
Don't ask to ask, just ask - chynkm
https://dontasktoask.com/
======
wonder_er
I wrote a similar guide (less concise/maybe more detailed) a few years back:
[https://josh.works/better-questions](https://josh.works/better-questions)

In another post, I make a case for never, ever asking "are you there?" in
Slack[0]. It's been popular for my friends who work on remote teams inside of
larger non-remote companies.

Both are relevant, both try to encourage us to be respectful of the time and
effort others might give us.

[https://josh.works/whole-messages-in-slack#you-there-and-
oth...](https://josh.works/whole-messages-in-slack#you-there-and-other-
messages-to-never-send)

~~~
jbay808
I once checked my Slack to find that, an hour previously, a coworker had sent
me a message: "Hello jbay808". So I wrote back: "Hello coworker."

An hour after that, I got a reply from him: "lol. Anyway I just wanted to let
you know that there's a bug in SW version 0.3..."

And I was wondering, why not open with "Hello jbay808, I just wanted to let
you know..."? It was a perfectly good asynchronous discussion after that.

~~~
wonder_er
Yep. A 1:1 transfer from "normal conversation" to "slack conversation" can be
really annoying.

If I barged into your office for help and before you'd even made eye contacted
started with "hey jbay808 I'm trying to run this database migration but keep
getting validation errors..."

and that was the first thing I'd said to you in three days? no good.

Doing this in slack? :chef-kiss:

~~~
alexbanks
A previous HR executive used to open every slack conversation with "yt?" Which
stood for "You There?". I never understood why you would say that and nothing
else, and if the answer was "no", why you wouldn't just say what you were
going to say so the person would read it when they WERE there.

~~~
wonder_er
hahaha. yep.

A senior executive at my company would sometimes ping me with "got a minute?"

And whenever I saw it, I'd _always_ think

> I'm about to get a raise or i'm about to get fired

When it's HR, or someone where the person sending the message is significantly
more powerful than the person receiving it should consider that their "ping"
might be interpreted as negatively as possible, unless they _specifically_
indicate that everything is fine.

(Turns out the VP was reaching out with some question about how we logged data
to a 3rd party tool, not to fire me. :phew:)

This was particularly challenging when a meeting would be scheduled.

> VP: Hey wonder_er, I just put a meeting on your calendar to chat tomorrow

 _spends 24 hours wondering if I 'm going to be fired_

turns out the call was to say "good work, here's your annual performance
bonus".

~~~
alexbanks
Yes. This HR exec was always guilty of putting unmarked calendar invites on
people's calendars because she didn't understand/know how to do
private/restricted invites. So you'd show up to work and find a 2pm "HR Sync"
on your calendar with no description. Really great times.

------
Kluny
This is a lesson I learned while writing call-to-action emails.

I'd start with a draft that was like,

"Due to xxx situation, we have political momentum this week and want to take
advantage of it by canvassing even harder than usual. Can I ask you to take
another shift this week?"

That became,

"Will you take a second canvassing shift this week? Due to xxx situation, we
have political momentum this week and want to capitalize on it by doubling our
canvassing shifts. Will you commit?"

The second gets better results and is way less irritating to read as a
recipient, even though it feels aggressive to write it.

~~~
scubbo
That's surprising to me. I would have expected the latter to lead to a
subconcious "no" upon reading the first sentence, and then you're arguing
uphill against that position.

I suppose the former is more likely to be mentally filtered out as spam or
marketing before the end of the first sentence (no aspersions upon you or your
communication! It's valuable. But it also looks _similar to_ the format of
spam or marketing, through no fault of your own)

~~~
Kluny
In this case, the difference is that I already have buy-in for the people
receiving these emails (volunteers who have worked for me before). If it was a
cold email, it would be a softer lead for sure.

~~~
akvadrako
Thanks for the example, but I'm not so convinced that's the reason. The second
example shows you respect people's time by starting with a minimal abstract
that gets the point across, then explaining the details, followed by a
conclusion.

