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Comment by Mc91 | Hacker News Reader

> Is there anything you would like me to do differently when asking questions?

Don't jump on me at 9 AM with a list of questions you have from the night before - I am going through e-mails and instant messages at that time. Wait half an hour, unless it is an emergency.

Like most people, I eat lunch at some point between noon and 1 PM. That's why my calendar is open, yours is as well, as are most people's. This is a bad time to start peppering me with questions.

Also, don't struggle on something all day and then at 4:45PM tell me you haven't made any progress and ask for help. Have this realization at 4 PM, or better yet 3:30PM or even 3:00PM. Sometimes a quick look by me at 3 PM can get you on the right path again.

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Please do jump on me at 9 when you start your day. I will already be done with all the emails and messages from last night and people in other timezones as I started working two hours ago.

Before you go for your lunch send me your questions. I might be eating, I might not. I might be out taking a walk. No matter, send me your questions and I will answer when I have time. Make sure you ask them in an async friendly way where you tell me what you already tried, what the actual error messages are if it's some error you are getting. Give me as much information up front as you can think of.

Don't wait until 3pm to ask your questions. You won't get an answer until the next day as I'm already off because I started early. Timebox your struggling. After half an hour, shoot me a message. If I'm around I'll answer right away and try to get you unstuck so that you can learn and make good use of the rest of your day.

All that to say: do not assume. Ask. Not everyone is the same. Not everyone has the same schedule. What works for Mc91 does not apply to everyone.

Thanks for the timebox hint. I should apply that more often. Realise that I'm stuck, struggling, break and regroup.

Can't you just get back to them when you get back to them? Why should anyone know what you are doing down to the minute?

Seconded. The person asking questions is just trying to get the questions into the queue. I doubt they are expecting an immediate response. And if they are, that’s a different question.

Yeah, sounds like they should just message back "Hey, I'll take a look at these in an hour or so, after I get caught up"

Actually I've told some people "don't struggle on something all day and then at 4:45PM tell me you haven't made any progress and ask for help" many times, and I still get the 4:45PM messages from them. It's not like the idea of telling them these things did not occur to me.

Even if I have a relationship with someone where this is well understood, I still think it's helpful to preface these kinds of blocks of text with something like "Hey, nothing high priority here, so you can take your time before getting back to me"

I agree, I like to start with “Not urgent, but”

Counterpoint: it's okay to set expectations for how you'd like to be interacted with, by your team members.

Oof. Block out time on your calendar if you need not be disturbed at certain times of the day. Expecting everyone else you work with to understand your idiosyncratic system is not a reasonable thing to do.

Please ask me everything at 9am by 10am I will be too busy and into something. Tell me you are struggling at 4:45 and we'll deal with it tomorrow. Telling me at 4pm means we have to deal with it now when I have planned other activities.

That’s a grumpy dev if I’ve seen one

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