Developer Tea

In today's episode, we talk about inversion and inverted thinking. This is a mental model inspired by considering the "negative space" instead of the space occupied by the thing you are seeking. For example, if you are trying to avoid failure, you might intuitively seek a "successful strategy" instead of looking at the reasons it may fail directly. Inversion will help you avoid these traps. 📮 Ask...

In today's episode we discuss a preparation step for your next one-on-one. Don't just wing it - do your homework... and talk to yourself a little bit. 📮 Ask a Question If you enjoyed this episode and would like me to discuss a question that you have on the show, drop it over at: developertea.com. 📮 Join the Discord If you want to be a part of a supportive community of engineers (non-engineers we...

In today's episode we'll discuss some counterintuitive advice for your interviews. This advice applies in interview settings, but also applies in 1-1 meetings as well. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Unblocked Unblocked provides helpful and accurate answers developers need to get jobs done. It tailors answers by augmenting your source code with existing team knowledge in GitHub, Slack, Co...

After today's episode, your resumé is going to get better! In this episode I will share the biggest mistake and the best advice I've ever received about building a great resumé. This will take some work from you, but I hope you walk away from this episode feeling like you have the right mindset to improve your resumé drastically, and land more interviews, ultimately leading to better job opportuni...

In today's episode, we talk about the counterintuitive process of prioritizing based on critical path. This is not a novel concept that I've invented, but rather a revisiting of the classic discussion started by Eli Goldratt in his book "The Goal", and later in his book "Critical Path", based on the theory of constraints. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: PropelAuth If you're building a B2B...

The most common mistake for any manager is to fail to clarify. This often happens because we mistake our average communications for having perfect clarity, when in fact we most often don't communicate at high levels of clarity. This isn't because we are bad at communication, but rather because our social communications carry less consequence when they aren't precise. Clarity is not simply being ho...

What does your culture have to do with your values? In this episode we open up the discussion about a model of thinking for culture and values to understand how they link, and more importantly, when they don't. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Unblocked Unblocked provides helpful and accurate answers developers need to get jobs done. It tailors answers by augmenting your source code with e...

Your feedback loops should be short enough that the cost of making a mistake is low enough that the value of the learning in the feedback loop exceeds the magnitude of the cost of a mistake. In other words: shorten your feedback loops to the point that you're no longer afraid to make a mistake. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Unblocked Unblocked provides helpful and accurate answers devel...

In this episode we discuss the importance of being your own advocate, and why this is likely the most rational position to hold. The takeaway: At any point, the person advocating the most for you is almost definitely YOU. 📮 Ask a Question If you enjoyed this episode and would like me to discuss a question that you have on the show, drop it over at: developertea.com. 📮 Join the Discord If you wan...

In this episode we discuss a practical application of information theory. Information theory is similar to the classic theory of communication, but distinct in important ways; these two theories together are a useful combo for creating a strategy for clarification. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Unblocked Unblocked provides helpful and accurate answers developers need to get jobs done. I...

In today's episode we talk about working principles again. Specifically, we're looking at a problem with measurement fixation, as well as the natural curve of degradation that most communication follows. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Jam.dev If you’re an engineer and you would rather spend your time writing code than responding to comments in your issue tracker, send your team Jam.dev....

In this episode we are revisiting some of my own personal core principles of working. I'm sharing these with you for you to do whatever you want with them, so please share however you can! The principles we discuss today are around the relationship between clarity and focus, and about how most negotiations aren't about feasibility but instead about strategy. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by...

In today's episode we talk about principles of productivity. Most of the advice you receive will fit in the two categories we discuss in this episode. Once you connect with these ideas, you'll be able to use them for your own gain. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Jam.dev If you’re an engineer and you would rather spend your time writing code than responding to comments in your issue track...

In today's episode we discuss the concept of "cost of delay", and explore the fact that cost of delay does not necessarily follow a linear path. When cost of delay has a cliff, or an exponential curve, how do you weigh one opportunity versus another? 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Unblocked If you would rather spend your time coding instead of digging for answers or dealing with question...

"What actions can I take to get better from here?" This seems like a simple concept, but in practice we often are more interested in protecting our ego. In this episode we try to practice this self-accountability through an exercise. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Jam.dev If you’re an engineer and you would rather spend your time writing code than responding to comments in your issue tra...

In this episode we continue our discussion about the most overused statistical measurement. We'll talk about a few more counterintuitive properties of the average, and how you might be underserving your colleagues as a result of thinking in averages. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Neo4j Is your code getting dragged down by endless JOINs and long query times? Try simplifying the complexit...

On average, you're probably overusing this specific type of statistic. In today's episode, we discuss the king of all misleading numbers: averages! There's so much to talk about with averages that we're splitting this into two parts. Disclaimer: I am not a mathematician. But we will talk about some of the interesting properties of averages and why they are so addictive to use for humans, but more...

Today we explore the idea of treating your time as a product. Start with a wishlist: what do you wish was true about your week? What are your "if-only" statements? Next, put on your product owner hat. How would you improve the situation, if you knew the "consumer"'s requests? This exercise should provide unique insight and a new lens to view your time and agency through. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brou...

The Von Restorff effect says we remember things that stand out. This is probably mostly intuitive - "that stood out to me" is a common colloquialism. But what isn't intuitive is the implied downside of uniformity, which is often the product of process. In other words, if your process creates perfect uniformity, elevating any one thing, say, in priority, is going to be exceedingly difficult. Additi...

In today's episode, we do a journaling exercise to provide a new lens on developing your own career roadmap. We're going to practice the power of hindsight, finding our wiser selves, and ultimately looking forward and backward...at the same time. It sounds a little odd, but it's all based in solid cognitive science. If you have a notoriously hard time figuring out your career path, I'd invite you...

As you grow your career, you will continuously lean on delegation to scale your efforts and focus on the most important things. True delegation requires ownership, and ownership can be thought of in two critical parts: agency and responsibility. In today's episode, we discuss the fool's errand of delegating only one or the other of these parts. 🙏 Today's Episode is Brought To you by: Jam.dev If y...

Little's Law explains, in a given queuing system, what the relationships of throughput within that system are. We can garner insights both for our work, and for our own lives, by recognizing how these relationships work and what we can do to utilize them. In this episode, we talk about when it is useful to use Little's law to your advantage. 📮 Ask a Question If you enjoyed this episode and would...

Finding leverage is difficult to do, but a lot of the reason for this is that we allow ourselves to fall into well-traveled cognitive pathways. If we reject the solution domain-set that comes to mind immediately, we may be able to consider options for solutions we had never considered. This larger solution set may also include a high-leverage option we had previously ignored. 📮 Ask a Question If...

In today's episode, we discuss turtles, resolutions, and why your beliefs and what you see as fact is probably worth questioning anyway. 📮 Ask a Question If you enjoyed this episode and would like me to discuss a question that you have on the show, drop it over at: developertea.com. 📮 Join the Discord If you want to be a part of a supportive community of engineers (non-engineers welcome!) workin...

Today Marks 9 Years of Developer Tea. Thank you all for your support, and your friendship. I wish you all well on your journey, and may you find clarity, perspective, and purpose. (Don't worry, we aren't going anywhere!) 📮 Ask a Question If you enjoyed this episode and would like me to discuss a question that you have on the show, drop it over at: developertea.com. 📮 Join the Discord If you want...