Engineering Happiness

ZendCon 2016 keynote

Transcript

1. Engineering Happiness
   Laura Thomson
   @lxt / laura@[laurathomson|mozilla].com
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2. Process
   Software
   System
   —Any Software Engineering 101 Textbook
   People
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3. For engineering managers
   Photo by Trev Grant, https://www.flickr.com/photos/trevgrant/13746359923 under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
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4. And engineers
   (pretty
   interested in
   their own
   happiness)
   Photo by Trev Grant, https://www.flickr.com/photos/trevgrant/13496315673 under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
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5. Hypothesis - happy engineers:
   Don’t quit
   Produce code
   Don’t complain
   (Assumptions: competence, motivation, fit)
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6. Don’t quit?
   Metric: retention/turnover
   But turnover sucks as a metric:
   (Extremely) trailing indicator
   ~30% mean turnover in SV
   Changes (spikes) notable, too late to be actionable
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7. Where is turnover useful/actionable?
   Look for anomalies
   Local maxima point to specific problems
   Junior? Senior? Management? Technical?
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8. “People leave managers, not jobs”
   Not only managers:
   Company/project/culture jumped the shark
   Stopped learning
   Burned out
   Better offer
   (Good manager can mitigate but not fully overcome these things)
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9. Productive?
   Critical happiness metric at the micro level, per person
   Less so as a macro measure of morale
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10. 0"
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    2008'03"
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    Pushes&per&Month&
    Time&
    Pushes&to&hg.mozilla.org&
    Holidays
    FX10
    Firefox 4.0
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11. Complaints?
    “If the worst thing they have to complain about is the art hanging on
    the walls…”
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12. Complaints?
    Sentiment (Slack, IRC, Basecamp, Yammer, commit comments etc)
    Silence
    Again: more about individuals than overall
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13. What else can we look at?
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14. Leading indicators:
    Hours worked
    Downtime or # pages/alerts
    Tech debt
    Stock prices / Market share
    Technology (TIOBE, HN, etc) in decline
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15. “Glassdoor Bingo”
    (What companies? What causes?)
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16. Technical debt is an energy vampire for good engineers.
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17. Surveys (CultureAmp, etc)
    Infrequent, quantitative and qualitative
    Monitors (standu.ps, tinypulse, etc):
    Frequent, quantitative (graphite for humans)
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18. Unhappiness
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20. Not to be confused with
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21. Not to be confused with
    Going into management
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22. “Burnout is defined as a state of chronic stress and frustration that
    leads to:
    physical and emotional exhaustion;
    feelings of cynicism and detachment; and
    a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment.”
    “Where do you fall on the burnout continuum?”
    https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/high-octane-women/201205/where-do-you-fall-the-burnou
    (Downloaded June 1, 2015)
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23. Causes of burnout:
    Long hours
    Death marches
    Too many pages
    Too much travel
    Politics
    Missing out on life/family
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24. GSD/BS ratio:
    Politics
    Excessive meetings
    Cargo cult process
    Tech debt
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26. Mastery
    Autonomy
    Purpose
    Pink, Dan. Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
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27. Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory
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28. Hygiene
    Work environment - hardware, tools, snacks
    Management / policies
    Salary / benefits
    Safety
    Messing these up makes people unhappy.
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29. Motivation
    achievement / recognition
    interesting projects
    learning new stuff
    growth / advancement
    Getting these right makes people happy.
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30. Motivation
    Hygiene
    Awesome
    Just a paycheck
    Early stage startup
    Terrible
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31. Enough management talk.
    Photo by Trev Grant, https://www.flickr.com/photos/trevgrant/13746359923 under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
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32. √
    How can I be
    a happy
    engineer?
    Photo by Trev Grant, https://www.flickr.com/photos/trevgrant/13496315673 under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
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33. Work on things you are good at and enjoy
    at places that fit the way you like to work
    and change once in a while.
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34. First, know thyself.
    What type of engineer are you?
    (A short and unscientific quiz)
    Public domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sigmund_Freud_1926.jpg
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35. Senior vs Junior
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36. Structured vs Chaotic
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37. Team Player vs Lone Wolf
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38. Purist vs Pragmatist
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39. Starter vs Finisher
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40. (There is no punchline to
    this quiz, but if it makes
    you feel better, you can
    say I said you were a
    Level 70 Senior Chaos
    Wolf of Pragmatic
    Finishing
    or whatever.)
    Public domain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_wolf#/media/File:Howlsnow.jpg
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41. Progress
    Image: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jacksonmedeiros/2719799718 under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/
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42. I am often asked:
    “How do I progress as an engineer?”
    “How do I become a more senior engineer?”
    “How do I get promoted?”
    “Should I go into management?”
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43. What’s progress to you? Do you want to:
    Move to a more challenging role?
    Move to a more interesting company?
    Work on a harder or more interesting project?
    Become an expert in something?
    Knowing what you want leads to how to get it
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44. Helpful things:
    Change projects or teams every 1-2 years
    Learn from people who are awesome
    Learn to write
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45. Skills maketh the engineer, for example:
    Java -> Android, Big Data, Financial Services
    Ruby -> Startups
    C or Rust -> Systems Programming
    (PHP, of course, leads to a ridiculously large number of web
    dev jobs, so it’s good that you’re here.)
    Be aware of the strategic consequences of your choices
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46. tl;dl
    Don’t be afraid to leave bad jobs
    Know yourself and what you like to do
    Have a plan for what you want to learn next
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47. Two last pieces of advice for long term happiness:
    1. Check on yourself every 6-12 months
    2. Develop good boundaries between work and personal life
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48. Upwards, to the right, and straight on ’til morning.
    Get this print: https://www.etsy.com/listing/107306078/welcome-to-the-internet-hq-11x17
    Questions? @lxt
    Slides? https://speakerdeck.com/lauraxt/
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