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RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 22:51:52 GMT

I tend to find that the Open Errors Policy is the best. When you have that kind of culture no error is hidden, a given error gets added to various lists; errors to manage correction, errors to evaluate why they occurred, errors to inform users of (and workarounds for) etc.The same goes for errors reported by users. When a user reports an error there definitely exists an error somewhere. It may or may not be a programming/data flaw but if not, it is an error in something like documentation, training or clarity of application UI.Hiding mistakes is counter to this culture. It detracts from the feeling that everyone is working together to achieve something. Wearing a silly hat is just a bonus!!!

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Michael Valentine Jones — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 08:09:51 GMT

[quote][b]Tom.Thomson (2/28/2010)[/b][hr]...The next Monday I walked into the office where the people who owned the affected code were and said something like "Listen up guys, I've fucked up and we are going to have to redo all the interrupt handling...[/quote]One of the most important things you can do is to admit your own mistakes. It you say “I messed up”, it gives people confidence that you won’t try to hide embarrassing mistakes and they will trust you more.One time I had a boss come to see me to complain about a mistake in a stored procedure, and I could tell by his red face that he was really mad. I think that he was expecting that I was going to deny there was a problem and to really yell at me. I shocked him when I said that I messed it up and had already fixed it. He was left very angry but with nothing to really yell about.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

majorbloodnock — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 04:03:27 GMT

[quote][b]Tom.Thomson (2/28/2010)[/b][hr]....I often found that correcting mistakes in private was pretty pointless: if I took someone aside to explain an error they would generally go back to the rest of the team and tell them, beginning with something like "You'll never guess what an idiot thing I did, thank heavens Tom spotted it before it went into the system" - same if anyone else pulled someone aside to point out an error - everyone would soon know because that's the way the teams worked.....[/quote]Far from pointless, I'd say that's quite the opposite. Not only do people have the confidence their criticism will be taken the right way, but also when criticised people get the opportunity to control when, how and if that criticism goes public. And to top that, it seems everyone seems secure enough as team members to be content with their mistakes being known. It doesn't matter which angle you use to view it, that's an impressive culture to have developed.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 23:49:29 GMT

Too right Tom! You have to trust the team to be mature enough to enjoy the infantile mechanisms for reasonable and professional purposes. It's crazy but it works because we are humans NOT the androids a lot of HR departments want to treat us as.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

L' Eomot Inversé — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 12:05:54 GMT

