Dates covered: July 1-7, 2019 (week 27 of 52)
Business
The Upside of Losing Innovative Employees to Competitors (via Harvard Business Review)
The article focuses on R&D employees, so your mileage may vary. The relationship between companies isn’t binary, and this is true in the government contractor arena as well: On one project you may collaborate (i.e., work with employees that have moved to the other company), and on others you may compete. Having employees move to another company can create bridges.
3 Reasons New Coaches and Consultants Fail (via Harvard Business Review)
- Reluctance to do low-paid, brand-building activities
- Unwillingness to reach out to past contacts
- Focusing on your interests, rather than your client’s needs
Career
Soft Skills for Developers: Why Do they Matter and Which Ones are the most Important? (via The Software Mentor)
I’d argue these skills aren’t limited to software developers:
- Personal responsibility — understanding tasks, communicating issues, estimating time, admitting own faults
- Quality of work — peer review participation, finding ways to make quality output, breaking large tasks into smaller ones, interest toward work, double-checking quality
- Communication skills — work in a team, communicate clearly inside and outside the team, receive feedback, ask for and offer help
- Knowledge of business — understand the business, justify decisions with metrics, transform business needs into tasks
When Passion Leads to Burnout (via Harvard Business Review)
Burnout is a real phenomenon, and leaders should acknowledge and look for this. Similar to depression where some ineffective solutions simplify to “stop being sad”, telling people to be resilient and recover on their own is unhelpful. Certain types of work — caring professions (e.g., healthcare), non-profits — are staffed by people who invest very personally in their work, and are at highest risk for this kind of stress.
Why Having a Target Salary in Mind Can Derail a Job Negotiation (via Harvard Business Review)
Anchors are an important part of negotiation because it helps with information asymmetry (i.e., one party — usually the employer — knows the real price range). If you have little experience for the job, anchor toward the low end and work up. Otherwise, the price range indicates to experience folks whether they should apply, or to appropriate folks, what that position tops out at price-wise.
Get your work recognized: write a brag document (via Software Lead Weekly)
If you work on several projects or have your finger in several pies, it can be daunting to remember all the positive change you’ve made. This post provides a template to help you remember and promote your accomplishments. (I do this during my monthly 1:1s with my folks, and I keep a running draft blog post of my yearly accomplishments.)
Culture
It’s Not Your Coworkers’ Job to Teach You About Social Issues (via Harvard Business Review)
Employees telling leaders to “look it up” when it comes to sensitive social issues doesn’t help solve the problem. There’s a great deal of information, so when doing your homework on an issue — say, LGBTQ+ — find curated information such as non-profit websites or TED talks. Reach out to others who aim to help educate leaders about these issues.
The Wrong Ways to Strengthen Culture (via Harvard Business Review)
- Using simple adjectives (e.g., collaborative, trusting). These are buzzwords and are usually at odds with how companies actually operate (i.e., the “say/do gap”)
- Measure culture with data alone, such as engagement surveys. You want to promote an environment where truth is needed.
- Leaving policies alone instead of supporting cultural change. Management needs to put its money where its mouth is and follow through.
Will Automation Improve Work for Women — or Make It Worse? (via Harvard Business Review)
“In the age of automation, men and women need more than ever to have the right skills, to be mobile and adaptable, and to be tech-savvy. Due to the barriers they face, women lag behind men on all three.”
Hiring
Why Code Challenges are Bad Practice for Hiring Senior Developers (via The Software Mentor)
As someone who’s studied music for most of my formative educational years, this analogy of asking senior devs to regurgitate facts to asking accomplished pianists to play scales is apt. The better interview is to speak with them about problems you both are solving and see where the conversation goes.
How to Reduce Personal Bias When Hiring (via Harvard Business Review)
- Accept that you have biases, especially affinity bias (having a more favorable opinion of people like yourself)
- Create a personal learning list
- Ask where bias could show up in your decision
- Reduce the influence of your peers’ opinions on your hiring decisions
- Use a “flip it to test” approach (if you were to swap out the candidate with one of your more typical hires)
- Understand how reducing bias could personally benefit you
It’s high time to rewrite the hiring script (via Signal v Noise)
Job postings are often written by people far removed from the work. Also, “we only hire the best” is not realistic, and you’re turning away many candidates who would likely do well.
Leadership
Aggressive Leaders Are More Likely to Be Punished for Their Mistakes (via Harvard Business Review)
Leaders achieve status and wield influence either through dominance (forceful, assertive, coercive, intimidating) or prestige (teaching, sharing, helping, developing). Mistakes are less likely to be thought of as unintentional for dominating leaders.
As a leader, your job should change every six months even if you stay put (via Harvard Business Review)
I’m a bit conflicted on the title, as it aligns with the “if you’re not growing, you’re dying” motif — which leave no room for maintaining a healthy state. However, there are some useful prompts in this post to help affirm you’re focused on the right things.
Process
Maybe Agile Is the Problem (via The Software Mentor)
The bandwagon for Agile is getting overloaded, with Agile being applied to any problem that needs fixing, or to sell certifications that declare someone a coach/expert after two hours and some money changing hands. This article rallies that we should return to Agile’s roots: Make People Awesome, Make Safety a Prerequisite, Experiment and Learn Rapidly, and Deliver Value Continuously.
Software Development Is Unlike Construction (via The Software Mentor)
“Construction is a poor metaphor for software development due to its non-linear nature, difficulty to maintain insight, disagreement in measure, and its conveyor belt of opinionated approaches.” Writing, music composition, gardening, and philosophy may have more apt analogs.
Instant Feedback Hurts Our Performance (via Harvard Business Review)
This research studied providing feedback to drivers to help them get a discount on insurance; there were three groups — 1) those that were close to their goal, where feedback nudged them forward, 2) those who were above the target, and thus relaxed their performance, 3) those who were well below that target and didn’t try because they felt it was unattainable. Feedback should be specific to the recipient, and based on the individual’s past performance (rather than comparing to the performance of others).
Security
Completed my recertification process for CompTIA Security+ CE (now expires January 2023)
Software development
Beware Engineering Media (via The Software Mentor)
The fast pace of technology leaves us dazzled — FOMO (fear of missing out), managing career risk, finding the next big thing. Every outlet (conferences, Hacker News, coding camps) has an agenda. Consider (1) the motive of the author/presenter, (2) the background of the content, and (3) the relevance to the problems you face.