Yes, so true and powerful! Caring literally produces better outcomes, which has been proven in studies observing the behavior of nurses with their patients.
Great piece, John. I've been thinking along some similar lines recently, having started Nick Shackleton-Jones's book How People Learn. He makes the case that we only learn at an emotional level and that even the well-known and scientifically valid "forgetting curve" is built on a false premise (ie, based on memorising random strings of letters rather than something anyone would want to stick).
As you write: "It's the emotions involved that make it stick - I feel the emotions because I’ve been challenged on something I care about - and that’s the secret to learning."
Love your last line: "If we want to unlock our learning potential, the answer doesn’t lie in finding better learning materials, better teachers, or thinking harder - it lies in discovering and sharing what we truly care about."
I always had fun with pair programming. Great way to learn, collaborate and see that it's normal to progress through trial and error. But when I became a manager I experienced a lot of reluctance from engineers when I suggested they try it. A few times I volunteered to pair with direct reports myself to see if I could nudge them into seeing the benefits and on those occassions I do think they embraced it. But only temporarily--it didn't become any kind of team norm. I think pair programming can be very rewarding but there seems to be a pervasive mistrust, imposter syndrome or maybe peer competitiveness getting in the way of sitting down with a coworker, showing a bit of vulnerability and just trying things for fun and profit. Maybe it's worth exploring what these hangups are and what we can do to dispell them. I appreciate that this essay went into depth on many other topics but for whatever reason it triggered positive memories of sitting side by side with developers as we laughed, stumbled and stepped through each a-ha moment on the way to solving problems. Thanks for putting the time in to reflect deeply and not just churning out top ten lists and bullet point pizza.
Yes, so true and powerful! Caring literally produces better outcomes, which has been proven in studies observing the behavior of nurses with their patients.
Hi John, this was beautiful, thank you.
Great piece, John. I've been thinking along some similar lines recently, having started Nick Shackleton-Jones's book How People Learn. He makes the case that we only learn at an emotional level and that even the well-known and scientifically valid "forgetting curve" is built on a false premise (ie, based on memorising random strings of letters rather than something anyone would want to stick).
As you write: "It's the emotions involved that make it stick - I feel the emotions because I’ve been challenged on something I care about - and that’s the secret to learning."
Love your last line: "If we want to unlock our learning potential, the answer doesn’t lie in finding better learning materials, better teachers, or thinking harder - it lies in discovering and sharing what we truly care about."
I always had fun with pair programming. Great way to learn, collaborate and see that it's normal to progress through trial and error. But when I became a manager I experienced a lot of reluctance from engineers when I suggested they try it. A few times I volunteered to pair with direct reports myself to see if I could nudge them into seeing the benefits and on those occassions I do think they embraced it. But only temporarily--it didn't become any kind of team norm. I think pair programming can be very rewarding but there seems to be a pervasive mistrust, imposter syndrome or maybe peer competitiveness getting in the way of sitting down with a coworker, showing a bit of vulnerability and just trying things for fun and profit. Maybe it's worth exploring what these hangups are and what we can do to dispell them. I appreciate that this essay went into depth on many other topics but for whatever reason it triggered positive memories of sitting side by side with developers as we laughed, stumbled and stepped through each a-ha moment on the way to solving problems. Thanks for putting the time in to reflect deeply and not just churning out top ten lists and bullet point pizza.