Slow is not a dirty word

http://www.jamesvandyne.com/slow-is-not-a-dirty-word/

by jamesvandyne • 12 years ago

95 26 12 years ago

Here's one thing slow ain't: 7% growth per week.

Yes. I find many developers and programmers to be very non-contemplative. This really hit me at OSCON this summer as I sat in session after session where the speaker was trying to teach me multiple JS/DB/web-stack-whatever frameworks/platforms in 50 minutes. I am used to drinking from firehoses at developer conferences, but it really seemed over the top. There was absolutely no time to think deeply about any of these things. No wonder there are so many holes, bugs, and just fragile software.

mattgreenrocks3• 12 years ago

How much of the web was built on Fast? How much of a Stockholm Syndrome do we have for Fast?

People routinely confuse motion with progress.

forgottenpass2• 12 years ago

I'm not going to argue against the idea developers are non-contemplative (I'm also not not arguing it), I simply think what you describe is something else.

This is the result of a market pressure that doesn't want to pay for developers that are contemplative. There is no use when they just want developers busting their ass with a color-inside-the-lines toolset, to build a run of the mill (technology-wise) webapp, and have it finished yesterday.

They don't want to pay for more talent than that, and anyone with a CS degree will soon be out of their price range, so we've seen is a rise in popularity of hyper-accelerated tip-of-the-iceberg vocational education "hacker schools" and "boot camps."

Developers do think deeply about things. Just at companies willing to hire someone with more than 5 years experience and give them time to think about problems.

emotionalcode2• 12 years ago

I've been afraid of participating in any sort of developer / computer science / code gathering because of how extroverted and quickly moving it appears. Thing after thing is built, and called a different name, and I can't help but wonder whether participating would show me a perspective of something different, or more of the same.

I'm a developer/(non-academically affiliated computer scientist) who spends an excessive amount of time thinking about my field, sometimes over the same concepts for many years. I don't know how many people like me exist; being the non-vocal kind of makes it seem like you don't (which I am quite fine with).

mattgreenrocks3• 12 years ago

I feel the same way.

I think it's worth trying it out, if only to step outside your comfort zone. There are a lot more people than you realize who are a bit more thoughtful; the culture just skews towards the loud.

FWIW, I've been studying Haskell and enjoyed the community there. So far, most have struck me as fairly humble and studious.

markbnj• 12 years ago

I agree strongly with this, and it's not a new phenomenon. A lot of older engineers will recall when management tried to measure us with LOC metrics. Today we have a whole culture built around speed. And yet a lot of the younger folks I work with seem to have trouble thinking deliberately through a problem and coming to a good solution. It's not their fault, imo. The pressure to move, move, move is tremendous. That Darwinian aspect of a market is not going away, but neither is the fact that writing good, solid software is a very contemplative and design-driven process. In my pretty long career I don't recall hearing of any projects that failed because they couldn't get code written quickly enough. I'm not sure why it is we always seem to come back to "fast" as the most desirable attribute of a programmer, but I suspect that it has something to do with the inability of management to accurately gauge risk or estimate timelines for a process they cannot really comprehend.

JacobAldridge• 12 years ago

Two critical philosophies I share with my business-owner clients, who have (as most of us do) a natural tendancy to jump from concept to implementation without taking the time to educate ourselves and plan a strategy.

1) Sometimes you need to slow down to speed up. This is Abraham Lincoln sharpening his saw; or replacing a flat tyre before entering the freeway.

2) Slow is smooth. And smooth is fast. Same context, just another way of indicating that often in business slow gets you to your destination (vision) a lot faster than unprepared, directionless speed.

drinchev• 12 years ago

I tend to agree with almost everything in the article.

What strikes me the most is that the word itself is actually bad, because it creates additional pressure that makes you weak.

Example :

I usually don't give estimates or deadlines to my clients and in the end I usually do the task in the same time as I would do it if I had a deadline. The only difference is that I work pleasantly and I don't need constant reminding : "Hey you have 3 days left"; "Hey you have 2 days left", etc... This makes me exhausted immediately.

rhubarbcustard• 12 years ago

"This fast-paced always-on life style blends our home-life and our work-life together. We can no longer leave the office and are always just a text or phone call away."

I've read quite a few articles recently about this blurring of office and home life and people being "on" all the time, has this really become normal for most people? It was "go home on time day" the other week, have things really got so bad that people need a special day just to get home and see their family?

I get paid to work 35 hours a week, I work those and then I'm not at work and unavailable unless I've agreed to paid overtime. I assumed most people worked like this too?

thieving_magpie• 12 years ago

The problem is in some countries (US, in my case) performance is often evaluated by hours spent outside your assigned schedule. This trend may be changing.

I am fortunate to work at a small company where I was told by my manager on day 1 that he was completely unimpressed by people working at 11pm. The mantra "work smarter, not harder" used to be an empty phrase for a lot of people, that may be shifting from what I've seen.

majelix• 12 years ago

If you're hourly, of course it's a different thing.

