Another new name for an old idea

In recent weeks, a new term has surfaced to describe a trend taking place in corporate America - Resenteeism. Just as with Quiet Quitting, workers who exhibit Resenteeism are putting in less effort than they once did, meaning they aren’t as productive and effective as they once were. The trend resenteeism takes its name from the resentment at the underlying core of the behavior that is observed.

What separates Resenteeism from Quiet Quitting is that the latter focuses on the end result - doing less work - while the former calls out the cause - resentment for how one is treated at work or as a reaction to one or a series of events.

In my previous post on Quiet Quitting, I outlined three causes: poor work environment, poor return on investment (ROI) for one’s effort given, and one’s purpose lies outside of work. Resenteeism can arrive from either a poor work environment or a low ROI on extra effort expended.

Poor working environments, which often arises from a lack of respect for people, will often lead to feelings of resentment. While some can suffer from a poor working environment stoicly, others will let months or years of disrespect build into resentment.

Workers putting in less effort due to a perceived poor ROI may do so for a variety of reasons. It might be due to an emotional response. It could also be a calculated, logical response after working hard for little reward. From the outside, one might attribute the behavior to resentment.

Resenteeism sounds like a new trend, but it’s just a new interpretation of the ‘Quiet Quitting trend we’ve seen over the past few years. Yet, as I shared in my original post on Quiet quitting, this trend is not new, though is more widespread. Understanding the underlying cause can help go a long way to overcoming this trend, but overcoming it will require concerted effort from leadership.

One skill separates successful leaders from the rest

People are promoted based on their ability to wow leaders. Their skills at an individual contributor level is impressive enough to lead to a promotion. But success as an individual contributor does not guarantee success at the next level.

Within a hierarchy, people tend to be ‘promoted to their level of incompetence’. This is known as the ‘Peter principle’, a concept popularized in the late ‘60s and ‘70s by Laurence Peter. In my experience, those who struggle with leadership responsibilities may have the IQ it takes to do the role and their previous role, but lack the EQ, or Emotional Intelligence, that it takes to lead others.

Make no mistake, stepping into a leadership role requires intelligence and skill. But that’s just the entry fee one is expected to pay to be a leader. But EQ is the one skill that makes the most successful leaders stand out from the others.

Unsuccessful leaders may appear successful for a time. Being promoted based on their skills may mean that they are adept at managing expections of one’s leaders. This is not a bad skill to have. We should all strive to keep our leaders informed of our movements. But when this is the only skill one brings to the table, that will not lead to long term success.

It’s been said that we model the behaviors that we observe. Leaders tend to mimic the patterns of communication they themselves observe. If a leader is surrounded by positive examples, then they may make do with the skills they have, for a time.

A leader with high emotional intelligence, and specifically, high self-awareness, can sense the patterns they are following and can choose to follow a different path. Self-awarenss is crucial in understanding where one’s strengths and weaknesses truly lie. As one leads others, self-awareness is key in gauging one’s progress and improving. The world around you is giving you feedback on your performance and a person with high EQ and self-awareness can leverage that feedback to improve themselves much faster than any manager-lead feedback cycle.

Let a little SPIDR help you break down User Stories

In modern Software Development, User Stories are ubiquotous. They are the core building block of anything that we build. User Stories are the fundamental item upon our entire backlog is built from. It’s for this reason that a team needs to have the best user stories possible. If teams have poor user stories, everything else they build on top of the user stories will tend to be poor too.

The first step to crafting the best user stories is to ensure they meet our own definition of a user story. Common industry practice is to ensure that user stories meet the ‘INVEST’ criteria.

• Independent
• Negotiable
• Valuable
• Estimatable
• Sized Appropriately
• Testable

The second key step is creating user stories that are sized appropriately. This can be challenging, especially since we’re aiming to make them Indpendent and Valuable at the same time. There are many different ways in which we can divide a user story down into smaller parts. Mike Cohn introduced a handy acronym SPIDR that captures the 5 main patterns for splitting a User Story. Any method of dividing a user story that I’ve encountered could be described by the SPIDR acronym, making not only a simple reminder, but also an exhaustive one.

Spikes

A Spike is a user story where the output of the work is research. The outcome is increased understanding and reduced risk for further work to come. Teams cannot know every aspect of the system they are building, and so they may decide to take some time to research the system in question.

