Hacker News Reader

As a counterpoint to that maybe everyone on the team should know who the expert is in any particular area and EVERY member of the team should have adequate communication skills

View on HN

This is wishful thinking at best, companies require practical thinking because reality is corporate suicide. Not everyone will have great communication skills - and as a team increases in size, this becomes increasingly difficult.

This isn't wishful thinking, I work with a 100% remote dev team and communication skills is one of the top things we screen for when interviewing. I assume other remote teams also value that skill.

Communication skills are certainly important. I believe we both agree communication both at an organizational level, as well at a personal level is important.

My point is that as an organization scales, you will have many teams, and teams of teams even. The wishful thinking is that you can disband this entire structure because 'we hire good communicators'.

I don't know what part of the industry you work in, but the idea that we would hire someone incapable of communication at the level of "you should ask Dave of Simon about that feature" seems nuts to me.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com