Daily Stand-Up Meetings Are a Good Tool for a Bad Manager | Hacker News Reader

Daily Stand-Up Meetings Are a Good Tool for a Bad Manager

yegor256.com

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Standups are one of those things that 15 years ago sounded great on paper.

"Yeah, everybody is communicating every morning. Our communication problems are solved!"

The reality is that 90% of my standups are pointless and more importantly interrupt my most productive time of the day.

I never understood the point of the daily meeting.

To find out what other people are doing, I can just look at source control or the ticketing system.

If things are properly organized, I don't really need to know 95%+ of the stuff other people are doing. When they are doing something that impacts me, they can tell me. I don't need a daily meeting for that.

The only advantage of the daily meeting seems to be micromanagement. But everyone has good days and bad days. There are some days where things come easily, and days when it's a struggle to do fixes that should be quick.

How are people supposed to know what you are working on if aren't communicating with them routinely?

There are better instruments for sharing this information. You can use task tracking software, you can use emails, etc. No need to stand up for that in the middle of the office, every morning.

Yeah, for example:

Boss: Fred, I want you to work on the Frobitz feature. FSK worked on the Frobitz feature a little, so coordinate with him.

For a daily meeting, I hear about a lot of stuff that usually has nothing to do with what I'm working on. Inevitably, two people get sidetracked and talk for 15-30 minutes on an issue that only affects them, making it a huge waste of time. (I know that isn't how daily meetings are supposed to work, but that's what happened at the place that did them.)

Peer pressure. If two people get sidetracked, after about 10-20 seconds, say, "Take it off-line. Next?" It's even better if multiple people are willing to do this, or at least to back you when you make the request.

People getting side tracked is a symptom of a bad daily stand up. These meetings should be quick and painless and primarily used to escalate issues.

Some of the comments here surprise me. I have used stand up meetings for years. Yet I never thought they were for the benefit of the manager. Instead they help keep everyone abreast of what is going on and quickly sets the tone for the day if there are any key issues that need to be resolved.

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