Beyond Writing Code

Category: communication

  • The dangers of “who” and “why”: post-incident reviews

    The dangers of “who” and “why”: post-incident reviews

    Originally posted 23 September 2023 on Medium.

    Five valuable lessons, including one that really threw me for a loop when I read it.

    In one of his LinkedIn posts, Jeff Gallimore posted some thoughts about retrospectives and post-incident reviews:

    Just a PSA and periodic reminder about things to keep in mind when conducting retrospectives and post-incident reviews.

    1. No one comes to work to do a bad job.
    2. Everyone is doing the best they can given the information they have at the time.
    3. There is no single root cause. There are multiple contributing factors.
    4. Counterfactual thinking (i.e., “I/We should have done…”) isn’t productive.
    5. Leading with “How”, “What”, and “Tell me more about…” is more constructive than “Why” and certainly “Who”.

    Psychological safety. Learning. Generative culture.

    Now, the first four reminders are important, and I’ve been getting better at catching myself as the years go on. But that fifth one was a new one for me, and I’ll admit, it stung a bit when I read it, because I often ask why and who.

    A dark hallway with a large glowing question mark on the wall at the end.
    My image search here was for “investigation”… this felt about right. Photo by Emily Morter on Unsplash

    Asking “who”

    I have no intention of assigning blame. I don’t find the “blame game” useful. Usually, I’m not trying to exonerate myself or my team, although I can admit to there being a little bit of motivation to do that. Mostly, when I’m asking “who” or “why” questions, I’m trying understand what happened so we can figure out what needs to be addressed. Specifically, if I’m trying to find out who was involved, it’s only because I want to know what they were experiencing in that moment. It seems like only someone who was there can truly report on what was happening at the time.

    That said, I’ve had people refuse to tell me who did something. At the time, this was frustrating. My thought was: how can I prevent this problem from happening again if I can’t even talk to the person involved to find out what was going on?

    Just reading that thought back to myself, though, raises a good counter-argument: why does it need to be me who finds out what happened and figures out how to prevent it?

    If you’re guessing that I’m thinking of a specific instance, you’re correct. In this scenario, the team affected (mine) and the team that appeared to have caused the problem had a history of conflict. Trust was low on both sides.

    I can only guess that when they saw someone asking “who did this,” they were motivated to protect one of their own from possible criticism. I might have believed that I would interview that person without blaming and shaming, seeking only to understand and to help. But I hadn’t established that trust with the other team, so they had no reason to share that belief. It makes sense that asking “who” would put them on the defensive. Not helpful.

    Could I have asked “why” instead? Would that have been better?

    Asking “why”

    Consider this scenario: A problem was caused (at least in part, see Jeff’s point #3 above) by someone doing action Z. Let’s forget about who this person is. Shall we ask instead: why did this person do Z?

    Let’s start by assuming that whoever did Z was doing the best they could with what they had (see Jeff’s points 1 and 2 above). They didn’t come to work intending to cause a problem. Maybe they:

    • truly believed Z was correct (or that they were doing it in the correct way)
    • did Z without even realizing they were doing it
    • did good thing Y that in turn set off Z unexpectedly
    • did Z believing it WAS good thing Y
    • knew Z was trouble, but they believed they had to do it
    • didn’t actually do Z at all

    The list could go on and on. Then behind those things there are often other layers: overworked operator, lookalike buttons, alarm fatigue, things changing without notice, culture of fear, information not flowing as expected.

    Each of these suggests a different strategy for preventing this from happening again. Maybe someone needs information, training, or just rest. Maybe a misunderstanding needs to be cleared up. Maybe some easily confused things need to be clarified and disambiguated. Maybe speaking up needs to be made safer. Or maybe we need to keep working to identify the cause and the fix.

    Again, though, I think it comes back to trust. I have, in the past, tried asking “why did you do this?” or “why did this happen?” as gently and kindly as I could, with people who I thought would trust me… but the responses usually don’t help. “I’m sorry” is one common response — no matter how gentle I think I am, the person still senses danger and apologizing seems safest. “I don’t know” is another common response.

    Nobody ever says “because I thought it was the right thing to do,” or “because I’m tired from long hours and I got confused” or “because the instructions weren’t clear” or…

    I don’t think asking “why” gets me anywhere.

    How and what to do instead

    Jeff’s post has helped me identify that I have some strategies that don’t work. His suggestions of “How” and “What” and “Tell me more about…” seem like good places to start.

