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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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Outside View or Anecdote? The Right Answer is Both

If you only look at your experience, you fall prey to anecdotal evidence and a whole host of other biases. But, we should be learning through iteration and empiricism. So how can we? Seek the outside view, without abandoning your experience.

Published: 7/11/2022
Length: ~8m
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Protect Transparency On Your Team

Your organizational efficiency is directly related to how you manage information, and information is lost when your organization is chronically lacking transparency.

Published: 7/8/2022
Length: ~10m
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Meeting Red Flags - Problems In Your Meetings That Signal Issues In Your Culture

Once you have the right meetings with the right people, it's time to look at the content of the meeting itself. In this episode we discuss possible red flags that may show up in your meetings, and what kinds of problems these flags may signal.

Published: 7/7/2022
Length: ~15m
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Better Meetings: Who Is the Audience?

Defining your audience is critical to a good meeting. If you haven't defined your audience... who is the meeting even for?

Published: 6/30/2022
Length: ~9m
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Better Meetings - What Kind of Meeting, What Kind of Goal?

Better meetings are not a myth, but it starts with deconstructing how you got to where you are today. A hectic calendar and meetings showing up like popcorn. What can you do to improve this? Managers and individual contributors can start by focusing on what the goal of the meeting is. If the goal of the meeting is to solve a problem, that's a yellow flag.

Published: 6/27/2022
Length: ~12m
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Your Career Growth Doesn't Just Depend On Your Competency

Competency is not the only way you can grow your career. If that was the case, then every engineering manager would be technically more proficient than their reports, and I can guarantee (from many experiences) this is not only not the case - it's not even the norm.

Published: 6/23/2022
Length: ~11m
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Two Questions Focused On Unearthing Hidden Information In Yourself

Sometimes a small question can change the course of your career. It doesn't have to be complicated, and it doesn't have to be detailed. A well placed question might unearth information you didn't realize was in you.

Published: 6/21/2022
Length: ~11m
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Asking a Taboo Question

In today's episode, I give you one question that is considered taboo (for some unknown reason) often in the workplace: What Do You Want? Amazingly, this diverse question is at the root of some of the most important conversations you'll have in your career. You are, after all, a human working with other humans - each with their own unique desires.

Published: 6/15/2022
Length: ~9m
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Reframe Play as a Principle

Play isn't just for kids. In today's episode we'll reframe what play means, and why it's a principle for great work and lifelong learning.

Published: 6/13/2022
Length: ~10m
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Interrogating Beliefs and Treasuring Those Who Disagree With You

When you find something that is counterintuitive, it's possible that it will create immense value to whatever problem you are trying to solve. Seek to interrogate your beliefs to build better explanations for what is true, and find those who disagree with you at an intuitive level.

Published: 6/8/2022
Length: ~16m
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Two Forks in the Road On the Path Towards Optimization and Productivity

Productivity is about working towards your goals, and optimization is about sharpening those efforts more directly. We talk about two forks in the road when you choose the types of optimization you'll deploy in your career and personal life.

Published: 6/6/2022
Length: ~18m
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Techniques for People Struggling to Define Their Values

Determining your values doesn't have to be an extremely serious or permanent exercise. Start at the simplest place you can, and iterate. Your values are as evolving and changing as you are - keep them held lightly.

Published: 6/1/2022
Length: ~14m
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Using Core Tools and Activities for Grounded Productivity

If you feel like everything is spinning around you and it's difficult to remain productive, you aren't alone. In this episode we talk about core tools and activities, and why it's so important to spend the majority of your time working in your core.

Published: 5/31/2022
Length: ~13m
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Productivity, But Only On Paper

Productivity measurements often show nothing of value at all. Today we'll discuss how complexity (or "story") points may actually show exactly the opposite of productivity.

Published: 5/25/2022
Length: ~13m
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The Only Productivity Discussion Worth Having

Productivity is meaningless without a goal, and no activity is banned from being considered productive.

Published: 5/23/2022
Length: ~16m
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Make Room to Expect the Exceptions

On the whole, exceptions are not exceptional. Each one may be unpredictable or rare, but they happen very regularly. How are you prepared to handle those exceptions? Make space today for the principle of headroom.

Published: 5/20/2022
Length: ~6m
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You Need Better Inputs to improve Your Options

The quality of your options is determined by the quality of your inputs. If your decisions have no good options, consider what the source of those options is.

Published: 5/18/2022
Length: ~11m
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Tradeoffs Of Control Optimized To Serve Your Goals

The background noise in today's episode wasn't just a mistake, it was a choice. A tradeoff. Tradeoffs represent a decision of control and energy. You will make them every day, but towards what goal? When you make a tradeoff and decide where to put your energy, you are necessarily deciding not to put it elsewhere. So, do so with purpose and intention.

Published: 5/11/2022
Length: ~11m
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Scheduling Time To Go The Extra Mile

What was the last time you prepared for a meeting? I'm not talking about the times when you were forced to prepare. I mean, when was the last time you put thought and effort into a meeting that most people just show up to? In this episode, we talk about simple ways to go the extra mile. Also, this involves no *extra* work on your part.

Published: 5/9/2022
Length: ~11m
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Premortems for Personal Goals

Premortems aren't just a tool for teams launching projects. You can use these for your personal goals as well. What are the things most likely to stop you from achieving your goals today, this month, this year, or by the end of your career?

Published: 5/4/2022
Length: ~8m
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Developer Tea was a part of Spec and is hosted by Jonathan Cutrell, engineering manager at Guild Education.