Other times, teams understand the system and the problem space, but may have a few different ideas on a solution. Here a Spike to create a Proof of Concept (PoC) can be valuable use of time and help the team to select a path for their solution.

A good practice that I suggest teams follow is to time box their Spikes. Estimating how long it will take to research a system can be difficult. Research tends to follow many deep rabbit holes. Having a time box for the spike can provide just enough time pressure to ensure the research is valuable.

Spikes provide a different kind of business value than user stories. They are more about reducing risk and making decisions then they are about delivering a product to a user. As such, they should be used sparingly. Despite Spikes being the first letter in the acronym, I suggest it be the last resort a team reach for when they split out stories.

Paths

In many software systems, there are many paths a user can take to complete a given task. When the work is large or complex, it can be useful to split user stories up by these paths, delivering the most common path first and then adding the functionality to other paths in the system later.

Interfaces

In complex systems, we often have many different tools that provide the same or similar functionality. Companies may support a website and a mobile application at the same time while having an internal tool that displays the same information or provides the same functionality. Splitting the work by each of these user interfaces can be an effective way at dividing the work into small, actionable chunks of work.

One can also split user stories by persona, or the user who is doing the work and is impacted by the change. Different personas may use different interfaces to do their portion of work. You may choose to split the work down based on the personas, allowing the team to deliver a solution per persona in an iterative fashion.

When thinking of interfaces, teams should still strive to craft vertically sliced user stories. This guidance does not suggest that teams split user stories up by the architectural layer of the system that the work needs to touch. Each story that builds out a unique interface should still contain any backend changes that are necessary to deliver the functionality to the user. That said, the first interface will often be larger as it will create some of the common backend functionality that subsequent user stories will leverage.

Data

User stories operate on data elements. When we have multiple data elements, creating a user story for each different data element can be an effective way to slice the work into small managelable chunks.

Leveraging a Data split can be prone to “throw-away” work, as the team will need to progressively build out APIs and other backend systems to deliver each of the data elements. If it is not too much effort, teams could attempt to fetch all of the data elements in the first user story, but care must be taken to keep the initial story small and focused, else teams will fall back into one giant user story with all of the data points.

Rules

We have to implement business rules into our system in order for the system to have proper constraints on what the user can and cannot do. When we have many business rules to implement, dividing the work by these business rules can be an effective and simple way to divide a large body of work into small chunks.

Conclusion

SPIDR (Spikes, Paths, Interfaces, Data, and Rules) is a simple way to think about dividing work into smaller user stories. Small user stories allow us to iterate faster, deliver faster, and get feedback sooner. Any user story we create is a hypothesis of what the user wants and is only proven valuable until delivered to the user and measured. By crafting small stories and prioritizing based on what we think is most valuable or by what allows us to receive feedback sooner, we can ensure rapid, valuable delivery to the client. All the while, we must remember to keep our stories vertically sliced, so that each story on its own is Independent and Valuable.

As John C. Maxwell says, everything rises and falls on leadership.

We are in the middle of an epidemic, as business news reports. In 2022, “Quiet Quitting” became a hot topic as workers on social media discussed the new trend in the workplace. Then, news media picked it up and spread to most of the major news reporting sites as the big trend impacting labor.

Quiet quitting, if you are unfamiliar with the term, refers to a worker choosing to put in less effort today then they did yesterday. This can take many forms, such as working fewer hours, doing the bare minimum, or simply no longer going “the extra mile.”

“Hopefully, it [the Pandemic] will force us to focus on what is trule important to each of us,”

I wrote that in my journal on March 14, 2020, the day after I was sent to work from home in an effort to “flatten the curve” of Covid cases.

I see signs around me that many of us did indeed find or rediscover what is truly important to us. Many people picked up new hobbies. I, like many others, rediscovered Bob Ross and the Joy of Pointing. My wife returned to her passion of reading.

In 2022, we saw 2 trends that continue this theme of pursuing what is important to us: the great resignation and quiet quitting. The great resignation dominated the headlines in the first half of the year and represented a massive shift of people in roles, companies, and industries.

