►
From YouTube: Should remote team members have public READMEs to foster greater empathy and collaboration?
Description
GitLab's Head of Remote, Darren M., talks with Sike Insights on a key topic related to remote teams: should remote team members have public READMEs to foster greater empathy and collaboration?
They discuss remote team communication, empathy, and transparency, and explain the merits of a public README.
Sike Insights has built a tool (Kona) that seeks to enable remote teams to work better together by fostering learning amongst team members.
➔ GitLab's Guide to Remote Work: https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/guide/
➔ Sike Insights: http://sikeinsights.com/
➔ Darren's README on GitLab: https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/marketing/readmes/dmurph/
###
When people are working together for the first time, there's a certain amount of mental and emotional energy exerted in getting to know someone. You're simultaneously doing the work, while trying to confirm or challenge preconceived notions about how a person prefers to be communicated with.
On an individual level, this requires a person to project the ideal version of themselves into each meeting, as it is assumed that this projection is the only meaningful way for another person to understand who they are and how they prefer to communicate and work.
READMEs provide a genuine report on how a person works, reducing bias/assumption and enabling people to work together based on a common framework.
###
This conversation led to several iterations and additions to the GitLab handbook.
➔ GitLab's README template: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www-gitlab-com/blob/master/.gitlab/issue_templates/README-template.md
➔ Creating and publishing your GitLab README: https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/marketing/website/#creating-and-publishing-your-gitlab-readme
###
Other topics discussed on this call are below.
➔ Informal communication in remote teams: https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/informal-communication/
➔ Communicating effectively and responsibly through text: https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/effective-communication/
➔ All-remote meetings: https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/meetings/
A
B
It
over
there
yeah
we're
working
we're
working
on
a
tool
to
kind
of
try
to
help
remote
teams
communicate
better
and
understand
each
other
better
and
so
Darren.
Do
you
mind
if
we
just
jump
into
the
questions?
Let's
do
it
awesome,
so
the
first
question
I
kind
of
wanted
to
ask
a
little
about
employee
empathy.
So
how
do
you
kind
of
encourage
like
empathy
between
your
remote
workers,
kind
of
given
the
mass
disconnect
in
physical
space
yeah.
A
So
remote
teams
need
to
be
really
intentional
about
informal
communication,
so
in
a
co-located
space
by
nature
of
keeping
people
close
together.
There's
this
natural
proximity
where
people
can
see
each
other
see
the
body
language,
maybe
if
they
see
someone's
down
or
the
distraught
I
could
ask
about
it.
Just
get
some
natural
connection
there
and
a
remote
team
where
you're
not
going
to
see
anyone
unless
you
engage
them
on
a
zoom
chat.
You
have
to
be
intentional
about
it.
So
a
lab.
We
have
an
entire
handbook
page
on
how
we
do
that.
We
encourage.
D
A
D
A
People
to
just
be
wherever
they
are,
and
so,
if
you
have
this
amazing
or
interesting
background,
it's
a
great
icebreaker.
It's
like.
Where
are
you
today,
oh
I'm,
visiting
someone
or
oh
I'm
skiing.
Today,
it's
an
amazing
way
to
engage
people
that
you
actually
would
not
get
in
an
office
because
everyone
kind
of
checks,
a
certain
part
of
themselves
at
the
door,
and
everyone
is
in
the
same
building.
A
So
you
don't
have
that
opportunity
to
kind
of
connect
with
somebody
on
a
level
beyond
work,
but
the
long
and
short
of
it
is
you
you
do
have
to
be
intentional
about
it.
You
have
to
create
opportunities
for
people
to
connect
with
each
other.
Even
if
it's
not
just
about
work,
the
last
thing
I'll
add
there
is
impersonal.
Interactions
are
actually
vital
to
what
we
do.
A
So
a
lot
of
people
assume
that,
if
you're
on
a
remote
team,
you
never
see
anyone,
but
in
fact
we
need
a
dedicated
strategy
to
how
we
engage
with
each
other
in
person.
So
every
nine
to
twelve
months
we
get
the
entire
company
together
for
an
event
called
get
lab,
contribute
where
there's
an
opening
keynote.
