>Basically like having a toddler around.
Unnecessarily condescending response to the OP, to be honest.
Unnecessarily condescending response to the OP, to be honest.
I am not trying to be condescending here, but it's hard to view this behavior as anything but overly disruptive.
https://www.businessdit.com/distraction-work-statistics/
Instead of "just a quick question", the OP could prepare a list of their questions, and ask them all at the allocated time. A scheduled deep dive into the questions the OP has might even be more productive than multiple unscheduled disruptions of others' time.
And in an open office, even if you ask only a single person something, others might hear it too, despite the question not being intended to them.
We are talking about multiple people's brain cycles being dragged out their focus space, we are talking multiple conversations happening next to you, we are talking about click clack of people's keyboards next to you, and people moving going to take a coffee in your peripheral vision. It's a nightmare.
https://theconversation.com/returning-to-the-workplace-heres...
> And in an open office, even if you ask only a single person something, others might hear it too, despite the question not being intended to them.
I guess I'm special, because when I'm in a "deep work", I just don't hear people around me. I know it's not the case of everyone, some of my colleagues just put noise-suppression headphones, which is yet another easy way to solve your problem without forcing others to cater to your needs.
Of course, open space can be bad, and there are numerous examples of crazy open space situations. But what OP was describing is clearly not to the extend of what you are talking then.
For me it varies on a day to day basis. Some days I could focus through a hurricane while others people buzzing around me is enough to make it difficult to think at all, let alone deeply. It averages out to normal productivity but I’d rather have fewer low productivity days, if I had the choice.
Great. Now the rest of us have to put up with even more noise.
People wearing headphones make a lot more noise themselves. Presumably because they don't hear the noise they make. Suddenly there's heavy breathing, sighs, grunts, moans, inaudible and sometimes disturbingly audible mumbling, humming &c.
The "normal" state is to be able to tune those out.
Normally people are conscious about the sounds they make and restrict them a bit. If you're coughing in a group, you try to do it softly, or you leave the room. Things like that. When people wear head phones this kind of subconscious self control seems to be a lot less effective.
I'm certainly not the only one to have made this observation.
That’s aside from tapping I might not realize is making noise with headphones on, or a particular motion in my chair that’s making it squeak and I don’t know it because headphones, et c.
Yes! I believe the OP should write down all their questions in a structured format, and then schedule a meetings with 1 person helping them onboard, where they can discuss the questions at length and go on any tangent, rather than interrupt colleagues ad hoc. That's a normal, grown up thing to do, and it will also help them crystallize and distill what knowledge is missing.
> I know it's not the case of everyone, some of my colleagues just put noise-suppression headphones, which is yet another easy way to solve your problem without forcing others to cater to your needs
I do put noise suppression headphones, but they can't stop the people moving in front of me nor the taps on my shoulder.
> without forcing others to cater to your needs
Not wanting to be interrupted is not forcing others to take care of your needs.If you are unsure what I mean, let me call you in the middle of the night because I want to have a conversation with somebody and discuss economics. You not wanting to pick up is completely normal, right, or are you forcing ME to cater to your needs of being left the heck at peace? How dare you forcing me to have normal boundaries and call you at reasonable times!
No, it's the people who interrupt others and forcing to drop everything else so they answer "just one tiny question" and expecting it to be done on the spot. That's forcing people to take cater to their needs! Hence me liking the OP's behavior to that of a toddler.
Let me guess: that 1 person will of course not be you, right? Because if it is you, I bet you will complain even more.
Also, it's ridiculous to pretend that all questions require deep dive at length. Some do, and, yes, I agree we should do that for those. But what about the majority of the questions? If these questions still exist, then you will still be interrupted, so it will not solve the situation.
Also, it is quite telling that you did not also consider another solution: if they need to ask you a question, you could have avoided that by properly sharing the information before hand. But of course, it's always someone else's fault. (just to be clear: it is sometimes someone else's fault, but your way of reacting of just thinking that everyone else should adapt is just giving me the impression that you don't care about solving the problem in a fair way)
But it does not answer my question: what you ask them to do is very inconvenient and inefficient, as the large majority of questions do not correspond to big dangerous lack of knowledge that needs 3 hours lecture course to be solved. So we still have the problem: why should the company pay for one person being less efficient because of needing to do all this useless process, instead of paying for you being less efficient?
> I do put noise suppression headphones, but they can't stop the people moving in front of me ...
