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I started Developer Tea in 2015 to help engineers find clarity, perspective, and purpose in regular short bursts of high-value content.

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Misconceptions about Exceptions and Cultural Shifts - Invisible Inertia

In this episode, we discuss how invisible inertia can cause us to misinterpret our reality in work scenarios. • Discover why common misconceptions about behaviour are so difficult to spot. • Explore why your "unique" situation might be a common trap, a "uniqueness bias". • Learn how exceptional states can become the norm and impact your life. • Uncover how people's values shape company culture, and how to evaluate this. • Why might expecting a culture to change in the direction you want be unrealistic? • Learn why you should evaluate situations for what they are right now, instead of expecting future change.

Published: 1/29/2025
Length: ~24m
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Action Orientation and Making Faster Decisions

Time-crunched and data-scarce? Learn how the RPD model can leverage expertise and intuition to speed up decision-making, and how the 'Rubicon' moment can make your team more action-oriented. Stop endless planning and start doing: Learn how understanding action phases can help your team move faster from discussion to delivery. • Is your team stuck in debate? Discover the "Rubicon" moment and how crossing it can boost productivity. • Learn to recognise when deliberation is costing you more than it's worth, and how to commit to a plan, even with limited information. • Is your team over-analysing? See how intuition and expertise can drive faster, "good-enough" decisions using the Recognition-Primed Decision (RPD) model. • Learn to make quick decisions in high-pressure situations using experience, even without perfect data. • Trust your team's expertise to move from talk to action sooner and more effectively. • Want to improve your team's speed and decision-making? Tune in to find out how to get moving!

Published: 1/22/2025
Length: ~26m
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Match your Action to Intention - Pairing Five Whats with Five Whys

Use "What" to get more specific. Align actions with intentions for better time management. • Stop wasting time on autopilot. Discover the power of the Five Whats and start being intentional with your time. • Tired of vague labels? Ask yourself, "What am I actually doing?" to gain clarity over your activities. • Learn how to move beyond "focus time" and define the specific actions you're taking. • See how your actions align with your goals (or don't!). Use this to refine your schedule and achieve your objectives. • These concepts can flex to apply to every aspect of your life

Published: 1/15/2025
Length: ~23m
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Upgrade Your Resolutions

In today's episode, we're focusing on taking your resolutions and making them matter. I will give you two challenges in this episode to improve the quality and potential of success for your resolutions.

Published: 1/11/2025
Length: ~18m
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Ten Years of Developer Tea

Today, we celebrate 10 years of Developer Tea. I wouldn't be doing this podcast without you listening. Especially if you have been listening for many years, thank you!

Published: 1/5/2025
Length: ~9m
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Better Low-Information Estimates - Putting the "Scientific" in SWAG

How can you create better scientific wild a** guesses when the work is not well defined? We discuss a few strategies in this episode. We also talk a bit about what an estimate is in the first place, and how it differs from a commitment / deadline.

Published: 12/17/2024
Length: ~27m
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Agency - How The On Over In Model Can Help You Grow Your Career

Are you operating in the world, or are you working on a problem? This shift in agency can make all the difference in your career.

Published: 12/11/2024
Length: ~13m
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Using ChatGPT for Career Experience Simulations - LLMs and Direct Simulations for Faster Career Experience Gains

Can you use ChatGPT to become a better engineer? I'm not just talking about learning a language or fixing a bug with ChatGPT providing advice... I'm talking about career simulations. In this episode we discuss how the airline industry has fixed the problem of experience, and how we can learn from their insights to create low-stakes learning environments that boost our career and confidence through the roof.

Published: 12/3/2024
Length: ~31m
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Coaching Yourself: Career Coaching Personas for Everyday Engineers, Part Three - Shoulder Socrates

In today's episode we discuss the concept of adopting self-coaching personas, and discuss the third persona, "Shoulder Socrates."

Published: 11/19/2024
Length: ~16m
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Coaching Yourself: Career Coaching Personas for Everyday Engineers, Part Two - The Overoptimizer

In today's episode we discuss the concept of adopting self-coaching personas, and discuss the second persona, the over-optimizer.

Published: 11/12/2024
Length: ~22m
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Coaching Yourself: Career Coaching Personas for Everyday Engineers, Part One - The Available Manager

In today's episode we discuss the concept of adopting self-coaching personas, and discuss a critical first persona to start with.

Published: 11/4/2024
Length: ~20m
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The Highest Leverage Work You Do - Footing the Ladder

High-leverage work often comes in the simplest form of helping another person with *their* efforts.

Published: 10/18/2024
Length: ~15m
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Prioritization is the Ultimate Skill

Learn to prioritize, and everything else falls into place. This is clarity through perspective and purpose.

Published: 10/4/2024
Length: ~14m
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Career Growth Comes From Finding Low Hanging Fruit in the Gaps

Your career growth will be directly correlated to your ability to solve critical unsolved problems in the gaps of your organization's problems. Focus on finding the problems that have a high chance of success for you specifically - the low hanging fruit.

Published: 9/19/2024
Length: ~9m
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How Culture Might Eat Your Values For Breakfast

In this episode we discuss the delineation between culture and values. What you allow is just as important as what you value.

Published: 9/5/2024
Length: ~14m
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The Tricky Parts of Merit Cycles

The blunt reality: Merit cycles are not how you build your earning power or career. They are a function of company culture and HR, and generally speaking are disconnected from your biggest opportunities for growth. So, where should you focus? That's what we talk about in today's episode.

Published: 8/29/2024
Length: ~26m
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Limiting Factors - The Hidden Focus That Matters the Most

In today's episode we discuss focus, again. This time, through the lens of a few mental models that help us decide what is *actually* the right thing to focus on. You'll learn the real enemy of focus (note: it's not just distraction).

Published: 8/22/2024
Length: ~16m
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Improve Your Chances In Your Engineering Job Search Using the Scientific Method with Brian Pulliam

I'm joined today by Brian Pulliam. I've personally engaged Brian as a career coach. In this discussion we'll talk a bit about coaching, and about how you can set yourself up to become a much better candidate in your job search as an engineering leader.

Published: 8/14/2024
Length: ~86m
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Improve Your Chances In Your Engineering Job Search Using the Scientific Method with Brian Pulliam

I'm joined today by Brian Pulliam. I've personally engaged Brian as a career coach. In this discussion we'll talk a bit about coaching, and about how you can set yourself up to become a much better candidate in your job search as an engineering leader.

Published: 8/8/2024
Length: ~87m
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Focus On Outcomes By Resetting Your Base

In this episode we talk about the concept of "resetting your base" - moving in a direction you don't necessarily want to go in order to achieve better outcomes in the long run.

Published: 8/2/2024
Length: ~19m
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Developer Tea was a part of Spec and is hosted by Jonathan Cutrell, engineering manager at Guild Education.