A
Closing
keynote,
and
then
everything
in
between
is
pretty
much
bonding
exercises
that
get
us
together
as
a
team,
and
then
we
have
user
events
throughout
the
year
give
up
commit
and
we
have
meetups
in
various
parts
of
the
world
where
we
try
to
get
as
many
people
together
as
possible
and
during
the
holidays
we
actually
give
people
money
to
self
congregate
around
locations,
and
so
in
Gale
app.
We
have
location
channels
where
we've
grown
to
the
point
where
there's
like
in
Australia
location,
channel,
world
Pacific,
Northwest
London.
C
B
That
makes
a
lot
of
sense.
It's
really
cool
that
you
kind
of
built
a
culture
where,
like
everyone's
super,
intentional
about
and
I
read
in
the
handbook,
like
I,
think
you
said
like
in
there,
it
was
like
people
should
actively
assume
that
their
good
intentions
behind
other
people's
messages
or
something
like
that.
A
Absolutely
assuming
positive
intent
is
something
that
you
may
hear
at
other
organizations,
but
it's
absolutely
core
to
what
we
do
at
gay
lab
and
it's
really
important
for
remote
teams.
So
we
have
people
spread
across
over
65
countries
and
they
bring
different
cultures
different
norms,
different
linguistics,
not
everyone
has
English
as
a
first
language,
not
everyone
prefers
to
communicate
through
text
or
they've
spent
their
entire
career
verbalizing
things,
and
then
they
hop
in
a
remote
setting
where
they
have
to
spend
most
of
their
time
and
get
loud
issues
or
MERS
requests
or
slack
or
email.
B
A
Change
going
from
verbalizing
something
to
conveying
your
heart,
conveying
the
message
through
text,
and
sometimes
that
can
get
lost
in
translation,
and
so
we
have
to
assume
that
people
are
at
the
heart
of
it.
Their
message
is
good.
Their
intent
is
good,
we're
on
the
same
team.
We
want
to
accomplish
the
same
common
goal,
and
so
when
you
lay
that
out
as
a
baseline
of
culture
during
onboarding,
where
everyone,
the
students
positive
at
ten,
what.
B
A
So
now
it's
on
me
to
dig
into
understanding
what
is
being
conveyed
and
that's
a
subtle
small
shift,
but
at
scale
that's
how
you
keep
an
organization,
sane
and
healthy
instead
of
everyone,
just
assuming
that
they're
out
to
get
each
other
which,
for
whatever
reason,
happens
in
a
lot
of
places,
but
that
simple
change
I'm,
just
assuming
it's.
Basically,
you
know
you're
innocent
until
proven
guilty
and
so
yeah.
C
Definitely
building
off
of
that.
How
much
do
you
think
is
necessary
for
company
culture
to
enforce
that,
and
how
much
do
you
think
is
like
inherent
like?
Do
you
think
people
would
stray
I
guess
into
the
kind
of
like
combative
nature,
just
naturally
as
part
of
human
nature,
or
is
that
something
that,
like
people
kind
of
already
do
but
get
lab
just
kind
of
guides
them.
A
A
We
have
to
turn
that
on
its
head
and
it
takes
continual
reminders
of
looking
at
our
values
like.
Oh
actually,
it's
assumed
positive
intent.
So
it's
a
continual
learning
process,
but
I
think
over
time.
When
you
see
it
reinforced,
we
have
a
thank
you
channel
on
a
values.
Channel
and
you'll
see
people
okay,
you'll,
so
you'll
see
people
every
single
day
call
out
a
certain
situation
where
they'll
thank
someone
else
for
clarifying
something
or
they'll
thank
someone
for
being
patient
as
they
learn
something
or
explaining
how
they
viewed
something
differently.
A
So
we
have
opened
organizations
about
these
things
when
you
see
that
talked
about
it's
a
continual
reminder
of
how
it
should
be
done
and
it
can
be
done
that
helps,
reinforce
it
and
I
actually
think
that's
where
I
met
beautiful
things
about
all
remote
where,
if
you
were
in
a
colocation
space,
it's
really
difficult
to
do
that.
It's
really
difficult
to
get
a
thousand
plus
people
to
have
visibility
to
someone
calmly,
explaining
something
or
interpreting
something
and
explaining
something
that
from
combative
to
positive.
A
A
A
C
C
B
Makes
a
lot
of
sense
so
kind
of
switching
gears
from
that
a
little
bit.
