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Comment by morbicer | Hacker News Reader

I assume crit is a short for criticism/critic.

While the technique seems good the article is so full of fluff it's borderline unreadable.

Yea agreed. I just wanted to find out what an "eng crit" was and why Figma enjoyed using them. Just couldn't get through the fluff to anything of substance in time, gave up.

Given what Figma is, I believe the phrase comes from 'design crit' which is more established in design circles.

I enjoyed thinking about how Figma engineers feedback with engineering critical hits.

I'd like to think the engineers are delivering the critical hits rather than receiving them, but alas, it seems like of the two, only "receiving" critical hits would actually constitute "feedback".

I was thinking critique, and it turns out to actually be linked in the article.

https://www.figma.com/blog/design-critiques-at-figma/

These articles are usually considered an ad for recruitment purposes and aren't really given much budget/time beyond that goal.

Essentially.. Hey everyone! We built this tool - FigJam - and we use it, and it's amazing and a game changer. (Please buy FigJam)

They seem more like a deterrent for potential recruitees. ;)

Probably could've made this slightly earlier, but it's in the second paragraph:

> This was the genesis of Figma’s engineering critiques, dedicated time for the engineering team to brainstorm novel approaches to technical problems, get feedback on existing work, and unblock each other.

It's actually short for "critique" and it comes from the world of art and design. A crit is a standard practice in which artists/designers get together to share their work in progress and give each other feedback, both positive and negative. It's a big part of design school.

Where's that corporate BS meter page someone linked to the other day? I bet this article would be off the charts.

I'd love to see that link!

The only page I found through kagi is:

    http://www.blablameter.com/index.php

but seems broken, because returns:

    Your text: 14741 characters, 2454 words
    BS Index :0.27
    Your text shows some indications of 'BS'-English, but is still within an acceptable range.

Here's what Kagi Universal Summarizer has to say about it:

- Engineering crits at Figma are dedicated time for engineers to get feedback on work in progress, brainstorm approaches, and unblock each other early in the design process.

- They aim to find a middle ground between design critiques and technical reviews by focusing on exploration and feedback rather than approval.

- Running crits in FigJam allows many people to provide feedback simultaneously in a collaborative way rather than taking turns.

- The format encourages parallel conversations through sticky notes rather than sequential or comment thread styles.

- Crits have become core to early, middle, and sometimes late phases of technical design work at Figma.

- Engineers are asked to prepare by creating a FigJam file summarizing their design for quick feedback.

- Feedback is led by suggestions rather than mandates to encourage many perspectives.

- Crits help focus on specific challenges by bringing in relevant experts.

- The overall process aims to accelerate work by getting feedback earlier compared to later technical reviews.

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