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Neither, they're talking about the culture of writing documents as a form of sharing ideas. Where other companies might use powerpoint presentations or unstruct

Neither, they're talking about the culture of writing documents as a form of sharing ideas. Where other companies might use powerpoint presentations or unstructured meetings to brainstorm on ideas, Amazon instead encourages people to write a document summarizing their thoughts, and then there is a meeting where people silently read and comment on the document, and then afterwards discuss it.

nullorempty 2y ago
In my experience these documents were actually never good. I’ve never seen anyone ask for estimates either. Surely it’s better than some other companies but if it were good they wouldn’t need this absolutely horrific oncall
hughesjj 2y ago
^ exactly, thanks for taking the answer perfectly. It's basically panel 2 from this: https://xkcd.com/568/ https://xkcd.com/568/ Beyond the initial publication of the doc, the peer review process is much more sane than trying to review a bunch of power point slides. Similarly, it's much much easier to refer to a well written document when it comes time to implement or reevaluate an idea than going over some power point slides and maybe an associated recording, to say nothing about searchability, discoverability, and maintainability of an actual written document vs PowerPoint slides. Also, idle side speculation: I wonder how much (if any) one of the underappreciated early employees @ Amazon had a hand in proselytizing this, given she (MacKenzie) is an author.
heap_perms 2y ago
This is Bezos talking about this: https://youtu.be/e47wAgIhZ7o?si=LKZxoabqrCSCQ1ki&t=64 https://youtu.be/e47wAgIhZ7o?si=LKZxoabqrCSCQ1ki&t=64
JonChesterfield 2y ago
That's an extremely sensible idea in multiple dimensions. It prioritises clarity of thought over rambling discussion in conference calls. I wonder if there's a feasible path to gradually steer an existing organisational structure in that direction.
- dheera 2y ago
  It also means - You can't take calls from cars - People leave 2 bullshit comments like "justification needed" for participation points and then go drink coffee instead of actually reading the doc or googling for said justification - People waste inordinate amounts of time writing docs for things that could be discussed in 10 minutes
  - adriand 2y ago
    > People waste inordinate amounts of time writing docs for things that could be discussed in 10 minutes I’m very much a writing kind of person when it comes to organizing my thoughts and I worked at a place where we did a ton of written documentation kind of like this. Then I left there and worked remote with a different company whose CEO, when I sent him an email, would pick up the phone and call me. We would then have the 10 minute conversation you’re talking about here. I came to love it because it’s true, a short focused conversation can be a huge timesaver. Since then, I’m often really frustrated by vendors and partners who steadfastly refuse to get on a call, when it’s very obvious to me that a quick call would be a far better use of time than endlessly going back and forth on email.
    - tayo42 2y ago
      These are informal quick chats work nicely, until it doesn't, then it's a disaster and docs are needed. With certain people I can work like that. With others that I don't trust, have seen don't shoddy work, don't communicate well, then write a doc and we'll discuss it.
      - tekknik 2y ago
        if we were coworkers, and i detected this unequal behavior from you i would force you to communicate with me using only docs. egos in engineers need to die.
  - tyre 2y ago
    Not taking calls from a car sounds like a feature. We don't need more distracted drivers or meeting participants.
smnscu 2y ago
Oof, must suck to work for a company who doesn't use technical design docs well. I quite like Oxide's RFD model, based off Joyent's I assume, given who their CTO is. https://rfd.shared.oxide.computer/rfd/1 https://rfd.shared.oxide.computer/rfd/1
dbtablesorrows 2y ago
I believe most tech focused companies do it and it's called design docs / RFCs.

nullorempty 2y ago

In my experience these documents were actually never good. I’ve never seen anyone ask for estimates either. Surely it’s better than some other companies but if it were good they wouldn’t need this absolutely horrific oncall

hughesjj 2y ago

^ exactly, thanks for taking the answer perfectly. It's basically panel 2 from this: https://xkcd.com/568/ https://xkcd.com/568/ Beyond the initial publication of the doc, the peer review process is much more sane than trying to review a bunch of power point slides. Similarly, it's much much easier to refer to a well written document when it comes time to implement or reevaluate an idea than going over some power point slides and maybe an associated recording, to say nothing about searchability, discoverability, and maintainability of an actual written document vs PowerPoint slides. Also, idle side speculation: I wonder how much (if any) one of the underappreciated early employees @ Amazon had a hand in proselytizing this, given she (MacKenzie) is an author.

heap_perms 2y ago

This is Bezos talking about this: https://youtu.be/e47wAgIhZ7o?si=LKZxoabqrCSCQ1ki&t=64 https://youtu.be/e47wAgIhZ7o?si=LKZxoabqrCSCQ1ki&t=64

JonChesterfield 2y ago

That's an extremely sensible idea in multiple dimensions. It prioritises clarity of thought over rambling discussion in conference calls. I wonder if there's a feasible path to gradually steer an existing organisational structure in that direction.

dheera 2y ago
It also means - You can't take calls from cars - People leave 2 bullshit comments like "justification needed" for participation points and then go drink coffee instead of actually reading the doc or googling for said justification - People waste inordinate amounts of time writing docs for things that could be discussed in 10 minutes
- adriand 2y ago
  > People waste inordinate amounts of time writing docs for things that could be discussed in 10 minutes I’m very much a writing kind of person when it comes to organizing my thoughts and I worked at a place where we did a ton of written documentation kind of like this. Then I left there and worked remote with a different company whose CEO, when I sent him an email, would pick up the phone and call me. We would then have the 10 minute conversation you’re talking about here. I came to love it because it’s true, a short focused conversation can be a huge timesaver. Since then, I’m often really frustrated by vendors and partners who steadfastly refuse to get on a call, when it’s very obvious to me that a quick call would be a far better use of time than endlessly going back and forth on email.
  - tayo42 2y ago
    These are informal quick chats work nicely, until it doesn't, then it's a disaster and docs are needed. With certain people I can work like that. With others that I don't trust, have seen don't shoddy work, don't communicate well, then write a doc and we'll discuss it.
    - tekknik 2y ago
      if we were coworkers, and i detected this unequal behavior from you i would force you to communicate with me using only docs. egos in engineers need to die.
- tyre 2y ago
  Not taking calls from a car sounds like a feature. We don't need more distracted drivers or meeting participants.

smnscu 2y ago

Oof, must suck to work for a company who doesn't use technical design docs well. I quite like Oxide's RFD model, based off Joyent's I assume, given who their CTO is. https://rfd.shared.oxide.computer/rfd/1 https://rfd.shared.oxide.computer/rfd/1

dbtablesorrows 2y ago

I believe most tech focused companies do it and it's called design docs / RFCs.