The first example sounds manipulative and disrespectful.

~~~
Kluny
Also possible, good point.

------
city41
I agree with this and also nohello.com (as linked in the article).

I want to add a third one: ask your question in a channel if possible, not as
a direct message to someone. DM'ing someone directly puts a lot of unfair
pressure on that person, and also denies other people from both helping and
learning. I think some people are embarrassed to ask for help in channels, and
that's an embarrassment well worth getting over.

~~~
finaliteration
I love asking for help in channels because I feel like it socializes the
answer and process for finding it much better than a DM does. It also helps
build trust within the team because someone can see a “stupid” question get
asked and then answered and then also feel comfortable asking questions like
that.

That being said, I have worked for some shitty bosses who have told me not to
post questions and information in channels directly because they want them
“vetted” first. I’ll never work for someone like that ever again.

------
branweb
I agree it's better to just ask, but whenever I catch myself asking to ask,
it's not due to laziness but rather to (perhaps misguided) politeness.
Sometimes it feels a little abrupt to dm someone or bust into a team channel
and just start asking questions (though perhaps that's irrational since it
never bothers me when the roles are reversed). I think the site would be a
little better if it addressed this motivation too.

~~~
xwdv
It is better to be efficient than polite. Better to be predictable than
"nice".

~~~
JadeNB
> It is better to be efficient than polite. Better to be predictable than
> "nice".

I probably agree on the second, but I think the first is subject to what the
definition of 'better' is. If someone has to give me, say, a bad evaluation of
my performance, then the most efficient way for them to do it is to walk up,
say "terrible performance" (and possibly list reasons), and leave—but I
certainly don't feel, as the recipient of the news, that that is the _best_
way for it to be delivered.

~~~
xwdv
Sure it is, after being given a comprehensive explanation about your terrible
performance, you will have no doubts about what needs to be fixed.

~~~
JadeNB
A comprehensive explanation is less efficient than a cursory explanation.

~~~
Ace17
Efficient doesn't mean "fast". It means that it minimizes the ratio
"energy_spent / goal".

So if we're going to talk about communication efficiency, we need to define
what's the goal being optimized here.

If a manager wants to minimize the time spent dealing with one of the
engineers and wants to see this engineer quit, then the "cursory explanation"
can be considered "efficient".

If this same manager, instead, wants to maximizes the odds the engineer stays
and improves her/his weak points, then the "comprehensive" explanation might
be a lot more efficient, despite requiring the manager to spend more time at
it.

------
legitster
I hate hate hate this advice.

I am a complete idiot at coding. And one of the biggest barriers to getting
good at it is _I don 't even know how to ask good questions_.

Online communities are already toxic places for newcomers. Ask a dumb question
on StackOverflow and you get downvoted and griped at. I know I am an idiot! I
know I don't understand what I am asking for! This is a cry for help!

>..which is just lazy. If you're not willing to do the work to solve your
problem, why should we?

When I ask a vague, dumb plea, I am intentionally trying to weed out the
pedantic people who would rather write a blog post about how dumb I am than
stop to help me. If they have the time to follow up, they will have the
patience to help me. Everyone else should move along.

If everyone has to stop and think of a logical and formalized way to ask a
question, no one will bother asking for help. Think of every time you have
reached outside of your domain - you would be so much worse off if you spent
the entire time researching the right way to ask something than just asking
for help.

In fact, I will turn it around. If you are not actually stopping to
thoughtfully answer dumb questions, you are not actually teaching anyone
anything.

~~~
xboxnolifes
I disagree with the topic you think the piece is even about. The piece isn't
about having a well thought out question at all. It's about not asking for
permission to ask the question. People don't want to say "sure, I'm around"
and then 5-10 minutes later say "sorry, I don't have experience with that".
They want people to ask a question to the best of their ability and if they
think they can help they will.

The domain I'm thinking about in my example is tournament organizing. So many
questions start off with.

> Can someone help me?

Or

> I have a question.