But my main curiosity is the other major career trend of 2022, Quiet Quitting” - the term used to describe individuals who were putting in less effort at works within their some role. What causes quiet quitting? I See 3 Candidates: work sucks, one’s ‘return on investment’ for their extra effort, and key to my original hypothesis, the pursuit of one’s passions outside of work.

Work Sucks

Social media and Subreddit, like r/antiwork are an outlet for those encountering poor leadership. Bosses who demand remote employees have their cameras on all day while they work, others who require the use of a 1⁄2 PTO day if one works from home. Leaders who state that “we’re like a family” but don’t hesitate to part with family during an economic downturn. Companies that revert pay to minimum wage for workers who quit without a two week’s notice. Governments working to strip unions the right to strike. Bosses who report employees to HR because they did not respond to texts while on vacation. A boss who rewarded hard work with an extra 10 minute break - that has to be Coordinated 24 hours in advance, that can’t be added to a regular break and that expires in 30 days. And all of this on the homepage of the subreddit on one day.

As a leader and an agilist, I see a common thread in all of this: the lack of respect for people. We all deserve respect as fellow human beings. Of these who have been disrespected by a leader, quiet quitting can be an emotional response to the situation. We each strive to have some balance in our lives. To exert some sense of control. And when we feel slighted, human nature responds with a ‘balancing of the scales’. “You interrupt my personal time, I’ll slack off at work to make up for the time lost.” “You disrespect me, then I’ll give you the same level of respect in return.”

With those who ‘quietly quit’ because ‘work sucks’ we have a leadership problem and that starts at the top and filters all the way into the front line managers. To combat ‘work sucks’ we need to raise the level of leadership, and that starts with a simple respect for people.

Return on Investment

Every day, people go to work and “go the extra mile”. For some, they are driven by an internal fire. They’re found their calling. For others, they are extrinsically motivated, hoping to get to the next level. But is that next level worth it? For some who choose to go the ‘Quiet Quitting’ route, it may be a very logical decision instead of an emotional one.

Time is a precious resource, one we only have so much of. Is ‘giving 110%’ in hopes of a potential reward a smart investment? For those who put in the effort, it may be a good use of their time. Others may have done the math and decided their time is better spent else where, with family, with a hobby, or with their own passions.

Passion

‘Ryan Daniels was an account executive for a major adentising agency. “and by the time he was forty, he had a very high- paying job that demanded seventy-hour weeks with a bonus of unrelenting stress. […] He moved to a much smaller company where he could, in his own words, “coast” and still excel.” Ryan used this freed up time to explore his passions and spend time with his family.’ And Ryan did all of this before the internet.

Ryan’s story comes to us from Bob Bufford’s 1994 book “Halftime”. In it, the author spoke of taking our mid-life and heading into halftime to plan and uncover the one thing we decide to “put in the box” and hang our personal passions on for the 2nd half of our life. It speaks of finding our calling, either in our work, through a career change, charity work, or through pursuits outside of work.

In this last example, he offered the “half speed option”, where one intentionally works less, either by switching to a less demanding and stressful job or by cutting back on one’s efforts at work by volunteering for less, being more efficient with one’s time, or by lowering one’s standards on the work they do, striving for doing acceptable instead of outstanding work.

I share this because while “quiet quitting” is a new term, it is not a new concept. Inherent in all of us is a choice of what is significant for us. Many choose work as this item of significance. But drastic life changes, like a pandemic, causes one to reasses what is important in life. Among the top regrets of the dying, no one said they wish they worked more. In fact, the number three regret is that they wished they worked less!

Conclusion

Quiet quitting is not a new concept, but it may be gaining in popularity. I believe there are many cases of this trend and the pandemic served as a catalyst. American culture is shifting, as it always has. Hard work is not valued as highly as it used to be, from my vantage point. And factors such as poor leadership, low ROI on putting in extra effort, and people choosing to follow their passions, have all led us here.

What can we do about this trend? It starts and ends in enlightened leadership. It starts with leaders who can connect people’s passions to their work and who offer people respect. To punish, bemoan, or micromanage employees because one suspects their people are “quiet quitting’ will only fan the flames.

To quote John C. Maxwell, ‘everything rises and falls on leadership’. If this problem exists in corporate America, then it was caused by the leaders in corporate America. Yet here too is where the problem can be reversed.

