On Yak Shaving
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As I entered the office I found a seat next to a nice coworker in the quiet corner. Perfect!
Only thing… that screen didn’t have a USB-C cable. No worries I’ll run down to the IT department and nick one.
Only thing… once I got back up I realized that the screen didn’t even have a power cable. Back down to IT, but this time I checked and yes - there were missing extension cords too. So I asked for that.
Once back at my desk I now had to unplug (and UNTANGLE) the cords, so that I could plug in the other 3 desks, interrupting my coworkers flow 2 times. And then connect my own desk to power.
Now I could attach the power cord. And then the USB-C. And then connect my computer so that I could … what was I doing now again.
Yak shaving defined
Recognize this? It happens a lot in daily work - spend (an unreasonable amount) of time doing something that is hard, tricky and often boring in order to be able to do the work we were here to do in the first place
This, my friend, is known as Yak-shaving and has been plaguing worker generally and programmers specifically, for as long as work has happened. The term was, probably, coined by Carlin Vieri at MIT (of course - anything IT-related seems to stem from there) and has a tighter definition that goes like this:
Any apparently useless activity which, by allowing one to overcome intermediate difficulties, allows one to solve a larger problem.
Yak etymology
This section is written from hearsay, but I kind of love the story.
Apparently (^^) the reason yak shaving was used for this type of activity is due to an activity in managing actually yaks. Yes - those half-tonne cows that people in the Himalayas are using.
They are big, smelly and have a thick fur. The yak herders (hey - that’s a job title if I ever saw one) take the yaks up to the mountains in the summer where they graze the lovely green grass.
Now, that means that they fatten up, and when the herders take them down the yaks do not fit on the tiny bridges that go over high pass and rivers.
The herders then have to shave the thick fur off. It’s hard work, takes a lot of time and they cannot really do anything with the fur as it lies in the mountains. But they have to do it to get the Yak down.
That’s the original yak shaving story. I think.
Yak navigation
Ok, but seems that there are a lot of Yaks to shave in the world and it might be hard to know how to do that properly, and even which yaks to shave and which one to leave hairy.
I remember a brilliant lightning talk from Gabriel Forsberg at Agile Sweden 2013 called “Yak shaving the right way”. And I wanted to share his findings here, as I remember them, and add my own comments to it. Any comic relief goes to Gabriel.
There are 3 things to consider when faced with a yak to shave:
- Shave the right yak
- Shave it well
- Share the yak-shaving
Shave the right yak
When faced with a yak you are first overwhelmed with the size and the amount of fur that needs to shaven. It can, for that reason, be worth some reflection time and consider - is this even the right yak.
For example, when I came to the desk, I first thought about if these desks are going to be around here for awhile, or if it was just temporary. I could easily have switched to another place, or just unplugged another screen if these were temporary desks.
The time it will take is also something to consider. This can be hard, as we often don’t discover the work we need to do until we are doing the work (Woody Zuill quote). Or, I guess, we don’t see how thick the yak hair is until we start to shave it.
This conundrum can be overcome with time boxing. I, actually, checked my calendar before starting and realized that I had time to fix the desk (shave the yak).
Another consideration is to ensure that you are not just shaving the yak for your own pleasure. Hairless yaks are ugly and they don’t like being shaved - if you are going to shave a yak, please let it be for others enjoyment too.
In my case; yes - other will benefit from me solving this problem properly.
Shave it well
Once you have decide to shave the yak, don’t mess around. Shave it, and shave it well. A job worth doing is worth doing well.
In my case, I could probably have got it to work by borrowing some outlets that are on top of the table, and have used only one extension cord to connect all tables. But then the extensions on the table top would not have been useable for charging stuff with, as intended. And by entangling the cords the table might not be possible to raise.
Once I was done, I spent one extra minute to check that everything worked. It’s easier to fix as I’m in my shaving mode than to go back later, bring out the razor and protective gear again… (am I taking the metaphor too far?)
Do the work so that no one else has to do it again. No one should have to shave this particular yak again. In the metaphorical world of yak-shaving yaks, hair typically don’t grow out as fast as on real life yaks.
Once you see the well-shaven yak in front of you, a sense of pride will fill you. Something better is in place in the world, thanks to you. You want to tell others - hey that’s the last step.
Share the yak-shaving
Just shaving a yak, the right yak well, so that others don’t have to, might not be enough to ensure that others don’t accidentally shaves the yak again.
This can be bragging (Hey guys! Look at me - I shaved this Yak. ALL. BY. MYSELF!) but the tone of your announcement can help that.
In my case, fixing the cords for a screen is not much to talk about. My hope is that the next person that sits here, just don’t have to get cord. I presume that I’ll tell IT, they might have this on their todo-list. But other than that I’ll leave it.
I did, however, write this blog post to let the WORLD, know about yak shaving and hopefully giggle a bit. Funnily enough, in writing this post, I had to look up some facts on yaks, how to spell etymology , find a yak picture and many other things not related to my work. Meta-yak-shaving.
Summary
Yak shaving is part of life for all of us. But remember the three golden rules of yak shaving:
- Shave the right yak
- Shave it well
- Share the yak-shaving