
The Rise of the New Groupthink - user02138
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/15/opinion/sunday/the-rise-of-the-new-groupthink.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=all
======
jgrant27
_The mind is sharper and keener in seclusion and uninterrupted solitude. No
big laboratory is needed in which to think. Originality thrives in seclusion
free of outside influences beating upon us to cripple the creative mind. Be
alone, that is the secret of invention; be alone, that is when ideas are born.
That is why many of the earthly miracles have had their genesis in humble
surroundings._

-Nikola Tesla

~~~
seiji
_These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and
inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy
against the manhood of every one of its members._

 _I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when my genius calls me. I
would write on the lintels of the door-post, Whim. I hope it is somewhat
better than whim at last, but we cannot spend the day in explanation. Expect
me not to show cause why I seek or why I exclude company._

-Ralph Waldo Emerson (1841)

~~~
SiVal
When my genius calls me, it waits on hold for a while then hangs up, because
I'm in a meeting.

------
mekoka
The book "Peopleware" has documented this very concept decades ago (according
to wikipedia, first edition was published in 1987), yet here we are in 2012
with still more "cool open" environments for programming teams.

Here's a link to the top positive review in amazon, giving an insight as to
its content
[http://www.amazon.com/review/R1R3N8JI29OPPE/ref=cm_cr_pr_vie...](http://www.amazon.com/review/R1R3N8JI29OPPE/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt#R1R3N8JI29OPPE)

Lots of startups want to recreate the cafe experience as a workspace, but I'd
rather work in a real cafe, with more people and more noise than an open space
office. In a cafe, you still have somewhat of an expectation of privacy,
there's less the prospect of someone interrupting you just because you're
within reach.

~~~
dredmorbius
A huge difference at a cafe (or library, or beach villa patio ...) is that the
people around you _don't have any say in your activity_. Other than, perhaps,
the cafe manager who could kick you out for hogging the table.

But, generally, the people there are strangers (or casual aquaintences), not
workplace bosses, subordinates, rivals, or even true collaborators. So what
they do has a lot less influence on you than would be the case at an office
(or a home environment for those who work at home with roommates or family).

Not only does this reduce interruptions (other than someone with low social
awareness or boundaries, you're not likely to get interrupted), but the
conversations and activities at other tables _don't concern you_. While you
might casually observe or evesdrop as a diversion, you've got no stake in the
outcome of a given conversation or interaction.

Similarly, you can flirt with the boy or girl at the next table without
worrying about it turning into an HR issue.

This is much less the case in an office. Particularly one with any sort of
disfunctional relationships.

Online collaborative projects (including Free Software projects) typically
operate similarly. People participate because they're interested and are
capable. You can't be fire (OTOH: you're often not being paid), but in a sense
this is a good thing as it disintermediates work and work product from
concerns over how that product is received.

------
ijreilly
My current company, a startup, has an even split of developers, half under 30
and half over 45. I'm one of the old guys. The development environment and
approach, mostly set up by the young guys, is pretty modern -- lots of open
source tools, hosting on launchpad, test-driven development, code reviews, all
developers in one big open space, everyone does everything (as opposed to
developers doing development, testers writing tests, build engineers creating
build infrastructure).

The young guys seem to thrive in this setup. It's driving me nuts.

I am most productive when I have a problem to solve and I can immerse myself
in it for hours every day, days at a time, without interruption. But now I
have to do timely code reviews for others. I also have to respond to reviews
of my code. The encouraged way of working is to commit small, reviewable
pieces, but then each commit involves several interruptions, and it's
difficult to go on to part 2 while addressing everyone's concerns about part
1. The infrastructure is problematic, because no one actually owns it, so
there are more interruptions to deal with problems there.

Everyone has an IRC window open, and while there isn't too much social
chatter, there is a distraction every time that a message arrives. (I hate
IRC. I was forced to it in my last job, when people would IRC my officemate to
get hold of me.)

I recognize the benefits of some of these practices. Code reviews do catch
problems. (On the other hand, a code review often acts as a substitute for a
design review, so we actually end up reviewing and maintaining bad designs.)
More people know more of the code, and we avoid problems created by a guy
going into a cave for weeks at a time.

But there is no denying that this style of working really makes it difficult
to concentrate, at least for me.