If a leader makes a decision but does not communicate it, did they really make a decision?

The above question may bring up images of buddhists monks asking questions like “What is the sound of one hand clapping” or “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around, does it make a sound?” On the surface the well known question involving ill- fated trees, it seems a bit absurd. Of all the trees that have ever been cut down and observed, has any done so without making noise? As far as we know, there’s never been a silent tree falling.

But the question forces us to return to the definition of sound, which dictionary.com defined as

“the sensation produced by stimulation of the organs of hearing by vibrations transmitted through the air or other medium”

While a tree falling would in fact create vibrations in the air, by this definition, no sound would be produced since no ears (“organs of hearing”) would be around to detect it and create the sensation we interpret as sound. Careful examanition of the definition of sound gives us an interesting answer.

Which brings me to my leadership question for this article: if a leader makes a decision but doesn’t communicate it, have they really made a decision? A decision implies action. In a business organization, can action be taken without communicating to others? Perhaps, or perhaps not. It may depend on the nature of
the action.

While the true answer to my question may be nuanced, just like the question of the falling tree, its intended to make you consider. If you make a decision, who needs to know that you made the decision? What public action must you take in order for others to understand the decision you made and its ramification on the organization? Decisions are not made in a forest where no one else is around. Decisions are made within the confines of an organization and will impact it.

Next time you make a decision, consider the falling tree and ask yourself, who needs to know that I made this decision?

Dysfunctional Teams tend to be dysfunctional in the same 5 ways

Teams of all levels, whether on the front lines with a team of individual contributors, or a team of executives working together to run a business, suffer from common dysfunctions. In 2002, Patrick Lencioni introduced the 5 Dysfunctions of a Team model in his book of the same name. These dysfunctions build upon each other, like a pyramid. We must resolve the dysfunctions at the lower levels before we tackle problems at a higher level. Just like in the construction of a building, the foundation is the most crucial piece. However, all levels are key to a well functioning team.

Lack of Trust

Trust is key to any relationship. When we bring many people together, each person has a relationship with everyone else in the group. While it may not be possible for everyone in the group to have high trust in eachother, a significant lack of trust will result in suspicion and a “trust tax” that the group will suffer from, slowing progress of the team.

Fear of Conflict

Some people naturally avoid conflict. They have a strong avoidance of it. In a team, healthy conflict, rooted in respect, is crucial to creativity and solving problems that the team will encounter. Most teams exist to solve problems and they will be hampered at their problem solving ability if they avoid conflict.

Lack of Commitment

A successful team needs everyone working together to achieve the goal of the team. If one or more team members aren’t committed to the goal, everyone suffers. The team may not operate at its full potential, other team members may have to work extra, or the uncommitted team members could be disruptive to the goal of the rest of the team.

Avoidance of Accountability

On a team, each person brings a unique set of skills and experiences. Together, the team can leverage their skills and expertise to achieve the team goal. Only, that is, if everyone is accountable to their part and the team. If team members avoid accountability, others will not be able to rely on them and their contributions.

Inattention to Results

Only in the final dysfunction do we consider the results of the team. So many other behaviors are necessary before we consider ‘are we successful?’

If we are inattentive to the results of our team, then we are missing an opportunity for feedback. We miss recognizing when we are failing to deliver, but we could also miss out celebrating our successes. This behavior could lead to burn out, which could be equally detrimental to the long term longevity of the team.

Bringing it together

One key use of the 5 dysfunctions model is in launching a team. One should start by establishing trust, and no, trust falls are not the answer.

Next, teams should work to establish how they will work together and handle disagreements. There will be disagreements and it is best to establish how to approach and resolve conflicts before one emerges.

Then, as we kickoff a new team, we consider what our purpose is, how we contribute, and ultimately build towards a commitment to the team’s success.

As we discuss how each person contributes to the team’s success, we should be explicit in what each person is accountable for. Spell out what each person can expect from each other and we know who is doing what.

Finally, a team launch that is anchored in the 5 dysfunctions will consider what success for the team looks like. Consider how will we measure our success? How often will we check in with these measures? How will we make these measures actionable?

