Canceling Developers for Mistakes? You’re Next!

Are you starting to hate other programmers on your team? Are you looking around on your software project and just waiting to see someone fail? Are you quick to condemn a manager or developer and cast them useless after a single mistake? Today we’re going to talk about how failing to forgive programmers and other IT professionals for mistakes can hold you back from the career you want in software.
When I first began developing software, I wasn't particularly ambitious. I needed to make a living to support my wife and son, but I came from a background of partying and playing in a band. But after a few short years I had several promotions and raises, and it started to go to my head. With each new success, my pride got bigger.
Once software projects started getting complicated, and I found myself leading software development teams, I started looking for people to blame. The scrum master didn't understand agile enough. The operations team wasn't making it easy enough to release changes into production. The other developers weren't following my coding patterns. Yeah, I became an elitist jerk in how I would lead programmers.
But as I've told you many times on this channel, I fell hard eventually. A victim of career-long burnout, I lost my job, a lot of money, and sunk into depression. But when I came out of it, I made this channel and started giving software developers and engineers career advice. It also led me to learn how to work better myself - and help you be a healthy software developer.
A moment though of reflection for yourself: are you on the way there? Starting to get rewards and recognition for programming? Is it getting easier to see flaws in developers and other people on your software project, making you quick to judge? Are you canceling the people who can help you for simple mistakes now that you lead programmers?
If we're humble and honest, we've all made mistakes. And I'm sure I'm going to make many more, whether on a software project, coaching you on your career, or on this channel. I'm pretty sure if you're willing to take an honest look at yourself, you know you're going to too. But you've made mistakes in the past and been forgiven. So should you be more forgiving too? Can we really be fair canceling anyone?
What would it be like if all our teams were more like this? What if we worked together assuming we'll make mistakes, and not being surprised? What if we spent more time forgiving, learning, and teaching - and less blaming? Imagine the courage we could have to try and do risky things that might be breakthroughs with our products, technologies, and careers? Programmers seem to have a harder time with this since we work with computers all day.
To this end, I'm asking for your help in this video. Leave a comment with a story about someone who blew it - BAD. But who turned around in your mind. Maybe you realized they were really good at something else, even though they had weaknesses in one area.
If you don't have a story like this, just read the comments for encouragement. Sometimes when you make a mistake on your software project, it can feel like nobody will ever forgive you or forget the mistake. But that doesn't have to be true. This is especially important if you're leading other software engineers.
A couple ground rules. First, please don't use their real name. Second, please don't name the company, project, or product you worked on. It will show some kindness to the person and also keep you out of trouble with HR!
#programming #career #leadership
Related videos:
My Software Developer Journey (Part 1):
• My Software Developer ...
My Recovery from Programmer Anger:
• My Recovery From Progr...
Lead Software Developers Better By Letting Go:
• Lead Software Develope...
Need help with your career? Book a free career consultation:
jaymeedwards.com/services/sof...
Section Markers:
0:00 Introduction
2:35 The Dangers of Leading
4:35 Falling Hard
6:14 Is Success Putting You in Danger?
8:15 Motivation for True Forgiveness
9:20 Leading Means Helping!
11:00 For Future Leaders...
12:52 What Could Teamwork Be Like?
13:48 Why Should You Care?
14:30 A Call To Action!!!
17:40 Next Time...
19:25 Episode Groove
Download a free software development career guide from my home page:
jaymeedwards.com

[@HealthyDev]

Call to action at 14:33! Help your fellow devs by leaving a story about someone who blew it big on a project - but turned around! ►► Know your options! Access my FREE data hub for the top 25 software industry roles, TechRolepedia → jaymeedwards.com/access-techrolepedia/

[@realtugabfh1367]

I like the content but you need to nail that background noise. It wouldn't be as much of an issue if the video were just a couple of minutes but at 20+ it may be a turn off for many. I can suggest one solution that might work. Let me know if you're interested and I'll explain how I do it for voiceovers.

[@HealthyDev]

@@realtugabfh1367 hey thanks for the feedback. I have a denoiser plugin running but I do have some hearing damage above 10k so I may not be hearing it. Do you feel it's in the low, mid, or high frequencies? Thank you!

[@realtugabfh1367]

@@HealthyDev I assume you record and edit, instead of live streaming. I use Audacity. First record a few seconds of silence, then adjust the level and apply whatever other effects you need to, to manage the levels (compression, and so on). Once you have boosted the levels (if needed) select the silence and Get Noise Profile using the Noise Reduction effect. Finally you select the noise reduction effect again and apply. If you send me a sample I can try to fine tune the filter settings, since you can't hear it. BTW, it seems like a mid frequency to me, like a buzz or whirring fans or something like that, but it is steady, which should make it easier to get rid of. Another option is to lower the volume on your mic and move it closer so it won't pick up the BG as much, but a combo of both should do the trick.

[@PabloEdvardo]

@@realtugabfh1367 "BTW, it seems like a mid frequency to me, like a buzz or whirring fans or something like that, but it is steady, which should make it easier to get rid of." definitely sounds like that -- a spectrum analyzer would probably show the peak and then a bandcut could eliminate it

[@Mykezero]

I'll share my mistakes. I once hooked up the test order database to the production erp (enterprise resource planning) system and transferred test orders into it. A few packages were sent to 90210, some packages to Rick James and three to my house. Thank god my boss was cool about it since I had to return them to him in person. The morale of the story is: you mess up in ecommerce and the mistakes are delivered to your house. Maybe the real morale is: don't enter your data into the test system. Beyond that mess up and a few others, I've been the man that has repaired and improved their systems over the years. Just sucks it took around 8 years FOR THEM to figure out that I can do so much more than programming a data feed and can deliver features of tremendous value. Now that hurts more than the bug I introduced xD

[@FinanzMinimalist]

There is a guy in my team who always say he is done, but he is not. He is a junior developer and a bit chaotic. I think everyone is knowing one of these team mates. But here is the story. He is one of the greatest guys i ever meet in my job as a freelance web developer. He is always the guy who asks how i am, who chats a bit about private topic and adds humanity to the project. Without him, i think i would have gave up this project a long time ago.

[@panstromek]

This is just such a common trap. It really fits the topic of this video because in my experience it happens to everybody. Usually the problem is that you try to over-solve the problem and don't see that. At my job, we try to prevent it in various ways - being really conservative with time estimates, turning it into a joke, lowering expectations, asking people if they need help often, encourage early feedback even when the work is not done, but it still happens fairly often. I know I fall into this trap whenever the task is something explorative, like designing an error API or plan out some service intergation, so I learned to just quickly throw something half-baked out to get feedback and avoid the trap of spending too much time on edge cases that just don't really matter at this stage.

