Vox

Leitura de 22 min

3X3: Questions that Could Change the Way You Think

Summary

This episode of Developer Tea presents three thought-provoking questions intended to shift a developer’s perspective on their career and daily habits. The host introduces the episode as part of a ‘three by three’ series, offering practical takeaways for listeners to apply immediately.

The first question asks, “What if I suddenly couldn’t code? What value could I bring to my career?” This exercise encourages thinking beyond technical output to other forms of value one can provide, such as mentorship, project management, or coaching. It’s framed as a positive mental exercise to diversify the types of work one does, not to increase workload but to maximize effort and recognize that code is just one output of a larger process.

The second question is, “What achievement do I have placed on a pedestal that has caused me to make compromises?” The host explores how future goals like promotions, salaries, or specific relationships can drive us to act against our personal values or preferences. He shares a personal example about wanting flexibility to spend time with his family, urging listeners to examine their underlying motivations and find alternative ways to achieve the same satisfaction without making harmful trade-offs.

The final question is, “What am I rushing?” The host argues that rushing implicitly devalues the current activity, suggesting it’s not worth the time it takes. He posits that if you’re rushing something, one of two things must be true: either the task isn’t worth doing yourself and should be delegated, automated, or eliminated; or the task is worth your time, and you need to eliminate other commitments to give it proper focus. The goal is to achieve a state of ‘calm urgency’ where you are never behind but always have something valuable to do.

The episode concludes by encouraging developers to use these questions to uncover their personal and career purpose, inspiring them to create better work and become great at what they do.

Topic Timeline

  • 00:00:00 — Introduction to the Three Questions Series — The host introduces the episode as part of the ‘three by three’ series, designed to provide three practical takeaways. He encourages listeners to find peace and quiet during the busy holiday season before diving into the questions that aim to change how they think.
  • 00:03:17 — First Question: What if I suddenly couldn’t code? — The host presents the first question: “What if I suddenly couldn’t code? What value could I bring to my career?” He frames this as a positive mental exercise to think beyond coding, exploring alternative ways to provide value such as becoming a project manager, agile coach, or mentor. The goal is to encourage diversifying the types of work one does, not just increasing workload.
  • 00:07:04 — Second Question: What achievement is on a pedestal? — The second question asks: “What achievement do I have placed on a pedestal that has caused me to make compromises?” The host discusses how goals like promotions, salaries, or relationships can lead us to act against our values. He shares a personal example about wanting flexibility for family time, urging listeners to examine their true motivations and find other ways to achieve satisfaction without compromising.
  • 00:12:41 — Third Question: What am I rushing? — The third question is: “What am I rushing?” The host argues that rushing devalues the current activity, implying it’s not worth the time. He states that if you’re rushing, either the task isn’t worth doing yourself (so delegate, automate, or quit it) or it is worth your time and you need to eliminate other commitments to focus properly. The ideal state is ‘calm urgency’—never feeling behind but always having valuable work.
  • 00:17:50 — Conclusion and Encouragement to Reflect — The host concludes by thanking listeners and reiterating the show’s goal: to help developers uncover their personal and career purpose, inspire better work, and achieve greatness. He encourages listeners to take time to ask themselves these questions and develop their own set of perspective-shifting questions.

Episode Info

  • Podcast: Developer Tea
  • Author: Jonathan Cutrell
  • Category: Technology Business Careers Society & Culture
  • Published: 2017-12-13T10:00:00Z
  • Duration: 00:18:50

References

Podcast Info

Transcript

[00:00:00] recently on developer t we talked about the power of questions and i recommend you go back and

[00:00:08] listen to that episode because today i’m going to be asking you three questions that might change

[00:00:15] the way you think this sounds like a very big idea but really it’s very simple i have three

[00:00:21] questions that i’ve asked myself recently that kind of changed my perspective in some way and

[00:00:26] i’m going to share those questions with you today today’s episode is another episode in this week’s

[00:00:32] three by three series the goal of the three by three series we’ve done one in the past another

[00:00:37] week before this week and this is the second three by three series be sure to go back and

