What's the Context
(<1 Min Read) Knowing context can change your decision.
There are many free and paid pieces of advice available on the Internet, including this one. And every piece of advice is right and wrong, including the paid ones1. Any advice is right and wrong when shared without context.
Without context, it’s hard to determine if the advice is right or wrong. For example,
Adding more observability is suitable for the system. Good advice if you are building a new, highly reliable system and wrong advice if adding more observability leads to more noise than signal.
Python is a great language to learn. Good advice if you want to learn programming but wrong advice to become a frontend developer.
It would be best to change your job every 2-3 years. Good advice if you feel stuck or looking for a higher salary jump. Bad advice if you are growing in your career, financially well-compensated, and trust the leadership/management.
So every time you encounter any advice, try to seek context. Because without context, everything is right and wrong at the same time.
(BONUS): Understanding context is especially critical if you are in a management role as not understanding context can have dire consequences for yourself and your team.
A free subscription gets you:
🎉 📰 Every new issue of this newsletter is delivered right to the inbox.
🔖 😲 Free access to previous posts is soon to be moved behind a paywall.
🏆 😊 Top posts that made it to the front page of hacker news with comment thread.
We have a strong bias towards paid things being better.