Brother, I really appreciate your rich writing style. When reading the intro it felt as if I was walking into the shop with you. Valuable insight within the article as well that truly suits any group.
I agree. It reminded me so much of my walk into work. Which could have been a bummer on a Friday night but the rest of the article was so darn good, that didn’t matter.
I might print this out and give it to my bosses at my Cintas branch. They get a little uneasy about the talk that goes on sometimes. I honestly have grown to love it. I look forward to the mornings when I know I’ll be to talk to a few of the crazier guys.
And like, listen: “riding the clock” exists, right? But for goodness sake, let people interact with one another! I’m interested to know if they actually read it and, if so, what comes of it. Thanks for taking the time to read and comment!
I work in software and have worked remotely for the last three years. My employer required everyone to be in the office twice a week now so I'm going through that period of adaptation. Even though I don't see my coworkers on a daily basis, there are a lot of zoom meetings and collaboration happening, but it's not the same. There is value in seeing your coworkers face to face, sharing meals, and having casual conversations with them. I have had to be more intentional about talking to my coworkers. Add to that the type of personalities you get in this industry and it becomes slightly more complicated affair.
Luckily, I have a manager that understands the importance of what you call yard talk and fosters those kind of interactions within the team. I can see how this could be applied to other fields, thank you for this!
I think there is definitely something lost in the video conferencing medium, so I’m glad to hear your employer is facilitating in-person interactions. Food certainly doesn’t hurt!
Nov 20, 2023·edited Nov 20, 2023Liked by Nate Marshall
My husband is a radiochemist and does a lot of lab work, but the rest of his time is spent in virtual meetings and otherwise digitally mediated chats (because there's people in multiple locations and many people are remote.) He's often been like "I HATE IT, I hate how I can't easily just walk over and talk shop with another chemist or engineer, face to face." So he and another chemist often take it to the local bar on Friday afternoons. haha But honestly, I've realized the need for him to do that. He always comes back more at ease, having been able to just shoot the breeze about work stuff without the digital mediation of a formal meeting or whatever.
This is so good. Your essays always get me thinking. ". . . no one working in isolation from other practitioners can figure out how to overcome their own lack of skill and produce high-level work" could apply to *any* endeavor - including architecture, including writing. As I read, I thought about one of the first jobsites I regularly went to for bi-weekly meetings. It was an academic building that I'd worked on from the earliest design phases and done all the construction drawings. I still remember my boss warning me when the roofers were up there - they had the foulest mouths of all. I loved every minute of it. I'm wondering whether the degree of spice in yard talk is proportional to the level of risk involved. The stakes are higher, so the language is coarser?
Your question about the risk:spice ratio is a good one. I’m willing to bet there’s a strong correlation. A lot of the people I work with have foul mouths and pure hearts - and I wouldn’t change it for the world!
I appreciate the craft of this essay - how you opened with a vivid personal story, then moved into the philosophy. As you built your case, I had the picture of your exchange with your injured co-worker in mind. I can already tell this essay will accompany me all day. Thanks!
Every place of business could use the yard talk idea. There are places that HR should stay out of, considering that all HR is good for is limiting liability.
This is a big part of the problem; there isn't a place where most men can talk about work and the problems that come with it.
Heard from a respected elder in our family trade: “Every man needs a place to go where he can spit and cuss”.
It may seem crude, but I couldn’t help thinking of ecclesiastical language. Every culture has a form of it; Greek had “High Greek”, Roman Catholicism has Latin, English has the King James “Thee and Thine”. Tradesmen have a language, and often a sort of creed and culture, all their own that cements them into a tradition. It is in every way a culture in itself.
Actually being an Anglican, with the idea of “Common Prayer” you probably can appreciate that yard talk, though “Common”, is sacred in some way.
Where HR is squashing all the yard talk, there is high turnover, loss of cohesion, no mastery, over-reliance on protocols, low ability to problem solve, lack of innovation....
One might think of such suppression as programmed destruction.
Like anything else, the flowering of good talk takes good leadership. As a teenager I worked at Dairy Queen with a bunch of other kids from my school. We were a very cohesive unit until two things happened. The first was that our boss began to trust us too much and check in less and the second was that my sister joined the team. When together the two of us were natural born rebels and all the other kids followed along. It got to the point where we were dancing on top of the freezers, keeping the place a mess and really upsetting the customers. :)
Brother, I really appreciate your rich writing style. When reading the intro it felt as if I was walking into the shop with you. Valuable insight within the article as well that truly suits any group.
