Tips for Code Reviewing Juniors in a Far-East Asian work culture?
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
I'm technical manager in a company developing our own inhouse software. After 23 years in Asia & 5 years of management, I still have no answer! It REALLY is a culture thing - I have the same problems as one other poster - staff would rather not say anything than give you bad news, despite the fact that they know from past experience that I am going to be MORE annoyed when I find out the bad news - 5 minutes before the deadline. Sensitivity is over-rated as far as I am concerned, when you are trying to compete globally. I'm too old to change so the junior staff will have to change or get fired if they cannot. I fired someone 2 days ago for going on sick leave & then being caught out running personal errands all day. Even today one of my shift staff didn't want to come in because they had a migraine - I told them I had a bottle of Panadol in my office drawer for my frequent migraines & they eventually came in. My solution is to resign as Technical Director & start my new job on 1st January with the same company as R&D Director, working from home & doing only the projects I want to do. They can have a local Operations Manager to try to get these young people to understand what holding down a job entails - i.e. not downloading GB of porn or Twittering all day.
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
I have worked for a number of years with people from South East Asia and what I think you are noticing is the phenomena in the West called 'Losing face'. What you need to be able to do is find a way to resolve the issue without them feeling that they have 'lost face'. Personally I would never work in the culture you talk about as it is so at odds with my own work ethic where owning up to ones mistakes is more acceptable. All I can say is good luck and try to notice how the people in this culture deal with each other, then follow suit - when in Rome... Also I think telling anyone their code sucks, whatever culture you are in, is poor management. What I suggest is setting up code review meetings. Get them used to it, and make sure everyone participates and contributes. What I think you need to build is connections. Good luck.
Continuous effort - not strength or intelligence - is the key to unlocking our potential.(Winston Churchill)
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or maybe you just think too highly of yourself? does this offend you? think about it
---------------------------------------------------------- "unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep" - my daily unix command list
swjam wrote:
or maybe you just think too highly of yourself? does this offend you? think about it
It would be easier if it was just a problem that was all in my head--a splitting migraine is relatively mild compared to having someone else writing try-catch blocks six levels deep and long and heavily if-else-else-if chains to no avail. Believe me, there's a huge cultural gap, and it has nothing to do with my skills or whatever perception I might have of myself.
Do you know...LinFu?
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
It's (IMHO) the responsibility of good senior developers to provide some sort of training and support to the junior programmers; I've been fortunate enough to work with some very experienced programmers who have taught me a great deal and made me a much better developer. How about asking each of the developers to go off and research something (a design pattern, a particular algorithm etc) and then to come back and do a 'knowledge sharing' kind of session? If you choose sensible research tasks you can relate them to the project in hand and ideally to any common problems you've spotted. These sessions would allow you to ask leading questions without having to tell an individual that they're doing something wrong and if done on a regular basis become a nice team activity (as far as senior management are concerned), helps communication within the team but more importantly teaches the developers that they should go off and learn things and develop their own skill sets. I'd also try and develop a set of standards that the entire team sticks to; standard libraries, naming conventions etc. If you allow the team to make some of these decisions they're more likely to adhere to them as well. Quite frankly, this is also going to make you look good to your management team, especially in a people-centric company - a few extra brownie points never hurt anyone!! :)
It definitely isn't definatley
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
From what I know - and I know only little - it is not more people centered, rather on the contrary. You may, however, widely overstepping limits of tact, which may alienate your developers more than you notice. How "western" is your supervisor? If not very much, the situaiton may be much more grave than you think now.
Philip Laureano wrote:
What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks?
You can say everything as long as it allows your developers to save face. Losing face in front of oyu is bad enough, losing face in front of everyone else is like getting schoolyard bullied at age 25 - very very very bad. When telling someone in person, you can mention possible causes beyond his control that might have caused it. You know that isn't what happened, and (one hopes) he knows, but it allows him to save face. E.g. don't chastice someone for checking in non-compiling code, tell them they need to test before checkin next time. Don't tell Roger Wu in front of the others the company is in deep shit because his estimates were just guesswork, but at the next meeting anonymously stress the importance of reliable estimates, that one needs to invest serious time, and verify his assumptions. etc. I know. It sucks. OTOH, a bit of this attitude might improve morale in a western cultured place, too.
