Should we ask for forgiveness instead of permission?
Estimated Reading Time: 4 Minutes (~500 Words)
As a kid, my favourite question has always been asking ‘why?’ repeatedly, which my parents (thankfully) responded to. To an adult, those might seem like annoying questions, but for me, each answer became an important jigsaw piece to build one’s view of the world.
Fast forward till today, one of the most frequent (and annoying) question I get is why certain rules exist (yes, karma dictates that I now answer my nieces and nephews). I am more than tempted to answer ’cause they do’, but I’ve learned (as with most good teachers) to deflect the question back at them and have them ponder about it. I occasionally get questions that are interesting enough to get me off my seat to search for an answer.
As adults navigate through life, most would accept rule(s) as they are. However, there is always the insanely curious friend / relative, that keeps questioning “why”; the thinker, innovator, continuously asking questions, pushing boundaries, challenging norms.
Growing up in Singapore, I was taught to follow all the rules with the unsatisfactory ‘just because’ or ‘you will get fined or jailed’. My worldview changed when I started travelling, one vivid example was when I was at a cross junction in Vietnam – motorbikes drive as though the traffic light was an accessory. For the locals, this was ‘normal’, but two questions popped into my head: why is everyone not following the ‘Red Light’, and more surprisingly, why weren’t there any accidents?
Beyond the travelling, I began to notice many other aspects of life where my supposed ‘rules’ did not apply. As a software engineer, DRY (Don’t repeat yourself) was one of the first basic principles taught, and we should always reuse functions that were written. For each function I wrote, I fervently sought out similar existing functions, at times making modifications. As I become more familiar and thought more about other aspects of code such as readability, I found several personal examples, as well as readings ([1], [2]) where this was not true. And this got me thinking: when was it a good time to break a rule?
I probably don’t have all the answers yet, but one approach I’ve taken is to treat most rules as guidelines, to understand the spirit of it, the why. Why are traffic lights necessary at a cross junction? Why do we not like repeated code? Often times rules are a good (but not perfect) manifestation of the sprit / intent of doing something. In most cases, once I understand the why, it becomes a little easier to decide whether that rule should be followed. In the context of work, with an enlightened manager / boss, it’s sometimes it’s better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
Given this, my personal goal is to reflect and relook at rules (conscious or not) in my head one at a time, and ensure that I am not following things blindly.
Footnote: This article is not advocating for us to break the law, that should be respected.
Links
- https://phauer.com/2020/wall-coding-wisdoms-quotes/
- https://sandimetz.com/blog/2016/1/20/the-wrong-abstraction
When was the last time you broke a rule, but upheld the spirit of it?
Salted Bites 