Making Better Mistakes Tomorrow

Danielle Jabin May 22, 2015

“Don’t make the same mistake twice.”

Someone said that once

I never make the same mistake twice.

In the past week or day even, we’ve all made

mistakes. I definitely have.

Mistakes are proof that you’re trying.

But how can we make better mistakes?

Who am I?

Hi, I’m Danielle.

I’m from here (California).

But now I live here (Sweden).

I work at Spotify.

Software Engineer à Agile Coach

What should I talk about?

“Something you’re passionate about!”

Our biggest difficulties in building software

stem from process and communication not the

technology itself.

What can you do today (or rather in 60 min

when this is over or on Monday when you’re

back at work) to make a difference?

Focus

Less is the new more!

In particular, limiting your Work In Progress

(WIP).

What happens without WIP limits? •  Trying to start new tasks instead of

tackling impediments/blockers. •  Requirements can change when

the time to complete is longer so work may need to be thrown away or redone.

•  Longer time to complete means longer time to receive feedback and iterate.

What’s really happening here?

Context switching!

Context switching always has a cost.

Are some people better at multitasking?

Researchers at Stanford wanted to find out

“It turns out multitaskers are terrible

at every aspect of multitasking.” - Clifford

Nass

Focus: Strategies

Scrum •  Sprints, Sprint Planning, Sprint

Review, Retrospective •  Timebox and limit WIP

Scrum Your Life!

•  Personal Kanban Board •  Personal WIP •  “To Do” lists •  One for the week •  One for the day •  Backlog

I like “To Do” lists.

TPD Priorities & Achievements

This Week in Tech (@ Spotify)

Modeling Behavior

Innovation is the driving force of the tech

industry. To boldly go where no man (or woman) has gone before.

What is innovation built on?

Experimentation!

Some experiments work, some don’t.

Think about where you work. •  What happens when someone

fails? •  What happens when you don’t

agree with a coworker? with a manager? with the CEO? How do you act on this?

At Spotify, we endeavor to cultivate a “failure is okay” culture. ‣  We don’t want to create a culture

that incentivizes people to not be forthcoming or daring or brave. -  Information gets hidden behind

inefficiencies! -  We don’t want to impede innovation! -  Encourage—reward, even—openness

and dissent.

To foster a desired culture, model the

behavior you want to see.

“Most human behavior is learned

observationally through modeling” – Albert

Bandura

Bobo doll experiment

When people aren’t afraid to fail, they’re willing to take risks

because they know the environment will be

supportive of them if it doesn’t go well.

Modeling Behavior: Strategies

Fail Wall

Spotify values on the office walls

Reinforcement and repetition

That’s this guy (CTO)

Imagine this: it’s your first month on the job,

and you’ve just very publicly broken some firewall settings.

What happens next?

Others chime in…

And more…

And more…

And even more!

Receiving Feedback

Ignorance is bliss.

…right?

The people around you have insight into your growth areas. Use it!

When life gives you lemons…

Not everyone will have received (or remember) training on how to give

good feedback.

To grow, we must find the value in criticism we

receive despite our natural reactive

tendencies.

Receiving Feedback: Strategies

“Fist of Five” Voting ‣  Quick and informal ‣  “What’s one thing that could be

improved for next time?” -  Specificity is key

‣  Press for constructive criticism (not just positive things, though that’s nice reinforcement too)

Loops at Spotify •  Want feedback? Ask for it! •  The more frequently you ask, the

less surprises there will be and the less intimidating it becomes.

“Have you given them that feedback?” •  Again, when you make it part of the

culture/day-to-day, it feels less intimidating.

Making Better Mistakes Tomorrow: -  Focus -  Modeling Behavior -  Receiving Feedback

Questions?

Thank You!