While the 5 dysfunctions of a team is a useful model for new teams, it is tremendously helpful for existing teams to determine where the team struggles. If you sense your team is struggling in one or more areas in this model, try this exercise. First, introduce the model to the team and explain each level, drawing the pyramid as you go. Then, invite them to put a sticker or mark on the layer they think the team is currently struggling with the most. Next invite the team into a discussion around the results, asking for observations that confirm or challenge the results. Finally, consider how you’ll tackle this dysfunction as a team to get better.

How joining an existing team might not be as inclusive as we think

Agile Development teams are the heart of an agile organization. Whether the team uses Scrum, Kanban, XP, or some amalgamation of agile practices, the Agile Development team is the core make-up of the organization. These teams, in the spirit of agile, aren’t just nameless cogs in a machine, but have their own cuture, identity, way of working, and of course, a team name. Much goes into setting up a team and crafting its sense of self.

But teams change. Someone leaves, someone is added, or leadership shuffles the team a little or a lot. How do you incorporate a new team member? When the team completely changes, it is quite obvious that a whole new team culture must be created. But when just one person is added or removed, does that require a brand new team identity?

To answer the question, consider your response to the next question. Does the team go back to a ‘Forming’ phase when just one person is changed?

From my experience, the answer is yes, though never as drastically as when the team is first created. When a new team member joins an existing team, how far do we typically go to welcome them? Do we re-establish team norms? Identify a new team name? Revisit the team calendar and meeting cadence? Do you purposefully reset the team culture or expect them to form and adapt to the culture the team has already established?

From a practical view, I rarely see teams change their names or drastically change the culture for one person. Given the overhead associated with returning to the beginning of a team’s formation and starting from scratch, this stance makes sense. Going through all of the formation activities take time that few teams choose to invest in.

Yet let’s look at it from the new team member’s perspective. How welcomed would you feel if you were placed on an established team that expected you to conform to their culture? One might feel like a second class citizen, an outsider on one’s own team. They’re known or introduced as the ‘new person’ on the team. We’ve all felt out-of-place at one point in our lives and it’s not a great feeling.

The next time you have a new team member join your existing team, consider how you can be truly inclusive and welcoming for them. What might you do to fully welcome a new team member onto a team? How can we balance being pragmatic with being inclusive? And how can we ensure that the new team member and their skills are blended well with the team?

Aligning our reading goals to our personal goals is key

I had three large learning focuses for 2023. In addition to books on personal efficiencies and software development, which I also focused on in 2022, a large focus was on Stoicism. For more on the stoic books, check out last week’s post.

Below I dive into the personal efficiencies and software development books I read in 2023, such as ‘High Performance Habits’, ‘Deep Work’, ‘Smart Brevity’, and ‘Leading Lean’.

Curiously absent from my 2023 books were any books solely on leadership. I was shocked when I realized I had missed that category of books entirely last year. When we don’t align our efforts to our goals, we can easily stray from where we want to go.

Thinking statistically

This book was recomended by the ‘Personal MBA’ book I read in 2022. A fairly short read, it provides a useful introduction to statistics for the professional to use. Some key points from the book

• Selection bias occurs when we select non-random data and treat it like it was random data. Selection Bias is very difficult to eliminate.
• Models abstract out into equations how a system operates..
• When presented with new evidence, we can leverage Bayes’ Theorem to help us change our beliefs.

Leading Lean

‘Leading Lean’ teaches how one can introduce lean concepts to any organization and the tools are can implement. This book was difficult to read as the author relied heavily on acronyms, many that they created and spelled out only once, which slowed comprehension. A sample chapter can be found at the publishers website if you’re interested in learning more.

Kanban

Often referred to as the blue Kanban book, this book dived deep into the mechanics of Kanban. I thought I was well versed in Kanban before reading this book and learned that there were many elements and nuances to Kanben that I was blind to, such as the concept of a ‘commitment point’, the point on a kanban board where the flow of work dicates that we’ve ‘committed’ to doing the work.

100 ways to improve your writing

Writing is a passion of mine, so I’ve sought out books on how to improve the craft of writing. This book provides a number of suggestions, many of which are reminders of good grammar or pointing out bad practices (such as the use of parentheses).

The book contains a few useful suggestions and checklists, but many of the ideas, such as utilizing writing exercises to improve your writing, are obvious.