    I’ll assume here that we’re avoiding confrontational non-questions that are really attacks in disguise (“How could you do something like that?” and “What were you thinking?” aren’t especially likely to bring on collaborative problem solving.

    Maybe the “you” in these questions is at the heart of the problem. I can see where that might put the focus on a person, rather than on a situation, a process, a circumstance. Does focusing on a person run afoul of Jeff’s fourth point — that counterfactual thinking isn’t helpful? We might be avoiding blame, but are we still ultimately talking about what “should have” or “should not have” happened? This person should have had more training, the documentation should have been clearer, the alarms should not have been so numerous, good thing Y should not have triggered Z?

    Perhaps the key is switching to a future focus. How can we prevent this from happening in the future? What could be done to improve the process? How could we make situations like this easier and safer? Tell me more about any barriers you see that could be removed or strategies you’ve thought of for doing things better. Engaging people in the problem solving, rather than trying to be the solver myself.

    I posted this on LinkedIn in 2023. But here or there, I’d love to hear your thoughts about how you’ve approached this. What have you found useful in place of “who” or “why”?

    Originally posted 23 September 2023 on Medium.

  • Lessons from Uncle Sidney

    Lessons from Uncle Sidney

    Uncle Sidney was notorious. I think even he’d agree to that.

    Sidney was his own weather system, with lots of thunder. Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash

    He might indeed be someone’s uncle, but he isn’t my uncle or the uncle of anyone I know.

    He was the main instructor for one of the programming languages used (and created!) by one of my former employers. But if you said Uncle Sidney, everyone within earshot of him knew who you meant. Sidney was his own weather system, with lots of thunder.

    His reputation preceded him, for everyone’s safety.

    Portrait of Sidney

    Likely in the same moment in which you were signed up for Sidney’s class, you were warned that you DO NOT under any circumstances show up late for class. Leave home an hour early, if you have to. Don’t be late. Your manager will hear about it, loudly and in no uncertain terms.

    His insistence on timeliness wasn’t pure whim, or even simply a matter of respect. He had the timing of every day of his class down to the minute. If you delayed the start of class, that would throw him off schedule. And there was no “just start without me, I’ll catch up” in this world. This class was intense, and he needed you on board and attentive for every minute.

    Second thing you learned: don’t fall asleep in class. I did this once. You better believe he noticed, stopped the class, and called me on it — loudly, crossly, but not unkindly. We took a short break. Again, he needed our attention for every minute.

    The stories could go on and on. Some of the stories were not so great. “Sidney yells because he cares,” we’d say. It helped me to think of being yelled at as a badge of honor, but not everyone can let shouting roll off them like water from the back of a duck.

    Some stories were more entertaining. My favorite moment was when he quipped that Friday was actually “fried day” because people were fried by then… and then he laughed so much at his own corny joke that he couldn’t continue class for at least a full minute. Which, of course, threw him off schedule.

    I emerged from those classes reasonably conversant with the programming language. It’s been years since I last used it, and most of my knowledge of the language is gone now. However, several other lessons from Sidney stick with me.

    Slow down, smart people

    I find myself repeating this one as I’m mentoring: smart people have a tendency to rush, especially by jumping to conclusions. We’re gratified to put some of the puzzle pieces together and think we see the whole picture. We see A and B, and we get excited. We immediately decide F and G, therefore K… skipping a bunch of intermediate steps. Then when K doesn’t turn out to be true, we’re confused and stuck.

    The answer is often to rewind and start again with A, taking it one step at a time. A, then B, then C, then D… wait, what about E? It turns out E isn’t true after all, which explains why K was a faulty conclusion.

    Here’s a concrete example. Let’s say a specific input to a function should be generating a certain output, but it isn’t. We stare at the function, and we don’t see how we could possibly be getting the results we are seeing, given the input we’re passing in — or more accurately, given the input we assume we’re passing in.

    Slow down a bit. Check to see if the values we’re passing in are what we expect. They are. Slow down a bit more. Are the values we’re passing to the function the same as what the function is receiving? “How could they not be??” you might ask. Check anyway. Wait, they’re not… I pass 5 and 100 and the function is receiving 0 and 0?? How can THAT be?

    And that’s exactly the reason for slowing down: you’ll find those problems that exist in the cracks, in places where you assumed everything was going according to plan. Maybe you never saved your most recent code changes, so the code that is running isn’t the same as what’s on your screen. No wonder E isn’t true.

