First Principle - Write Stuff Down

Write Stuff Down is the best advice I can give to any engineer.¹

Seneca wrote about this 2000 years ago in On The Shortness of Life. Peter Drucker gave this advice in a modern context over 50 years ago in The Effective Executive. You must respect your time. How do you know what to do today? Write it down.

Now you’ve decided to spend your time on something. Great. Guess what? If it’s worth doing, it’s worth thinking about first. If it’s worth thinking about, it’s worth writing down. How do you track your thoughts? Write them down.

You’ve decided to do something and you've thought about how to do it. You’re willing to try something to see if it works. How do you know what you’ve tried before? Write it down.

My favorite quote about writing things down comes from Stuart Halloway’s talk Debugging with the Scientific Method,

of the seven deadly sins, you may think not writing things down is sloth, it’s not, it’s hubris

When you don't write things down, you shout “I’m smart enough to remember every thought I have throughout the day. Future me will be able to recall everything with ease.”

Kevin Kelly recently included it in his 103 Bits Of Advice I wish I had known.

How?

Start with descriptions and comments in your ticketing system at work. Anyone should be able to read these and understand what’s going on.

Then make sure your version control commit messages are clear and concise.

Finally, start keeping a personal/professional journal open all day at work. I like taking hourly notes. It’s a natural way to break up the day and record my thoughts.

tl;dr

I can’t stress this enough, write stuff down is the meta skill that enables all other key skills like: organization, communication, and critical thinking.

Notes

1

Actually it’s the best advice I can give to anyone to improve their life. Keep a journal. Write down anything at first. Doodle. Try to include things you’re grateful for. Go from there.