~~~
MartinCron
_I am most productive when I have a problem to solve and I can immerse myself
in it for hours every day, days at a time, without interruption._

That's what's most productive for you, but it might not be what's best for the
organization as a whole.

~~~
godDLL
Would you care to giv an example of how that works? I'm having a hard time
visualizing such a scenario (unless your department's job is to stall).

~~~
MartinCron
Simple example. It may disrupt my flow to help my colleagues solve problems,
but it may save them hours of time if I say "oh, I already did that here..."

------
DuncanIdaho
What I find gross is that the article somehow considers cubicles as a
"private" solution.

This modern management cargo cult has reached really gross levels of
absurdity.

If open plan is a cacophony of voices amidst which a person is to find focus
and deep thinking, then cubicles are the same cacophony without the peripheral
vision part.

I find teamwork, collaboration and such bullshit words just a mask for true
motive. Cheapness. Cheapness in landlords, Cheapness in architects and
Cheapness in companies who ultimately make up reasons for why they don't want
to spend money and time on building truly productive environments.

Its sort of sour grapes situation.

~~~
HalibetLector
I don't know about other people, but cubicles instill in me a sense of
paranoia I don't get in an open office plan. It actively raises my stress
level and makes it harder to focus knowing anybody can show up behind me at
any time and I can't see them coming.

------
hammerdr
There are many parts of this article that boil my blood. The biggest of which
is the use of "Groupthink" to describe a practice of creativity. Groupthink
has a very specific meaning in many peoples minds which does not apply in this
situation. Dilution of the word Groupthink as well as the mischaracterization
of a practice the author happens to dislike are both egregious.

Creativity is often spoken of as an end. I do not believe that is true.
Sitting in complete isolation being creative does good to no one. Instead, it
is a goal to share and execute on your creativity and vision that you have
thought of in your own mind.

Programming is interesting because it is a marriage of creativity and skill--
it is not art nor engineering but is a craft. You forge creativity with skill
(and experience) into lines of code.

However, that does not scale. If we have 50 programmers working in complete
isolation then we will have 50 different programs. Collaboration becomes key
to scaling the craft.

The only way to scale craft is through constant, effective communication. The
tools we use every day as software developers serve to enhance, enforce or
provide communication. Even in completely remote projects like Linux, there
are tools used to ensure communication: code is submitted to a committer in
small, readable patches; style guides focus on the readability of code rather
than their cleverness or creativity; changes are discussed and debated on
mailing lists and IRC; subcomponent Czars are assigned that share the overall
vision of the project.

The so-called "Groupthink" isn't about Creativity--it is about effective real
change in the real world by actually applying the creativity that we have
instead of allowing it to evaporate.

~~~
gambler
_However, that does not scale. If we have 50 programmers working in complete
isolation then we will have 50 different programs. Collaboration becomes key
to scaling the craft._

Sticking 50 people into the same room does not guarantee true collaboration.
Especially if they have different goals, which is often an overlooked factor
in large companies.

~~~
hammerdr
Nope.

But its one of many tools to encourage collaboration.

------
moocow01
Thank you to the writer of this. This is actually the reason I only take work
that allows me to mainly work remotely. I used to work in an open layout as
described and I would be interrupted for every little thing resulting in not
much actual work being achieved. Oddly enough the open layout seems to be'the
way' for cool startups - maybe in actuality this driven more by the cost
savings of having an open layout office versus the alternative. I find it to
be a poor setup for having to do anything that requires mental concentration.

~~~
joezydeco
I'm sitting here in one of these "cool startup" offices right now. I
absolutely hate it. No place to stack anything, no walls to hang whiteboards,
calendars, pictures. No DOOR to close when I just want to get something done.

I have noise everywhere that headphones can't drown out. I have people tapping
me on the back constantly because, apparently, having headphones on isn't a
big enough signal that I'm trying to shut out the world. Yeah yeah, I know,
sit people down and tell them. People forget. Just give me a door I can LOCK
and that will work just fine.

I'm a few hours away from commandeering an unused storage room and making it
the new Software Lab.

~~~
whamill
No whiteboards? What kind of startup doesn't have loads of whiteboards? You
should go buy a load of that paint you can use to turn walls into whiteboards
and paint your desk and cupboards and floor - www.ideapaint.com

~~~
joezydeco
No, we have whiteboards. They're just across the room on the outer walls where
I can't reach them easily. We also went cheap and bought melamine bathroom
panels that are impossible to erase.

~~~
gruseom
_[whiteboard] melamine bathroom panels that are impossible to erase_

I had this exact problem. Citrus cleanser in a spray bottle solved it
perfectly.