    Don’t always take notes

    There’s some evidence that writing things down with pen and paper, rather than typing them, improves retention. Writing by hand might force you to do more processing to put the ideas in your own words, whereas typing lets you record what was said closer to verbatim, without necessarily comprehending it.

    Sidney took this a step further, calling me out on my tendency to try to write down everything. He would provide us with notes, he promised. Try putting the pen and paper aside and just listening. Just absorb the ideas and make sure you understand. Too much writing, especially in a class as fast-paced as his, and you might start to miss the current idea because you’re too busy trying to record the previous idea. This can snowball quickly.

    Ask the question ASAP

    If I’m listening to someone lecture, I often hold a question in my mind, rather than asking it. I am trying to allow for the possibility that they’re going to explain it momentarily, or that I have all the information and I just need to make some mental leap to understanding. This is not a great habit.

    With some lectures, the information is cumulative. If you don’t understand the point that was just made, you are going to be confused by the point currently being made, baffled by the point coming next, and completely lost in a matter of minutes. And at that point, it can become hard to admit that you actually lost the teacher several minutes prior and you need them to recap a lot.

    Put another way: the best time to ask is as soon as you have the question, or as soon as you realize you’re confused. The next best time to ask is when you’re kicking yourself for not having asked because you’re now completely lost. As challenging as it is to confess being lost, it’s only going to get worse the longer you stay lost.

    Could you teach it?

    Related to the point about asking the question right away: one of Sidney’s tricks was to ask the class if we all understood something. Are we sure we all completely understood it… yes, nods all around.

    Okay, he’d say, then explain it back to me.

    Uh oh. Suddenly, we’re not sure we understood it so well after all. Oops.

    It’s not necessary that you understand everything perfectly on the first try, or that you could explain it to others after just one hearing. It is definitely useful to know that there are layers of understanding, and to know when you might be expected to be at a deeper layer than you are. Now, I routinely check my understanding: did I just barely follow what I was being told? Could I explain it to someone else if they asked? If not, what do I need to ask to get clarification? Or is my minimal understanding sufficient for now?

    You influence others too

    Uncle Sidney retired before I left that company. On his last day, I made sure to catch up with him to say my goodbyes and wish him well in his retirement.

    And it really hit me — as one of the original developers of that language, he’d taught “generations” of developers how to reason about it. He’d taught us how to slow down, skip the note-taking sometimes, ask the questions, and check our understanding. And everyone who taught the language would do so in his footsteps as well, even if their approaches and teaching styles were entirely different. In that way, his influence on the organization was not so unlike an uncle after all.

    What’s your legacy, and what do you hope it will be? When you move on from where you are now, what will people remember about you? What habits will they pick up from you, what lessons did they learn from you, and how did you influence the culture and people around you?

    Originally posted 10 September 2023 on Medium.

  • Have you been giving your employer money?

    Have you been giving your employer money?

    I suspect most people would not spontaneously and voluntarily give back part of their salary to their employer. I don’t mean donating to a cause, or chipping in for board games to play at lunch. I mean just handing your employer a wad of cash. “Here, this is for you.”

    So don’t do it with your time.

    Photo by Eric Rothermel on Unsplash

    Your time belongs to you, just like your salary does. Moreover, time is one of the few things money can’t buy more of. You can only — at best — free up time you already have, like paying someone else to do yard work that would take you hours.

    Think of it this way: If your company didn’t have health insurance, a retirement plan, an education reimbursement benefit, free food, etc., you could simply buy those things outright if they paid you enough.

    If you didn’t get time off today, you couldn’t buy more of today no matter what they paid you. You can’t buy a second evening to add on after you work through the first evening. If you don’t take a vacation this year, you can’t buy a 53rd week. You can’t even buy an extra few minutes between the call that ended at 1:55 and the one that starts at 2:00.

    When the time is gone, it’s gone. Before it’s gone, choose to do something with it that is part of your best life. And I am not thinking “side hustle” here (no judgment if that’s your thing). I’m thinking rest, family, friends, health, joy, creativity, meaning.

    To clarify

    This message isn’t for the people who get paid more if they work more. If you need to work more hours to get paid more to get by, or if you deliberately choose to do that (maybe you’re saving up for something important), that’s a different story.

    I’m talking here to people who are paid the same whether they work 40, 50, or 60 hours.