[@polyliker8065]

I'm that kinda guy r.n. fairly good relations in the team but more friendly than professional. Probably largely because I tend to fail to test every single edge case manually and brake some piece of code I didn't think was dependent on what I changed. (We've just recently started to finally use automated unit testing) I think this has resulted in a lower trust that I do have a fairly decent idea of what I'm doing because clearly I don't know every nook an cranny of the code base which has been detrimental to my relationship with at least one of my coworkers.

[@archmad]

we also have that guy. I am more realistic and most of the time I say "i don't think we can finish this on time", and people look at me like i'm pessimistic person.

[@adam4813]

I was that guy, earlier in my career. I've grown, a lot, since then, but I can tell you it wasn't out of cockyness, it was out of optimism, at least in my case.

[@JorgetePanete]

given*

[@sadboisibit]

At my previous job, I was leading a small team. One of the team members had been working in software for 10+ years (while I had

[@HealthyDev]

Awesome turnaround! I’d be happy to work under your leadership. I hope your team sees your efforts towards doing the right things. But even if not - you can rest well knowing your doing your best.

[@jamesspinella7053]

It sounds like maybe a better approach would have been to define the tech stack. To me that's one of the main responsibilities of the dev lead/architect, and of course technologies should be chosen carefully based on the team's "state of the art" (SOTA).

[@gbolt111]

@@jamesspinella7053 agree. Tech lead should have defined that. But if that guy was not liking his position, he would have performed anyway I guess

[@eranjeneabeysinghe8100]

@@jamesspinella7053 I second that!.. Usually, it's the architect or dev lead (some occasions CTO) responsible for picking the tech stack and making sure that all teams conform to it. It should have been an organization-wide policy rather than an ad-hoc decision based on personal bias.

[@maxscriptguru]

Software development is a profession where making mistakes should be expected. That is the nature of software development. Accept it and get used to it. If programming was easy we would make less mistakes. But programming is hard, very hard sometimes.

[@shubhodaye2152]

True. As a tester I always look for developer's pain points. It is so lonely to debug something for hours.

[@geriatricprogrammer4364]

It's IT illiterate managers. Half of then think creating a spreadsheet or word document is about the same level as software development and rest fear IT. More specifically fear how their career may be affected by any mistakes IT problems.

[@eranjeneabeysinghe8100]

In online courses they write few lines of java code and show how easy it is. But in a real-time, distributed, high performant and multi-tenant application (which most systems are today) it's a nightmare to manage the inter-team dependencies and hitting the deadlines. Worst of all are the strange errors coming from the invisible code (code coming from 3rd party libs, frameworks etc) at the critical times which are killing the dev team. It's important to have empathy from others, which the dev team deceives. As a tech lead in my team I always defend my team against rude comments by some people in managements when the team faces such issues at critical times

[@azatecas]

at my previous company, they hired an "experienced" developer, turns out most of his development skill was wordpress plugins (not development but installing plugings). He had trouble setting up his environment and some coworkers talked trash behind his back(not me). it turns out the guy was a great communicator and had great organizational skills, so when he would consult with clients he would actually clarify what was possible to do, and would recommend organizational changes to the client to be most efficient, and got his job done before any of us. great guy

[@HealthyDev]

What a great story! Love it, this is exactly what I’m talking about. And how priceless those skills are as a dev!

[@b00mk1n]

The fact that loyalty is punished in software development and pretty much every other profession, is really awful. 2 years is not even enough to get to know the full project.

[@pk5298]

I worked with a guy that thought he was the only one with the answers. He was stubborn, difficult to provide feedback and just tough to approach. He was given a project about changing the deployment process of one of the applications, and was completely confident he could get it completed. Well I watched for 3 months as he tried task after task without success, and I could see it was wearing on him. The hardest part about it: I had to go home with him everyone night because it was me. I questioned a pretty much everything I ever knew about development after that, and about a year after that debacle I was let go from the company. The thing I learned: Sometimes you can't just brute force your way past a problem, and it is okay to admit defeat. Failing at something doesn't make you a failure.

[@HealthyDev]

I love the way you wrote this. And your humility in self reflection is admirable! I did a video a while back specifically about my challenges with coping with failure. You’re not alone, and your story is eerily close to some stages of my own journey. The lessons we learn sometimes in these failures are priceless though. To be able to tell them to others we work with (or online as you’ve done here) can really make a difference in helping the next generation of devs hopefully suffering less. Would I have preferred to not go through it? Probably. But having some purpose and meaning is a pretty great consolation prize for the struggle!

[@erichepperle5902]

This was awesome. I was that Jr developer who was let go from multiple software contracts for "not a skills match". In every case, management had been telling me that I my performance was good, but after the termination they never cared enough to tell me what I did wrong or how I could improve.

[@HealthyDev]

Sorry to hear that. I believe how a company treats you if passed over in interviews or termination from employment, says more than anything. I hope you were able to land in a better place with more opportunities to get the support you need.

[@guenthersiu6002]

Fostering a forgiving culture should be a top priority. Part of the development is to experiment and to make mistake to learn from them. In addition, allowing the team to owe up their mistake means the team can work together to fix the issue and get the project further along and grow as a group. Criticizing the team members mean they will cover their mistakes, which may endanger your project.

[@vincentmanera]

Mate I’m real glad to see you back on here making content. I came across your channel at the right time when I first stepped into managing a team. Your insights are invaluable amidst a sea of clickbait content on KZbin.

[@HealthyDev]

Awesome! I'll bet your team is happy to have someone who's thinking about keeping the team healthy!

[@benbaran4517]

I think a big part of being a senior person is to teach those who are less experienced to lead you too. Leadership is not about position. That person right out of college knows a lot more than me about a lot of stuff. They should be empowered to let me know when I’m wrong too.

[@HealthyDev]

Agreed on people of all skill levels having things we can learn from each other. I talked about that in one of my other videos, "Are You A Perfectionist Programmer?". Personal opinion however, true leadership is a skill and most people who don't study it in college are not in a position to do it. But I think I get the general gist of your statement and I agree. Nobody wants to work with an elitist jerk "I'm senior, you have nothing to offer me!". LOL

[@benbaran4517]

@@HealthyDev I think my main point is true leadership is empowering people in general, and as part of that to disagree with you. Can’t really teach leadership in a class, I think. Though I have taken many. I think we’ve all had to “manage up” at some point and it should be taken as a good trait from those of us in the “up” position as long as it’s healthy.