As I've said, I don't understand how people can be in "deep flow" and be so easily distracted by people moving around. People are different, so I can understand it can be a problem for you. But my problem with this reaction is that everything is centered around what is best for you, without any considerations of how it affects others. I reacted because you first mentioned that GP was behaving like a toddler, but in your reaction and the description of the problem, you seems to focus on you, you, you, which does not look very grown-up either, don't you think?
> ... nor the taps on my shoulder
If they tap on your shoulder, you should simply answer, like a grown-up does.
> Not wanting to be interrupted is not forcing others to take care of your needs.If you are unsure what I mean, let me call you in the middle of the night ...
But you are not complaining about being interrupted in the middle of the night to talk about things that is not related to you, you are complaining about doing your job: working with colleagues and sharing information so that they can progress.
What I'm saying is simple: 1) you can be a toddler and interrupt someone constantly for no good reason. This is not good and unprofessional 2) you can be a toddler and cry when someone interrupt you for a good reason. This is not good and unprofessional 3) the good situation is in the middle: you WILL have some level of interruption, it is just unreasonable to expect otherwise and it is childish to ask people to jump through hoops to care to your need to never be interrupted.
> How dare you forcing me to have normal boundaries and call you at reasonable times!
You don't have normal boundaries. Grown-ups at work know that they will interact with other people. You inventing that people should not interact with you, or interact only in your own terms even when it is inconvenient for them.
> Hence me liking the OP's behavior to that of a toddler.
OP's behavior did not even mention if they interrupt people that have inform them they don't want to be interrupted. As far as we know, OP's behavior is 100% compatible with what you want.
I don't mind it being me, as a matter of fact, it's often me, as I am in a more senior position and have a lot of historic context. However, a lot of time has been spent on documenting most things, so often I am just going over the docs with the new onboarder, which is okay, as long as it's done in a structural manner.
> You don't have normal boundaries. Grown-ups at work know that they will interact with other people. You inventing that people should not interact with you, or interact only in your own terms even when it is inconvenient for them.
I don't mind interacting at all, nor do I mind onboarding. I do mind, however, being interrupted all the time, on information, that could easily have been condensed in an onboarding package if the company gave people the space, time and initiative to create such a package.
What I am pointing out is that the OP experienced bad onboarding and thought the solution to that is being in-person in the office. I would argue what they simply had was a badly planned onboarding, with randomly shared responsibility across the team, and an ad-hoc learning plan. If the OP's company uses that lesson and makes a better onboarding process, that'd be great and they might even reconsider the need to be there in person.
> you are complaining about doing your job: working with colleagues and sharing information so that they can progress.
I would love share the information, but I want to do it in a structured manner, and not in chunks and without disruptions.
That's why schools and unis have classes, and classes have predictable and scheduled time frames. It's not just a building with teachers, and random children entering ad hoc and asking whatever question came to their head, then leaving, and coming back 5 min later.
And what's wrong with wanting lots of this information to be self-service? That's the whole idea of knowledge bases, of onboarding docs, of developer handbooks. What does it have to with people being in person or not? I'd argue if the OP's company spent the effort in actually putting all that knowledge in writing, they will have an easier and less disruptive onboarding to the team, with reduced bus factor, and clearly documented steps.
I'm not in sales at all. Having an overview of the different bits of the business isn't a sales attribute. It's just an example of "what your job is" - which might range from weeks of uninterrupted detailed technical work at Microsoft Research, to presenting to clients, to running teams, to making technical decisions and getting agreement, to writing code.
Thinking every engineer's job is "writing code" and anyone who thinks wider is wrong is what the pushback in this thread is all about.
My fault.
> Thinking every engineer's job is "writing code" and anyone who thinks wider is wrong is what the pushback in this thread is all about.
Writing code is not the only activity of an engineer that requires focus and concentration. Most of my activities require that.
But 90% of the time someone taps on my shoulder, they want me to think for them. You can do that by yourself. Just send an email.
We might have the same access, but rather than dig through 20 medical textbooks, I'll go ask a doctor. Access is a really poor way of thinking about things.
> But 90% of the time someone taps on my shoulder, they want me to think for them. You can do that by yourself. Just send an email.
Why send an email when they're thinking for themselves?
