[paracyst]

This sounds like a good idea that I would really like to try, for my own sanity if for nothing else. For me, the issue—imagined or not—would arise in the Friday morning daily stand-up. I’m not sure it would go over well if I said that I intend to spend part of the day doing PRs (this is fine and expected) and the other part learning/researching (likely not).

Oh the joys of the JIRA sweatshop. We have JIRA pulled up on the big screen TV and the product guys cycle through the status of each dev team members’ items during each daily standup. This is my first development job, surely it’s not like this everywhere?

[protonimitate]

The way we handle this is by padding our sprints enough so that there's always "extra time" at the end.

E.g: If we as engs think we can do 12 tickets in a one-week sprint, we commit to 8. This leaves room to pick up any production issue related work, address tech debt, and have some breathing room so we're not rushing through jira tickets.

It's also workplace specific, but imo product people shouldn't be engaging in daily standups other than passive observation. If they are drilling through the jira board and asking for status updates, they're taking on the role of a micro-manager, not a product owner/manager.

Standups should be engineers talking to eachother and raising blockers/issues that would prevent them from meeting the sprint goal they committed to, not daily check ins with product (again, imo).

[r00fus]

How does this fly in an organization where your promotion is based on sprints and not sustainable coding/quality?

[oswamano]

Man, I wish this is how my last place did it. Instead, if we were getting through 12 we'd commit to 14 and then the dev manager would wonder why stuff wasn't getting done.

[vorpalhex]

It's not like that everywhere

> product guys cycle through the status of each dev team members’ items during each daily standup

Something has gone horrible off the rails. Standup is supposed to be a quick time for every team member to raise any blockers primarily, with a quick "here's what I did, here's what I'm doing" type blurb. The benefit of standup is identifying blockers and if engineers are getting mired in problems (so you can fix those issues outside of standup).

[hnick]

A place where I worked got off the rails when standups were used to allow two people to work through a problem while the rest of us sit there patiently. They grew to be 45 minutes long each day.

People brought chairs. To a standup!

[organsnyder]

Agreed. PMs (product or project) should rarely speak during standups; instead, they should be listening for blockers and other action items for them.

I've worked in environments where the PMs micromanage like this. It's both hellish and extremely inefficient.

[BigJono]

If this were the case then standups would be totally useless unless the org was so cooked that nothing gets done unless someone is made accountable in front of the entire team.

If I run into a blocker why would I wait until the next morning to try and get it resolved?

[ddek]

Yep, that's a way away from ideal.

You're unlucky, there are a lot of software teams out there where the developers are pretty much autonomous. That's not to say they do absolutely whatever they want, but micromanagement is usually out of the question.

A couple of months ago I spent about half my working hours in a week watching everything that happened at .Net Conf. I didn't ask anyone, I just said I was taking training time and since I don't take much no-one cared.

If I was in your position, I'd take this as a sign that there are better places to work. Wait out your current job until it's adding value to your CV (few good projects and contributions you can talk about), then move out. You'll get more money, and you'll probably have a better idea of what to look for.

[vagab0nd]

Any idea what to look for when searching for such a job? I have asked about micromanagement in interviews before but I usually just get bullshit answers.

[noelsusman]

Where I work standups are for devs only. The product guys are involved in planning and reveals, but otherwise they stay out of our hair. We're expected to complete what we've committed to on time or promptly notify the product guys if that's not going to happen for whatever reason.

About once a week (usually Friday) I tell my team I'm going to spend the day researching or exploring some new idea that doesn't have any stories yet. It's never a problem. A decent chunk of our big leaps forward for our projects have come from us working on random stuff nobody told us to work on.

[Viliam1234]

By the way, this is the official SCRUM way. Product people should be there for planning and for demo. If at the end of the sprint they got what they wanted to get, they should be happy and do their own work... or relax if they have nothing else to do.

Micromanaging means you have nothing useful to do, and you are needlessly making other people angry. Such people should be fired first. (Yeah, I know, they are often the last ones to stay, because people who have better options leave first.)

[itronitron]

You may want to describe part of your work on a task as reviewing solutions (for a given PR) and then after the standup spend some time learning about related tech to whatever PRs you have assigned.

If the product guys are any good they will care about having 'options' and will therefore welcome devs that are taking a broader look of the solution space.

[sidlls]

It isn’t like that everywhere but it’s quite common, especially in companies where development is not the primary focus of the company. You’re more likely to end up in that kind of company than not unless you are in a place like the Bay Area or similar tech hub.

[MrFoof]

Replying purely for reinforcement of the parent.

This is not just common, but the norm in most organizations. I think the only time in the past 12 years (working with probably 20 organizations) where this didn't occur is the one engagement when I was charged managing the team.

There's far too many places where a team of even just four or five developers will spend 30 minutes (sometimes an hour!) every morning in "standup" being grilled on every single item committed to in the sprint.

[Aeolun]

It is like this in two out of 4 places that I’ve worked.

Those two were both large corporations. It is my theory that it happens as soon as you have a separate scrum/project manager for the project you work on.

[lonelappde]

Stand up for what you believe in. Tell them you are spending the day on research.

Better yet, cancel that standup because it's garbage. Only one representative needs to go to the product meeting.

[matz1]

Well, you don't have to mentioned that you are doing your own research...

Do they look over your shoulder every minute?