But if you're salaried, it's an arms race. Employees willing to work extra hours get more done (or at worst, only appear to get more done), and thus will get the rewards and promotions.

vitd• 12 years ago

I actually experienced the opposite. The employees who went to heroic efforts to work long hours and “get things done” were often the ones who did the worst work that had to be cleaned up by someone else later. The people who came in on time and left on time tended to be more methodical and their shit just worked.

TeMPOraL• 12 years ago

Many people work low-paid jobs with constant risk of getting fired. In such cases, not answering the phone can mean not having a job next day. I know someone who sweats from stress because of a missed call and can stop doing anything, and I mean anything, to pick up that call.

I'm happy that I work in software and don't have to deal with bullshit like this, but many don't have that luxury.

x1798DE• 12 years ago

This post is not really making any argument for slow, just saying that some good things happen slowly - though he doesn't actually specify a timescale, rendering the word "slow" meaningless anyway. If you could have the things that he describes as being good quickly (i.e. you get them immediately, not that they have short duration), I imagine you'd be ecstatic. If you could have beautiful, hand-crafted quality furniture made in 15 minutes, wouldn't you prefer that to a longer process, all else equal?

To try and extract some actual useful information from this collection of meaningless platitudes, I'd say that there's a point to be made here that different things happen on different timescales. Building relationships may take considerably more time than a few development cycles, etc. Recognizing what's a reasonable timescale for each part of your business/life/project and considering the costs you'd pay for trying to accelerate them is probably not a bad thing to do.

mgregory22• 12 years ago

Information is fast, wisdom is slow.

chasing2• 12 years ago

Slow is wasting time. Slow is letting other people take initiative while you ponder. Slow is often unsustainable and irresponsible. Slow is often disrespectful. Slow is not necessarily more thoughtful. Slow is a luxury many people and businesses often don't have. Slow is expensive. Slow has nothing to do with tweeting about a sunrise because, really, if tweeting about a particularly pleasant sunrise is your little way of sharing a moment with the world, go nuts. Slow has little to do with documenting the world or not. If fact, I think taking a photo or writing about an experience can help someone extend and savor a moment.

skorecky• 12 years ago

I think you're missing the point.

JoeAltmaier• 12 years ago

Sometimes its fast that's all those things - not worth the effort to do it right, just do it fast.

john_b• 12 years ago

If you equate "slow" with "wasting time" you have very clearly missed the point.

"Move fast and break things" works only when the value of, and audience for, your work is highly uncertain. If you have any confidence whatsoever in the value or audience of what you're building, slow is usually better.

Going fast in the wrong direction is only a good use of time and resources when you quickly recognize the mistake and turn around. In my experience, most people who prioritize speed above all else are hellbent on a specific destination and won't change course until it's too late.

chasing2• 12 years ago

Well, my point is that it's a little silly to decide that "slow" is always better than "fast." Or vice versa. You wind up with platitudes that are vague to the point of absurdity. Like: "Slow is usually better."

Of course you shouldn't universally prioritize speed above all else. That'd be dumb.

You shouldn't rush through something that should be done with careful deliberation. You also shouldn't linger on something when time is of the essence.

tonyplee• 12 years ago

I prefer the Electrical Engineering's phase "Impedance matching".

"In electronics, impedance matching is the practice of designing the input impedance of an electrical load or the output impedance of its corresponding signal source to maximize the power transfer or minimize signal reflection from the load."

This basic control system theory that is applicable to Electrical and Mechanical System design.

More and more I believe it is applicable to Business System.

In product / business development, I like to think the term as "Don't waste $, time, human resource on scaling Marketing/Sales, until one is reasonable certain that the product is ready product marketing fit is validated in small scale."

forgottenpass2• 12 years ago

"This fast-paced always-on life style blends our home-life and our work-life together. We can no longer leave the office and are always just a text or phone call away."

A psychiatrist wrote about a blog post about this phenomenon in commenting on Randi Zuckerberg's book (dot-complicated). It talks about the societal drive to fill free time with work.

    Email is a convenient scapegoat not just because "family 
    time should be protected" but because it gets us out of 
    inquiring what went wrong with our home life that we 
    could ever be tempted by work emails, and the avoidance 
    of this inquiry is highly suspicious, i.e. on purpose.

http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2014/01/randi_zuckerberg.html

cinch• 12 years ago

i'd say it depends on how important a project you are working on. if it's another run of the mill CRUD app, that only get's used internally by a few people, then you'd want cheap/fast, low quality. if it's mission critical, air plane software, you take your time and get it right.

but the author is hinting in the right direction: today "slow" get's undervalued. i've been told i work slow, and yea it had a negative meaning. i interpret it as good: i take my time and do it right. maybe i was just working in the wrong company, where the software quality isn't that important versus churning out more.

Slow is not a dirty word

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