    And I’m also not pointing to people who are up and working at 5 am, people who are still in the office at 7 pm, or even both on the same day. I don’t care what schedule you work. I know someone who would goof off in the afternoons, go home, put the kids to bed, and then focus on work for a few hours. Same effort, just a different schedule.

    For that matter, this isn’t even about someone choosing to work 50 or 60 hours because their work happens to be their passion. If you are in a divinely inspired flow state in your code, your art, your carpentry, your mission… you rock on for as long as that’s infusing you with life and joy.

    But if that isn’t you, and you’re choosing work over taking time off, that raises an important question.

    Why ARE you doing that?

    I can preach about this, but there’s some reason why you’re so often choosing work instead of stopping.

    Stop for a moment and think of those times when you look at your watch and it’s noon and you’re hungry… or it’s late and you’re tired… or your calendar is open and you’re thinking of scheduling time off… and yet you choose work instead of lunch, leaving for the day, or planning that vacation. Why are you making that choice?

    I can’t answer that for you, but I can answer it for myself. For me, it’s usually some sort of insecurity. I am unsure if my efforts so far have been enough. I’m unsure if I will be able to meet some deadline, real or imagined. I’m unsure what would happen if I point out that the work to be done has exceeded the capacity to get it done. Or maybe I’m pretty sure what would happen (whether or not I’m correct) and it’s a consequence I don’t want to deal with.

    Interestingly, it’s often paired with some sort of false self-confidence. Sure, I haven’t been able to get [whatever] done in the three days I’ve been working on it, but if I can just focus on it for another hour, then I’ll really make some good progress. An hour later, when I’m not further along, I’ll be disappointed in myself. Only further evidence of my inadequacy! I’d better stay another hour.

    It’s your job to push back

    Regardless of your seniority, but especially if you’re a tenured and experienced employee, it’s part of your job to push back when the work exceeds the time and capacity allotted. I’m thinking of my developers here. You’re the one who is in that code, and you have the full picture of what else is on your plate. Your manager has to rely on you to let them know what’s feasible and what isn’t. They might not like the message, but they need to hear it.

    How do you deliver that message? What are the alternatives when there’s more work than capacity? Check out my earlier post on how to handle that situation:

    Something’s gotta give

    Just remember that anyone who says “too bad, we need it done, so you’ll have to stay late” is saying something akin to “too bad, we need money, so you’ll have to give it to us.”

    Originally posted 5 September 2023 on Medium.

  • Why people do what they do

    Why people do what they do

    Originally posted 30 August 2023 on Medium.

    I’m a huge fan of the DevOps Enterprise Summit, (now called Enterprise Technology Leadership Summit). Disney’s Jason Cox (Head of Global SRE) is a fine speaker and storyteller, and my favorite Disney character. His presentation on Creating Digital Magic gave me a lot to think about.

    Go check it out now, if you’d like to, because I’m about to give some spoilers.

    I’ll wait. [humming a little tune to myself]

    Registration is free, and it gets you ten free videos per month, which is a pretty good deal. It gets you on the IT Revolution mailing list too, of course, but I actually like what they’ve been sending me, so I don’t mind.

    Okay, so you’ve either watched the video, or you’ve decided you don’t mind the spoilers. There’s more to the talk than this, but here are Jason’s three main takeaways:

    1. Listen.
    2. Have empathy.
    3. Actually help people.

    Hooray! Wait…

    My first reaction was to cheer. Yes! So many people in tech need these lessons. I’m sure we can all imagine working relationships, past or present, that would be utterly transformed in positive and uplifting ways (or at least made tolerable) if they embodied these three principles. We could stop wondering if we’re talking to a wall, an ogre, or both. We could get some real work done. We’d be happier.

    My next thought was: wait… do we really need to tell people to listen, be empathetic, and help?? Shouldn’t that just be a given? As a friend of mine says, “we’re trying to have a society here, people.”

    People are baffling sometimes. Photo by Chris Arthur-Collins on Unsplash

    What have we come to as an industry, or as humanity, that we need a leader from a major company to get up on the main stage at a conference to tell us that we should be kind to each other? Great message, but kind of awful that it’s so needed.

    My third thought: does telling people something like this actually help?

    Given everything I’ve heard about the community that has sprung up around the DevOps Enterprise Summit conferences, I imagine that a fair amount of Jason’s audience already behaves in the way he’s exhorting people to consider. I suppose it’s pleasant, for someone who already puts effort towards listening, empathy, and helping to hear a champion of those principles speak about them with enthusiasm. I’m sure there’s an element that believes they don’t behave that way, when in actuality they do, and I suppose the message could motivate those people to try harder.

