Re:Charles Lindbergh is the reason the U.S. doesn't have cam...
by salawat on Saturday October 17, 2020 @11:26AM
(#24810670)
>Maybe one thing is that people become more afraid of looking stupid. They may not ask for important clarifications.
This 1000 times. I learned extremely early there is great value to be found in being "the strategic dunce" in the room in any Engineering context, and it is the most difficult 'skill' to teach to Junior Quality people.
When you get a bunch of Engineers in a room, you can often follow what they think is going on, and if you only observe and question shallowly, everything appears fine.
Then you play the dunce and ask them to clarify a basic point. Do it once. Do it twice. Do it a third time. Usually by 3 or four, unless planning has gone off without a hitch, you'll uncover some misunderstanding or assumption someone made, but the rest weren't aware of.
It doesn't take much, just a willingness to hold people to make what they think explicit. It can seem like a tiresome practice, but by doing it, you can also short-circuit the pattern by which everybody delegates a complete understanding of the system to 4 or 5 people, and you start to have everyone able to delve into the details of larger and larger swathes of the system, reducing the chances of only discovering fundamental holes in understanding until it's too late.
I find 80% time investment making sure everyone is saying the same thing about the same thing any day; since at that point, the implementation basically lays itself out in front of the mind's eye,and you turn the builders into walking cross-check functions.
This 1000 times. I learned extremely early there is great value to be found in being "the strategic dunce" in the room in any Engineering context, and it is the most difficult 'skill' to teach to Junior Quality people.
When you get a bunch of Engineers in a room, you can often follow what they think is going on, and if you only observe and question shallowly, everything appears fine.
Then you play the dunce and ask them to clarify a basic point. Do it once. Do it twice. Do it a third time. Usually by 3 or four, unless planning has gone off without a hitch, you'll uncover some misunderstanding or assumption someone made, but the rest weren't aware of.
It doesn't take much, just a willingness to hold people to make what they think explicit. It can seem like a tiresome practice, but by doing it, you can also short-circuit the pattern by which everybody delegates a complete understanding of the system to 4 or 5 people, and you start to have everyone able to delve into the details of larger and larger swathes of the system, reducing the chances of only discovering fundamental holes in understanding until it's too late.
I find 80% time investment making sure everyone is saying the same thing about the same thing any day; since at that point, the implementation basically lays itself out in front of the mind's eye,and you turn the builders into walking cross-check functions.