Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Holiday Break
I've been posting every two weeks consistently, but the holidays caught up with me this week. I'll be back in two weeks. Happy Holidays!
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Grabbing the Dog Toy
If you've ever played with a dog you know about this. The dog brings you a ball to throw and sets it at your feet. When you reach down to grab it, the dog takes it back. If you try to take the toy from the dog, he'll refuse to let go. The harder you try to get the toy, the deeper he sinks his teeth into it. Don't think your point of view is superior to the dog's; you're as emotionally connected to the ball as he is. And as long as the relationship between the two of you is defined by your desire for the ball, you'll get nowhere. The only way you can get the toy is ignore it, wait for the dog to leave it alone and then snatch it away when he's distracted. Interestingly, once you have the toy, the dog changes from angrily defending its property to happily waiting for you to throw the ball.
Human beings are social creatures like dogs, and we aren't that different from them. At certain times we revert to adversarial relationships, even if it's against our own interest. Any attempt to address the problem directly seems to cause everyone to dig in their heels even more, making things worse. Breaking out of this bond requires distraction, either by changing the subject or getting away from the problem long enough to cool down.
Fights with customers over whether a change is a bug or an enhancement are notorious for how much emotion they raise and how impossible it is to come to an agreement. Even though classifying something as an enhancement means more time will be spent getting it right, customers feel like their change is being snatched away from them to some far off future they'll never see. Distract the customer away from their bug definition by defining the process instead. A change can either be made quickly with minimal testing or can go through a whole design-code-test-document cycle. These terms are easier to swallow because they don't make the customer feel like their change is being taken away. Throw that ball as hard as you can and the customer will run after it.
But customers aren't the only ones that can't let go of dog toys; it's a universal affliction. It's easy to become possessive about a piece of code, a build method or an operating system and feel defensive when someone criticizes them. Although this behavior is easy to recognize in others, it's hard to see when you're the one with your teeth sunk into something you should let go. Being too attached to anything, from a variable name to a business process, makes it that much harder to drop when necessary. You should be able to step back from anything enough to judge whether it's time to give it up.
This is done by being alone. Defensive aggression is a perversion of social behavior so you have to be antisocial to break out of it. Our business culture encourages endless meetings to talk out problems but sometimes you need to be alone with your own thoughts to figure something out. The social network feeds your need for defense from perceived attacks, so leaving it allows you to look at something objectively without thinking of it as your property.
This doesn't necessarily mean being physically alone. Everyone knows you can be alone in your thoughts even if someone is present. But most don't realize that even if no one is around, you could still not be alone enough to think. If, in your head, you're rehashing an argument with someone you aren't really alone. You're still acting out a defensive social posture against the character in your mind, who strangely, knows how to push your buttons better than any real person does. You need to banish this person, either by ignoring them or waiting until they get tired and leave you alone. Then you'll be alone enough to think about things without getting defensive. At this point you can relax your jaws, let the ball fall on the grass, and think of something else.
Human beings are social creatures like dogs, and we aren't that different from them. At certain times we revert to adversarial relationships, even if it's against our own interest. Any attempt to address the problem directly seems to cause everyone to dig in their heels even more, making things worse. Breaking out of this bond requires distraction, either by changing the subject or getting away from the problem long enough to cool down.
Fights with customers over whether a change is a bug or an enhancement are notorious for how much emotion they raise and how impossible it is to come to an agreement. Even though classifying something as an enhancement means more time will be spent getting it right, customers feel like their change is being snatched away from them to some far off future they'll never see. Distract the customer away from their bug definition by defining the process instead. A change can either be made quickly with minimal testing or can go through a whole design-code-test-document cycle. These terms are easier to swallow because they don't make the customer feel like their change is being taken away. Throw that ball as hard as you can and the customer will run after it.
But customers aren't the only ones that can't let go of dog toys; it's a universal affliction. It's easy to become possessive about a piece of code, a build method or an operating system and feel defensive when someone criticizes them. Although this behavior is easy to recognize in others, it's hard to see when you're the one with your teeth sunk into something you should let go. Being too attached to anything, from a variable name to a business process, makes it that much harder to drop when necessary. You should be able to step back from anything enough to judge whether it's time to give it up.
This is done by being alone. Defensive aggression is a perversion of social behavior so you have to be antisocial to break out of it. Our business culture encourages endless meetings to talk out problems but sometimes you need to be alone with your own thoughts to figure something out. The social network feeds your need for defense from perceived attacks, so leaving it allows you to look at something objectively without thinking of it as your property.
This doesn't necessarily mean being physically alone. Everyone knows you can be alone in your thoughts even if someone is present. But most don't realize that even if no one is around, you could still not be alone enough to think. If, in your head, you're rehashing an argument with someone you aren't really alone. You're still acting out a defensive social posture against the character in your mind, who strangely, knows how to push your buttons better than any real person does. You need to banish this person, either by ignoring them or waiting until they get tired and leave you alone. Then you'll be alone enough to think about things without getting defensive. At this point you can relax your jaws, let the ball fall on the grass, and think of something else.
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