At random intervals during the day the senior engineers will often get into a discussion over the correct implementation of some technology with regard to a particular problem we are attemping to solve. These discussions seem to have no discernible pattern in terms of the duration and therefore they can last anywhere from 5 minutes to upwards of 5 hours with the occasional discussion spanning a few days. When the discussion lasts days, we always break to do research and other tasks and then rejoin the discussion later.
These discussions are very disruptive in terms of interrupting the flow of the nearby engineers as well as halting progress on any non-related tasks the senior engineers were involved in before the break out of the discussion. The work area is such that almost all discussions are heard by all the engineers which often leads to a cascade of involvement.
My manager gut always cringes at the onset of each discussion because the gut reaction is to protect the short term productivity of the team. However, despite all the short term cons, there is a mountain of medium and long term benefits to these discussions in terms of implementing technology in an optimal pattern that is optimized for maintainability and horizontal scalability.
Even with all of the benefits, a discussion has to be managed. An uncontrolled discussion is like a wild fire propelled by a Santa Ana wind storm, it will consume all in its path with the direction dictated by the whichever way the wind happens to blow.
Here are some tips on managing the discussion to balance both productivity and innovation:
- Limit Emotional Arguments: As soon as the discussion becomes emotional and has morphed into an argument, its time to table the discussion to allow the participants time to cool off and gather their thoughts. If the matter at hand is more pressing, then have a cool off period of 10 minutes or so and move the discussion into a conference room. I don't recommend eliminating emotional arguments completely because often times there is a deeper concern that will get expressed in the heat of the discussion. Heated discussions shouldn't be the goal or the norm, but can be useful in exposing deeper problems.
- No Personal Attacks: Any discussion point that includes a personal attack is weak and useless. These should be strongly discouraged with the prompting to express a critique in a way that doesn't attack the other individual.
- Encourage Involvement: Try to include more junior level engineers in the discussion when possible as a training exercise. The sooner an engineer feels comfortable expressing an opinion on a technical topic in front of his/her peers the better off the project will be. If the subject matter is not conducive to this type of exercise, take the discussion to another room where it won't interrupt the flow of the engineers not involved with the discussion.
- Reach a Consensus: The point of the discussion is to make a decision on the best way to proceed with some implementation of technology for a given problem with stated objectives. If you don't reach a conclusion then you are spinning your wheels and truly hurting productivity.
- Avoid the Weeds: Don't allow the discussion to follow rabbit hole offshoots. Keep the discussion focused so as to reach the conclusion as quickly as possible while still determining the optimal solution path.
- Allow Time to Process: Sometimes the participants need to time to process what has been said and to do additional research. The manager or lead engineer will need to play the moderator role in determining when to table the discussion for later.
- Have a Flow Day: Make sure your team has an entire day dedicated to being in the flow, at a minimum. This will make up for any short term productivity loss caused by discussions. Additionally, you can dedicate a few hours of each day to flow as well.
Here is a list of the common "fallacies" that are often used while arguing: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies :) It's pretty funny how often some of these are used (myself included).
ReplyDeleteThis is a hard problem to solve because usually people argue passionately because they care about the topic and have a vested interest in it.
Maybe part of the solution is having a good facilitator that can keep the discussion moving in a productive direction and aligned with the present business goals. Also they should gently expose any fallacies that get injected by team members. ;)
I think you are right however in that good respectful debates have a great deal of value. However, there is a point of diminishing returns which is sometimes hard to see clearly in the heat of a debate. This is another good reason for a moderator.