And want nothing else than a 'sure' or 'yes?' before asking their questions.
But why not just ask the question / state the issue that is almost always
already thought out as:

> I'm having an issue with registering my team.

Or

> Am I eligible to participate if X?

There was no long and thought out process of "logical and formalized" question
forming here. It was just avoiding the waste of time between the asker having
a question and getting an answer.

~~~
jancsika
> People don't want to say "sure, I'm around" and then 5-10 minutes later say
> "sorry, I don't have experience with that".

Yes, if only humans could outsource such desiderata to some kind of
specialized "engine" that could produce human language sentence given a set of
explicit data and instructions.

Would this be the right forum to ask about how to design such an engine?
Seriously asking because it doesn't look like anyone here has experience with
solving such a novel problem.

------
nikivi
I wrote something similar in my wiki too:

[https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/research/asking-
questions](https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/research/asking-questions)

Boiling it down to a series of broad steps:

1\. Do your own research first.

2\. Include things you have tried and thought of before asking the question.

3\. Be explicit about what you want to achieve in the end and provide as much
information as possible to help.

4\. Respect other people's time.

Learned it the hard way.

------
derekp7
The problem I have is I tend to go to the opposite extreme. In anticipation of
any question that someone may raise about the issue I'm asking about, I tend
to give a lot of background (most of it probably irrelevant) and other
details. No one wants to have to read through my whole life story, just to get
to the meat of my query an answer it.

~~~
wonder_er
This isn't "the opposite extreme", this is a helpful process by which you can
share context with the person you're asking help from.

We _usually_ work on challenging problems. It's unreasonable to expect to
easily share relevant context when getting help from someone.

I send _extremely_ detailed notes to coworkers all the time. I usually _take_
detailed notes as I work, so it's fairly easy to "package" the note for
someone else's consumption.

For a recursive example, this: [https://josh.works/better-
questions#examples](https://josh.works/better-questions#examples)

I've documented how I ask questions and how I ask for help, so I can share it
with others... who ask questions... and ask for help. >_<

~~~
alangpierce
> We usually work on challenging problems

At least for me (as someone who's more often answering the questions at my
company), this varies quite a bit. Certainly sometimes there's a deep
technical problem or an issue requiring genuinely tricky troubleshooting, but
often it's a new hire who is still getting up to speed and didn't realize that
there's some command that they need to run that will solve all of their
problems. In a case like that, I worry about an environment where they feel
afraid to ask a question unless they've already fought with the problem for a
long time, and where they feel obligated to post an extensive write-up of the
steps they've already tried. I would call that an "opposite extreme" since
they're significantly less productive than they would be if they had been more
willing to reach out for help early on. That's my main concern with the
article: it has a tone of scolding people for the way that they ask questions,
and I worry that it would cause people to be afraid to ask questions even when
it would be best for them to do so.

I think the ideal approach is a balance: some initial detail on the problem,
but with an understanding that deeper details can come in the follow-up (which
might be over chat or over a call or some other medium).

------
chiefofgxbxl
This reminds me of all the cases of "This notice is to inform you that "
notices posted around public and in my apartment complex.

When COVID hit, the grocery store posted a nice multi-paragraph letter on the
window to the effect of "This notice is to inform you that due to an executive
order signed by Gov. ... wearing a mask while in this store is now required."
Took several months, but finally it's replaced by a much better, "No mask, no
service" sign using an image of a mask and massive font.

One from my apartment building was an entire letter essentially telling people
"security cameras in use".

Get to the point. Use few words and large fonts. Use images. Don't make people
think.

~~~
HenryBemis
Wouldn't the typical sign (yellow triangle with camera icon, and text "CCTV in
operation") do the work? Nobody will read a letter on a door, but a shiny
yellow poster A4/Letter would definitely attract the eyeballs.

Or is it a regulatory thingie, that you "must" have the letter? (genuinely
asking - are you in the US)?