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
Hi, Ask why? Many people will do or say things and they don't have a clue as to why they are doing or saying something. Often it's a political statement and has nothing to do with engineering. So, if you see or hear something you think is wrong; ask "Why?". Sometimes there is a factual reason and, you may learn something. Or, you may find the reason to be irrational. Then you can reply with a "What do you think if we did it this way?" and, show them a way you prefer.
Mac
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
There might be a cultural difference. Ok, there IS one. But focusing the entire line of reasoning on the premise, is suboptimal, methinx. I am 100% sure that there are software companies in the US where there are ZERO code-reviews. Introducing code-reviews in such a company [whether it is in Kentucky or Kyoto] is not an overnight process. #1. You need to put some hard work in and really demonstrate to everyone that you are as great as you are. You need need to crack some tough nuts to gain some street cred. #2. You need people to not only tolerate, but also appreciate reviews. Start with management above you. Then make sure the juniors get it too. The idea of code-reviews needs to be absorbed into many levels of your organisation. #3. Assuming that everybody doesn't suck, engage the othe smart seniors, into doing reviews. And finally take a close look at what you really want...
Philip Laureano wrote:
managed to land a fairly-comfortable job
Just my two cents
_____________________________________ Action without thought is not action Action without emotion is not life
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
Ok, I'm speaking from a position of complete ignorance here, but would it be possible to seed good coding and working practices in a couple of the more receptive people and just let the others pick it up by osmosis(it's my favourite way to learn things)?
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I'm technical manager in a company developing our own inhouse software. After 23 years in Asia & 5 years of management, I still have no answer! It REALLY is a culture thing - I have the same problems as one other poster - staff would rather not say anything than give you bad news, despite the fact that they know from past experience that I am going to be MORE annoyed when I find out the bad news - 5 minutes before the deadline. Sensitivity is over-rated as far as I am concerned, when you are trying to compete globally. I'm too old to change so the junior staff will have to change or get fired if they cannot. I fired someone 2 days ago for going on sick leave & then being caught out running personal errands all day. Even today one of my shift staff didn't want to come in because they had a migraine - I told them I had a bottle of Panadol in my office drawer for my frequent migraines & they eventually came in. My solution is to resign as Technical Director & start my new job on 1st January with the same company as R&D Director, working from home & doing only the projects I want to do. They can have a local Operations Manager to try to get these young people to understand what holding down a job entails - i.e. not downloading GB of porn or Twittering all day.
Member 4475214 wrote:
Even today one of my shift staff didn't want to come in because they had a migraine - I told them I had a bottle of Panadol in my office drawer for my frequent migraines
Assuming your employee had a genuine migraine, I'm glad I don't work for you. If you told me that when I had one, I'd quit. You don't have frequent migraines; you've got minor tension headaches. If you did have them, you'd know that Panadol (common asprin) doesn't do sh!t for a migraine. I'd love to have you in my head for an hour with one of mine. You'd run away mewling and crying :mad:.
Software Zen:
delete this; -
Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
Philip Laureano wrote:
What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks?
If you do code reviews, and you find a problematic piece of code, ask them politely why they did it that way. What factors lead them to use that approach? What other approaches did they consider, and why were they rejected? At some point, ask them if they'd considered the approach you think is the correct one. If you can do this without looking at any one person's specific example of a problem, it will allow them to save the face that seems so important. Of course you might also find that your approach isn't the best way, either. :) If you find the same problems over and over again, put together a session on that class of problem, and some practices for dealing with it, without pointing to any individual's code. In fact, avoid pointing fingers if you can avoid it at all. Most people are much more accepting of constructive advice if they don't think you are talking to them specifically, or all by themselves. Brad
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Member 4475214 wrote:
Even today one of my shift staff didn't want to come in because they had a migraine - I told them I had a bottle of Panadol in my office drawer for my frequent migraines
Assuming your employee had a genuine migraine, I'm glad I don't work for you. If you told me that when I had one, I'd quit. You don't have frequent migraines; you've got minor tension headaches. If you did have them, you'd know that Panadol (common asprin) doesn't do sh!t for a migraine. I'd love to have you in my head for an hour with one of mine. You'd run away mewling and crying :mad:.