[@jdubz8173]

My second software-oriented job was in building out front-ends for marketing websites. It was a fabulous work environment, but the longer I stayed, and the more I got promoted and got closer to management, the more uncomfortable things became. At one point I had an executive attempting to intimidate me into working faster instead of focusing on code quality. I had the confidence (or pride?) to reject his suggestions in favor of professionalism as I saw it. Time passed and in the middle of a longer term refactoring project for an internal tool (which may have been a mistake to take on) I'm brought into an HR meeting with my team lead to discuss concerns about my productivity. This was very much a surprise to me since I've held so much pride in my productivity on the team in the first place. After bringing up how odd it was that this was being handled (why hadn't this been brought up to me directly by my team lead prior to this?) I was put on a PIP and given some months to improve. They had basically pointed out some very benign aspects of my work habits that I could improve on and couldn't really disagree with (occasionally being a little late to the office in the morning for instance). That night I felt such an immense amount of shame that I cried. I put it all on my own shoulders that I had failed. It was so unbearable that I had to share my experience with others, but I didn't really have people to turn to for this kind of situation. Then I realized that I was a part of a discord group that centered around philosophy and one of the channels they had was full of developers. So I shared my situation there. After some time, the developers there all shared that they had been through similar situations and understood where I was coming from. For some reason, just hearing that I wasn't alone and that it wasn't abnormal made the pain go away. In the following months, I simply focused on improving upon the PIP details that I agreed to. Overtime, I started to get hints as to what was _really_ happening. Lack of bonuses... people leaving... etc... Until finally, one day, I was brought into another HR meeting to be told that I was being let go along with 98 other individuals in the company to improve the bottom line of the company. At that point it all made sense. They were looking for _any_ reason to have people leave on their own volition prior to this step. They hired a guy specifically to trump up claims against people to coax them to quit, I also heard. I was one of the few who remained after those rounds and ended up getting severance pay during the layoff with the others. I have such an appreciation for the people who related to me and helped me not feel so alone in that situation. I was new to the industry and had no idea these tactics took place. If I were to give myself advice back then, I'd have told me to look for a better job the moment the PIP meeting took place. Sure the severance was nice, but my wife was with our first child and there was a lot of panic-induced job searching after my layoff. Being more prepared and having more leverage in my interviews from there would have been a much wiser thing to do. Anyway, hope this is helpful to someone.

[@angrysnek4445]

I just got a new job at a good company making a lot more money and it’s definitely a big ego booster. Thanks for making this video to remind me to stay humble. I hate having an ego

[@HealthyDev]

Congratulations! Confidence is a good thing. I hope your new opportunity fuels you through the challenges ahead. You sound like you know to keep an eye at least on your ego - which is more than I could say for much of my career lol!

[@angrysnek4445]

@@HealthyDev Thank you! I appreciate your kind words. I am Christian and god tells us that arrogance is evil and of the devil. We should always be humble and love each other the same no matter our status. It's easy for us to be corrupted by the things of this world so we must be careful. God bless!

[@etienneb.6956]

Thanks for coming back, I appreciate all the effort you put into making those helpful videos.

[@nahuelleiva8460]

Yes, it happened to me some weeks ago with a newcomer. I started getting angry about certain things like "how he doesn't comment on his code? Why he doesn't pay attention to the details? Doesn't he realize he just copied and pasted the code without even testing it?" So I started to tell myself: I was there too, I once was a junior as well, I shouldn't be searching for someone to blame. Instead, I should explain why we follow certain patterns or why we should pay attention to the details, or why Stack Overflow is not just a page but a powerful and amazing tool for us software developers. We should try teaching those who don't know the same as we do, we are partners and even mentors for them, not enemies.

[@IotaEtaSigma]

I could not agree more. Be blessed in your life.😅

[@TheS1ot]

First of all, welcome back :) You should honestly find an editor and write a book. You’re the most honest and experienced IT person that I’ve met from psychological point of view. You have a lot of ideas to share for that book to become a bestseller. I’m really glad that I found your channel once. Back to the homework :) I’m currently a team lead and I just have this exact person who “fails” constantly being a junior. But what I’m finding is that he is actually a very open-minded and is literally ready to do whatever I tell him. So what I actually should do is just to spend more time with him encouraging him and leading the correct ways instead of blaming and get angry about it.

[@HealthyDev]

You found yourself a sponge! I love people like that! 👍

[@newdavesg]

Good to hear u returned. Looking forward to more experience/advices sharing from u.

[@Bob1German]

Hi Jayme - great video and I've been enjoying your channel! I do have a story to share. I was a consultant working in a dev lead role on a large project. Most of the team worked for my client. They hired a new developer and before long, a lot of the other developers became frustrated with her because they felt she wasn't able to keep up as a coder. She got stuck a lot and asked a lot of questions, and of course this was reasonable because she was fresh out of school and this was her first development job. I helped her on some of the specific questions, and I could tell she was frustrated and that, even as she was learning, she really didn't enjoy coding very much. This may have partly been due to the flak she took from some of the other devs, and though I spoke with them privately, it was clear that though they might be able to muster a little more politeness, they had written her off as a lost cause. Meanwhile, on the same project, we had some ongoing devops issues. It wasn't called devops - this was a long time ago - but basically the daily builds were a joke; they often failed and there was a big scramble before each milestone release. One day it hit me that this new developer - who was really smart, just a little green - had some very strong organizational skills. So I suggested that we put her in charge of the daily builds and really the whole release process. The result was AMAZING. She gained a lot of self-confidence, as she was not only successful, but she suddenly was the one identifying the mistakes of those arrogant guys who had been criticizing her! She taught her peers about being nicer and listening more by example - if she had been as mean to them as they had been to her, it wouldn't have worked! Instead. she stayed focused on the team's success and didn't rub their noses in their mistakes. And the best part was we ALWAYS had a reliable build every day; she ran it like clockwork and the project quality improved immensely. Now she's a successful consultant, playing a lead role on projects of her own. So sometimes the answer isn't just to stop blaming, it's to find the right fit for a person's skills and talents. One final thought: your video reminds me of a favorite but now old book - "Dynamics of Software Development" by Jim McCarthy. Rule #4 was, "Don't flip the bozo bit" - and yeah - it's what you said in your video more or less! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bozo_bit

[@stevengregor9544]

Great video Jayme, well done, loved the guitar outro as well. In recent years I've tuned into my detail-oriented, perfectionist, and downright OCD tendencies. The struggle has been attempting to control my frustration with others when they don't look at things the same way, which is nearly always. It's a growth area for me, recognizing that we all have our strengths and weaknesses, including myself, and that having a great team of great people doesnt mean mistakes wont happen.

[@HealthyDev]

Hang in there Steven. It seems like the more competent we get with our jobs, the more accepting we need to be of people falling short. Career-long growth area for me for sure!

[@thebiolithic]

as a software developer, a Christian, and a Texan, it was refreshing to find this channel for my mental health. Not that everyone needs to be any of the three, but nice to find someone who is somewhat like me. Thanks for the videos HSD!