It also
1) forces (or at least encourages) laying the whole thing out in a coherent order
2) leaves a record of both the question and the answer, so that the asker can refer back to it if they forget
3) leaves a record so that if the asker is asking obvious questions, or repeatedly asking the same questions, or failing to formulate their questions in a sane and coherent manner, there is documentation to take to their supervisor, not only to prove it, but to show exactly the shape of the problem, and have a possibility of getting them the kind of help they need
You get an appointment. Here noone is against appointments, here people discuss the notion of going to ask a doctor in the middle of a surgery a "quick question".
Because, the act of writing down a question --- with the necessary details to state the question precisely --- is often enough to find the answer yourself. Unless it is simple matter of a missing fact. But that is rarely the case in my line of work.
Some businesses have huge depths of technical content to understand that can't all the memorised in a training session. Nothing difficult can. Even knowing who to talk to about an issue is going to be found out via a question.
Need help? Send an email or make an appointment and he will respond with help.
How is it your assumption that the team member asking the question can’t possibly be delayed 30-45min for them to be available. Seriously? Are they in an active shooter situation and need to phone a friend or something. Lives on the line?
So, according to you, no one would ever need to ask you a question. So, obviously, GP will never ask you a question (they will ask other people if they want to).
So why are you calling them "toddler"?
> I do mind, however, being interrupted all the time, on information, that could easily have been condensed in an onboarding package if the company gave people the space, time and initiative to create such a package.
This is not at all what OP was presenting. You realize that?
> What I am pointing out is that the OP experienced bad onboarding and thought the solution to that is being in-person in the office.
That is not true. Plenty of people are having a very good onboarding and still like to fine-tune their understanding of the situation, which is arguably a very good way to reach good software.
> would love share the information, but I want to do it in a structured manner, and not in chunks and without disruptions.
But that is exactly the point of my initial comment about workflow. When your colleague Johnny needs the quick and simple information X to allow him to finish his code (for example "I've read what ath3nd has written in the doc, but it is ambiguous because sometimes it is, obviously ath3nd is not a god who can read mind and think of all the interpretation of their comment, especially when ath3nd is also not expected to not introduce a bug in the code from time to time"), you are asking him to break his flow, write some kind of ticket, wait for it to be triaged and come to you and wait for you to answer.
Your initial point is that you need to not be interrupted when you are in your flow, and you are now arguing that we should use a very flow interrupting process for the other participants.
> That's why schools and unis have classes ...
Are you seriously pretending that GP that just said "asking quick questions and getting an instant answer" is in fact in favor of not having any structure at all?
In fact, guess what, in a lot of classes, students are allowed to ask questions during some part of the lecture, even during exercises. Yes, incredible, right: some students are concentrating on solving the exercises while others _talk_! They _talk_! In the same room! Instead of writing a written letter to the teacher and wait for the post return so they can proceed with the exercise they have a question about.
> And what's wrong with wanting lots of this information to be self-service?
No one here is arguing against that. Simply, you can have as much self-service you want, it will never make a quick and simple question not the most efficient way to go.
It is just incredible that some people are so self-centered that they cannot understand that asking simple and quick questions is just, SOMETIMES, a super pragmatical and efficient way of progressing.
Your argument that you need to maintain your flow by actively interrupting other people is incredibly selfish and frankly just ridiculous. Also, flow is overrated. If you are in flow-mode, you are probably not doing the hard parts of your job. Not having to context-switch is different from flow, but more important, I would say, but you are forcing that on your fellow developers. If they don't mind, that's fine! If they do, you should respect that.
My point is that we had a situation where at least one person is going to adapt. The person self-centered is the one saying "the good solution is to have the other person adapt".
I'm NOT saying that the good solution is to have the other person adapt, I'm saying "why are you saying that having the other person adapt is the best solution? That's self-centered".
You answer me by saying "you are asking me to adapt to you, so, you are self-centered".
But I don't ask that. I don't force anyone. I'm just saying "why are you upset that this guy is forcing you to adapt to him but think that you forcing him to adapt to you is not self-centered".
I see the situation as very very symmetrical:
Some people needs A to be efficient, some people needs non-A to be efficient.
One aspect of the problem is that some people say "I like A, so let me just do A, and I let you non-A". But in reality, they don't let them do non-A. If you are a team of 2, and that you like not receiving questions but that your coworker like to ask question, there is no situation where we satisfy both.
The only solution is to act like adult and accept that I will do less A than I would have liked, but my coworker will do less non-A that they would have liked.
But here, some are saying "no! I want to do all A and it's to my coworker to adapt fully".
Unless 90% of the questions you spend time coming up with become entirely irrelevant after you receive the answer to the first one