A useful and interesting editorial.I think there may be a cultural difference between the two sides of the pond, or maybe between two different kinds of company.In my experience people have generally been a bit less sensitive than the editorial suggests. Most places we would have team meetings to discuss progress and problems, and people would make suggestions about problem fixes - and it wouldn't matter if your suggestion was completely nuts, because it might spark someone into spotting the answer. Team leaders and managers made mistakes too, often real howlers. Generally people were not embarrassed by mistakes, even for mistakes that led to roars of laughter. Everyone know we were a team and cared about each other - and I guess that's what it needs.Even apart from team meetings, I often found that correcting mistakes in private was pretty pointless: if I took someone aside to explain an error they would generally go back to the rest of the team and tell them, beginning with something like "You'll never guess what an idiot thing I did, thank heavens Tom spotted it before it went into the system" - same if anyone else pulled someone aside to point out an error - everyone would soon know because that's the way the teams worked. Maybe the silliest mistake I ever made was to allow some design to go through into product without first using proper queuing theory to check the likely response delays (I'd done top of the head guessing, always a dangerous thing with communicating processes): my boss took me aside for that one, and suggested I look up some elementary queuing theory stuff. The next Monday I walked into the office where the people who owned the affected code were and said something like "Listen up guys, I've fucked up and we are going to have to redo all the interrupt handling; and we have to do it soon enough that we can ship it as an upgrade before any customers get enough workload onto their systems to be hit by the problem"; then I explained what the problem was, what needed to be done to fix it, apologised for having allowed them to waste time testing a guaranteed to fail on heavy workloads method, promised to fight for better test gear so that next time we could test heavy workloads, and told them I was off to see the boss to expliain that my mistake had wasted a lot of their effort. I wasn't embarrassed, but I was really bloody annoyed with myself. The team didn't think any less of me because I'd screwed up big - they knew that they could screw up too. I learned from my error - I quickly became a real expert on queuing theory and discrete event simulation using stochastic methods, and that was a big gain. I guess it's a different culture if people are so embarrassed to have made mistakes that their embarrassment upsets them, more than their annoyance with themselves for having lost the ball, so much that they are discouraged from working rather than encouraged to increase their knowledge so as not to make similar mistakes again - a culture that I would hate to work in.I do believe that some mistakes should be handled in private - but this doesn't include trivial programming errors (trivial mistake doesn't neccessarily mean trivial consequences). For example if someone decided that bubble sort would be OK to sort a million strings with a 5 sec response time requirement I would not make that public, unless making it public becaame the only way to stop it happening. Maybe Daniel Hallam's Fozzie Bear was a bit over the top, or maybe not: it depends on the team dynamics. I've worked in teams that had similar customs, spent my share of time with the Fozzie Bear equivalent on my desk, and it didn't bother me or anyone else. One guy I worked for kept a pile of cards with "Attaboy" and another pile with "Aw Shit" printed on them, and used to hand them out as appropriate at management meetings. I earned my share of both (once got an Attaboy cancelled by an Aw Shit in about 15 seconds: got the first by explaining that my team had completed development and test of all specified work for the next release, and the second by adding that there were still 3 outstanding requirements that were so vague we couldn't begin to specify them). No-one was ever embarrassed by getting the wrong king of card - why should they be? I've known a couple of managers who would whinge and moan and go on and on about peoples mistakes, calling them incompetent and/or lazy and spending a lot of time being as nasty as they could. I've never had a jot of respect for that approach (in fact I've had a lot of disrespect for it) and it is certainly counter-productive. But going to the opposite extreme and lot letting any mistakes be known and discussed by the whole team - well, to me that means you don't trust your team to support each other, and in that case what on earth did you hire them for in the first place?

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Michael Valentine Jones — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 23:34:36 GMT

[quote][b]Michael Valentine Jones (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]In a public forum like SSC, I think it is more important to correct errors in the thread directly than to worry about someone’s feelings. The damage that can be done by poor practices being accepted unchallenged and released into the wild is far worse.However, being professional and courteous in criticism is always appropriate, whether in public or private. If you criticize someone in private in an inappropriate manner, you can hurt their feelings just as much as public criticism.At the same time, you have to be professional enough to accept criticism and not treat it as a personal attack.[/quote]Here is an interesting case:[url]http://www.sqlservercentral.com/Forums/Topic873721-145-1.aspx[/url]

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

WayneS — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 21:05:58 GMT

[quote][b]Daniel Hallam (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]We here have a team mascot of Fozzie Bear from the Muppets. He sits on the desk of whoever messed up last. We've even attached a bicycle horn that is honked when he moves desk.[b]While humiliating[/b], it serves a purpose of hammering in the need for discipline in following procedures and being aware of the consequences of ones actions.[/quote]Totally inappropriate. This is just completely wrong. You KNOW you are humiliating people... your "team" must hate you.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Daniel Hallam — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 15:45:22 GMT

We here have a team mascot of Fozzie Bear from the Muppets. He sits on the desk of whoever messed up last. We've even attached a bicycle horn that is honked when he moves desk.While humiliating, it serves a purpose of hammering in the need for discipline in following procedures and being aware of the consequences of ones actions.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

KevinC. — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 13:07:14 GMT

Good article, Tim.Thanks.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Michael Valentine Jones — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 10:26:01 GMT

In a public forum like SSC, I think it is more important to correct errors in the thread directly than to worry about someone’s feelings. The damage that can be done by poor practices being accepted unchallenged and released into the wild is far worse.However, being professional and courteous in criticism is always appropriate, whether in public or private. If you criticize someone in private in an inappropriate manner, you can hurt their feelings just as much as public criticism.At the same time, you have to be professional enough to accept criticism and not treat it as a personal attack.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Jan Sorenson — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 09:54:50 GMT