------
mcqueenjordan
Somewhat related idea: [https://www.nohello.com/](https://www.nohello.com/)

~~~
cosenal
that is linked at the bottom of the page

------
2bitencryption
I'm bemused by the concept of this "single page with dedicated domain name
explaining a concept in three short paragraphs".

Especially because this one claims at the bottom that it was mostly taken from
here: [http://sol.gfxile.net/dontask.html](http://sol.gfxile.net/dontask.html)

So... why not just link to that page? Why register a domain and pretty much
copy-paste that content?

I'm not trying to be inflammatory, just trying to understand this concept. Do
people share these links with others or is it just for Hacker News credo?

~~~
scubbo
Much like "nohello.com", I assume that it exists to be easily memorable and
recognizable in a profile.

------
hinkley
A variant on this problem was proposed to me years ago and I still try to
follow the advice.

When you haven't talked to a person in a while (or ever), especially someone
who is used to being asked for favors, they may become guarded and reticent if
you open with small talk out of nowhere. They will sense the other shoe and be
preoccupied with predicting when it will drop.

It's better, I'm told, to rip off the bandaid. To say something like, "Hey can
I borrow your <tool I don't own>? It would really help me. How are the kids?
Did you ever finish that shed you were working on?"

It's much less manipulative and open about what exactly is happening. And it's
open-ended. You don't end up sabotaging yourself by interrupting halfway
through their story about emergency visits to the orthodontist to ask about
that tool, because you only allocated three minutes to pretending to be
interested.

------
expatriate
This happens all the time when planning social events, e.g. "Are you busy
tomorrow?" instead of "Do you want to go watch a movie tomorrow?"

~~~
SketchySeaBeast
That one is bad because "are you busy tomorrow" has equal chance of you asking
me to do something distasteful, so I'm usually going to opt for a "no" because
I have no desire to move that couch for you, but I may be open to seeing a
movie together.

~~~
hnick
I will just say "why" or "that depends, I'm busy but maybe I can make room".

There seems to be an attitude that we shouldn't be rude to people, but to be
honest, I learned such things at a young age from blunt responses like this.
Along with the old response "Can I ask you a question" "You just asked me
one". They forced introspection.

------
romwell
Just to clarify: the problem is not asking to ask (or saying "hello", as in
nohello.com) - the problem is waiting for a response to the message before
saying what you were going to say to begin with.

Nothing wrong with "Any Java experts around? I haven't updated my Java
knowledge since version 5, and am looking for resources to lean from", for
example.

Similarly, "Hey John, would you have 15 minutes? I have a question about such-
and-such API that you have worked with" is non-problematic, whereas "Hey John,
would you have 15 minutes?" by itself is.

If the next thing you say does not depend on the response, say it right way.

In short: when you have something to say, say it.

------
csours
Best resource I've found on asking technical questions (also linked at the
bottom of the post):

"How to Ask Questions The Smart Way"

[http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-
questions.html](http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html)

'Smart Questions' should be required reading when onboarding college hires to
technical jobs. I still think about it when writing emails, and it helped me
greatly when I was a tester to write better bugs.

------
LifeIsBio
It's also worth pointing out the inherent utility of forcing yourself to write
out a well-thought-out question. The number of times I've made it 3/4 of the
way through a stackoverflow question before finding out what the problem was
for myself is silly.

I've started doing it intentionally. If I'm stuck on something, I'll start a
slack message with no real intention of sending it. Works wonders.

------
jakecarpenter
Agreed, the world would be a simpler place if we all followed the same play
book...for online communication and everything else.

But we don't, and we probably can't. Cultural, language, religious, gender,
and educational differences mean that part of any non-trivial discussion is
going to involve some sort of "handshake" where you establish the rules of the
discussion. And it is going to be a slightly set of rules for any discussion.
I've seen sites (and before the web, messages) like this for years. You paste
the link and are on your way. Or, more commonly, you paste the link and then
proceed to provide the information someone is looking for. This is a variation
of the "use the search, this has been covered" fight that every forum has.

Why go through that? If you want to engage with somebody, do it. If not,
don't.

------
renewiltord
This is a safe one, actually, because if you ask this way you won't get
answers, so it's really your own problem.