I
also
wanted
to
kind
of
pick
your
brain
as
to
how
do
you
approach
meetings
and
how
I
guess
how
you
believe,
other
people
within
relevant
teams
approached
meetings
as
well,
so
I
wanted
to
like
know
about
like?
Do
you
prepare
for
certain
meetings
and
like
what
kind
of
meetings
are
they
if
you
do,
and
also
just
add
on
to
that
as
well
like
do
you
think
people
that
get
lab
prepare
for
meetings
as
well,
yeah.
A
A
couple
of
purposes
one:
it
makes
the
meetings
more
efficient
because
you
have
to
prepare
for
it.
You
have
to
look
at
the
agenda
before
the
meeting
even
starts,
so
you
don't
spend
any
time
in
the
meeting
going
over
what
the
agenda
is.
Everyone
already
knows
what
it
is
and
by
having
that
agenda
document
there,
it
allows
the
person
calling
the
meeting
time
to
crystallize
what
the
point
of
it
is
instead
of
getting
in
a
meeting
and
then,
like
a
million
things,
are
happening,
you
just
kind
of
go
anywhere.
It's
just
human
nature.
D
A
Other
thing
about
that
is,
it
allows
people
to
contribute
asynchronously,
and
this
is
vital
for
gitlab.
So
we
have
people
in
sixty
five
plus
countries.
A
lot
of
people
right
now
are
asleep,
but
they
could
still
contribute
to
this
meeting.
If
the
agenda
was
already
there
because
they
could
have
gone
in
five
hours
ago
and
added
a
question,
then
I
can
verbalize
or
someone
else
can
verbalize
on
the
car.
A
And
then
we
document
the
answer
in
the
same
document
and
then,
when
that
person
wakes
up
they're
able
to
go
in
and
see
what
the
result
of
that
was,
that
is
key
to
working
asynchronously
and
it's
get
up
couldn't
do
it
any
other
way,
I
think
the
final
thing
is
all
of
that
contributes
to
us
having
meetings
as
a
last
resort.
So
a
lot
of
companies,
especially
synchronous
companies,
their
first
reaction
to
get
anything
done
or
move
a
project
forward
is
to
just
get
a
meeting
together
and
a
get
lab.
A
The
meeting
is
the
last
resort.
If
you
can
move
a
project
forward
by
conversing
with
someone
in
a
gale
an
issue
or
a
merge
request,
something
that
is
documented
more
something,
that's
asynchronous,
something
that
has
low
context
so
that
there's
a
lot
of
precision
in
detail
where
people
can
read
at
their
leisure
and
catch
up.
A
That
is
always
preferred
because
meetings
are
super
inefficient
and
they
break
your
concentration
of
whatever
state
of
flow
that
you
were
in
and
then,
after
the
meeting
there's
the
burden
of
having
to
document
whatever
came
out
of
the
meeting
into
something.
That's
a
single
source
of
truth.
I
could
get
a
lot
issue
of
merger
questions.
A
There's
a
lot
of
work
that
goes
along
with
it,
even
and
even
if
you
record
a
meeting
so
that
someone
can
watch
later,
that's
a
huge
burden
because
they're
watching
the
meeting
and
maybe
not
all
of
it,
is
related
to
what
they
need
to
know.
So,
there's
this
big
time
sink
in
trying
to
watch
something
after
it
happens
while
the
rest
of
the
team
that
was
in
it
to
begin
with,
already
moved
on
to.
B
Yeah,
if
you
don't
mind,
we
wanted
to
show
you
what
we
were
working
on
and
kind
of.
We
wanted
to
pick
your
brain
as
to
like
whether
or
not
you
think
people
would
use
it
like
whether
or
not
people
would
like
come
back
and
like
actually
do
the
commands
as
you'll
see
in
the
future.
Do
you
mind
if
we
share
a
screen?
Let's
do
it
all
right?
Let's
do
it,
let
me
show
you
right
now:
can
you
see
my
screen.
B
Yes,
so
basically,
what
we've
been
working
on
is
I,
don't
know
how
much
you've
seen
on
our
site
or
anything,
but
we
basically
have
a
bot
that
does
two
things
one.