    But what of the people who already aren’t listening, being empathetic, or helping? Do those people actually hear this message and think “you know… he’s right, I really ought to try that”? And if they do think that, is just telling someone this (granted, in a heartfelt and well-presented way) enough to get them to change their behavior?

    Underneath it all for me is this deeper question…

    Why do people do what they do?

    There’s a huge hazard, one that trips me up all the time. The fundamental attribution error is the tendency to chalk up someone else’s actions to something inherent to that person, but one’s own behavior to external factors.

    Some relevant examples:

    • They didn’t listen to me because they don’t care. I didn’t listen because I was distracted by an urgent issue that came in.
    • They aren’t empathetic with me because they’re egocentric and childish. I am not empathetic with them because they’re giving me attitude all the time.
    • They don’t help because they’re lazy and incompetent. When I don’t help, it’s because I’m busy and overwhelmed.

    We make up stories about other people all the time (“that look she gave me means she’s nervous”) and if we’re not careful, we take them as reality. The fundamental attribution error creeps into these stories and influences the narrative we write. Add to that any other reasons we might be defensive and ready to blame others while exonerating ourselves — e.g., looming deadlines, personal financial woes, traffic jams — and we’ve got a potent combination for believing others to be awful and oneself to be an innocent victim, neither of which are especially useful conclusions.

    Just telling people — even yourself — to do something is generally not enough. If you want behavior change, you’ve got to work out a plan for it.

    In other words, “great, Leaf, but what do people DO about it?”

    What to do

    Here are a few things I’ve tried in the service of breaking the habit of telling fundamental attribution error stories:

    • I have a sign taped to my monitor that says, among other things, “Is this true, or a story?”
    • I’m starting to use being angry or upset as a warning flag that I’ve got a story going on. It’s useful to tune into signals from the body if you can. I’ve spent decades being a floating head, so I get it if that’s hard.
    • The phrase “that’s one possibility” is helpful here. Or try my dad’s favorite: “Is that so?” Both are good litmus tests for spotting when you’ve got a story instead of a known truth.
    • I just finished Douglas Squirrel and Jeffrey Fredrick’s book Agile Conversations, which suggests a practice of deliberately considering alternate explanations, including some ridiculous ones to get the ideas flowing.
    • I try to figure out under what circumstances I might exhibit the behavior for which I’m criticizing someone else.

    Let’s try an example.

    They don’t help because they’re lazy and incompetent! Hey, I’m angry here, my jaw is tight and my hands are clenched. This might be a story I’m telling myself. So… yes, lazy and incompetent is one possibility.

    Maybe they don’t have enough people to handle the workload. Maybe I wasn’t clear in my request for help. Maybe they somehow heard a message that this wasn’t urgent, so they’re prioritizing more urgent work. Maybe they are fending off a zombie attack and I’ll be lucky if they can help at all.

    What has caused me to not be helpful to others in the past? Well, I sometimes get requests from people who don’t realize that I’m out of the office, so maybe a key person is on vacation. I keep getting stuck in meetings, which gives me less time to help; maybe they’re getting pulled into too many meetings. And hey, sometimes people are simply asking for something unreasonable. Could it be that my request is not as reasonable as I think it is? Maybe I’d better check into that.

    Where I landed

    Right then. Jason’s three takeaways — useful, or no?

    I’d like to see more speakers go past explaining their ideas to suggesting things to try. But just the same, I’m going with yes, his talk was useful for me. It got me thinking about how we determine why people do what we do. It led me to articulate some things I’ve tried to bring more depth to my conclusions and go beyond accepting the first and likely problematic story that comes to mind.

    Have you caught yourself telling yourself stories? Have you noticed times when you’ve made the fundamental attribution error? What might you do differently, or what have you already done or tried to do, to listen more, be more empathetic, or actually help others?

    New p.s. for 2025: I’ll be at Enterprise Technology Leadership Summit in Vegas in September. If you will too, come find me there.

  • Three reasons not to bring hostility

    Three reasons not to bring hostility

    I enjoy challenges to my “conventional wisdom” about how developers and dev teams work. We can improve. “The way we’ve always done it” isn’t necessarily the best way.

    Luckily, I have found people on social media who offer those challenges in their posts. Much of the time, if I don’t agree already, I learn something or at least I have a new point of view to consider.