These negative feedback loops are great!

Positive feedback loops are ones like "Java sucks. You can't even do
$THING_THAT_YOU_KNOW_IT_CAN_DO_BUT_DO_NOT_KNOW_HOW" which need websites.

------
ajaimk
We call this "Actionable IM" where I work.

Anyone who doesn't use it doesn't get a response.

~~~
dgellow
That sounds harsh.

------
zepearl
I agree with the the article - mention directly the problem (context & your
own problem) in as few words as possible to allow people to understand if they
can help or not.

Same thing about "Do you have a minute?" (most of the time in the company's
internal chat, but sometimes as well on the phone) => I'm really working most
of the time on stuff that might range from bureaucratic things to confcalls in
major incidents => mentioning the context&problem would allow me to take an
informed decision.

Having said this, I do fall into this trap from time to time :)

------
badrabbit
I hate this so much, if you are posting a question in a q&a forum like
stackoverflow, this rule makes perfect sense. But in a conversation it is
perfectly normal to gauge interest or ask if is ok to ask a question hoping
you will be directed to a better place. Why is online conversation so special?
We are not writing a letter with a pen,it's instant just like having a normal
talking conversation. Sure,the actual question should be conscise but the
norms and etiquettes of conversation pre-exist for a reason.

~~~
treesprite82
> Why is online conversation so special?

Because it has the potential to be asynchronous.

If I glance through a channel and see a bunch of questions then I can answer
them in just the time it takes for me to write an answer. Whereas if I see
"Hey can anyone help me?" then I need to ask "Possibly. What's the issue?" and
wait for the asker to return, see my message, then formulate their question.

Note that this is assuming a programming chat room. "Asking to ask" makes
slightly more sense in a 1-1 DM with someone.

> the norms and etiquettes of conversation pre-exist for a reason

Mostly for face-to-face conversations.

------
jancsika
Here's a fun game: create an HN client that recreates the same UX problems
that these anti-social "netiquette" guides attempted to address.

In other words-- in what specific way can you fuck up the UI of HN to cause
users to become so timid and confused that they create posts asking if it's ok
to post here.

Another fun one would be to screw up the UX for replying such that an average
of 2% of each thread is filled with veterans telling neophytes not to create
top posts but to instead reply underneath the comment they're responding to.

~~~
juped
Don't worry, Gmail made top-posting cool.

------
Kuraj
I don't know.

The reason I tend to do this is because sometimes I have problems with
figuring out what my issue actually is, and that I might be running into an XY
problem. For these reasons I prefer to engage in a synchronous form of
communication.

That doesn't mean that I expect someone to commit or that I won't respect the
person's boundaries when they refuse to help for whatever reason.

------
chiefalchemist
If you bother at all, the response is simple: "Yes. Why do you ask?"

It works both ways. Bad questions too often get answers, but often bad
answers. That is, questions often should be met with more questions. But
they're not. Many people are wired to want to help - which is great - but too
few are wired for critical thinking and analysis.

------
dang
Related from a couple days ago:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24239880](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24239880)

------
labster
I have a comment on this topic, is it okay if I share?

------
Lammy
Corollary: Rebuke people in your company/community who respond to beginner
questions with "RTFM"-like anger.

------
vernie
Nice follow-up to No Hello from a few days ago. This is good but I don't think
it goes far enough. Ask? That's weak shit. Demand. Maybe start with "One of
you worthless motherfuckers".

Edit: Maybe also threaten violence if your question isn't answered.

~~~
rhacker
We have someone on our team that speaks like this. They caused someone to quit
last week. I know your comment is a joke, but there are actually different
backgrounds in play where this stuff doesn't fly. (Not everyone is jokey you)

~~~
vernie
How has that person not been fired or at very least been disciplined? I know
people on here like to think they're doing important work but we're mostly
just making dumb websites and it's not that hard to find someone who can do
that and isn't a dickhead.

------
m3kw9
A website just for that. Just to get a point across.