Software Zen:
delete this;Gary Wheeler wrote:
You don't have frequent migraines; [...] You'd run away mewling and crying
Hah! I had much the same thought when I read that! My wife knows what to do when I get one of mine; darken the room, cool cloth on the forehead, and everybody out of the house. :) Fortunately, since finding a doctor who was more interested in solving the problem than medicating the crap out of me, we've identified a couple of triggers, and I avoid those like the plague now. The incidence of migraines has gone down by about 300% over the last three years.
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Gary Wheeler wrote:
You don't have frequent migraines; [...] You'd run away mewling and crying
Hah! I had much the same thought when I read that! My wife knows what to do when I get one of mine; darken the room, cool cloth on the forehead, and everybody out of the house. :) Fortunately, since finding a doctor who was more interested in solving the problem than medicating the crap out of me, we've identified a couple of triggers, and I avoid those like the plague now. The incidence of migraines has gone down by about 300% over the last three years.
Brad Stiles wrote:
darken the room, cool cloth on the forehead, and everybody out of the house.
Same here. Dark, quiet, ice pack for the head. The funny thing about the ice pack is, it gives me a physical sensation in that part of my head that I can pay attention to instead of the pain.
Brad Stiles wrote:
since finding a doctor who was more interested in solving the problem than medicating the crap out of me
I was lucky too. I've had them all of my life, but most doctors subscribed to the notion that men didn't get migraines, and they should just suck it up and deal with it. 15 years ago, my doctor helped diagnose what was going on. She gave me good drugs for dealing with actual migraines, and helped me learn how to identify my triggers and recognizing onset more quickly. I've slowly but surely gotten better at it. I've only had a couple bad ones in the last three years, through a combination of avoiding triggers and medicating early. I'm at the point now where I can tell I'm getting one 12-24 hours in advance. I've found if I can take something for it early enough (before it gets to the "just-kill-me" stage), I'll stave the worst of it off.
Software Zen:
delete this; -
Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
I've found people in the US not liking code reviews either. You need to have them with the program that they'll be revivewed, and buy in from management that reviews will happen and results applied. How to do the reviews, and deliver results could maybe be worked out like others suggest, with your boss or someone local. There can be real cultural differences. I took an internal course at my old company about US vs Indian cultures. How both cultures think very differently than each other in the workplace...
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
Philip Laureano wrote:
What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks?
I suggest not even trying. Cultural ideals are embedded into them when they grow up and will be hell to break. Any suggestions you give have the possibility of being seen as heretical or critical. Rather, see if you can work around their "flawed outlook". But I understand that your job would be to tell them where stuff isn't working well. So do it as sparingly as you can. Try ordering the possible problems in the code in terms of how lethal and commonly encountered they are. Then confront them one-on-one with the biggest and baddest things first. If they have multiple issues, see if you could postpone telling them about the others things for later. Pointing out too many things may give them the feeling they are incompetent or that you are cruel. The hardest part is lessening the blow of your bad news. Don't be direct in pointing out problems; perhaps you could ask them a question that leads them towards the flaw (ex: "What if the variable was assigned this value?"). Be as discreet as possible; don't let the co-workers know or even get the hint that the person you talked to was "scolded". The person you talk to will be nervous if anyone else knew that you gave him/her advice. Lastly, see if you can resolve the coding problem in terms that even the coder would prefer. The culture is oriented towards everyone as a whole, right? So it would also be better in their eyes if the final product was more user-friendly and/or syntactically understandable (for fellow readers). While you may not like the idea (I know I wouldn't), I suggest letting all code that works slide by regardless of how poorly it was constructed. There's a good chance that they'll code that way for the rest of their life.