Thank you for the kind words, Brett. I’m glad it was worth the read for you.
I agree. It reminded me so much of my walk into work. Which could have been a bummer on a Friday night but the rest of the article was so darn good, that didn’t matter.
I might print this out and give it to my bosses at my Cintas branch. They get a little uneasy about the talk that goes on sometimes. I honestly have grown to love it. I look forward to the mornings when I know I’ll be to talk to a few of the crazier guys.
And like, listen: “riding the clock” exists, right? But for goodness sake, let people interact with one another! I’m interested to know if they actually read it and, if so, what comes of it. Thanks for taking the time to read and comment!
I work in software and have worked remotely for the last three years. My employer required everyone to be in the office twice a week now so I'm going through that period of adaptation. Even though I don't see my coworkers on a daily basis, there are a lot of zoom meetings and collaboration happening, but it's not the same. There is value in seeing your coworkers face to face, sharing meals, and having casual conversations with them. I have had to be more intentional about talking to my coworkers. Add to that the type of personalities you get in this industry and it becomes slightly more complicated affair.
Luckily, I have a manager that understands the importance of what you call yard talk and fosters those kind of interactions within the team. I can see how this could be applied to other fields, thank you for this!
I think there is definitely something lost in the video conferencing medium, so I’m glad to hear your employer is facilitating in-person interactions. Food certainly doesn’t hurt!
Thanks for taking the time to read and comment!
My husband is a radiochemist and does a lot of lab work, but the rest of his time is spent in virtual meetings and otherwise digitally mediated chats (because there's people in multiple locations and many people are remote.) He's often been like "I HATE IT, I hate how I can't easily just walk over and talk shop with another chemist or engineer, face to face." So he and another chemist often take it to the local bar on Friday afternoons. haha But honestly, I've realized the need for him to do that. He always comes back more at ease, having been able to just shoot the breeze about work stuff without the digital mediation of a formal meeting or whatever.
The struggle is real. I can relate to that.
This is so good. Your essays always get me thinking. ". . . no one working in isolation from other practitioners can figure out how to overcome their own lack of skill and produce high-level work" could apply to *any* endeavor - including architecture, including writing. As I read, I thought about one of the first jobsites I regularly went to for bi-weekly meetings. It was an academic building that I'd worked on from the earliest design phases and done all the construction drawings. I still remember my boss warning me when the roofers were up there - they had the foulest mouths of all. I loved every minute of it. I'm wondering whether the degree of spice in yard talk is proportional to the level of risk involved. The stakes are higher, so the language is coarser?
Yes! There is such wide application!
Your question about the risk:spice ratio is a good one. I’m willing to bet there’s a strong correlation. A lot of the people I work with have foul mouths and pure hearts - and I wouldn’t change it for the world!
I appreciate the craft of this essay - how you opened with a vivid personal story, then moved into the philosophy. As you built your case, I had the picture of your exchange with your injured co-worker in mind. I can already tell this essay will accompany me all day. Thanks!
Well put, Nate. I couldn't agree more, from my limited experience in the trades.
Every place of business could use the yard talk idea. There are places that HR should stay out of, considering that all HR is good for is limiting liability.
This is a big part of the problem; there isn't a place where most men can talk about work and the problems that come with it.
Heard from a respected elder in our family trade: “Every man needs a place to go where he can spit and cuss”.
It may seem crude, but I couldn’t help thinking of ecclesiastical language. Every culture has a form of it; Greek had “High Greek”, Roman Catholicism has Latin, English has the King James “Thee and Thine”. Tradesmen have a language, and often a sort of creed and culture, all their own that cements them into a tradition. It is in every way a culture in itself.
Actually being an Anglican, with the idea of “Common Prayer” you probably can appreciate that yard talk, though “Common”, is sacred in some way.
Inter-generational co-construction!!! Yes. Really powerful
You laid out universal, workplace truths.👍🏼
Where HR is squashing all the yard talk, there is high turnover, loss of cohesion, no mastery, over-reliance on protocols, low ability to problem solve, lack of innovation....
One might think of such suppression as programmed destruction.
Like anything else, the flowering of good talk takes good leadership. As a teenager I worked at Dairy Queen with a bunch of other kids from my school. We were a very cohesive unit until two things happened. The first was that our boss began to trust us too much and check in less and the second was that my sister joined the team. When together the two of us were natural born rebels and all the other kids followed along. It got to the point where we were dancing on top of the freezers, keeping the place a mess and really upsetting the customers. :)