~~~
joezydeco
Thanks for the tip!

------
jamesbritt
I have a very comfy and full-featured home-office set-up, but still try to get
out at least once a week to (ostensibly) work among other hackers.

There are some business advantages to not being cloistered, not the least
being people know you exist and may be available for whatever kind of work you
do. And it's good to have be around smart geeks who can answer questions or
give you a sanity check on ideas.

But the big gain for me is the serendipity. I don't expect to be dreaming up
amazing creative thoughts in any sort of communal or committee activity, but
the exposure to semi-random ideas and events is important to my own thinking.

Left alone (or alone with the Internet) people may tend to only read what
they're familiar with, or approve of, or in some way filter out the things
that might challenge their beliefs and expectations. That's fairly natural,
but it's bad. You need to take deliberate steps to overcome that.

If you pick your groups well it can help free you from the prison of self-
reinforcing thinking.

~~~
JamesLeonis
Here's an interesting TED talk by Steven Johnson where he argues for exactly
what you are saying.

[http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_johnson_where_good_ideas_com...](http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_johnson_where_good_ideas_come_from.html)

~~~
jamesbritt
BTW, his book The Invention of Air is really good.

------
ChristianMarks
If the group thinkers can re-invent Bolshevism for the classroom and the
workplace, allow me to invent my own journalistic sociological gloss to bring
attention to a physiological trend that the group thinkers might not
appreciate.

It is an anthropological finding that the human brain decreased in volume by
10% — about the size of a tennis ball — around the dawn of civilization 20,000
years ago. It is believed that the decrease in volume coincided with the
emergence of cooperative, prosocial behavior, which enabled the members of
reduced-cranium groups to solve some problems that eluded their more amply-
brained relatives. The larger brains were adapted to more independent modes of
survival. Bonobos have smaller brains than chimpanzees, but can solve problems
that larger-brained chimpanzees will not solve, unless they decide to
cooperate, which is unusual. [There are videos online of cooperating
chimpanzees in the lab.] Successive generations of domesticated animals
exhibit reduced brain volume in comparison with their ancestors.

The assumption that assimilation into the group is always good ignores the
flip side of cooperation among prosocials. Prosocial behavior doesn’t imply
feeble-minded docility. Fear of separation from the group, and antagonism
toward larger-brained independent individuals is deeply ingrained. The reduced
brain volume is compensated for somewhat by vindictiveness. Prosocials reward
conformists and will punish transgressors at some cost to themselves. Road
rage is an example. The capacity for revenge, even if this is costly, is the
flip side of cooperation.

Groups are good at solving some kinds of problems, but not all problems (cf.
Jaron Lanier, DIGITAL MAOISM: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism
<http://edge.org/3rd_culture/lanier06/lanier06_index.html>).

One should exercise caution when internalizing group values.

In a study published on July 15, 2011, in the Institute of Physics and German
Physical Society’s New Journal of Physics, researchers have shown that
swarming, a phenomenon that can be crucial to an animal’s survival, is created
by the same kind of social networks that humans adopt. … _Locusts rely heavily
on swarming as they are in fact cannibalistic. As they march across barren
deserts, locusts carefully keep track of each other so they can remain within
striking distance to consume one another — a cruel, but very efficient,
survival strategy. — Science Daily (July 15, 2011), Swarms of Locusts Use
Social Networking to Communicate_

It’s a locust-eat-locust world out there.

~~~
corporalagumbo
Man, what are you trying to say? Something about small-brained prosocial
locusts eating separated chimpanzees because they feel vindictive, is that it?

~~~
ChristianMarks
I am asking how far we want our craniums to shrink in the name of cooperation.
There are trade offs. I suggest that cooperation has its sinister aspects. And
I believe you should carefully consider the group values you internalize, if
at all possible. My career suffered at my previous place of employment once I
pointed this out, so one might wish to be circumspect.

------
scott_s
I couldn't make it past the first page of the article because I felt it was
veering too much into the territory of "I have an axe to grind, and I'm
looking for anecdotes to support it." My two sentence take:

1\. In my experience, private space and time is necessary for individuals to
get real work done.

