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We run two types of standups at Ritza: daily Slack updates and synchronous standup calls. Everyone participates in the daily Slack updates, while call participation depends on your role and schedule.

Who Participates

  • Daily Slack Updates: Everyone, all roles
  • Writer Calls: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday:
    • Full-time engineering writers (40 hours/week): All 3 calls
    • Part-time engineering writers (20-30 hours/week): 1-2 calls per week

Daily Slack Updates

Daily Slack updates help you commit to specific, achievable goals for your workday. They create accountability and help the team understand what everyone is working on.

When to Post

If you're a full time Ritza employee or if you're joining the call at 9.30 that day, then please post your standup at 9am. This means we can use the channel and don't need to do repeat status updates on the call.

If you're a part time writer and not joining a synchronous call that day, then please do the update at the start of your allocated Ritza time for that day.

Post these updates in #ritza-team. They can be short, but they should be specific and explain what you will work on and expect to deliver that day.

What to Share

Share your specific goals for the day. Be concrete about what you plan to deliver. Even if you don't plan to fully complete something that day, it's great if you can rather break off a smaller sub task that you can commit to delivering that day.

✅ Good Examples

  • "Complete the authentication section of the Django tutorial (800 words) and push code examples to GitHub"
  • "Research and document 3 deployment options for the Foobar and Node.js article for Acme"
  • "Review and edit the first 2,000 words of the React hooks guide for Acme"

❌ Vague Examples

  • "Work on Django article"
  • "Read about deployment options"
  • "Work on editing Acme article"

Sharing Obstacles

If obstacles prevent you from achieving your goals, share those too.

  • Technical or work-related issues: Post in #ritza-team so others can help
  • Personal or health issues: Use your private #ritza-<name> channel or DM your manager directly for anything you're not comfortable sharing with the team.

What Makes a Good Task

Updates are best shared at a task level. A project you're working on might contain implicit or explicit subtasks.

A well-defined task should:

  • Take no more than 3 hours (often less)
  • Be a self-contained deliverable ready for feedback if needed
  • Focus on a single type of work (coding, writing, or research)
  • Have a clear "done" state

Examples

✅ Good Task Examples

  • Coding: "Create POC demonstrating CRUD operations against the FooBar API, push to GitHub"
  • Writing: "Write the authentication section for the Django guide (1,000 words)"
  • Debugging: "Fix the bug that's causing duplicate payments in our Stripe example"
  • Editing: Edit the first 3000 words of the Acme and Foo article.
  • QA: Do a full run through the Acme article
  • QA: Take new screenshots for the Acme article

❌ Bad Task Examples

  • Build a proof of concept application and write a 5000 word guide on how to do Foo for Acme
  • "Read about the platform"
  • "Research Acme"

Daily Workload

People working 8-hour days often plan at least two 3-hour tasks per day, one to complete in the morning and one in the afternoon. Smaller tasks are fine though! If what you're working on naturally fits into 5-6 1h tasks, then you can share each of those as you complete them.

Getting Help

If you're stuck:

  1. Ask early: Don't wait hours trying to solve something alone, or only say days later that you're behind because of some issue that you never mentioned until that point.
  2. Be specific: Describe exactly what you've tried and where you're blocked
  3. Provide context: Share enough information for others to understand and potentially replicate your issue
  4. Ask in the right place: Share widely, often #ritza-team means someone you didn't expect might have an answer for you.