    However, I have noticed two unsettling things about some of this writing: 1. It can be a bit — or a lot — hostile to people who don’t agree, and 2. I found myself enjoying that hostile tone (if I already agreed with the writer myself). Ick.

    I get it. It feels good to be certain about being right. Whether or not one is actually right.

    And, although I suspect few people want to admit this out loud, it feels good — at least temporarily — to put someone else down. Why else would so many people do that so often?

    “You’re just plain wrong… real developers wouldn’t… only immature developers would… doing x is foolish… why even do y, it’s a waste of time…” Mockery, insults, and lots of condescension.

    I also understand that sometimes people are simply responding in kind, having been the original target of some hostility from detractors. That kind of thing can push my buttons too, and I can get caught up in defensiveness — here’s the data, or the expert opinions, or the superior reasoning. You’re wrong, I’m right, so there.

    The more I reflect on this approach, though, the more it worries me. While I can still learn from others who operate this way, I’m moving away from engaging in and with that kind of hostility, and here’s why.

    Be kind

    First and foremost: “be kind” seems a good rule of thumb to me. There’s another human being on the other end of the conversation. Disagree, present your case, set limits and boundaries, fine. But be kind about it. As a friend says, “we’re trying to have a society here.”

    It’s ineffective

    Second: is hostility useful? Does condescending help? Is it likely to change someone’s mind? I think not. Does rudeness towards you change your mind on a topic? Assuming not, why would your return fire change their mind?

    Or is the objective not to change someone’s mind? What is the objective, then? Uh oh. For me, if I look closely at it when I am in “fight mode,” the objective is to prove my superiority. Not how I want to show up in the world.

    It’s bad for you

    Third: it isn’t healthy for the one being hostile. For me, it only feels good temporarily while I imagine myself the better person, the better warrior. After that fades, though, it’s just icky. It hurts your heart.

    You can lob poison at someone else, but you get it all over yourself in the process. Don’t do that to yourself.

    “But they were hostile first…”

    Ahh, the childhood playground defense: “But they started it!” Perhaps they did, but you need not continue it. It’s an internet discussion about technology, not a threat to your well-being. It can be hard to remember that when your nervous system is telling you otherwise!

    And for me, responding in kind is an excuse, not a reason. It lets me justify my indulgence in bad behavior to myself.

    Someone else’s aggression doesn’t force you to be unkind. You can be kind and still be truthful, clear, resolute, etc. You can kindly disagree, set boundaries, or present counter-arguments. You are also free not to engage, or even not to respond at all (to anyone, hostile or not). Yes, it’s nice to educate, but it’s not your responsibility to do so just because you believe someone is mistaken or just because they left a comment for you to read.

    Meet people where they are

    I forget, often, that I am fortunate to have had a lot of formal and informal opportunities to learn. I’ve been in environments that support change and growth. I’ve had contact with people and ideas to challenge my status quo.

    Not everyone has had the same exposure to the same resources that you or I have had. It may seem that only someone living under a rock could possibly not know such-and-such. Let’s imagine that that’s true (metaphorically or literally!), they just got out from under the rock yesterday, and you are their first contact with a new idea that could potentially transform how they think and act.

    I’m suggesting that instead of yelling at them for having been under a rock, we kindly help them. We meet them where they are and listen to what it was like under the rock. We recognize that what’s a given to us may be a new idea to them and maybe a little hard to swallow. “The way we’ve always done it” feels safe because it is familiar, this way is unknown territory and therefore scary. Let’s help people change their thinking instead of putting them down for not already agreeing with us.

    We could even be open to changing our own thinking. Could it be that we are wrong?? Unheard of!

    I know this “I-know-better” attitude can be an old habit for me, though, so you are welcome and invited to call me on it. If you are interacting with me, whether online or in person, and you see me snarking at someone, gently remind me of my intention to be kind. I’m learning too.

    Originally posted 25 August 2023 on Medium, but updated a little when posting it again here.

    I’m especially intrigued by my call to action at the end. How comfortable are people in giving me feedback? A topic for another post to come.

  • Why Everyone Else Knows More Than You Do, and What To Do About It

    Why Everyone Else Knows More Than You Do, and What To Do About It

    The developers you work with know stuff that you don’t, and you know stuff that they don’t. Obvious, right?

    So why does it seem like everyone else knows more, and you’ll never catch up? Why does it seem like you’re a little kid on a tricycle, trying to pedal faster while the big kids zoom by on their bikes?

