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Comment by Waterluvian | Hacker News Reader

What drives me nuts is how many people can’t separate those two tasks/projects.

We’re going to write down what Step 7 currently is/does. No, now is not the time to start discussing what it ought to do. Please let us just get through sorting out what Step 7 currently is. Yes, some people do it differently. That’s why we hit a snag. Let’s just pick one of those wrong ways, document it, and do it all wrong together. We’ll fix it as a separate step. Now isn’t the time to fix it, as much as it feels like a convenient time to.

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What drives me nuts is how many people don't read!

With that out of the way, the original article and this comment thread really makes me feel good by giving a sense of being right.

> Let’s just pick one of those wrong ways, document it, and do it all wrong together.

This reminds me of my colleague who established the importance of consistency very early.

"If you need to be wrong to be consistent, be consistently wrong".

They say this sarcastically but.. if you are the only sane one among a group of insane, now you are the insane one.

If nothing else, if things are consistently wrong, they can be consistently fixed.

This is also what's preventing the EU from stopping messing with clocks twice a year.

1) everyone agrees that it's stupid to move the clocks, we have electric lights now

2) NOBODY agrees which timezone everyone should be when we stop messing with the time.

Because solving 1&2 at the same time is about impossible, nothing will happen. What they should do is agree on 1. Write it into irrevocable law. THEN start arguing about 2.

Yeesh. I’ve never worked with a smart group of people who came to that conclusion. That sounds toxic. :(

Which way sounds toxic—wanting to get it right now that they’ve become aware it’s a problem? Or getting something down now, as close as possible to what happened yesterday and the day before, to unblock the larger process—then refining it after the fires are out?

Seems like horses for courses to me: I can imagine my very happy healthy teams needing to operate in either mode, depending on the specific problem. I also can imagine us needing the person closest to the problem to tell us which direction applies.

(To your point though, I also can imagine that any type of pressures like these would really bring out the dysfunction in “toxic” teams.)

> Or getting something down now, as close as possible to what happened yesterday and the day before, to unblock the larger process—then refining it after the fires are out?

In my experience, the refining never happens.

But at least, in that scenario, the process is unblocked.

The other way, you've blocked the process until every subcommittee of the committee assigned to fix the process has delivered their Final Report Draft 8 FINAL (1) (13) (1).docx. And that could be preventing an entire department from working at all.

Sometimes blocking the process is the best way to do. Blocking gives leverage and allows to fix long-standing inbalances.

Imagine that you have been slaving for low salary with abusive boss, who constantly promises but never delivers. If shit hit the fan and you are desperately needed, this is the perfect time to talk and solidify improvements. Game does not run on gratitude.

The same rule unfortunately also applies to relationships.

I think you identified the problem.

> subcommittee of the committee assigned to fix the process

That bit, is the problem.

What do you mean exactly?

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