It
asks
every
user
in
a
in
a
slack
workspace,
a
series
of
questions,
so
it's
scheduled
for
9
a.m.
every
single
morning
and
you'll
see
that
here
like,
for
example,
this
one
right
here
is
a
little
more
basic,
it's
about
roles
and
responsibilities,
so
it
also
provides
an
example.
B
C
B
So
that's
the
first
part,
and
the
second
part
is
what
we
call
or
what
are
just
a
I
generated
insights
in
that
like
if
I
want
to
call
so
I
guess
just
a
preface.
We
have
a
bunch
of
different
commands
that
people
can
call.
So
if
I
want
to
like,
let's
say,
give
feedback
to
Corrine,
because
you
know
I
have
a
one-on-one
with
her
and
we
need
to
kind
of
talk
about
different
things.
I
can
run
the
command,
Kona
good
feedback
screen
and
then
what
I'll
do
is
it'll
show
her
answer
the
question.
B
B
C
And
so,
as
the
subject
of
this,
the
insights
are
basically
taken
from
my
public
slack
channels
and
so
we'd
be
analyzing.
The
text
and
figuring
out
the
personality
footprint
that
falls
underneath
that
we
use
Big
Five
personality
for
like
more
data-driven
kind
of
personality
things,
rather
than
just
sort
of
like
a
sixteen
personality,
little
archetype
to
fit
it
in,
but
as
somebody
who's
like
was
I'm
an
English
major
by
trade
like
I,
don't
I'm,
not
super
technical
I
was
very
skeptical
at
first,
but
these
insights
are
actually
accurate,
like
very
accurate
yeah.
B
B
C
B
A
B
D
D
A
That
are
joining
their
team
or
may
be
new
to
working
with
them
in
a
cross-functional
team.
It
essentially
says
this
is
how
I
prefer
to
be
communicated
with
these
are
my
strengths
and
weaknesses
these.
This
is
a
little
bit
about
me,
and
so
it's
a
way
to
sort
of
get
to
know
someone
and
clarify,
maybe
some
preconceived
notions,
but.
D
A
Yeah
put
that
to
put
that
together
in
to
end,
and
so
it's
it's
a
little
daunting
to
ask
someone
else,
especially
someone
that
is
not
a
natural
storyteller
or
as
a
natural
editorial
background.
It
was
really
comfortable
communicating
about
themselves
in
general,
but
communicating
about
themselves
with
the
written
word.
That's
not
something
that
comes
naturally
to
everyone.
So
what
I
see
about
this
is
it's
almost
a
a
minimum,
viable
change,
sort
of
a
small
iterative
process
to
building
out
a
personal
readme
one
question
at
a
time
so
I.
A
D
Lot
of
sense-
sorry,
sorry
to
cut
in
real
quick.
What
are
some
of
the
things
that
you
put
in
the
readme,
because
we've
been
working
really
hard
on
trying
to
figure
out
how
improve
the
questions
that
we
asked
and
and
right
now
we
have
just
a
list
of
seven
questions,
one
one
per
day,
but
but
but
we
want
to
try
to
figure
out
like
what
are
the
things
that
that
people
want
to
know
about
about
you
when
they
work
with
you.
So
what
are
some
of
the
things
that
you
you
put
in
grading
gotcha.
A
A
All
right
is
it
showing
up
the
readme?
Yes,
so
the
top
starts
with
just
a
basic
introduction
that
essentially
shows
my
role
and
then
I
linked
my
role
to
a
blog
post
that
I
wrote
when
I
joined
the
company.
I
need
some
context
around
what
the
role
is.
Alternatively,
if
there
is
a
job
description,
that's
hosted
like
a
job
family
type
of
thing.
That
would
be
a
good
thing
that
link
there
to
give
people
some
context
on
what
it
is,
and
this.
A
Just
put
the
blog
post
I,
put
linked
to
my
job
family
description,
our
statement,
audience
objectives
and
goals.
My
team
page
entry
might
get
my
contribution
graph
and
then
my
LinkedIn
profile
and
I
feel
like.
If
you
read
all
of
those,
you
don't
have
a
pretty
good
idea
of
who
I
am
as
a
person
I
also.
A
Interview
and
I
thought
it's
interesting.
It
could
be.
It
could
be
insightful
to
see
a
video
of
someone,
it's
kind
of
see
their
mannerisms
and
their
emotions
and
how
they
verbalize
certain
things.