[@HealthyDev]

Ha! Thanks. As the ol’ cheesy saying goes: “I wasn’t born here, but I got here as soon as I could”. I love Texas. Never thought that’d be the case but after 15 years in the Austin area I feel blessed to have the opportunity to live here. I like all the little towns outside the metro area a lot too. The cost of living and some of the political stuff lately has been nuts, but then there’s some measure of that everywhere!

[@erikyoung5139]

I'm in hardware engineering and in Dallas but find much of what you cover in your channel very applicable. Thanks for all you do.

[@Earl_E_Burd]

Loved the guitar riff. Worked great in the production of the video. Thanks for sharing

[@gantoreno]

Just when I needed you the most, you came back. It's great to see you again, Jayme. 🙌🏻

[@mikehall257]

Glad to see you return man. I discovered your channel sometime in 2020, and really enjoyed the content. Every so often I'd return to check for new videos or maybe even a final goodbye. I'm excited to see the content you're going to be putting out, it sounds like you have even more to talk about!

[@HealthyDev]

Thank you Mike!

[@LostMekkaSoft]

I am in a leadership role and I am really quick to point out mistakes. But the thing is that I don't see them as bad things. When I make a mistake, I often proudly declare what went wrong and what I leaned from it. It is funny and educational at the same time. When I see my peers make mistakes, I incorporate that into the coaching to give them a head start on how to learn everything out of it. Mistakes are the vehicle for growth and should be celebrated as such. And like with technical debt, if you and your team are very open about it, you can even actively plan to take risks and make mistakes, while still keeping well inside your project budget.

[@HealthyDev]

I really appreciate you having the courage to share the other side of my argument. I agree mistakes can be good learning opportunities. I guess in my experience it’s important to let them slide sometimes to keep relationships strong. As a manager I’d imagine you may sometimes struggle with discernment around the best times to lean in, or when to let it slide (I do too). Continuous improvement can be toxic if taken too far. Hopefully your teams never experience that!!

[@LostMekkaSoft]

@@HealthyDev I agree, it is important not to overload anyone. Even if the team has a very healthy attitude towards mistakes, overdoing it can still produce a sense of overly high expectations. It is definitely a thing to keep an eye on. Learning only happens when there is a safe space for it, and my highest priority is always to provide that safe space for everyone :)

[@tiamabderezai5374]

So happy to have you back. Really underrated channel.

[@tannerthorne6877]

I am so glad you are back! This channel has helped me a lot and I look forward to seeing more of your content!

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks Tanner, great to hear it helps some!

[@balinthaui6080]

Thanks for sharing your experience and wisdom.

[@SkyrimBeast]

This video is refreshing. I find myself making targets out of a few developers on my team. I don't have any business or right taking such a stance. Plenty of developers have helped me over the years. Who am I to not pay it forward. Thank you Healthy Software Developer. As stated before, this video is refreshing. And the message you're delivering is something I needed to hear

[@HealthyDev]

I’ve gotten caught up in the same frustration Chris, sometimes I know the right way to treat people but pressure and frustration gets the best of me! I don’t know that anyone ever gets this perfect, so just trying to do better is already a win. Hang in there!

[@Viciius]

Man, I'm so happy you're back! Thank you very much for your time and effort!! I really appreciate. Also, please continue doing those guitar solos. Amazing!! 😎🎸

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks John! Happy to be back and your encouragement means more than you know…🙏

[@PinheiroJaime]

We hired a guy as a senior developer long time ago. I knew he was not as good technically as other seniors, but okay, I thought he was a good hire and good fit to the team. It turned out, most developers got "envy", this new guy wasn't so good as the others, but had a better salary. He clearly had the experience, but still, to do his job he needed a lot of help. It was a bad situation on the team. We ended up firing him, to avoid creating a bigger problem with the overall moral on the team. He got another job quickly, as he was in deed very good, but not as technically good. He is now, as far as I know, leading a team of QA. He was just not in the best role. Happy for him in the end and wish him the best. Not sure how this is a f*** up, maybe HR messed it up, maybe the whole team, surely not the guy as he needed a job. But still I have a memory of it.

[@HealthyDev]

That’s a pretty interesting story. Makes me really think. It was probably hard for him to get fired like that. But it sounds like a blessing in disguise? Thanks for sharing.

[@ethanjensen7967]

For my senior year project at my university, some classmates and I were working for a client to build them a web application for document management. During the first semester, we did not accomplish very much. Many of us on our team could point to particular instances where our client did not do a good job at communicating. Our client thought that we were an incompetent team. I was tempted to blame the client, but I decided to see where my skills were insufficient and where my client was correct. I realized that I am great at planning, but not good at learning the intricacies of systems and my client had the opposite problem. I let my team know this and instead of blaming the client and giving up, we created a rhythm of weekly pull requests that allowed our client to point out mistakes in our code, among other strategies. Within 2 weeks our project was completely turned around and we ended up making a really cool project that was useful to our client. Framing the miscommunication as a struggle between a big picture vs detail oriented thinker was really helpful.

[@HealthyDev]

Brilliant! Fast feedback is the solution to so many trust problems. You nailed it with this situation, congrats!

[@vorandrew]

Welcome back!... really missed you man!

[@adamoneil7435]

nice to see you back!

[@ArtursDerkintis]

I’ve been in a “app is not working for whole weekend” place myself few times in early days. And what I’ve learn is not to measure someone by their screw up but by the way they get up. All the times I’ve messed up I took all the blame and focused on getting the fix out asap. Then I proceed to reflect on process of why did I screw up - most of the times it had to do with not testing my work with actual tests and that had to change.

[@HealthyDev]

Great reflection! Taking the blame to action, and not to heart. Your team is blessed to have you!

[@eranjeneabeysinghe8100]

I can relate. I am a lead Java engineer in a global tech company and I always fight against competition amongst my team members. I educated them on how valuable to have cross-functional and cross-domain experts who contribute their share of the knowledge for the betterment of the entire team. Also, I make sure unnecessary pressure from the management doesn't land on the team and quite often I would hit the management back asking them to 'prioritize' things in a more pragmatic way. At first it wasn't easy, but after earning the trust of the management after delivering many critical releases they now listen.

[@hosamsamar5573]

glade you're back , I have learned alot from you as junior business analyst and what to expect, would appreciate if you make videos about your interactions with BA , and project/ product managers, and some tips and advice

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks for the kind words and feedback hosam. I’ll think about how I might do that. I’ve got quite a bit of other material to cover first but this is a good idea. Thanks!

