“I won’t miss what I want to do or what I want” is one of the soft skills, I believe. Although missing these won’t cause immediate harm, securing them can lead to learning and richness in the mid to long term.
Some examples of tools (especially lists) that fulfill this are as follows:
Let’s refer to this genre as What You Want, abbreviated as wyw.
In my opinion, engineers tend to underestimate wyw. The same goes for engineers in the field, engineering managers, and even senior engineers.
This is because wyw appears to resemble self-improvement or life hack endeavors, which engineers often dislike. While this is partially true, it’s more than that. It’s something that is particularly useful for engineers.
In this article, I will demonstrate the value of wyw. Specifically, I will introduce a method for sharing wyw among multiple people.
A What You Want Log is a collection of wyw. It’s accumulated collectively by several people. Think of it as the wyw version of a product backlog where tasks are typically stored.
Anyone can write anything in a wyw log, but be sure to define the scope of what can be written. A clear example is “things you want to do related to this project.”
Incidentally, I often set the scope much broader. It may include personal wants or things to do, or discussions about personal career growth. This approach tends to foster more conversations.
Simply use some tool to allow multiple people to write at any time.
Cosense is a Japanese-produced simultaneous editing wiki that can operate thousands of pages with ease and without needing Slack. It’s also appealing because it can be customized using JavaScript.
Create a “wyw workspace” including all members, and have them collectively write wyw. It’s enjoyable as you can link pages, embed images or videos easily, and hype things up.
There’s already an example: /wanna. It’s a Japanese community, but multiple people are already writing wyw. I’m also participating. It’s fun to see others’ wyw, get advice, and of course, write my own. Through wyw, you can get to know others and reflect on yourself.
Create a repository for wyw and handle 1-issue per 1-wyw.
It’s important to ensure writing is as casual as possible, so try to keep the following in mind:
As wyw accumulates, you can create various mechanisms using APIs. You can create a Reader or a feature that randomly displays content. It might also be interesting to integrate by sending this week’s entries to a Slack channel.
Create a wyw board in Miro and write on it using sticky notes. Also, if you come up with more wyw upon seeing others’ sticky notes, keep writing them down. It’s like brainstorming asynchronously.
One thing to note is not to organize. Even if it’s cluttered or there are duplicates, focus solely on writing sticky notes for wyw. The more sticky notes accumulate and things get cluttered, the more interesting it becomes.
I consider the wyw accumulated by multiple people in this manner to be knowledge. This is because it includes individual personalities, needs, and advice from the members.
It might also be useful to input it into a generative AI for dialogue or analysis. Since the wyw is derived from the members themselves, the information suggested from it will be both attractive and practical.