Remote Team Interaction Workbook

Written by the same authors as Team Topologies, this book dives into techniques and practices for software development teams to work remotely. Given many development teams are working remotely part of the time, this book is useful aid for many teams while also serving as a quick intro or reminder on the Team Topology structure.

High Performance Habits

Through extensive surveys and interviews, the author has identified 6 habits that high performers follow. High Performers are those who can sustain high output over a long period of time. In doing so, they exhibit six habits, three personal and three social habits.

• Personal Habits
  • Seek Clarity
  • Generate Energy
  • Raise Necessity
• Social Habits
  • Increase Productivity
  • Develop Influence
  • Demonstrate Courage

The author then provides 3 key practices for each habit to help you implement the habit for yourself.

Looking over the list of habits and diving into the book, there is some overlap here with stoic philosophy. The author also frequently quotes stoics and others.

Full Steam Ahead

‘Full Steam Ahead’ explores what makes for a good vision and how to craft are on your own. An inspirational and compelling vision includes a clearly articulated purpose that explains why you are doing what you are doing. It includes a vivid picture of the future we are working towards, which tells us where our efforts lie. Finally, it includes the values we follow, which says how we will accomplish the vision.

Deep Work

Our ability to retain focus for long stretches of time is decreasing just when the value of thinking and working deeply on a task is becoming more important.

That is the premise of ‘Deep Work’ which lays out the value of being able to focus and work deeply while also providing strategies and tips on how to achieve deep work.

There are 4 key philosophies to Deep work

• Monastic. Eschewing most if not all shallow work
• Bimodal - Taking stretches of days, weeks, or even months at a time for deep work
• Rhythmic-Develop a routine of deep work stretchus within a day
• Journalistic-Using any possible time to go into deep work.

For most, monistic and bimodal are difficult or impossible to fit into their life. The journalistic is the most challenging to implement, as it requires strict discipline to use every short moment possible. This leaves rhythmic the most accessible approach to achieve deep work for most people.

Smart Brevity

When you write, keep your audience at the fore front. Place the most relevant information for them firsh, then provide more context below if they wish to read on.

That’s the main takeaway from smart Prefer more, check out my blog post on ‘Smart Brevity‘ or cheek out the book yourself.

A deep dive into the practical side of Stoicism

Over the past 5 years I’ve read at least 24 books a year. In 2023, I surpassed previous years by reading 64 books over a large, number of genres.

My main reading focus for 2023 wes personal efficiencies, software development, and Stoicism. Today, I’ll focus on the lessons from the stoic philosoply and its practical applications.

After reading ‘The Obstacle is the Way’, in 2022 I became intrigued by Stoic philosophy and read 10 different books on Stoicism in the year.

Below are the key insights I gained from the 10 books on Stoicism. Of note, many of the books below are written by Ryan Holiday who wrote ‘The Obstacle is the Way’, including ‘Life of the Stoics’, ‘Ego is the Enemy’, ‘Stillness is the Key’, ‘Courage is Calling’, ‘Discipline is Destiny’, and ‘The Daily Stoic’.

Next week, I’ll dive into the key learnings from my other 2023 books.

Life of the Stoics

Written by Ryan Holiday, author of ‘The Obstacle is the Way’, this book tells the history of Stoicism through the people who founded it, influenced it, taught it, and shaped it to the school of philosophy that we now associate the word ‘stoic’ with someone who is emotionless.

The book starts with Zeno the founder of Stoicism in Athens. It follows several generations of leaders of the school of Stoicism and how it spread to Rome, where many of the later stoics like Cato the Younger, Seneca, and Epictetus would extend and build on the philosophy. The book concludes with Marcus Aurelius, described as the Philosopher King, as we was both well versed and strongly practiced Stoicism and served as the Emperor of Rome during the height of the Empire.

Ego is the Enemy

Another book by Ryan Holiday, ‘Ego is the Enemy’ explains how our ego sabotages us and how to overcome our ego to succeed. Ego can masquerade as many things. Often it shows up as arrogance. It’s the “need to be better than, more then, recognized for”. But ego can show up in other, more subtle ways, such as telling ourselves that we’re special, that we deserve to succeed or that we were wronged by others.