[@kdietz65]

I feel like I give a lot of latitude and rarely get the same latitude given back to me. That's frustrating. Current example: I have a friend/architect/partner working with me on the product. We had some different ideas and he says to me "Oh, I'm never gonna get to architect this the way I want. You're too controlling. You want it done your way and I won't get to do what I think is right." So I say, "Fine. You be the architect. I'll focus on business stuff." So he goes off and does a massive refactoring for months on end, still doesn't have anything working to demo. So to try to help rein him in just a little, I suggest smaller, more iterative changes. I say let's add some code generation here. He says, "No. Not the time for code generation." I say let's refactor this concrete database class to an interface. He says, "No. The right way to do it is to refactor to a repository pattern." Etc. See, I've given him massive latitude, he won't listen to a single thing I say. Every idea I have is wrong, every idea he has is perfect and correct. I don't get back the same latitude I've given. That frustrates me. There's massive hypocrisy in the world. That's hard to deal with.

[@HealthyDev]

Sorry to hear you two are having some friction. In my experience two of the hardest people to get along are architects. One of the benefits of the role is setting standards and approaches, and it’s a position of power somewhat in many teams (at least that’s been my experience). I was once on a major architectural initiative with a good friend and we couldn’t find a way to share well enough, so I chose to bow out and let him take it over so we could keep the relationship healthy. Other times I’ve held my ground even when the other person was not exactly pleased. I guess in my experience it’s always a compromise and you win some and lose some. I decided several years ago I was going to be more forgiving of people even if they didn’t do the same for me. Not out of fairness or moral superiority, but because it’s like I’d want to be treated. I just detach from and spend less energy on combatative types if we don’t get along. Life’s too short! It’s still hard sometimes though for real! Hang in there Kevin. I hope things go better with that relationship soon.

[@kdietz65]

@@HealthyDev Thank you.

[@Johodefo]

This is about the gazillionth time I hear you talking and think: I could literally tell that story myself, having only to change minor details (I worked in a beverage market, not a pizza shop). It's bizzare and comforting at the same time. Cheers.

[@HealthyDev]

Helps to know we’re not really all that different eh? It’s comforting to me to know you’ve been through some of the same stuff. Hope things are going better for you lately.

[@alexandroskechagias]

I can relate to many points you made here. Great video.

[@rozzerthat]

Welcome back Jayme, and delivering yet another gem to the Developer Support Group!

[@HealthyDev]

Lol! Thanks ☺️.

[@user-fu3mx3db1t]

Jamie, thank you for a great video! I am a software developer and just discovered your channel this weekend. Your videos are so interesting and cover such relevant topics for my career. I am so grateful you decided to share your knowledge with the world :)

[@vulpixelful]

I'm an experienced swe who has helped juniors salvage an off-track project, and I had to ask a lot of questions because they work in a different domain of the codebase. The problem was, they came off as really rude and unpersonable, and it really caught me off-guard emotionally! I'm pretty sure it has to do with some residual embarrassment from having holes in their design that I needed to interrogate to finish chunking the work, but in the moment it's pretty frustrating. I often try to be an example and broadcast my mistakes to make others feel safe to do so, but I'm sure it's harder for some to internalize that message. Anyway, I think I'm good at hiding my frustration, and sending a text to myself about it to let my emotions out but discouraging myself from gossiping about it. I'm also pretty sure I'm having somewhat of a hero complex here, but I'm working on it 😅 I'm working on the whole forgiveness thing in general really. I've come to find that I can forgive technical mistakes faster than social ones...

[@HealthyDev]

Oh man do I see myself in your story. Hero complex - absolutely struggled with that (and still fight not to fall back into it!). Sounds like you’ve got a pretty healthy self awareness I have no doubt your career is only going to get better with that attitude!

[@randEveScrub]

Very good video, I come back to this Channel every 2 months for all these gems

[@a544jh]

I've been dealing with "reverse imposter syndrome" during my whole career and I've been looking for advice on how to deal with it for years. Finally found some. Thank you.

[@jodyswartz7230]

So happy you are making content again!

[@mikecastor2047]

I love the little musical interludes!

[@MENTIONNN]

Glad to have you back!

[@orzelg]

Thanks Jayme! Thanks to Haven that your videos showed for me somehow - saying about algorithms would be huge disappointment form me ;-). I’m 20+ in a business and… just quit the job and have “vacation”… Just learning and looking for direction… I’m sure that your videos will impact my decisions. Your videos are great - I don’t understand why only 70k subscribers. BTW - nice Tele, AC 15 (i guess) and what a beautiful spring reverb… It is wonderful - IT guy dealing with traditional (even vintage) guitar gear instead of all this new (great as well) inventions like HX, QCore, AX etc… What a pleasure to see and listen to!

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it! Yep, it's an AC15. And a G&L ASAT Special. Cheap craigslist finds both of them! Incredible how nice of instruments can be had for so cheap today, as long as we set them up right.

[@AL-go2mv]

I have worked at companies where causing a single bug was the difference between you getting a raise or not. At these companies finger pointing is the norm. At some companies asking questions is seen as a sign of weakness, laziness or disruptive. I have learned that I should avoid these companies as I spent a lot of my time having little psychological safety. As a result of experiencing this personally I do not judge people based on the questions they ask and avoid finger pointing. I also am open and inviting when someone asks me a question and see it as a sign of taking initiative and having curiosity.

[@perditus273]

You know I needed this. While not exactly what you asked, there exists an opportunity at this very moment to help recover a drastic failure of the previous sprint. I, personally, let individuals sink while I watched from the sidelines. There was more I could have done. This sprint I will give your suggestions a go. The individuals in question may take it poorly because of my execution or resistance, but I will give it an honest go. Thanks for the video. I'll post an update in a month: failure or success.

[@HealthyDev]

Nice, looking forward to hearing how it goes!

[@vladlesin4889]

Wow. I am glad you are back.

[@phi-quest]

This is a fantastic video and one of the best lessons learned.

[@callbackdons]

I love the sentiment behind your challenge at the end of the video. I need to make an effort to internalize the attitude you're promoting in this one.

[@Tx66]

So good to have you back.

[@MachineYearning]

Don't blame the person - software quality is the responsibility of the whole engineering team. Someone wrote a bug that hit prod? Ask questions like, "Why did our static checks miss this? Why did our automated testing miss this? How did this pass QA? How did this get signoff from the product owner? Did we clearly understand the mission critical requirements of this software component?" Healthy criticism should (almost) always be directed at the organization and process, not the individual. Of course mentorship is always great and I 100% support that effort as well!

[@angelacho5228]

I am SO glad you are back!!!!

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks Angela!

[@angelacho5228]

@@HealthyDev You know, many people put money and intelligence as their idol and as their defense. Your humility indicates to me you know Jesus and you care about people. That's so encouraging to me, especially a female who is trying to break into tech.

