[PragmaticPulp]

> but any time “exceptions can be made in an emergency”, that is a sign that an experience can, albeit maybe with considerable pain, be made asynchronous.

It's not a question of whether or not something could possibly be made asynchronous. Most things could be made asynchronous with enough investment of time, money, energy, and staff.

The real question is what are the tradeoffs and what are the consequences. If the RC is trying to build a community, making the group orientation asynchronous wouldn't have the same effect.

Having a true emergency is an entirely different situation than just sleeping in (OP admits he ignored the calendar invite because it was at 7:15AM). In a true emergency, people are usually willing to go out of their way to make exceptions. When someone simply ignores e-mails and sleeps in, it's not fair to ask other people to go above and beyond to cater to that person.

Apples and oranges.

[reikonomusha]

The way you’re communicating is wildly unempathetic, and I truly hope your zero-tolerance faux-friendly “better for everyone” attitude isn’t ruining other students’ experiences. You’re painting the author as some sort of lazy individual who does things on his own accord. “Sleeping in” and “ignoring emails” doesn’t seem to be accurately portraying. Being online at 8AM is not “sleeping in” by most people’s standards. Perusing and participating in discussions is “not ignoring emails”. He made a mistake, RC has zero tolerance for it.

Why not just say “We have a zero tolerance policy for missing mandatory events” without all of the non-sequitur pseudo-rationalization? That’s OK. People may not agree with it, and it may hurt other people financially, but at least it’s direct and honest.

[sbisker]

I’ll grant that when I read the article, I missed the part where he admitted to intentionally ignoring the invite. If they tossed him for what they considered a values mismatch, that’s obviously a little different. Still, I feel like a “Listen bub!” voice conversation could have helped here, versus relying on email - if only in delivering the bad news better, if not actually hearing out the apology and talking over potential next steps. And I give him points for admitting to that mistake - that strikes me as far more in line with their values than lying and saying his mother was sick (which he could have trivially done).

As for asynchronicity, I totally get that something will be lost. The question is whether enough will be lost as to render the participant totally unable to learn those values over, say, the next few days and catch up. But something might be gained as well - it’s possible that these synchronous moments are an actual bottleneck. Experimenting with async could result in them handling more students with less staff.

[reikonomusha]

Broadcasting and passive communication will always be lossy in any format. You’re absolutely right that a “hey bub” moment would have really clearly indicated whether the author was willing to buckle down or not.

And, even better, they could have had that discussion in the interview. “We aren’t here for fun, we are where to X. We demand your full attention even if things sit outside your personal comfort zone in sleeping, etc.” But I guess it’s easier to just kick people out of the program than to be delicate and upfront with wording and seriousness.