    This is how I feel sometimes. Not shown in photo: all the big kids on their big kid bikes. Photo by Tommy Bond on Unsplash

    The answer is that it’s true: everyone else you work with does know more — collectively. Taken all together, everyone else knows more than any one person does.

    The mistake you’re making is the subtle assumption that if one person in the group knows something, everyone else — or at least most people, other than you — must already know it too.

    Let’s say someone asks a networking question, and you don’t know the answer, but one of your colleagues does. Then you’re having trouble getting API authentication to work, and one of your colleagues advises. Another developer helps you with a thorny NodeJS issue. Someone else teaches you how to fix a build failure. And another colleague whips up a quick script to get you some data you need. After a while you start to worry if you are the least knowledgeable person in your group… your company… maybe ever.

    Everyone else is on their tricycles too

    Here’s what you’re not seeing: Your network-savvy colleague might have been the only person on the team who could field that question. It’s not true that just because one person knew that, everyone else did. Also, that network pro might not have a clue about API authentication, or Node, or build failures, or scripting.

    Even harder to see: you definitely know things others on your team don’t, and I’m not just talking about your bank account password or the name of the imaginary friend you had when you were little enough to ride an actual tricycle. You have job knowledge, industry knowledge, business knowledge that others around you do not.

    For many years, I had a hard time seeing this. I assumed that everyone around me must already know all the things I do, for some reason. But again, it’s not true that just because one person (you, in this case) knows something, everyone else does.

    The person who helped you with the API might not know React like you do. The developer who solved the Node issue might not write clean code like you do. The script-writing whiz might be totally lost if you start talking about code security.

    Sometimes you’re the big kid on the three-speed bike, and one or more of your colleagues are on their trikes, wishing they could zip around like you do.

    You can DO that?

    Years ago, I worked with an experienced developer named Nick. Knowledgeable, skilled, kind, thoughtful — Nick was a role model for me. He’d written a lot of the code for the application I was working on.

    One day, when I was still new to the team, we were in a staff meeting. The boss started talking about some technology I’d never even heard of. I was just a little kid on her tricycle, trying to keep up with the knowledgeable big kids, so I decided it was best not to interrupt the meeting to ask.

    I was making a note to myself to ask someone later, when Nick politely interrupted the boss and said:

    Photo by Marcos Luiz Photograph on Unsplash

    “I have no idea what you’re talking about. What is this?”

    Yep. In a room with some super-knowledgeable peers, Nick had just admitted to not knowing something. The world did not end. Nobody rolled their eyes, or hinted that Nick should know this already, or otherwise had any judgmental reaction. In fact, a few people looked relieved. I’m sure I was one of them.

    The boss apologized for getting ahead of himself and took a verbal step back to explain what he was talking about.

    You know, I don’t even remember what the technology was. I don’t think anyone even mentioned it again after that meeting. But, twelve years later, I remember being floored that someone who I thought “knew everything” could just state calmly, in front of his colleagues, that he didn’t know something.

    Ask, and ask publicly

    In that moment, I saw that it was part of the role of a lead developer to speak up and ask when you didn’t know something, because your newer colleagues might not have the courage yet. Since I wanted to be a lead developer, I was going to have to get used to speaking up.

    Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

    Later, I saw that the pressure to appear knowledgeable is universal, no matter what your experience level. If you’re new, you might feel you have to prove to your team that you know what you’re doing. If you’re more experienced, you might feel like others will judge you for not knowing as much as they thought.

    Let’s smash the stigma around asking questions or asking for help. There’s no shame in not knowing something. The problem arises when you don’t take action to try to find out — either you don’t try at all; or you do try, but when you get stuck, you don’t ask for help.

    How do we smash the stigma? Ask questions, and ask in a way that others see it. I know, it’s less intimidating to message a trusted colleague privately. When you keep it quiet, you maintain the illusion for others that everyone around them knows everything. When you model the behavior of humbly asking for help, you teach others that it’s okay to do the same. When others start to join you, you’re changing the culture for the better.

    Photo by Mars Sector-6 on Unsplash

    Pro tip: modeling good behavior, teaching others, and changing the culture for the better are things leaders do. When you speak up, you’re not highlighting your weakness, you’re demonstrating your strength. No joke. My boss told me recently that one of the key factors in hiring me was that I was not afraid to ask questions.