Tim, great editorial. Sometimes those of us who work in a technical world place less emphasis on the human factors of life. As was mentioned, there is a time and place for everything. Discretion with public criticism shows a lot of class, at the same time, an ill place critical remark can make one look like the "north end of a south bound mule". Keep up the good work.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

djackson 22568 — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 09:47:46 GMT

You (SSC Veteran) point out one of the major causes of people not wanting to hear criticism. If they are in a role they are poorly suited for, every attempt to assist them just reinforces their knowledge of their inability to do the job. Anyone can write a program, it takes someone special to write good code. Some might say that anyone can be taught to code well, that simply is not the case. Logic is not taught in schools which leads to a significant portion of the population not being able to understand why things work.EG: A square is a rectangle. A rectangle is not always a square.I remember a discreet math course I took, education majors at the college were also required to take it. We had two very young, very lacking future teachers who stood up and argued that they should not have to take this course because they are going to be teachers, and why should teachers have to understand logic.:-(

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

jkhalsa — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 09:11:48 GMT

Good article. It reminds me of a joke from another career world --- music.It's a sight-gag, but here it is in writing:The maestro is about to raise his baton to lead the orchestra in Beethoven's 5th Symphony. The head violinist stands up to tune the orchestra and quietly whispers to him, "Maestro, your fly is open." The conductor quietly nods and says in a whisper, "Thank you, Aaron."He then slowly turns his back to the orchestra, discreetly zippers his fly in full view of the audience, furtively looking over his shoulder at his colleauges.-- J Khalsa, Marlboro MA

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Rod at work — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:44:07 GMT

Good article, Tim. I appreciate the reminder. I think it is true, in most cases, that calling someone out privately is best. I know that I prefer being told, privately, that I made a mistake. I can then correct it (unless its already been corrected) and certainly remember to not make the same mistake again.However, when I read this the incident from my past that came to mind was with a junior programmer who used to work here. This is several years ago now, back when VB4 was new. We were all learning VB4 then, and were very busy involved in writing the major applications which our agency still use today, although they now run under VB6. Back when VB4 was the hot thing, but there were several things that it didn't do. It didn't have several built-in functions which we take for granted today. One of them was it didn't have a built-in function for doing string replacements. We were very busy writing some of these basic string functions, and this developer was given the task of writing a string replacement function. She did a horrible job, because what she did was find the sought for string, substitute the new replacement string, and then look at the whole string again. For example, her function declaration looked something like this:[code="vb"]Function Replace(OriginalString As String, SoughtForString As String, ReplacementString As String) As String[/code]So, her algorithm was to look for the SoughtForString in the OriginalString, substitute the ReplacementString, and then look at the whole, new OriginalString again. This worked fine, if you did something like this:[code="vb"]Dim Tmp As StringDim Tmp2 As StringTmp = "This is a test"Tmp2 = Replace(Tmp, "i", "d")[/code]This would then result in Tmp2 being equal to "Thds ds a test". In such cases her Replace() function worked fine. But what happened if you did something like this?:[code="vb"]Dim Tmp As StringDim Tmp2 As StringTmp = "This is a test"Tmp2 = Replace(Tmp, "i", "ii")[/code]What happened, because she always started at the beginning of the new, orignial string, is that she would get errors because the machine would run out of memory, because it would do this:Tmp2 would equal "Thiis is a string"then her Replace function would find the first "i" in "Thiis" and would then come up with:Tmp2 would equal "Thiiis is a string"then her Replace function would find the first "i" in "Thiiis" and would then come up with:Tmp2 would equal "Thiiiis is a string"etcI tried telling her in private what was happening, and she simply did not understand what I was talking about. I tried again, and she didn't understand what I was talking about. We were releasing versions of the software, with her bug in it, and it was crashing our application and our users were getting upset, etc. No matter how many times I told her, she didn't get it.Finally I decided I had to take the code away from her, fix the problem so that it would stop crashing our application with out of memory error messages. Eventually this woman retired and left. She is intelligent in many other ways, but programming wasn't one of them. When she left she admitted that her programming skills were poor. I believe she's doing much better, now that she's away from IT.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

