The Expressive Engineer - AKA "Empathy for Engineers"
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Talk by Sue Johnston and Declan Whelan at Agile & Beyond, Ypsilanti, MI, May 5, 2016 The stereotype of engineers and technical professionals as inarticulate, socially inept geniuses inventing problems to solve is not just unkind. It's inaccurate. (OK, maybe not the "genius" part.) Yet the Dilbert image persists. So do jokes like the one about the engineer sentenced to death on the guillotine, who watches the instrument of death malfunction, then tells the operators how to fix it. In this interactive session, we'll show a little empathy for engineers and other analytical folk whose neurological wiring makes them seem different from the rest of humanity. We'll also explore how those with the engineering mindset can consciously adopt behaviours that amplify their value to their teams and organizations - and make their lives easier by positioning themselves for understanding. The analytical mind is particularly valuable when we can turn it off and adopt the perspective of the person we're talking with. Technical professionals are excellent at finding solutions to problems. Unfortunately, searching for the perfect solution to the interesting problem we see can prevent us from seeing other problems that stand in the way of value for others. True collaboration and value creation invite us to see through the lenses of end users and sponsors and help them connect the dots. In this interactive presentation, you will discover: - how to make your ideas meaningful to others by taking their perspective - how shifting your language from "What?" to "So What?" helps people connect your dots - why giving up the need to be smart may be the smartest thing you ever do Join Declan, a professional engineer and developer, and Sue, a communication coach, in a lively discussion of what can happen when engineers and technical professionals shift their mindset from solving problems to creating impact.
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The Expressive Engineer - AKA "Empathy for Engineers"
- 1. THE EXPRESSIVE ENGINEER Shifting from output to impact Sue Johnston Declan Whelan A.K.A. “EMPATHY FOR ENGINEERS”`
- 2. WHAT’S THE UX OF WORKING WITH YOU?
- 3. WHAT’S GOING ON HERE? The engineer believes • Work is about solving problems. The non-engineer believes • Work is about achieving a vision.
- 4. WHAT’S GOING ON HERE? The engineer believes • The future is looming. • We must plan for the worst since we don’t know what will happen. The non-engineer believes • The future is promising. • Anything is possible. Let’s be ready.
- 5. WHAT’S GOING ON HERE? The engineer believes • Language is for transmitting information. The non-engineer believes • Language is for making meaning.
- 6. WHAT’S GOING ON HERE? The engineer believes • I know in my head because of detailed analysis. • I test each detail for validity, then recombine and test again. The non-engineer believes • I know because I can relate to it and connect to my experience. • I validate by checking with others.
- 7. CUSTOMARY “WHO ARE WE?” SLIDE DECLAN WHELAN SUE JOHNSTON Current role Agile coach + trainer Agile coach + trainer Professional training Electrical Engineer Psychology/Business IT roots Software development UX, user docs + training Came to agile via Agile Coach Camp Professional coaching Inspired by Building great software Effective communication Required cute animal image
- 10. Work is for solving problems Work is for achieving a vision Future is looming; plan for worst. Future is promising; invite possibility. Knows in head, through analysis Knows through gut feel Language is for transmitting information Language is for sharing meaning Wanting something should be irrelevant in decisions Wanting something is important in decisions If you say something you don’t know to be true, you are lying If you say something you know is untrue you are lying THE ENGINEERING MINDSET CONTINUUM Inspired by The Geek Leader’s Handbook, by Paul Glen
- 11. Work is for solving problems Work is for achieving a vision Future is looming; plan for worst. Future is promising; invite possibility. Knows in head, through analysis Knows through gut feel Language is for transmitting information Language is for sharing meaning Wanting something should be irrelevant in decisions Wanting something is important in decisions If you say something you don’t know to be true, you are lying If you say something you know is untrue you are lying WHERE ARE YOU? EXERCISE 5 minutes 1. YOUR settings 2. DISCUSS at table Inspired by The Geek Leader’s Handbook, by Paul Glen
- 12. THE ENGINEERING MINDSET • You don’t have to be an engineer to have one.
