---
title: Async Updates
url: https://varstatt.com/principles/delivery/async-updates
author: Jurij Tokarski
description: Progress is communicated asynchronously, not in meetings
section: Principles (https://varstatt.com/principles)
category: Delivery (https://varstatt.com/principles/delivery)
---

Writing is the delivery communication layer. Every work session produces a written artifact — not a meeting, not a call, not a Slack ping asking "how's it going?"

### Write After Every Session

After each work session, the developer posts an update. What got done. What's next. What decisions were made and why. A screenshot, a link to the deployed feature, a short paragraph of context. Simple.

The client sees progress continuously. No waiting for a weekly status meeting. No "any updates?" emails because the update is already there. The async update replaces the status meeting entirely.

### What Goes in an Update

Keep it concrete. "Implemented the checkout flow. Stripe integration is working in staging. Still need to handle the webhook for failed payments — doing that next." Link to the deployed change if possible. Attach a screenshot if it's visual. Flag blockers explicitly: "Blocked on: need the production API key from the client."

Avoid vague updates. "Worked on the backend" tells nobody anything. Name the thing. Show the thing.

### Decisions Get Captured in Real-Time

When the developer documents a decision right after making it, the reasoning is still fresh. "Went with approach X because Y" — that context lives in the thread forever. Six months later, someone asks why — the answer is already there. No reconstructing half-remembered conversations.

This also protects both sides. When the client asks "why did we do it this way?", the answer is already in the thread. No defensiveness needed. Just a link.

### The Compound Effect

Updates accumulate into a project history. After three months anyone can scroll back and see every decision, every feature shipped, every blocker resolved. That's more useful than any retrospective. It's real-time [documentation](/principles/diligence/documentation) that writes itself as a side effect of working.