Earning the Right to Be Illegible
15 hours ago
- #leadership
- #organizational-control
- #software-engineering
- Modern organizations maximize 'legibility' to control and measure all parts of the system.
- Illegible work, though untrackable, is essential and often more efficient than legible work.
- Engineers must earn the right to be illegible by first proving their reliability within legible processes.
- Seniority grants more freedom to engage in illegible work due to increased trust from the organization.
- Strategic use of illegibility involves balancing between moving quickly and resurfacing to communicate findings legibly.
- Leadership involves converting illegible insights into legible strategies for broader organizational understanding.
- The concept of a 'trust battery' illustrates how trust is earned and spent within an organization.