> Although I’ve never had a boss that needed to find an error.
I think that is key. A great mentor early in my career pointed out to me: "A" rated people need to work for "A" rated bosses. It's possible to have a "B" or "C" person work for an "A" boss, but when you put "A" people under "B" or (god forbid) "C" bosses, all kinds of problems ensue.
[I've personally experienced that situation only once, and swore never again.]
I’m not sure what maps to “A,” “B,” “C” here. My gut says: “B” is the kind of person who you’d use this trick on, “C” might be too lazy and just not bother, and “A” might be confident and respected enough to say (and have everybody believe) that they checked and didn’t have any issues. Only “B” has that mix of insecurity and some ability…
Actually, I bet you could have an ok workplace with “A” workers under “C” management. Or maybe the “C” turns into an “A” if they manage to hire good people and get out of their way…
I guess it depends on what "A", "B" and "C" means exactly.
But the problem with "C" managers is that they won't judge "A" work as "A" work, won't understand why some of the "A" work is important, and will get in the way of the "A" engineers, making them go down "C" paths.
A "C" level manager brings the whole team down to "C" level and destroys the morale of "A" and "B" workers while they're at it.
An "A" level manager can guide everybody towards "A" level work.
I was writing software at a bank and found a bug. I was told to save it for when we had our audit —- because no matter what, the auditors were going to insist we fixed something and it might as well be something the development team wanted fixed too.
I’ve heard of contractors who leave electrical outlets out of their plans so that the building department, which will insist something be changed in the plans (proving the department’s usefulness), does not insist on something hard.
I mean, all banking software has genuine bugs team dont have time to fix. There is about zero reason to save a bug for audit purposes when you can just take something off jira.
This is often my pain as a senior dev. If the more junior members of my team propose something, and it's perfectly acceptable, if I just rubber stamp it then it looks like I didn't read it or do anything. So with some of the past managers I've had, I felt like I had to find something to point out, so best to find something that doesn't inconvenience the proposal author too much.
I could see the same dynamic in reverse when I had to propose stuff to the central tech team at that employer.
Some people do. It is silly and childish. However they do find some good things to speak up about once in awhile and they are least are not shy about those things. What we need though are people who will speak up about important things but have the gut so keep quiet otherwise - very few of those exist.
It is my firm belief that it isn't likely to find a the flaws in anything important (except for the obvious flaws intentionally left that other posters have mentioned) in the scope of a meeting. Once in a while you will by chance, but even if there is a flaw it needs some to look and think. People who think out loud often drive the meeting in the direction they are thinking and if there happens to be something in that direction they will find it sooner - but they miss the other directions others would have gone thinking in because they directed the thoughts of everyone.
Yes, but you're thinking far too literally. This is a negotiation tactic from the far reaches of history. Humans have always done this to manipulate one another.
You want something from someone else, at some cost to you. If you let the other party decline something you seemingly want, they have the impression that they're giving up less or are getting a better deal.
It's just compromise. Except you never actually wanted the thing you're compromising on and the ltjer party never cared about. It's just ticking the psychological boxes.
Yeah. It works wonders depending on the kind of people you work or deal with.
Some people will go through great lengths to find a flaw in whatever they look at, and once they see one they will keep asking about it continuously even if fixing it is something very counterproductive.
> Although I’ve never had a boss that needed to find an error.
I think that is key. A great mentor early in my career pointed out to me: "A" rated people need to work for "A" rated bosses. It's possible to have a "B" or "C" person work for an "A" boss, but when you put "A" people under "B" or (god forbid) "C" bosses, all kinds of problems ensue.
[I've personally experienced that situation only once, and swore never again.]
I’m not sure what maps to “A,” “B,” “C” here. My gut says: “B” is the kind of person who you’d use this trick on, “C” might be too lazy and just not bother, and “A” might be confident and respected enough to say (and have everybody believe) that they checked and didn’t have any issues. Only “B” has that mix of insecurity and some ability…
Actually, I bet you could have an ok workplace with “A” workers under “C” management. Or maybe the “C” turns into an “A” if they manage to hire good people and get out of their way…
I guess it depends on what "A", "B" and "C" means exactly.
But the problem with "C" managers is that they won't judge "A" work as "A" work, won't understand why some of the "A" work is important, and will get in the way of the "A" engineers, making them go down "C" paths.
A "C" level manager brings the whole team down to "C" level and destroys the morale of "A" and "B" workers while they're at it.
An "A" level manager can guide everybody towards "A" level work.
I was writing software at a bank and found a bug. I was told to save it for when we had our audit —- because no matter what, the auditors were going to insist we fixed something and it might as well be something the development team wanted fixed too. I’ve heard of contractors who leave electrical outlets out of their plans so that the building department, which will insist something be changed in the plans (proving the department’s usefulness), does not insist on something hard.
I mean, all banking software has genuine bugs team dont have time to fix. There is about zero reason to save a bug for audit purposes when you can just take something off jira.
I was taught to always speak up in every meeting by my boss at that time. Always, no matrer what, I had to come up with something.
If you do that, you'd do me a favour.
This is often my pain as a senior dev. If the more junior members of my team propose something, and it's perfectly acceptable, if I just rubber stamp it then it looks like I didn't read it or do anything. So with some of the past managers I've had, I felt like I had to find something to point out, so best to find something that doesn't inconvenience the proposal author too much.
I could see the same dynamic in reverse when I had to propose stuff to the central tech team at that employer.
Why not compliment them with a job well done? Add some details in your compliment that shows you've read their proposal.
Do you mean the babble hypothesis? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babble_hypothesis
That's exactly it! I didn't knew it had a name until today. Thanks!
Some people do. It is silly and childish. However they do find some good things to speak up about once in awhile and they are least are not shy about those things. What we need though are people who will speak up about important things but have the gut so keep quiet otherwise - very few of those exist.
It is my firm belief that it isn't likely to find a the flaws in anything important (except for the obvious flaws intentionally left that other posters have mentioned) in the scope of a meeting. Once in a while you will by chance, but even if there is a flaw it needs some to look and think. People who think out loud often drive the meeting in the direction they are thinking and if there happens to be something in that direction they will find it sooner - but they miss the other directions others would have gone thinking in because they directed the thoughts of everyone.
Yes, but you're thinking far too literally. This is a negotiation tactic from the far reaches of history. Humans have always done this to manipulate one another.
You want something from someone else, at some cost to you. If you let the other party decline something you seemingly want, they have the impression that they're giving up less or are getting a better deal.
It's just compromise. Except you never actually wanted the thing you're compromising on and the ltjer party never cared about. It's just ticking the psychological boxes.
It's extremely common in graphic design because it's so easy for everyone to have an opinion.
Yeah. It works wonders depending on the kind of people you work or deal with.
Some people will go through great lengths to find a flaw in whatever they look at, and once they see one they will keep asking about it continuously even if fixing it is something very counterproductive.