So
if
you
have
that
might
as
well
toss
it
in
there,
then
a
few
kind
of
things
about
me
that
you
would
never
know
I
feel
like
kind
of
had
to
find
Who
I
am
this
could
be.
This
could
be
anything
for
anyone,
but
you
know
I
noted
here
that
I
love
writing
I'm
gonna
slow
record.
Maybe
that's
a
good
icebreaker.
A
A
A
So
these
are
my
overall
few
things.
So
the
next
section
is
how
you
can
help
me.
I
think
this
is
a
is
a
big
one,
because
if
you
don't
kind
of
ask
someone
to
do
that,
a
lot
of
people
are
humble
and
they
won't
put
that
out.
There,
but
it's
actually
really
useful
to
know
how
people
like
to
be
helped,
because
it's
vastly
different
from
person
to
person,
you
may
think
you
know
someone,
you
may
think
you're
doing
something.
That's
doing
someone
a
favor,
but
in
fact
mentally.
It's
not
really
anything
forward
at
all.
A
So
just
laying
out
how
you
can
help
me,
it
gives
some
insights
on
that
my
working
style,
so
I
noted
here
that
I'm
a
hub
and
the
strength
deployment
inventory
so
SDI
was
something.
I
was
fortunate
to
do
a
few
years
ago
at
a
different
company,
and
it
was
absolutely
the
most
insightful
thing.
I've
ever
done.
It's
unbelievable
and
so
I
found
out
that
I'm.
A
B
A
And
analytical:
that's
you
like
who
is
this
guy
like
what
is
his
true
self,
and
that
is
my
true
self
Hubbs
will
morph
to
be
whatever
the
group
lacks,
so
whatever
I
perceive
the
group
is
lacking.
I
will
become
that
thing
to
kind
of
fill
the
void.
So
having
that
out,
there
will
be
useful
to
someone
working
with
me
for
the
first
time,
because
if
they
see
something
like
that
happening,
it'll
make
it
easier
for
them
to
assume
positive
intent
and
get
a
better
understanding.
A
What
I
want
to
earn
I
think
is
a
good
one
and
then
finally,
how
to
communicate
with
me
now
I
want
to
say
that
most
of
these
subheads
came
from
Jeremy's
example
and
I'll
click
over
to
Jeremy's
example,
narrated,
so
I
mimicked
a
lot
of
this.
He
put
in
an
additional
line
here
and
in
fact
one
of
them
unique
things
he
did.
Is
he
actually
linked
to
his
most
recent
360
performance
review?
So
not
everyone
has
to
do
that.
B
B
A
Raimi's
over
time,
my
perspective
on
that
is,
it's
such
a
it's
kind
of
a
newer
muscle,
I
think
Gila
has
over
100
people
and
I.
Think
there's
like
10
LEDs
total
for
the
entire
company
really
yeah,
it's
very
much
a
new
thing,
and
so
what
I've
been
thinking
about
is
how
can
I
encourage
more
people
to
create
these
and
engage
with
these,
and
actually
what
I
would
love
is
if,
if
our
Google
Calendar
would
automatically
append
the
readme
to
every
person
that
was
in
a
meeting
such.
A
D
That's
that's
crazy.
What
we've
actually
been
thinking
about
is
within
our
our
slack
bot
is
yeah
actually
sense
that
you
have
a
meeting
with
X
Y
&
Z
person.
It's
like
a
pre-meeting
brief.
Like
you
know,
LinkedIn
sends
you
a
message:
notification,
ten
minutes
before
it's
like
these
are
how
you
read
the
room
beforehand.
These
are
something
you
need
to
know.
Yeah.
A
Look
honestly,
this
would
I
feel
like
this
would
create
so
much
more
empathy
in
teams.
This
would
reduce
the
stress
and
anxiety
level
of
trying
to
put
on
a
face
and
sort
of
be
this
thing
that
you're
perceived
as
you
need
to
be
in
a
certain
meeting,
and
it
just
breaks
all
that
down.
It
opens
up
vulnerability.
It
just
gives
you
the
honest
take
on
who
everybody
is
and
also
creating
these
things.
It's
a
forcing
function
on
you
being
honest
with
yourself
and
putting.