[@HealthyDev]

@@angelacho5228 thanks I wish I could say that was always the case. I still struggle to not fall back into elitist ways but it’s encouraging to hear you feel I’m improving. Thanks! 🙏

[@jamirajamira7303]

Loving the guitar playing. It works surprisingly well. It makes the videos a lot more chilled and relax.

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks for the feedback! Wasn’t sure if it would add to or takeaway from the show. 👍

[@orzelg]

@@HealthyDev No, do not take them away. They are great. You know, intro, outro, bridges etc. 🎸💪

[@QueenOfMissiles]

Use to have a few consultants that worked with me. They were some of the most frustrating people to work with. As they lacked the skills, struggle to communicate, and needed my constant help. They only knew JQuery but were trying hard to learn React (something I had just picked up and was championing the company on adopting)... they sadly kept failing heavily and making a ton of mistakes. Especially since their understanding of javascript and coding in general was horrible. This resulted in them failing a lot and me having to pick up the tech debt often. Yet they showed great improvement and willingness to learn. Taught me a lot of stuff on how to teach people and work with developers that don't find development easy. Sadly due to COVID they both got let go. I made sure even with my frustration at their lack of skill to give both recommendations. As both showed they could improve but just were not given the right environment to learn.

[@HealthyDev]

Thanks for sharing this is a great story with some valuable reflections. Your point about the environment needing to be ripe to help them is particularly poignant. This is a problem at far too many companies.

[@krisspinney4515]

I don't really have any great examples of other devs making big mistakes, though I've made a few myself! Luckily I caught most and fixed them before end users would know anything was wrong. Great way to get your cardio in while sitting in a chair! I've worked with a number of people early in their careers who were very competitive about their skills - they wanted to be the most knowledgeable person in the room and wanted to make sure everyone knew it! There was a time when I thought sparring with those sorts of people was kind of fun, but it got old quickly. Then I worked at a company where my mentors and everyone around me were humble and would share / laugh at their own mistakes, and would jump at the chance to help anyone facing difficulty. I learned more at that job than I ever did from dueling with the ego devs. We had fewer problems making their way into production and everyone was happier in that workplace. That left a *big* impression on me. I've recently made it to tech lead and I can't help but feel that carrying that humble dev culture with me to every new job and working to spread it has had some impact on getting me here. I'm now getting the chance to help people who are stuck, in the same way others have helped me without making me feel like I was a failure for needing help. It's honestly my favorite part of the job now! One of the key behaviors my tech mentors used was framing problems as an interesting puzzle to solve together if the answers aren't really easy, and when they are sharing then some context about how they learned how to solve it / experience of struggling with it. Lack of knowledge isn't a moral failing or a developer sin, it's nothing more than never having had the opportunity to learn. And we can't all learn everything, as much as we might like to!

[@HealthyDev]

I love your story. Your teammates have no idea how incredibly blessed they are to work with someone who’s been on both sides of the elitist development divide. Well, maybe they do! Either way super positive testimony to your adapting to what you experienced. Thanks for sharing this!

[@heyjordn]

Welcome back man!

[@nreed7718]

Sometimes it's the environment. Someone might do outstanding work in a place with structure and good practices but sink when the project becomes chaotic or suffers from top-down imperatives and unrealistic expectations.

[@HealthyDev]

Great point. I've often heard it said that you can tell a lot more about a team by how they deal with tough times then when things are smooth sailing. That's been my experience, it sounds like you agree?

[@nreed7718]

@@HealthyDev Interesting. I didn't think about it that way, but I agree. Yeah, I've seen teams rise to the occasion under challenging circumstances and seen other teams become dysfunctional and engage in unproductive behavior like finger-pointing, sabotage and complaining. Where I'm coming from is that I personally don't thrive on chaos and after experiencing this recently on a project, I am feeling a little inadequate, to be honest. Seeing how other people deal with it, while reflecting on my own difficulties. There have only been a couple of times I was on a Death March in my career and I hope to never repeat it, but sadly from what I hear from friends and colleagues this has become all-to-common in our industry. We just delivered yesterday but it was painful and at this point, all I can do is think about taking up meditation and maybe changing careers. Need to take the next few days to decompress and reflect.

[@HealthyDev]

@@nreed7718 man yeah that's hard. I've been on a couple death marches/death spirals and nobody deals with that well. At least in my experience (a death spiral being a project doomed to not please the customer or blow it's budget and deadline significantly etc.). I usually feel a lot better after some rest. The company never wants to give you any, but you can at least relax the expectations on yourself and commit to less until you're back up to regular energy levels. The pressure never gets less, I just set better boundaries I guess. Hang in there!

[@PieJee1]

I've been on both sides. My first job they thought I was just chaotic for not making UML diagrams of what I was going to do and thought it is impossible that someone remembers so much. They did not see much value in me and were not listening to me. Then I got in a company where people followed me in doing whatever I say was the correct direction because my coding was so 'elegant' and concise and I remember everything in detail which made it possible for me to fix and/or develop everything quicker than everyone else. Still the team lead position went to a different person who worked for a shorter amount of time, because he was actually helping his fellow colleagues. So I learned a lot because of that.

[@igboman2860]

I'm happy you are back, it's been a minute since you left

[@bryanstark324]

Just to touch on the point of helping someone, many companies have moved to remote work so I didn't get a lot of face-to-face time with some people that needed troubleshooting. My solution was to make some videos for everyone to demonstrate how to do certain tasks and put them on a SharePoint site so it could kind of look like an online course. I just didn't have any other way to help new people who were onboarded learn to do certain tasks. I actually was catching myself talking down to one person that constantly got errors on their computer. I felt it was because she was doing something different, but I couldn't actually see what she was doing. So the video approach was to show how "I did things," and then if she was doing it wrong on her computer, I thought maybe she could see how I did it and self-correct. I'm currently on a 2-week vacation (feeling burned out), so I'll find out when I get back if she was able to correct her difficulties. Also, again, really happy to see you making videos here Jayme.

[@HealthyDev]

Hope your rest goes well. Great idea with the videos! Sounds like a relationship that’s far from being too far gone to repair. People are more forgiving than I give them credit for sometimes!

[@firstnamelastname3117]

"We're all going to make mistakes", I could not agree more. I've been hunting a new spot lately myself, and one of the first questions I ask the first dev I speak to is how they handled the last time someone messed up. Honestly, if you have a proper testing strategy, mess ups should be caught at the PR stage or when it hits qa anyways. So, I've never understood getting upset. The worst that should happen is you have to fix your pr, or a bug arises out of qa; none of those effect production, at least yet.