Ego is at the root of most challenges. And it can be managed and overcome. To do so, we must

• Be Humble in our aspirations
• Gracious in our success
• Resilient in our Failvers

Stillness is the Key

Yet another Ryan Holiday book, Stillness is the Key dives into how to instill and nurture a sense of calm in the mind, body, and spirit.

This calm or stillness is the key to seeing clearly, being strategic, building good habits, and following the example of the Stoics.

Stoic Challenge

Everyday life presents an opportunity to practice being Stoic. Whether its being stuck in traffic, waiting in line at the grocery store, or dealing with an upset child, each moment offers us an opportunity to practice a stoic mindset. Viewing these moments as ‘Stoic challenges’ offer a way for us to set the proper mindset to approach these situations and remind ourselves to remain in control of our emotions.

Enchiridion & Teachings of Epictetus

After reading many modern books on Stoicism, I decided to spend some time reading ancient stoic texts including the ‘Enchiridion’ by Epictetus and the ‘Teachings of Epictetus’. The writings are dense and contain a few useful muggets including:

“You will be hurt when you consent to be hurt.”

“If you wish someone to be without faults, you are foolish.”

Discipline is Destiny

The Stoics valued 4 virtues: courage, temperance, justice, and wisdom. Temperance, or discipline as the author choose to call it, is about having command over one’s mind, body, and soul. “Most powerful is he who has himself in his own power.” - Seneca

We must exhibit discipline in all areas of life. Each area strengthens the discipline of other areas and conversely, a weakness in one area results in a weakness in other areas. “Once you compromise, you’ve been compromised.”

Courage is Calling

“There is nothing worth doing that is not scary.” It is up to us on how we respond to fear. Courage is about overcoming this fear and taking action anyway.

There are many aspects of courage, but one that resonated with me is the idea that our training and our preparation enables us to overcome our fear and push forward anyway.

The Daily Stoic

There’s no one single lesson that jumped out at me from this book. Instead, it was the experience as a whole of a daily reminder on some aspect of Stoicism that made this book a great read that I am continuing into 2024.

Anti Fragile

While not a book strictly on Stoicism I’m including it in this list as it references Stoic philosophy while also referenced in Ryan Holiday’s ‘Obstacle is the Way’. The concept of Antifragility is that there are things that get stronger by being exposed to stressors. The opposite of fragile, an item that breaks when exposed to stress is not robust. Something robust, at best, is unharmed by stress. The true opposite of fragile is something that improves by being exposed to stress. Conceptually, one can apply this idea to development teams. Such an application may be intentionally exposing the team to stress instead of protecting them like a ‘Scrum Mom’ would.

Software Design Principles do not always translate to leadership

Software engineers learn and follow a number of design principles when building solutions. These principles outline good practices that one should follow in order to build the best applications. These become ingrained in our brains as engineers, lessons like do not repeat yourself. In 2019, I delivered a talk at Cincy Deliver considering if and how these principles translate to leadership. Can the principles that we as engineers spent countless hours learning translate to a leadership role?

One such design principle is information hiding. Good software design states that well designed code doesn’t include information that is not needed and hides information from others who don’t need access to it. This design principle reinforces other design principles such as Separation of Concerns and Single Responsibility Principle. By hiding information away, we ensure software is crafted with clear lines of duty.

But, when we take this principle and apply it to leadership, what does that look like? It might come across as a leader hoarding information, keeping his team in the dark, and feeding just the information the leader deems is necessary. Have you worked for or encountered a leader like this? Your experience in this situation may vary. You may thrive on having only relevant information delivered to you, freeing you to focus on the task at hand. Or, you may be like me who does their best work with the context of what is going on around me. The information may not be relevant now, but knowing it may lead to a connection later that proves valuable.

In my current role, I work with eight development teams. We’ve experimented with conducting a sprintly review that includes all teams, allowing them and the stakeholders to a window into all of the work occurring . This practice of information sharing frequently bared fruit, such as a time a developer suggested utilizing new functionality another team developed in a unique way with the feature his team was developing. If the information was hidden too tightly, he wouldn’t have known of this feature and how it could be used.

In an organization, not all information can be widely shared. Some things, such as HR moves, are sensitive. But hiding information paired with limiting team members to a single responsibility robs the organization of your teams mind and
their ability to make fascinating connections.