- 15. PERSPECTIVE MENTAL MoDELS Mental models are deeply held internal images of how the world works, images that limit us to familiar ways of thinking and acting.
- 16. Art by Markus Raetz PERSPECTIVE
- 17. PERSPECTIVE
- 18. PERSPECTIVE Images from Jonathan Rasmusson
- 19. EMPATHY Empathy I understand and feel your pain. Sympathy I feel sorry you have pain.
- 20. TYPES OF EMPATHY • Cognitive empathy • The capacity to understand another’s perspective or mental state. • Sometimes known as “perspective taking” or “theory of mind.” • Emotional/Affective empathy • Literally feel the other person’s emotions. • A somatic or physical connection. • Compassionate empathy • Capacity to respond with an appropriate emotion to another’s mental states. • We feel their pain and take action to help.
- 21. EMPATHY MAP THINK and FEEL SEE HEAR PAIN GAIN SAY and DO Developed by XPLANE and popularized by Innovation Games
- 24. MAKE A HABIT OF LISTENING
- 27. WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT Engineering Other “Lacking empathy, people in large organizations struggle to make intuitive decisions and get fooled into believing they understand the business if they have quantitative research.” (Source: Dev Patnaik: Wired to Care) Education of S&P 100 CEOs (Source: Spencer Stuart) 33%
- 28. WHAT ONE THING WILL YOU COMMIT TO? • Before you leave this conference • At your work
- 30. USEFUL REFERENCES Paul Glen leadinggeeks.com • Leading Geeks: How to Manage and Lead People who Deliver Technology • The Geek Leader’s Handbook: Essential Leadership Insight for People with Technical Backgrounds Indi Young indiyoung.com • Practical Empathy: For Collaboration and Creativity in Your Work Brene Brown https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Evwgu369Jw Andrew Annett Agile & Beyond 2016 Growing Communication Skills with the Empathy Toy (Session tomorrow at 3:00 PM)
- 31. Sue Johnston sue@leanintuit.com @itsunderstood Declan Whelan declan@leanintuit.com @dwhelan Waterloo Region FIND US HERE!
Editor's Notes
- No need to say anything. Just give people long enough to read the cartoon.
- This is where we can do the little sketch – sort of like this. This is what they are THINKING. What’s in the thought balloons over their heads. Scenario: D & S talking about a new feature to build. Perhaps login via twitter. D: “Her fuzzy visions are too vague to work on.” S: “He wants to turn my beautiful vision into a problem.” D: “She gets mad when I try to make sense of her fantasies.” S: “His questions get in the way of my imagination.”
- More thought balloons S: “All he talks about it what won’t work.” D: “Her optimism means I get stuck managing all the risks.” S: “I don’t even want him in the room when we’re planning.” D: “She thinks I’m dragging her down, when I’m trying to help.”
- This is where we can do the little sketch – sort of like this. Could support it with slides that give context. D: “She is so vague, I can’t figure out what she’s talking about.” S: “He is annoyingly literal. I can’t say anything without him picking it apart over details.”
- More thoughts S: “His details confuse and annoy me when I’m trying to get the big picture. D: “I’m offended by her attachment to being ignorant.” S: “And his condescending attachment to being right interferes with our getting results.” D: “She endangers us all with her intellectual laziness.”
- So this is who we REALLY are. We’ve had occasion to work together lots of times – we’ve learned to dance with each others’ quirks and strengths and enjoy our difference. We’ll lead you in an exploration of the engineering mindset – how it can get us into trouble – and how it can work well for us.
- Our observation is that there’s a stance that’s prevalent amongst the people attracted to engineering and software development that we’re calling the “Engineering Mindset.” It makes total sense to those who have it, but can get in the way of effective interaction with those whose brains are wired differently. Our hypothesis is that interactions between people will improve if we expose, understand and embrace our differences and make an effort to understand each other. Here’s how we expect the session will unfold. We haven’t put any times on it. We don’t want to lie to you.
- .So let’s take a look at the Engineering Mindset
- If we recall the dialogue we acted out at the start of our talk, the issues that created tension for us fell along these dimensions. (Give them a minute to look at them.) Where do YOU fall on the continuum? (Paul Glen calls these dichotomies “Contraxiums.”)
