I’ve given a fair bit of brainspace to this idea of “toil” lately - trying to wrap arms around it, trying to figure out what it means and how to make it better. I have thoughts and opinions and ideas…and ultimately no direct conclusions, but something that I keep coming back to is that the very term “toil” has become detrimental to trying to solve for it.
It’s too generic. It means too many things to too many different people. What are we actually talking about here?
Are we talking about late-night iris alerts? (This may be the most non-controversial example I can think of.)
…but what about triaging email alerts?
Are we talking about the “button-pushing” brand of repetitive/low-value tasks?
Are we talking about the overhead of understanding the complexities of our infrastructure?
Are we talking about being able to automate a specific thing?
Are we talking about something that has been automated, but perhaps suboptimally?
To this end, I’d like to try an experiment. If you have something to say on this subject, please feel free to drop something in this doc:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/16F89H0ZQvEFMqAX-0YLlaP9lwQ0yDasaFfy5Hsd1hqE/edit
This isn’t something I’ve done before in this space and I don’t know how it’s going to turn out. It’s a little bit dangerous in that this document is open for Edit - and to a whole bunch of folks who have been newly-liberated to a WFH experience, no less. To that end I’ve given some super-basic guidance, posted at the top of the doc:
Contribute as you see fit. Please, don’t be an asshole.
Please consider this as the single guiding principle…but beyond that contribute as you see fit.