[@senantiasa]

What's a PR stage?

[@MrTbirkett]

So, today I’ve been debugging an issue that presented itself as Kubernetes CNI pods not starting. Our entire dev environment was out of action meaning no builds, no pipeline to production. Eventually found that a developer had manually added several AWS VPC endpoints that effectively blackholed traffic to various AWS service endpoints. They haven’t discussed the idea or the problem with anyone. They also didn’t speak up today when we were debugging the problem… Looking forward to the “blameless” post mortem.

[@HealthyDev]

Sorry that’s rough. Maybe it’s an opportunity to adopt a gradual trust policy where you give developers increasing permission in AWS as they demonstrate competence? Just an idea. As for them not speaking up, yes that’s definitely frustrating. I wonder if they were treated like crap for a mistake in the past and don’t feel safe anymore? From an integrity standpoint that shouldn’t matter in theory. But as imperfect as we can be, I guess it doesn’t surprise me they gave in to fear and didn’t speak up. If you can understand their past experiences with being honest about mistakes and let them know they’ll be treated as learning opportunities, they may open up more. But I wouldn’t be surprised if it takes a while. Trust is hard to get back (both your trust in them and their trust in people they admit mistakes to). Hang in there, hopefully things go better next time.

[@igboman2860]

Isn't this a process failure that a developer can randomly make changes in production? I believe that is the lesson to learn here, maybe using infrastructure as code using like Terraform and reviews will be a better process going forward. It is easier to debug your infra if it is repeatable

[@kensearle4892]

I remember one gal who came into the company, very sharp and technically up-to-date but seemed a bit arrogant and off-Standish. Fast forward a few years and with technology quickly advancing, she was a little behind technically but more humble. I mention this because it is not always easy for any of us trying to have a work-life balance to stay up to date on everything. If we are ever in the situation of being the ones who are currently up-to-date, help our fellow developers if they are stuck, share tips, or as a group share coming tech ideas. One day our skills in certain areas will be rusty and will appreciate a little help. Bible quote: Giving this video a plus!

[@tacticoolrick5562]

Talking about your junior guys making mistakes: one of my juniors, otherwise a good engineer, brought me a piece of spaghetti front end code. We reviewed it together, talked about the problems, and I put him on the right track. A couple days wasted work, but ultimately he's a stronger engineer and the whole team is stronger for it.

[@DieterPrivate]

I really can't imagine anyone can think like this. You are always part of a team, working together towards a common goal, helping each other to improve.

[@HealthyDev]

Hey Dieter, I'm not sure I understand your comment. What aspect of the video can you not imagine anyone thinking like? There's a lot covered so I'm not sure which point you refer to. Thanks.

[@DieterPrivate]

@@HealthyDev specifically the beginning of your story. I was really shocked to hear that initially. But I can see now how it can happen. I always had (still have) like a culture of helping each other out, of working towards a common goal, especially at work. It may be due to being a workaholic before, and like to train people to become better. That's the point in your vid I totally agree on, taking time of your own work to help out others.

[@HealthyDev]

@@DieterPrivate thanks that makes sense. Nice to hear you didn't have to go through some of the same growing pains as me!

[@kernelpanic5672]

Cool that you're back

[@geriatricprogrammer4364]

First IT company I worked at had a three strikes and your out policy.

[@HealthyDev]

Wow. That’s ridiculous.

[@geriatricprogrammer4364]

Everyone will mess up at something, it's just the nature of the job. As long as the mistake is fixed and the reason for it is understood, move on. The problem is middle management how are hell bent on a witch hunt.

[@yehudamakarov]

Yeah!! A new video!!!!

[@markuspfeifer8473]

I‘m so lucky to work in a small company that doesn’t do hierarchy (most of the problems you describe seem to be related to that). People get responsibilities according to whatever they do well and that’s it.

[@phatrickmoore]

X was working on a project in an "away-team" / "matrixed" model, reporting to their direct manager but doing work for the functional manager of the project. Well, X didn't know any of the other people working on the project, didn't know the manager, and X was being kind of a jerk to them, being pretty critical of the project. Well, X also wasn't delivering a lot, and this fed back into the whole mess. Communication degraded and the team broke down. BUT the functional team came together and did a "reset" on the project and the communication in an intervention meeting. In this meeting was an exercise where you identified (and wrote down!) positive things about everyone one of the other team members. From there, it was so much easier to focus on the positives, and having the chance to start fresh made a world of difference. X did better in the role from there on out :P

[@ToadSprockett]

If you code, you make mistakes. I've been doing this for 35 years and I don't care how smart you are, you WILL make mistakes. How you and other handle those are what's important, I view mistakes as a chance to get better and when I'm mentoring I make a point to show my mistakes so they can learn and understand that it's part of growing as a developer. PR's and Code Reviews can become toxic if your not willing to help people learn, or mentor when they make mistakes or are clearly struggling. I just left a job because the PR's became Punishment Reviews and I didn't see any way it would get better, so I retired and started a new career. Extreme maybe, but sometimes you can't fix these things and it's better to just move on...

[@amdizle28]

More vids please, the content is career/life saving

[@macgyverswissarmykni]

Regarding leadership: "Iron sharpens iron" is my mantra. Esp. as a consultant, I've learned that as soon as you think you're the smartest person in the room, you've failed not only yourself but also the people you work with. A good leader sets others up for success, but also searches for the possibility that they have something to learn from others.

[@arbiculum6239]

Had an engineer go off in a completely wrong direction from the project. Was effectively building software for an already finished part of the project. They presented their work for some feedback, very happy with how things were going. Oof. Had to let them know this was not the objective or the deliverables that has been assigned. Talk about crestfallen, I think some of the team was ready to just put greased skids at the exit and send them flying out the door. But, I also understood that experienced team members can become very "in tune" with the needs of the project that new members don't see and can't just be plugged in with an simple upload. I coached the person not to beat themselves up, and requested that if there was any doubt in the future with an assignment, "Don't Suffer In Silence" and then guess a direction. Come have a lunch with me, one on one, express you discomfort with your understanding. We'll work it out. The direction was clarified, project timelines were adjusted, the person worked like crazy to catch and up and deliver. Plus, we came to understand that this person was very knowledgeable on regulatory compliance which was a gap in the group (experience from a prior job). Wow, so glad they weren't discarded for a mistake which should have been honestly shared by both sides. Also, when times get tight and the "bogeyman" of lay-offs come around. Employees can feel insecure and start looking for ways to make others seem inadequate to keep one metric length ahead in their managers viewpoint. Don't fall into this trap and take out someone who has made a mistake. This isn't a gameshow or a reality TV show, it's real work, treating people as one dimensional metrics will only bite you in the backside later.