2\. In my experience, small, focused teams which have as-needed discussions
and well-partitioned responsibilities are massively more productive than
individuals when it comes to solving large problems.

~~~
troymc
You should have read the whole article. The author does cite numerous third-
party sources of evidence.

~~~
scott_s
I felt he was confusing my two points, and it got frustrating. Collaboration
does not imply literally working with those people in the room all the time.

~~~
saraid216
Both points are valid and one is often forgotten in favor of the other.

------
BadassFractal
This is very interesting, especially in light of certain software development
approaches such as XP, where you're told to work in pairs as much as possible.
Many people argue that you haven't truly experienced teamwork until you've
pair developed for a whole workday together for months at a time. The approach
works for several companies, Pivotal Labs comes to mind.

I've personally experienced benefits of that work style, but at the same time
I've always wondered if in the process you lose the opportunity to be by
yourself and deeply and creatively think about a problem from different
angles, without having to share that with anybody while it's still brewing.

On the other hand, you have companies such as MySQL that were almost entirely
remote, and still managed to get lots of great technology built, rarely, if
ever, working in the same building. That did the trick for them, they were
also quite successful.

I think at the end of the day you can have the cake and eat it too. How about
this: if you need to do some deep thinking or some heavily creative work, you
can do it on your own terms, by yourself, late at night, like the Woz would
prescribe. If you need to do some work that you can easily wrap your head
around, then working closely together with someone else or a larger team is a
likely boost in effectiveness, as it provides you with safeguards and spare
pairs of eyes.

Thoughts?

~~~
calibraxis
I vaguely recall reading somewhere that pair programming wasn't meant to be
for more than a few hours a day (like 4). An agile coach I know agreed with
this. But I can't easily find this caveat on the net.

~~~
BadassFractal
I remember seeing that, you're right. I believe it's actually in Extreme
Programming Explained, or in one of those other core books. If I recall
correctly, the guideline was to avoid pair work at maximum intensity for
longer than 4 hours (small breaks are implied).

------
nathansobo
I've spent far more programming hours pair-programming than working alone. It
works for me. This fall I decided I wanted to learn Cocoa, so I called up
Pivotal Labs and asked if they had any iOS projects I could work on. They
paired me with someone who had been working with Cocoa for a year. On day one
I was adding value. Within two weeks I was proficient, and within a month I
was working as fast or faster than other developers at Pivotal. I wouldn't
have been able to do it alone.

Pairing is the fastest way to ramp up in a new language, ecosystem, or
codebase. And beyond just ramping up, it continues to teach you long after you
reach mastery, because you're constantly exposed to new perspectives and
ideas. Pairing is also good for the team... by rotating pairs frequently, you
distribute knowledge through the team. It's like a RAID array for your
codebase.

People talk about the cost of being interrupted. But what about the cost of
having to read through someone's solo-written code when they're home sick and
not understanding it? When your team is pairing, you can interrupt one person
while the other person keeps coding, maintaining the focus for the pair. If
you have a question, ask it. If the team needs to know something, tell them.

Working alone is good, too. I enjoy rocking out with my headphones or working
quickly from a gut level understanding and not having to articulate it to a
pair in words. But often I find that my solo code improves when I expose it to
feedback from a pair. Not a slow asynchronous code review, but a real time
back and forth conversation. For me, software is a social activity. Deadly
silent offices give me the creeps.

------
snowwrestler
It's true that people are more creative in private than they are in public.
But, that is why brainstorming sessions are so useful.

Brainstorm sessions might surface creativity that has already happened. If you
ask a group, "What are some product ideas we haven't considered?", there's a
chance that some people have been independently thinking about new products,
but wouldn't have thought to propose them.

Or they can serve to direct/request creativity. If you ask "What are some
product ideas we haven't considered?", people who had not been thinking about
new products, might start. It gives them something to think about on the drive
home or in the shower. I've received some great ideas via email a few days
after the actual session.

------
jonnathanson
_"In one fourth-grade classroom I visited in New York City, students engaged
in group work were forbidden to ask a question unless every member of the
group had the very same question."_

This is the essence of what's so destructive and horrifying about today's
obsession with groups: the idea that everyone in the group is equal. Equal in
talent, equal in work ethic, equal in drive, and equally entitled to being
heard. And that the consensus of the group of purported equals is more
important than the achievements of any of its constituent members.

The plain, and perhaps un-PC truth is that that's a load of hogwash. Some
perspectives _are_ better than others. Some people _are_ smarter than others,
or work harder, or are better read, or are more knowledgeable, or are more
capable. Some creative visions _are_ more correct than others, even if we
imagine that it's not possible to be "correct" or "incorrect" in the praxis of
creative expression.

Beyond these variances in ability or capability, we also encounter variances
in style. As noted in the article, some people simply work best alone. Some
disciplines -- writing, coding, art, etc. -- simply lend themselves well to
conditions of quiet, relative isolation, and to long bouts of individual
effort. That effort can be in service of a team, or as part of a team, but we
shouldn't fool ourselves into thinking that creating by committee is in some
way ideal.

The creative output of a committee tends to revert to the average creative
capability of the least creative member on the committee. Social psychological
studies have borne out that fact, and anyone who's ever been on a design
committee knows it from brutal experience.

That's not to say, of course, that group brainstorms and the like can't be
productive. They certainly can be. But the people in the group are everything.
They need to be very sharp and very creative. They need to get along well
enough not to clash over personal matters -- but not so well that they simply
agree with one another and revert into groupthink. But such groups are rare,
and I dare say that they're the exceptions to the general rule. High-
functioning creative teams are things of beauty, but they're not for everybody
or every situation.

Finally, the _structure_ of a group is critical to its success (or failure).
Groups with well established divisions of labor tend to be more productive,
and far less painful, than groups in which everyone does everything together.
Ever try to write a school paper as part of a team? It was either a horrendous
experience or a fantastic one. The horrendous teams sat down together and
drafted every sentence, laboriously and unceasingly, by committee. The
fantastic teams either divided up the sections by areas of interest or
expertise, _or_ delegated the task of drafting the paper to the person who
expressed interest and professed great ability in writing -- allowing everyone
else to do research, discuss and debate the topics, and so forth.