majorbloodnock — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:30:03 GMT

[quote][b]Gary Varga (2/25/2010)[/b][hr][quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr][quote][b]Gary Varga (2/25/2010)[/b][hr][quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]...even though this is a very public medium I believe the basic rules of considerate communication can still be maintained.Semper in excretia, sumus solum profundum variat[/quote]...like only using agreed languages in communications?Quality!!![/quote]Guilty as charged, M'Lud, and many thanks for highlighting the irony discreetly ;-):-DAll I can say in defence is that the Latin is only a (hopefully) humorous signature, and not part of what I was trying to communicate. Mind you, it's entirely possible that even then it's grammatically incorrect, so if you notice any mistakes, please feel free to correct me - in a PM, of course, to save me from more public embarrassment......[/quote]I'm just cross that my education didn't extend to enabling me to understand such witticisms.[/quote]Sadly nothing clever enough to live up to the preceding drum-roll. Translated, it means "Always in the manure; it's just the depth that changes".

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:21:15 GMT

[quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr][quote][b]Gary Varga (2/25/2010)[/b][hr][quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]...even though this is a very public medium I believe the basic rules of considerate communication can still be maintained.Semper in excretia, sumus solum profundum variat[/quote]...like only using agreed languages in communications?Quality!!![/quote]Guilty as charged, M'Lud, and many thanks for highlighting the irony discreetly ;-):-DAll I can say in defence is that the Latin is only a (hopefully) humorous signature, and not part of what I was trying to communicate. Mind you, it's entirely possible that even then it's grammatically incorrect, so if you notice any mistakes, please feel free to correct me - in a PM, of course, to save me from more public embarrassment......[/quote]I'm just cross that my education didn't extend to enabling me to understand such witticisms.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

majorbloodnock — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:16:11 GMT

[quote][b]Gary Varga (2/25/2010)[/b][hr][quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]...even though this is a very public medium I believe the basic rules of considerate communication can still be maintained.Semper in excretia, sumus solum profundum variat[/quote]...like only using agreed languages in communications?Quality!!![/quote]Guilty as charged, M'Lud, and many thanks for highlighting the irony discreetly ;-):-DAll I can say in defence is that the Latin is only a (hopefully) humorous signature, and not part of what I was trying to communicate. Mind you, it's entirely possible that even then it's grammatically incorrect, so if you notice any mistakes, please feel free to correct me - in a PM, of course, to save me from more public embarrassment......

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:03:45 GMT

[quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]...even though this is a very public medium I believe the basic rules of considerate communication can still be maintained.Semper in excretia, sumus solum profundum variat[/quote]...like only using agreed languages in communications?Quality!!!

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:01:02 GMT

[quote][b]djackson 22568 (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]I agree with the article suggestions, but in today's economic environment I find that most people no longer want to hear they made any mistakes. I don't know if it is because they fear for their job, are hearing complaints from their supervisors too often, or simply have so much to do that they can't take the time to do the job right. (Yes I know, then when will you have time to do it over!)A lot of people can't stomach the slightest correction, no matter how it is offered. Personally I enjoy when people point out a better way to do things. It is one way I learn.Fortunately I do work with some people who have the same attitude I do, and the efficiency we have as a team is mainly due to our willingness to offer criticisms and suggestions to improve process.Sigh.[/quote]When someone takes the time to highlight an error, omission or such like in something one has done, it highlights that they deemed your efforts worthy of at least a cursory glance e.g. they read you post.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

djackson 22568 — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:57:46 GMT

I agree with the article suggestions, but in today's economic environment I find that most people no longer want to hear they made any mistakes. I don't know if it is because they fear for their job, are hearing complaints from their supervisors too often, or simply have so much to do that they can't take the time to do the job right. (Yes I know, then when will you have time to do it over!)A lot of people can't stomach the slightest correction, no matter how it is offered. Personally I enjoy when people point out a better way to do things. It is one way I learn.Fortunately I do work with some people who have the same attitude I do, and the efficiency we have as a team is mainly due to our willingness to offer criticisms and suggestions to improve process.Sigh.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Frank W Fulton Jr — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:51:28 GMT

