Making Better Mistakes Tomorrow
Danielle Jabin May 22, 2015
“Don’t make the same mistake twice.”
Someone said that once
I never make the same mistake twice.
In the past week or day even, we’ve all made
mistakes. I definitely have.
Mistakes are proof that you’re trying.
But how can we make better mistakes?
I’m from here (California).
But now I live here (Sweden).
I work at Spotify.
Software Engineer à Agile Coach
What should I talk about?
“Something you’re passionate about!”
Our biggest difficulties in building software
stem from process and communication not the
technology itself.
What can you do today (or rather in 60 min
when this is over or on Monday when you’re
back at work) to make a difference?
Less is the new more!
In particular, limiting your Work In Progress
(WIP).
What happens without WIP limits? • Trying to start new tasks instead of
tackling impediments/blockers. • Requirements can change when
the time to complete is longer so work may need to be thrown away or redone.
• Longer time to complete means longer time to receive feedback and iterate.
What’s really happening here?
Context switching!
Context switching always has a cost.
Are some people better at multitasking?
Researchers at Stanford wanted to find out
“It turns out multitaskers are terrible
at every aspect of multitasking.” - Clifford
Nass
Focus: Strategies
Scrum • Sprints, Sprint Planning, Sprint
Review, Retrospective • Timebox and limit WIP
Scrum Your Life!
• Personal Kanban Board • Personal WIP • “To Do” lists • One for the week • One for the day • Backlog
I like “To Do” lists.
TPD Priorities & Achievements
This Week in Tech (@ Spotify)
Modeling Behavior
Innovation is the driving force of the tech
industry. To boldly go where no man (or woman) has gone before.
What is innovation built on?
Some experiments work, some don’t.
Think about where you work. • What happens when someone
fails? • What happens when you don’t
agree with a coworker? with a manager? with the CEO? How do you act on this?
At Spotify, we endeavor to cultivate a “failure is okay” culture. ‣ We don’t want to create a culture
that incentivizes people to not be forthcoming or daring or brave. - Information gets hidden behind
inefficiencies! - We don’t want to impede innovation! - Encourage—reward, even—openness
and dissent.
To foster a desired culture, model the
behavior you want to see.
“Most human behavior is learned
observationally through modeling” – Albert
Bandura
Bobo doll experiment
When people aren’t afraid to fail, they’re willing to take risks
because they know the environment will be
supportive of them if it doesn’t go well.
Modeling Behavior: Strategies
Spotify values on the office walls
Reinforcement and repetition
That’s this guy (CTO)
Imagine this: it’s your first month on the job,
and you’ve just very publicly broken some firewall settings.
What happens next?
Receiving Feedback
Ignorance is bliss.
The people around you have insight into your growth areas. Use it!
When life gives you lemons…
Not everyone will have received (or remember) training on how to give
good feedback.
To grow, we must find the value in criticism we
receive despite our natural reactive
tendencies.
Receiving Feedback: Strategies
“Fist of Five” Voting ‣ Quick and informal ‣ “What’s one thing that could be
improved for next time?” - Specificity is key
‣ Press for constructive criticism (not just positive things, though that’s nice reinforcement too)
Loops at Spotify • Want feedback? Ask for it! • The more frequently you ask, the
less surprises there will be and the less intimidating it becomes.
“Have you given them that feedback?” • Again, when you make it part of the
culture/day-to-day, it feels less intimidating.
Making Better Mistakes Tomorrow: - Focus - Modeling Behavior - Receiving Feedback