~~~
jshen
"In one fourth-grade classroom I visited in New York City, students engaged in
group work were forbidden to ask a question unless every member of the group
had the very same question."

I'm going to guess that the idea here is that if someone in the group has a
question, and another member of the group knows the answer, then they can
resolve it within the group. Funny how the same thing can be framed so
differently isn't it?

~~~
SiVal
So if anyone in your group insists he knows the answer, you're out of luck.
Reframe: The blind leading the blind.

So if anyone in your group doesn't care about your question, you're out of
luck. Reframe: I don't know why I even bother.

So if anyone in your group is more interested in a different question, you're
both out of luck. Reframe: Sorry, class, we're out of time.

Yes, it's funny how many ways a bad idea can be framed differently.

~~~
sunir
I believe that is an extreme and cartoonish conclusion to draw from so little
information. How do you know that is the experience the children have?

The sister comment from another teacher brings facts to the table that explain
the intent of the exercise, which is limited in scope and aimed for a specific
purpose. Good or bad it is a game to attempt to teach kids it is ok to admit
they don't know and to ask for help from their peers. If you consider how
often and how ennervating it is when our adult colleagues can't admit not
knowing, I think you can understand why someone crafted this exercise.

~~~
SiVal
I have enough information to tell that children in this case are forbidden to
ask their question unless everyone in the group has the same question, because
that information was explicitly given. This is not the same rule as one which
allows an individual child to freely ask the teacher whatever he likes,
whether his groupmates want to ask or not, if he still feels like asking after
trying his peers first.

The former process is controlled by the group; the latter, by the individual.

~~~
joemoon
I agree that it sounds like a bad idea, but you're just having a knee-jerk
reaction. You don't have enough information to make that judgement. How do you
know this wasn't a well crafted exercise designed to teach certain elements of
social interaction? I guarantee you a good teacher could use a situation like
this as a tool to teach the class something valuable.

Hell, it could be an exercise to teach students the dangers of group think. It
would be intellectually dishonest of the author to frame the situation in the
way that she did, but we have no idea of the context. Did the author watch the
whole class and speak with the teach afterward, or did she just observe the
class for a few minutes?

Without more context you just don't have enough information to make such a
damning judgement.

------
spartango
I think this comes down to an issue of balance:

Places which have nothing but cubes and sealed-off workers do miss some of the
"creative" or "interactive" benefits of open, collaborative workspaces.

At the same time, places that strictly "open"...do indeed inhibit certain
types of focused work. Isolation definitely helps progress in particular
problems. There are examples throughout this thread of that.