Not only would I like to be informed, but I would like to be informed sooner rather than later

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

majorbloodnock — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:34:46 GMT

[quote][b]jcrawf02 (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]I think I will have to disagree with you, for purely selfish reasons, if the setting is a forum such as SSC. With the intarwebz so open to search, if the 'mistake' (small or great) is not pointed out within the same document that it originates from, others (read: I) will stumble upon it when looking for answers and be misled. This is why I come to SSC, because the discussions often lead to a much more profound understanding of what is going on. That said, the correction should have a modicum of restraint, not "Hey, you idiot, why can't you do anything right?...", but rather "I would disagree, because of X and Y, the correct answer should be Z".If the setting is in the office, then I would agree that the mistake should be corrected privately, unless it causes critical errors that need fixed immediately, and training needs noted for the group.[/quote]Let's not forget, though, that threads are inherently designed around discussion, frequently with differing opinions contributing. Even if someone's posted something that turns out to be wrong, they needn't necessarily have to feel embarrassed about making the mistake - especially if it was an easy mistake to make. Moreover, the discussion you're talking about that gives a more profound insight needn't ever become criticism, constructive or otherwise (although I agree it does sometimes descend to that level in practice).Where someone's committed a real howler that they probably will or ought to be embarrassed about, you've always got PM to have a "quiet" word first, so even though this is a very public medium I believe the basic rules of considerate communication can still be maintained.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:22:48 GMT

Hey, we are all agreeing!!!

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Steve Jones - SSC Editor — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:14:01 GMT

These forums, I think, do require pointing out of mistakes for the reasons Jay mentioned. However if it's something like a typo, I have pinged people to privately edit their post.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

jcrawf02 — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:11:55 GMT

I think I will have to disagree with you, for purely selfish reasons, if the setting is a forum such as SSC. With the intarwebz so open to search, if the 'mistake' (small or great) is not pointed out within the same document that it originates from, others (read: I) will stumble upon it when looking for answers and be misled. This is why I come to SSC, because the discussions often lead to a much more profound understanding of what is going on. That said, the correction should have a modicum of restraint, not "Hey, you idiot, why can't you do anything right?...", but rather "I would disagree, because of X and Y, the correct answer should be Z".If the setting is in the office, then I would agree that the mistake should be corrected privately, unless it causes critical errors that need fixed immediately, and training needs noted for the group.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

WayneS — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:02:04 GMT

Very good article Tim.[quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]I'll also suggest a good rule of thumb (closely linked with Tim's point) is to criticise privately [i][b]and congratulate publicly[/b][/i].[/quote]and might I add to the congratulate publicly... and often.[quote]The other important thing is to recognize that you might not be right.[/quote]How does that concept work? ;-)Seriously, that does bring up that you need to pause to ensure that you are right before telling someone else that they are wrong.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

OCTom — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 06:53:58 GMT

Sometimes a public unveiling of a mistake is appropriate. For instance, when a team is meeting on a design and someone suggests something that is entirely inappropriate for the application. That is the time to nip the error in the bud. However, one can still be nice about it. That's where diplomacy comes in. And, it's also a great time to educate why the idea is bad to begin with.I once knew a fellow who would laugh hysterically when someone made a comment or asked a question he thought was stupid. He didn't last long in a team environment.Most of the folks answering questions on SSC are polite and nice but there are some that could use some humility and patience. The same goes for those asking the questions. I have been retitcent to post questions and answers here mainly because I risk being taken to the woodshed publicly. I really appreciate everyone who does volunteer their time here answering questions and creating QOtD's. It's helped me over the last couple of years learning SQL Server on the job.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Steve Jones - SSC Editor — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 06:49:44 GMT