[@HealthyDev]

Such a beautiful story. And so much wisdom here. Thanks for sharing this, somebody in a similar situation is going to be really encouraged! 🙏

[@babaramdass462]

"ambitious refactoring mistakes" lol that sounds eerily familiar

[@HealthyDev]

😅 it's a right of passage I think hehe.

[@tacticoolrick5562]

Honestly, I don't want anyone on my projects to fail. I want everyone to be a success, I want the project to be a success.

[@CraigyDizzle]

I had a colleague update something like 10,000 products with the inverse of the correct exchange rates because they got mixed up and had them all set to completely wrong pricing. Temporary nightmare to urgently fix but it got fixed, we put in some better language to make it less likely to happen again, and looked back thinking it was a human mistake. Ended up being something to laugh about later on and actually quite appropriately they turned out to be brilliant at documenting processes BECAUSE of the blind spots so things needed to be written super clearly which I might've otherwise missed. "Flaw" -> "Strength"

[@ladycodedutchess]

I think I need to improve on communication skills before I can lead. So I’m hesitant to take a managerial position.

[@HealthyDev]

I tell people I coach if you have a heart to lead other people out of care for them - the other skills can be learned. Not caring about the people one leads, but having good communication skills would be worse! Maybe you can find a manager who is willing to help you practice communicating in areas you want to improve on the job? Otherwise there’s the old “fake it til you make it” approach. Which admittedly I do a lot and can sometimes be dangerous. Anyway we need more good managers in tech - awesome to hear you’re pursuing it!

[@exitsmells909]

A guy on my team was tasked with porting data from one system to another in a very large database. Turns out he didnt check the new system details enough and was his first time working with it and didnt tell us. When the import happened all the data was a mess and it took us several months to solve. God love him tho after that he spent countless hours writing fixes for solving his mistake

[@tomyvarghese5495]

Love this.

[@nmatrix9]

At least you're honest, encountering exact same issue with a certain "colleague", who is making the work environment so consistently toxic (with focused passive aggressiveness towards myself), that the current environment is becoming unbearable.

[@jonaskoelker]

I'll point the fingers at myself: due to configuration differences across environments, plus a refactoring which made a previously dead code path come alive when the project was run in a particular mode, I shipped code which prevented production servers from spawning in that particular mode. Luckily we had some old versions of the program running. Ogres, onions and defensive reliability measures all have layers. Also we have a generic kind of task our software does. It does it oh about 5-10 ways with small variations. I know, let's build a reusable template that let's you plug in just the things that are different for variant x_1 through x_n. It's fine, but it's done in a very object oriented style, meaning inheritance heavy. The various building blocks are not very composable, and the whole subsystem feels the opposite of nimble. I consider that a design mistake I made. I look forward to refactoring all of that.

[@brianmccormick8328]

The project managers at my company are given a team picked by the functional managers. They're told to do the best they can with what they're given. It's almost impossible for someone to get fired for even very poor abilities.

[@DawidCech]

in one of the projects I've lost a balance between being a servant, silent helpful leader and proactive, competitive one, my bad 😔

[@HealthyDev]

The more hats, the more mistakes! Go easy on yourself. That’s a lot to juggle.

[@THillick]

Grazie Mille!

[@dreivoicu]

I love your content :D

[@peppep1704]

"You ever catch yourself [...] just waiting for someone to fail?" Thanks to the Great Resignation, it feels like all we can ever expect again is failure. I haven't seen anyone succeed in my workplace at anything since I started a full year ago.

[@liquidmobius]

I find the coding/programming world to be quite toxic overall. Most developers look down on anyone who doesn't know what they do and are quick to jump on mistakes. But rather than be kind and be a mentor, they do everything you mentioned in your video. My hat really goes off to those who have always been humble. I appreciate your honesty in this video, but in my book there's no extra points for anyone who goes from toxic to being decent or halfway decent.

[@HealthyDev]

With knowledge comes pride, unless that pride is fought with intentional humility. We are a society of narcissists by nature, so it's very hard to find humble programmers. But it's not impossible! Hang in there. At least YOU can be one. 😊

[@wendiborden6590]

We had a kid working for our company, just very new and not really skilled in the types of problem solving we needed. It came time to cut costs and we let him go. Turned out well for him, he ended up at another company I had a friend at, turned out he was a wonderful fit as a QA tester and thrived. Likely makes more money than me now lol. I liked the guy, just was not the right fit 💕

[@JorgetePanete]

I was in an internship for three months, kinda bad experience, the important part is that only the last day the manager told me my code was complex and hard to read, which was the most feedback I got besides basic stuff, he gave 0 examples of it and I got to learn nothing from that poor feedback

[@thomasf.9869]

I am in the unenviable position on of being lead dev facing push back from a team that is reluctant to deal with their technical debt situation. Getting on top of it means changing the culture that fuels it, and one invariably has to deal with push back. I am not dogmatic. I try gentle persuasion.

[@jameswyatt1304]

A few mistakes per annum is common for humanoids, especially the bulk of most staff. But some are just too dangerous to allow one to keep making decisions on a team. I make them with regularity, but I try not to make dumb ones or the same ones. That said, how they made the mistake(s) and how they handled it is much more important. Was there any risk analysis and sharing of options/plans? Did they hide, blamestorm, or defer the blame? Did they quickly reach out and communicate to reduce impact and outage? The real Bottom Line is that mistakes are understandable, but incompetence and repeated adverse impact are not.

[@HealthyDev]

Agree completely. Definitely some discernment necessary in applying this. In my experience judgmental management that doesn’t look at things like you do is more common. Hopefully between the two of us we avoid that in tomorrow’s leaders. Thanks for the feedback!

[@Bizmonger]

I'm experiencing this right now.

[@HealthyDev]

Hang in there man. I know you hold yourself to a high standard which is admirable but makes this stuff extra hard. I don’t always deal with it well either. Hopefully you find some more peace this year!

[@marfnl2]

My first job i was look at as a leed, And i did all the same things wrong you did. But i'm note sure if it was my pride. Or that they expected me to take a less than IT literate person and turn him into a system admin to replace me. Telling my company you can't just wing it, Like updating/changing someones website without making sure there is a backup, basic stuff like that. And they wanted me to show him just how to configure sending email from your site, (the basic setup was auto configured, so no setup there) And anything out of the ordinary requires quite some knowledge to configure. So how do i start there? Explaining DNS networking to someone that barely knows how to use windows. I understand i have to be more humble. But How was i supposed to handle this?!

[@archmad]

i have the opposite experience, i have a lot of humility with peers. tried help and mentoring, but nobody was mentoring me. That's the biggest mistake because i also need to grow. People also throwing the word "Balance", and we should be balance of everything