Agreed. Perhaps it's less about the nice words one uses and more about the features (embed in a website, embed times in an email) that reduce the work for the person trying to book a meeting.
It's a good point. There is a feature which allows the sender to "reserve times" in a one-off meeting. That way, they don't get booked before you have an opportunity to select a time.
The family example was meant to be a silly example -- most of use Calendly for work -- but it's helpful feedback that it's probably better to say "my availability" versus "my Calendly."
I recommend using a "polite" script many people use: "Feel free to let me know when you're available. If you prefer, you can choose from my availability here." It opens the door for the other person first.
Do you think this would have landed better if the recruiter would have first asked you for YOUR availability before sending their link? Or was it just the act of sending a link of any type that required a click on your part?
Hey, there. I wrote the post. I agree: From my experience people "jockeying for power" tend to get the most irritated by a scheduling link getting dropped on them without some sort of niceties surrounding it.
"but I sure wish it were easier to identify engineering organizations by their type ahead of hire."
You can make it easier before joining. During the interview process, ask one of the interviewers if they can share an example of how the organization makes decisions in a quantitative and/or qualitative way. If they don't mention a Mode/Amplitude/whatever report with user data and/or talk about some user interviews (and the concomitant report) then it's probably not a data-driven process. Or the data isn't shared beyond Leadership. And if they roll their eyes or say, "We just build what the CEO or Sales wants" then you have even more evidence that this might the kind of place where you'll just take direction and not get a clear reason.
Sure, we've all known founders who've created products that were successful without talking to potential users, but it's very rare. What we've all encountered more often: founders who stubbornly don't talk to users as some sort of half-understood adherence to the biography of Steve Jobs. And then their product fails. If they had only tried a different way -- I don't know, talk to the people who might pay them? -- they could have avoided complete failure. It's not as glamorous as magically stumbling on a good idea, perhaps, and requires extra work, but it's often a more viable path for most of us.