4 hours coding.
deleted 2y ago
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