I think the best work environments/attitudes are those that encourage a blend:
the last few companies I've worked at have had open, collaborative workspaces,
but at the same time really encouraged folks to go find their own nook (in the
building or somewhere else entirely) when they needed to focus. The concept of
"desk hours" or "continuous availability" was basically nonexistent.

It's all about balance. If your workspace lacks that in any aspect, you'll
have something to complain about.

------
drcube
Off topic: The illustrator is apparently Andy Rementer, and while his name
isn't familiar, the art very much is. Where else has this guy's work been
featured?

~~~
dredmorbius
<http://andyrementer.com/?page_id=6>

Though I'm thinking I've seen similar styles before. It's vaguely reminiscent
of some of the 1960s/1970s psychedelic comics such as R. Crumb. Not really my
forte though.

------
LearnedHand
This article reminds me of a couple by William Deresiewicz:
<http://theamericanscholar.org/solitude-and-leadership/>
<http://chronicle.com/article/The-End-of-Solitude/3708>

------
jak88
Collaboratism ... the new ism of our modern age.

------
nirvana
In East Germany, toddlers and grade schoolers were required to go to the
bathroom together, with no partitions between the toilets. Privacy was
irrelevant because individualism was irrelevant. Even extending into bathroom
habits the communist goal was to make people cogs. I'm sure this seemed like
"scientific management" to them, and I bet many of them have no idea why it
failed.

At my last job, all the programmers worked at a central table. I was
criticized for working in my office (which I shared with one person) with my
headphones on. This was called "siloing". They wanted people to work on code
together.

I don't know about other programmers, but for me, when solving problems I find
I often have many things in my head at once, many requirements to be met for
the solution and sometimes a variety of variables whose meanings I have to
keep straight.

I literally can't think when I'm constantly being interrupted. I can't think
when I'm having to explain each symbol in a line of code to a co-worker.

Its impossible, until telepathy is perfected, for a co-worker to have the
exact same understanding of what I'm doing and why. Sure simple obvious things
are easy, but when you're constructing something original, you can't
communicate it to someone completely because there are always too many
details, even things you haven't resolved yet yourself.

At this groupthink place, every other programmer was in their 20s. They were
all junior programmers (except for the founder of the company, who worked
alone in his office.) They were not very productive. They adopted a whole lot
of bad process, but they thought that by sitting around all at the same table
they were more productive.

Maybe they were more productive than they would have been. But there was a
huge gulf between the kinds of problems I was capable of solving (architecting
major components of the product) and the kinds of problems they were solving
(each unit test written was a task, everything was broken into tiny little
independant, simple tasks.)

After I left, I decided I was done working for other people. I knew it was
time to do a startup, because I'd reached my limit.

That company culture represents the view that people are cogs. Just like the
east germans attempted to instill into their kids the culture of being cogs.

I think wozniak is right. Great programmers are artists, they live in their
head. I wouldn't call myself a great programmer-- I'm competent, and I'm great
at knowing my limitations.

But I make a really terrible cog.

That startup failed within a year after I left it. Somehow I doubt any of them
think it was due to their process.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
> when you're constructing something original, you can't communicate it to
> someone completely because there are always too many details, even things
> you haven't resolved yet yourself.

This is what's so hard to explain to people.

It's the necessary, painful part of any project: where you get to the part
that you may not know exactly how to solve. A more communal individual would
be prone to throw their hands up and call for a meeting. (I hate when people
try to make their problems be everyone's problems.) But, they're cheating
themselves out of a wonderful experience. Going at it alone in the face of
uncertainty is a delicious thrill; you start hacking away at it, hoping for
something to give, but ultimately knowing you're just making it up as you go,
and it may not work out. Eventually, you learn enough about the problem such
that you can talk about it semi-coherently. But until then, talk is useless,
no, it is an impediment. Without understanding, there is no use attempting to
articulate anything. Intuition begets understanding.

I believe some companies simply cannot accept this level of uncertainty. It's
too dangerous to take something on that might fail. They can hire all the cogs
they want.

~~~
sopooneo
I feel what you're putting down. It is very hard to explain to people what it
is like when you are at the point of a project where you are not really even
looking for answers yet. No, you're still determining what the _questions_
are. You're still figuring out what the "what" is. They just don't get it, but
I really think you have to go through that to produce a useful product.

------
leon_
That's why I don't like pair programming.

