Async vs. Sync

The Default

Default to async. Written communication is searchable, skimmable, and does not interrupt anyone’s work. It gives the other person time to think before they respond. If you can handle something in chat or a short written message, do that first.

The goal is balance. Too much async and decisions stall, threads go cold, and problems that needed five minutes drag on for days. Too much sync and deep work gets fragmented, nothing gets documented, and the team builds a dependency on real-time conversation instead of thinking things through independently. Neither extreme works. The skill is knowing where on the spectrum a given situation belongs.

Switch to a Call When

You have gone back and forth three or more times without resolution. If a thread is getting long and the gap is not closing, the medium is the problem. Call, resolve it, then document the outcome.

The topic is emotionally charged. Conflict, difficult feedback, disagreement about direction: these belong in a call. Text strips tone. Do not deliver hard things in writing if you can avoid it.

You are genuinely thinking together. Some problems need real-time exploration. If you do not yet know what the answer looks like and finding it requires building on each other’s ideas, a call is the right tool. Async is for conveying, not discovering.

A decision is blocked and waiting costs more than the interruption. If the team cannot move until something is resolved, call. Unblock it.

Stay Async When

You are sharing information. Status updates, risk flags, decisions already made, questions with clear answers: all of this is async. Do not call someone to tell them something they can read.

You need the other person to think before they respond. Some questions deserve considered answers, not the first thing that comes to mind. A well-written question sent the night before often gets a better answer than a call the next morning.

The conversation should be on the record. If the outcome needs to be referenced later, write it. Anything involving a decision, a scope change, or a commitment belongs in writing, even if you talked through it live.

It can wait. Not everything is urgent. If the answer does not affect anyone’s work in the next few hours, give async a chance before pulling someone out of what they are doing.

Making Async Work

Async only works when your messages are complete. A vague message in async triggers a clarifying question, which waits hours for a reply, which triggers another question. A thread that should have been one exchange becomes a two-day delay.

Every async message should do three things:

1. Lead with the point. State the conclusion or the ask in the first sentence. Context comes after, not before.
2. Include your ask explicitly. Every message ends with who does what by when. “Let me know your thoughts” is not an ask.
3. Give enough context to respond. If you are asking a question, include what you have already tried, what the constraints are, and what a good answer looks like. Do not make the reader come back to you for information you already have.

A message that does all three can be answered immediately. One that does not will sit.

See Clear Communication for the full reference on writing messages that move things forward.

How Long a Call Should Be

When you do call, keep it short or make it count. A useful default: 15, 45, or 90 minutes. This is not a rule — there are outliers and context matters. But being deliberate about meeting length forces clarity about what you are actually trying to do.

15 minutes for quick syncs: unblocking someone, a decision with limited options, a check-in. If you cannot state the agenda in one sentence before booking, it is probably not a 15-minute meeting.

45 minutes for 1:1s and moderate discussions that need some depth. It avoids the 60-minute trap where meetings drift and run over into the next thing.

90 minutes for real work: design sessions, complex decisions, anything that requires building on each other’s thinking. 90 minutes matches the brain’s natural focus cycle. Below that, the work does not have room to develop. Above it, attention fades.

The point is not to be rigid. It is to notice when you default to 60 minutes out of habit rather than purpose, and ask whether the meeting would be better served by a sharper 15 or a proper 90.

After Every Call

When a call ends, the person who called it sends a short written summary to the relevant channel or thread: what was decided, what the next steps are, and who owns them. Do this immediately, before context fades.

A call that produces no written record is a call that will have to happen again.

When the Same Question Keeps Coming Up

If people are repeatedly asking the same thing in async, that is not a communication problem. It is a systems problem. The question should not need to exist.

Asking for someone’s availability means the team is not using their calendar to flag free and busy time. Asking who owns a task means ownership was never made explicit. Asking what the current status is means updates are not being shared proactively.

When you notice a recurring question, flag it. Do not just answer it again. Leadership’s job is to identify these friction points and put structure in place so the question stops coming up. Recurring questions are a signal, not a norm.