    Furthermore, when you ask your questions publicly, others can benefit from the knowledge transferred. Someone else, when they encounter the same problem or question, will get stuck just like you did. When you ask in a more public way, everyone else benefits. When Nick asked our boss for more information during our staff meeting, the whole team learned.

    Change that culture

    So, raise your hand in that staff meeting, post that question to your team, or use (or establish!) a Slack channel specifically for developers across teams to ask questions and help each other out.

    When a colleague asks something you don’t know, add a comment that you’d like to know as well. They, and others, will see that they’re not the only one with that question.

    Photo by Randalyn Hill on Unsplash

    When a question comes through that you do know how to answer, share your knowledge! Some days, you’re the big kid on the bike, and someone else is calling out to you from their tricycle, trying to keep up.

    Above all, always be kind, regardless of the question or who is asking. A question might seem basic or obvious to you, it might be answered by a simple web search, it might be better asked in another forum, it might have been answered two days earlier in the same forum… it doesn’t matter. Be kind. Establish the norm that questions are always responded to with kindness and without judgment.

    That’s what a leader does.

    Do you feel like that little kid on the tricycle sometimes? What do you do to help the people around you feel more comfortable admitting when they don’t know and reaching out for help? Let me know in the comments.

    Originally posted 13 June 2022 on Medium.

  • Something’s gotta give

    Something’s gotta give

    You’ve already got a full schedule when the boss asks you to take on a special project. Or maybe an urgent issue just jumped up above everything else you were planning to do this week. Or you’ve got multiple stakeholders, and all of them insist on being your “top priority”.

    Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

    Before you start canceling evening and weekend plans so you can spend even more time than you already do at work: stop.

    You only have so many hours in the week when you will be able to work effectively. And anyway, sacrificing your personal time might be necessary in a pinch, but it should be a rare occurrence. That time is yours!

    When you start to see that you’ve got more on your plate than you can handle and still deliver the high quality of work you’d like to be known for, here are some strategies to find balance.

    Something else is de-prioritized

    If you’ve got room for five projects in your week, and your manager just approached you with a sixth, inquire about which of the other five you should set aside to focus on the new project. It may be that when your manager realizes you have five important things already planned, that sixth one doesn’t seem so urgent after all. Or maybe they agree that #1 and #2 are still your top priorities, but #3 could wait for later, and this new project should take its place in your workload for the week.

    Someone else to the rescue

    If none of your current projects can be dropped, perhaps there’s someone else who can assist with the new assignment. Or perhaps you can shift one of your items to someone else’s to do list in order to allow you to pick up the newcomer.

    Be warned however that simply adding people is often not helpful. If a colleague is assigned to help you with one of your projects, but you are going to spend more time explaining the project to your colleague than you would spend just working on it yourself, this might not be the time-saver you expect. There are great reasons for working collaboratively, but short term time savings is not always one of them.

    Scale it back a bit

    Let’s say you learn that all six of these projects must get done, and they must all get done by you. Can the scope of any of these projects be scaled back to allow you to handle all of them? Perhaps the columns on the table you’re coding don’t need a sort option, after all. Or maybe you can just handle the “happy path” case for the new screen, the error handling pieces can be taken care of next week.

    Step up now, step back later

    In some situations, you might legitimately have a time crunch that can’t be avoided. There’s a hard deadline next week, and there’s nobody else available to pitch in. If that’s the case, you might choose to negotiate putting in some extra time now in exchange for a little extra time off after the deadline has passed — if you can trust that your management will keep that promise. A few late nights this week might be rough, but next week when you’re cutting out early on a sunny day or taking a morning off to relax, it might all be worth it.

    Estimating your work is part of your job

    It isn’t easy to say “no” (or even “not this week”) to management or other stakeholders. However, accurately estimating how much time a project needs is part of your role. Your boss might not be aware that the “simple” item you are coding will take several days, or that you need several hours of preparation time for that workshop you are leading on Thursday.

    For larger tasks, you might need to break it down into sub-estimates. Then, when your supervisor says “what do you mean that will take six weeks??” you can calmly explain how you arrived at that number to help them understand everything involved with the project. And again, if they say “but I need it done in three weeks,” you have options: drop other work, get some help, scale the project back, and so on.

    Think of it as your manager relying on you, as a professional, to let them know how much time you will need to complete your work. This can help make it a little less intimidating to speak up when the boss arrives to add more to your already packed to do list. And finally, more good news: this gets easier with practice!

    Originally posted 16 May 2022 on Medium.