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
You need to figure out a way to make the reviews as objective as possible. Maybe you can make a checklist (which may be largely based on mistakes that they have made in the past) and have them fill it out. You can use books like "Code Complete" to make checklists too. (In fact, this book has checklists at the end of the chapters.) Of course, that will only get you so far, but it might be a way to "ease" into more in-depth discussions of quality. Somehow you need to get the message across that criticism is actually good for everyone and everyone, especially Junior team members, are EXPECTED to make mistakes. You can point to statistics about bugs per line-of-code to get this point across and challenge them to beat the stats. Maybe you can "pay" (points, credits, time-off) for every improvement (bug fix, style, comments) made in a review. In the mean time, I'll just tear to shreds my American colleagues in reviews; they can take it! Good luck, dude! Stuart
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You need to figure out a way to make the reviews as objective as possible. Maybe you can make a checklist (which may be largely based on mistakes that they have made in the past) and have them fill it out. You can use books like "Code Complete" to make checklists too. (In fact, this book has checklists at the end of the chapters.) Of course, that will only get you so far, but it might be a way to "ease" into more in-depth discussions of quality. Somehow you need to get the message across that criticism is actually good for everyone and everyone, especially Junior team members, are EXPECTED to make mistakes. You can point to statistics about bugs per line-of-code to get this point across and challenge them to beat the stats. Maybe you can "pay" (points, credits, time-off) for every improvement (bug fix, style, comments) made in a review. In the mean time, I'll just tear to shreds my American colleagues in reviews; they can take it! Good luck, dude! Stuart
Stuart Rubin wrote:
In the mean time, I'll just tear to shreds my American colleagues in reviews; they can take it! Good luck, dude!
*sigh* I've been trying to get my project to do something like this since I was hired. I'd much prefer it over Learn-By-Blowing-Up-In-My-Face. It's always the same thing "That would be a good idea, but we don't have the money. Maybe next revision." The closest I got was having my codebase for an app ran through automated tools a coworker had from a project that was abruptly canceled following the customer being bought out. He found new regular coverage before having time for anything more in depth. :doh:
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
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Stuart Rubin wrote:
In the mean time, I'll just tear to shreds my American colleagues in reviews; they can take it! Good luck, dude!
*sigh* I've been trying to get my project to do something like this since I was hired. I'd much prefer it over Learn-By-Blowing-Up-In-My-Face. It's always the same thing "That would be a good idea, but we don't have the money. Maybe next revision." The closest I got was having my codebase for an app ran through automated tools a coworker had from a project that was abruptly canceled following the customer being bought out. He found new regular coverage before having time for anything more in depth. :doh:
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
There's the rub; it's well known that code reviews SAVE money, not cost it! Still, it IS hard to get people to implement this kind of rigor. My thoughts on checklists, procedures, etc. for code reviews is that a bad (or at least inadequate) process is better than none at all. With respect to the original poster, maybe he can have his team collectively generate a set of coding standards, best practices, etc. Then, everyone will have some ownership in the standards and will understand their need better.
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There's the rub; it's well known that code reviews SAVE money, not cost it! Still, it IS hard to get people to implement this kind of rigor. My thoughts on checklists, procedures, etc. for code reviews is that a bad (or at least inadequate) process is better than none at all. With respect to the original poster, maybe he can have his team collectively generate a set of coding standards, best practices, etc. Then, everyone will have some ownership in the standards and will understand their need better.
You know that. I know that. Over the long term I think my project management knows that. With me as a solo dev on one app (in reasonably good shape (I think)), and a second person as an almost solo dev on the other (a known intern spawned codethulu), I think the hangup is the spinup time needed to get someone else familiar with the appropriate codebase, combined with prayers that the desert oasis contract'll finally come in and we'll be able to rewrite the demon properly in something that is not excel VBA. X|
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
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Now that I've managed to land a fairly-comfortable job as a Senior Developer in a SouthEast Asian company, I find myself at odds with the culture here in the company and their attitude towards work and code. Apparently, my immediate supervisor wants me to be more "sensitive" to the people under me because they might get offended if I pointed out the flaws in their code. The culture in Asia seems to be more "people" centered, and the reason why I'm at odds is because I grew up in the U.S. where the goal is efficiency rather than social harmony. So anyway, here's my question: What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks? If I have a deadline to meet and I've got people under me who I have to tiptoe around, it's going to hamper my efficiency, not to mention the fact that I won't be able to correct them for the mistakes that they make without offending their sensitivities. Has anyone else been in this situation before? And how did you resolve it?
Do you know...LinFu?
Philip Laureano wrote:
What's the most diplomatic way to tell them that their code well...sucks?
First you have to beat them in hand-to-hand combat; then they'll respect you and listen to your opinions about code. As their sensei you would have the right to instruct them, with no one losing face.
"A Journey of a Thousand Rest Stops Begins with a Single Movement"