Very nice editorial, Tim, and I'll respond before I head out for a much needed break today.Whether it's business communication, or posting here on the forum, I think small errors can be brought to someone's attention when you notice them. Not to embarass, but to clarify or help them. If it's more embarassing, or the person might take offense, I think a private attempt to discuss it with them ought to be made. If that doesn't work, then like with security vulnerabilities, I think they might need a (more) public discussion.The other important thing is to recognize that you might not be right. Go into the constructive criticism with the knowledge that you are expressing how you feel, and could possibly be wrong yourself. Give the other person the chance to defend themselves and be as willing to listen to them as you would like them to be for you.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Steve Jones - SSC Editor — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 06:45:05 GMT

[quote][b]majorbloodnock (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]Agree totally with the editorial. Constructive criticism is almost always the right thing to do, and if it's not appreciated then at least you know you did the right thing.I'll also suggest a good rule of thumb (closely linked with Tim's point) is to criticise privately [i][b]and congratulate publicly[/b][/i].IMHO, of course....[/quote]I completely agree here, especially for managers.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Tim Mitchell — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 06:43:40 GMT

[quote][b]Scott Smith health care consultant (2/25/2010)[/b][hr]... You should work in HR.[/quote]In that case, I retract the entire article :hehe:

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

GSquared — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 06:38:34 GMT

Good analogy.I use all three, depending on the circumstances.There have been times where I judged the error just needed to be fixed and nothing really needed to be said, so I did so.There have been times where I felt a private communication (via whatever medium) was appropriate, so I did that.And there have been times where I've called the person out publicly. I only resort to that when I feel that not doing so will cause more damage than doing so, or where I'm calling someone out for publicly berating another undeservedly.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Scott Smith health care consultant — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 05:49:09 GMT

Great article. Nicely done about a difficult topic. You should work in HR.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

IceDread — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 04:38:43 GMT

Everyone can make bad decisions but what I find most annoying is when you in private talk to the person about it and he refuses to take responsibility for it and dose nothing about it. Very annoying and unprofessional. Having that happen is perhaps not very common but it's very bad and annoying.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Gary Varga — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 04:25:49 GMT

In the right environment, a public correction can have a great deal of benefit for many. It attempts to dispel urban myths and encourages open debate. Obviously, this is different from the "zipper issue" where being discrete is everything.Adults, particularly professionals, need to differentiate between when it is beneficial for a wider audience and when it isn't.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

george sibbald — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 03:30:47 GMT

some good points Tim, and perhaps a timely reminder for anyone suffering from 'forum fatigue'.there will of course always be people who cannot accept having their points clarified, let alone criticised.question, how would you privately correct someone on a public forum like SSC without leaving bad information out there to trip up someone coming along later?

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

majorbloodnock — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 03:21:49 GMT

Agree totally with the editorial. Constructive criticism is almost always the right thing to do, and if it's not appreciated then at least you know you did the right thing.I'll also suggest a good rule of thumb (closely linked with Tim's point) is to criticise privately [i][b]and congratulate publicly[/b][/i].IMHO, of course....

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

ST_John — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 02:31:02 GMT

Absolutely agree, much better to hear from someone quietly that you've made a blooper and even though that initial conversation can (and prob will) be awkward it is perfectly possible that it can lead to a fruitful professional friendship.btw, if anyone has spotted any of my bloopers, please e-mail me quietly :-)[i]John[/i]

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

SQLRNNR — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 23:05:31 GMT

Thanks Tim. This was a nice reminder on accepting and owning up to a mistake. It is not a pleasant situation to need to discuss a mistake with somebody, but must be done from time to time.

RE: Dude, Your Fly is Open

Henrico Bekker — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 22:26:38 GMT

Nice comparison with zipper and bad code, decisions etc.I agree Tim, none of us are perfect, so in the event of a "not on purpose" mistake, or even if anything we do, could be done better or improved, why not? Essentially we are all on the same team, and no one should have a team member make mistakes.There is no shame in taking advice, especially if it's good advice!Watching someone make a mistake, and leaving it, is on you.

Dude, Your Fly is Open

Tim Mitchell — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 21:07:21 GMT

Comments posted to this topic are about the item [B]Dude, Your Fly is Open[/B]