- Using the handout we’ve provided, move the sliders to reflect where YOU stand on each of the dichotomies. Then, at your tables discuss how it affects your interactions. What’s the UX of working with you? You’ll have 5 minutes. [MAY NEED TO BE LONGER] Do a debrief – What stood out for you, either as an individual or in discussion with others? This is an exercise in self-awareness. What is it like to work with you?
- WE MAY NOT NEED THIS SLIDE What IS different about the engineering mindset? Life is full of problems to solve. There is one right answer. OR There is the best answer – and we can find it Data is the only truth. Precision is important. Engineers need to be able to take ideas and turn them into bolts and bars, zeroes and ones, tangible things. OUTPUT
- DECLAN For this exercise, we’ll invite you to draw a hand. We’ll give you 30 seconds How many of you traced your hand? How many of you looked at your own hand, or someone else’s? How many simply worked from your own understanding of what a hand looks like? Mental models are deeply held internal images of how the world works, images that limit us to familiar ways of thinking and acting. Very often, we are not consciously aware of our mental models or the effects they have on our behavior-. One of the most important aspects of being able to take someone else’s perspective is to use careful observation.
- DECLAN Mental models are deeply held internal images of how the world works, images that limit us to familiar ways of thinking and acting. Very often, we are not consciously aware of our mental models or the effects they have on our behavior” One of the most important aspects of being able to take someone else’s perspective is to use careful observation.
- A change in perspective can make a big difference.
- Keeping in mind that the first value of the Agile Manifesto is that we value “Individuals and Interactions over Processes and Tools, if we want to have good interactions with others, we need to be able to take their perspective, see things from their point of view and strive to understand their mental model What I see may not be what you see. Both are a version of the truth. That’s important for EVERYONE, not just those with the engineering mindset. Though, it is common for those with the engineering mindset to be convinced – and try to convince others – that theirs is the correct perspective, the one that matters.
- Being able to take someone else’s perspective is often understood as EMPATHY Not to be confused with SYMPATHY
- 3 types of empathy Cognitive/Perspective taking Cognitive empathy, also known as ‘perspective-taking’ is not really what most of us would think of as empathy at all. Cognitive empathy is basically being able to put yourself into someone else’s place, and see their perspective. Emotional/Affective Emotional empathy is when you quite literally feel the other person’s emotions alongside them, as if you had ‘caught’ the emotions. Compassionate Finally, compassionate empathy is what we usually understand by empathy: feeling someone’s pain, and taking action to help.
- Empathy for users For bosses/clients Each other We can use this tool to help us step into the world of the others in our lives. What do they
- When we use our empathy, we step into the world of the people we’re interacting with. We begin to understand them. When we do that, we also invite them to step into our world, and they begin to understand us. So to check in – we demo
- Make a habit of "radical listening" "What is essential,' wrote Marshall Rosenberg, psychologist and founder of Non-Violent Communication, "is our ability to be present to what's really going on within - to the unique feelings and needs a person is experiencing at that very moment." IS THERE AN EXERCISE THAT’S FAST AND FRESH ????????
- It's about recovering the curiosity everyone had as children, but which society is so good at beating out of us. Get beyond superficial talk but beware interrogating people. Respect the advice of oral historian Studs Terkel - who always spoke to people on the bus on his daily commute: "Don't be an examiner, be the interested inquirer."
- 33% of S&P 500 CEOs undergrad degrees are in engineering. (Source: Spencer Stuart) “A major flaw in contemporary business practice is a lack of empathy inside large corporateions Lacking any sense of empathy, people inside companies struggle to make intuitive decisions and often get fooled into believing they understand their business if they have quantitative research to rely upon. (Source: Dev Patnaik: Wired to Care) I have to remind myself, almost every day, that one of the the most important qualities I can possess as a developer is empathy. Primarily for the user, their cognitive load, and what they’re trying to accomplish. But further, for the developer who comes to my code when I’m done, the guy who operates it, and everyone else down the line.
- Here’s how we expect the session will unfold. We’ll have something for you do do in each section.