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   Ruth Malan (ruthmalan@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 11-Jun-2024 22:32:47 JST Ruth Malan

   Realizing that I get really squirmy when I see "optimize" used in the context of the organizational/team work we do. Even within our technical systems, we're working within a design space that is complex enough that "optimize" is... well, I don't know but... hm. A stretch. But for our teams, we need to shift the managementese away from notions that optimizing... is something to strive for... It's people, people! We're working on messy -- wicked -- problems.

   • Paul Cantrell repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     Ruth Malan (ruthmalan@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 11-Jun-2024 22:32:47 JST Ruth Malan

     in reply to

     • Mx. Aria Stewart
     • Deb Chachra

     “There’s an always-on assumption that there are still yet more efficiencies to be found, if we go looking for them, still yet more ways to hone the team’s focus, to turn laser-eyed onto whatever it is the executive team has deemed most necessary”
     — Mandy Brown, https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/against-optimization

     Brown quotes @debcha :

     “Optimization is intrinsically brittle, because it’s about closely matching the output to the conditions, which means it’s vulnerable if those conditions change.”

     Via @aredridel — 🙏🏻