The Document Culture of Amazon
When I joined, I was perplexed by this way of operating meetings. It surprised me greatly that people wouldn&#x27;t want to read the doc at ahead, give it time for thinking and researching, and then come to the table feeling prepare to contribute to the best if your ability.<p>Now, I understand and deeply appreciate this method. I believe it provides lots of benefits. It drives towards better docs that can be understood quickly by non-experts. When there are just a few minutes to review the doc, we don&#x27;t have time to go digging for information on our own - the critical information must be provided in the material given. There will also be SMEs in the room who can clarify any shortcomings here. Because the audience of the docs is non-SMEs, it drives towards inclusion of other teams. From this, you get more diverse viewpoints, considerations, and experience. It also contributes towards cross-team awareness and education. It makes it much easier to participate as a contributor to the meeting while simultaneously less impactful when you don&#x27;t. It let&#x27;s us timebox our attention span - you won&#x27;t accidentally spend hours rabbit-holing into a doc.