7 ms·

I think this might be one of those times where the title might lead to confusion in the comment section and leads people a bit astray. I saw this talk in perso

by holman 10y ago

I think this might be one of those times where the title might lead to confusion in the comment section and leads people a bit astray. I saw this talk in person at Nordic Ruby, and it was one of the best talks I've seen (and I've seen a bunch). Strangely enough, I don't really think back and think much about "optimism" when I think of the talk, though, even though the talk is about optimists. My takeaway was the type of tooling and thought processes that are advantageous when approaching problems and conflict. In many talks — mine included — people will say something along the lines of "be nice to your teammates and leave good feedback", for example, but that's really vague. Reg's talk helped me understand what that type of feedback might be, how it can be explicitly phrased, and how I can give concrete feedback without being antagonistic. I think it makes for a more effective argument, especially when building product, but also it just makes for friendlier humans. Yeah, this does lead to "optimistic people", hence the title, but I just thought it was weird to see discussion here about the merits of positive people versus negative people. I think the talk's a much bigger dialogue about interacting with humans and, possibly more importantly, yourself. Anyway, I really liked the talk, and as much as this Markdown is great at getting the point across, this is one of the talks I'd suggest actually watching. \m/

donw 10y ago
The best advice I received on this topic was that feedback should be actionable, specific, and kind. Actionable and specific mean that the person on the receiving end has a set of concrete actions to take to implement. For example, "get better at programming" isn't specific, and "get a PhD in Computer Science" probably isn't actionable, but "work on improving your ability to write readable code by working through the exercises in this book" is something that can be worked with (especially if you can spend some time to mentor that person!) Kindness matters a lot, though, and it is different from niceness. When giving feedback, some people say that they are brutally honest, but often the emphasis is on the first word, rather than the second. Things like "The module you wrote is crap because your code sucks and is hard to maintain." doesn't help in any way, shape or form. On the other hand, others that focus on being nice often heap on the praise, while excluding or downplaying the criticism. "You worked really hard on that module, and maybe should should spend a more little time refactoring and cleaning things up" is too nice. Kindness means sharing the good and the bad, but without being aggressive or accusatory: "Thanks for the hard work on that module. It does exactly what it needs to, but I'm really struggling to understand what's going on in there, as there are some really big methods and classes. Breaking those apart into smaller separate objects and functions would help a lot."
- tedmiston 10y ago
  > When giving feedback, some people say that they are brutally honest As someone who prefers giving and receiving terse feedback... I would suggest that there's nothing wrong with brutal honesty for type of people who appreciate receiving it. If I write code and forget to test some specific cases, I would much rather get a code review of "Missing tests for negative numbers, empty string, null" than a longwinded and "nice" version. I don't need to hear compliments on what's right... just what can be improved. Some people really value bluntness and see directness as more friendly because it's honest.
  - donw 10y ago
    Terse feedback can be fine, once you know that, for a specific person, terse feedback is effective. I have met more than a few people that said they preferred "brutal honesty", but would still react very defensively to straightforward, terse feedback. Being terse without seeming to be on the attack is very difficult, and it is human nature to defend ourselves -- and stop listening! -- if we perceive that we are being attacked.
  - wpietri 10y ago
    > I don't need to hear compliments on what's right... just what can be improved. I used to say the same thing, but now I think I was wrong. I didn't want to hear compliments on what's right. But I did need it. Focusing on negatives helped me reduce error rates. But ignoring the positives limited my ability to grow. What got me to slowly switch was learning about appreciative inquiry. It's a practice of focusing strongly on the good aspects of something and seeking to amplify them. I looked into it because a team I was working with had these brutally negative retrospectives. They were in a rut of flagellating themselves every week about all their failures. They were a great team, but weren't performing well because they became gradually more stressed and discouraged. And after I saw that in them, I eventually saw it in myself, too. I'm now 6 or 7 years into consciously switching approaches and I'd never go back. Just today I was pairing with a younger programmer, and we even took some time to appreciate their anxiety. That fear of failing was causing them a lot of problems, but instead of asking them not to worry, I asked them to channel their anxiety into areas where it was useful, like writing good tests. That said, I'm with you on not wanting "nice" versions of things, which I see as a social performance, and not actual kindness.
tedmiston 10y ago
Any chance the talk was recorded? Edit: Found it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xjntzo-mYc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xjntzo-mYc

by holman 10y ago

donw 10y ago

The best advice I received on this topic was that feedback should be actionable, specific, and kind. Actionable and specific mean that the person on the receiving end has a set of concrete actions to take to implement. For example, "get better at programming" isn't specific, and "get a PhD in Computer Science" probably isn't actionable, but "work on improving your ability to write readable code by working through the exercises in this book" is something that can be worked with (especially if you can spend some time to mentor that person!) Kindness matters a lot, though, and it is different from niceness. When giving feedback, some people say that they are brutally honest, but often the emphasis is on the first word, rather than the second. Things like "The module you wrote is crap because your code sucks and is hard to maintain." doesn't help in any way, shape or form. On the other hand, others that focus on being nice often heap on the praise, while excluding or downplaying the criticism. "You worked really hard on that module, and maybe should should spend a more little time refactoring and cleaning things up" is too nice. Kindness means sharing the good and the bad, but without being aggressive or accusatory: "Thanks for the hard work on that module. It does exactly what it needs to, but I'm really struggling to understand what's going on in there, as there are some really big methods and classes. Breaking those apart into smaller separate objects and functions would help a lot."

tedmiston 10y ago
> When giving feedback, some people say that they are brutally honest As someone who prefers giving and receiving terse feedback... I would suggest that there's nothing wrong with brutal honesty for type of people who appreciate receiving it. If I write code and forget to test some specific cases, I would much rather get a code review of "Missing tests for negative numbers, empty string, null" than a longwinded and "nice" version. I don't need to hear compliments on what's right... just what can be improved. Some people really value bluntness and see directness as more friendly because it's honest.
- donw 10y ago
  Terse feedback can be fine, once you know that, for a specific person, terse feedback is effective. I have met more than a few people that said they preferred "brutal honesty", but would still react very defensively to straightforward, terse feedback. Being terse without seeming to be on the attack is very difficult, and it is human nature to defend ourselves -- and stop listening! -- if we perceive that we are being attacked.
- wpietri 10y ago
  > I don't need to hear compliments on what's right... just what can be improved. I used to say the same thing, but now I think I was wrong. I didn't want to hear compliments on what's right. But I did need it. Focusing on negatives helped me reduce error rates. But ignoring the positives limited my ability to grow. What got me to slowly switch was learning about appreciative inquiry. It's a practice of focusing strongly on the good aspects of something and seeking to amplify them. I looked into it because a team I was working with had these brutally negative retrospectives. They were in a rut of flagellating themselves every week about all their failures. They were a great team, but weren't performing well because they became gradually more stressed and discouraged. And after I saw that in them, I eventually saw it in myself, too. I'm now 6 or 7 years into consciously switching approaches and I'd never go back. Just today I was pairing with a younger programmer, and we even took some time to appreciate their anxiety. That fear of failing was causing them a lot of problems, but instead of asking them not to worry, I asked them to channel their anxiety into areas where it was useful, like writing good tests. That said, I'm with you on not wanting "nice" versions of things, which I see as a social performance, and not actual kindness.

tedmiston 10y ago

Any chance the talk was recorded? Edit: Found it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xjntzo-mYc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xjntzo-mYc