[00:00:42] look for those episodes but the whole goal of this is to provide you three episodes this week

[00:00:47] monday wednesday and friday as normal but in these three episodes we’re going to be giving you

[00:00:52] three practical takeaways that you can apply to your career

[00:00:56] you can ask yourself these questions today that’s the entire goal of the three by three series

[00:01:03] and these episodes have been particularly popular with this audience so i hope that you are enjoying

[00:01:09] this further and i did have some people contact me and say hey you should continue this so you

[00:01:15] if you are enjoying the three by three i really would appreciate some feedback

[00:01:18] so that we can continue this into 2018 now before we continue i do want to take a moment

[00:01:25] and in the meantime i’m going to be asking you three questions that you’ve asked yourself today

[00:01:26] encourage you to take a few minutes out of your day to sit down and just relax this is a very busy

[00:01:34] time of year for pretty much everyone but especially for people who work in any kind

[00:01:40] of commerce business a lot of developers are working in that sphere or you’re working with

[00:01:45] people who are working in that sphere so i recommend that if you’re feeling stressed out

[00:01:51] if you’re feeling a little bit overwhelmed you’re not alone there’s tons of people who are in the

[00:01:56] same kind of emotional state that you’re in the same kind of stressful state that you’re in

[00:02:01] trying to meet deadlines while also managing uh probably you know dealing with holiday stress

[00:02:07] like trying to manage schedules of meeting family and uh you know holiday parties at work and that

[00:02:13] kind of thing so it’s very easy to get overwhelmed and no wonder we see the new year as a reset

[00:02:20] because suddenly all of that stuff kind of falls away and we have our clean slate and

[00:02:26] we have our you know our new year’s resolutions ready to go and we we kind of calm down a little

[00:02:32] bit after all of the craziness so instead of waiting until the new year to find that little

[00:02:38] bit of sanity i recommend that you find some peace and quiet today and whatever that means

[00:02:43] maybe it means a five minute walk outside uh depending on how cold it is where you are

[00:02:48] or maybe it just means you know sitting at your desk and listening to one of your favorite songs

[00:02:54] whatever it means for you

[00:02:56] find some peace and quiet find some tranquility and remind yourself that you know this happens

[00:03:01] every year so i hope somebody who’s listening to this i hope you feel encouraged as a result of that

[00:03:07] of this quick discussion on finding a little bit of peace and quiet in this extremely busy season

[00:03:13] okay so let’s jump into these three questions that i think are going to change your mind

[00:03:17] three questions are going that i think are going to change the way you think

[00:03:21] so we’re going to jump straight in the first one is what if i suddenly

[00:03:26] couldn’t

[00:03:26] not code what if i suddenly couldn’t code what value could i bring to my career

[00:03:31] and you might be thinking well why would i ask this question i’m not going to stop coding

[00:03:35] the reason i actually have thought about this in the past is because i was thinking about my

[00:03:40] liabilities ways of protecting my career in case you know some kind of tragedy occurred let’s

[00:03:46] imagine for example that suddenly i wasn’t able to use my hands maybe i get in some sort of accident

[00:03:53] and my hands are paralyzed and this is

[00:03:56] hypothetical i’m not intending to make you think about all of the bad things that can happen to

[00:04:01] you instead this is actually just a positive mental exercise in thinking beyond the code

[00:04:08] right this is something that we do on the show very often so the exercise isn’t to list all of

[00:04:13] the ways that you would end up not coding that’s only going to serve to you know create worry and

[00:04:19] anxiety but instead imagine what you would do if you suddenly couldn’t code and for the sake of the

[00:04:26] exercise you can still imagine that you have use of your hands uh you can still imagine that you’re

[00:04:32] physically able and that your mind is still able to accomplish things so what would you do what

[00:04:38] could you do to provide value in your career and this is an important question everybody’s going to

[00:04:43] have different answers to this right this isn’t just one you know there’s not a a silver bullet

[00:04:48] answer to this some people already have their answer while they’re listening to this episode

[00:04:52] right now they know exactly where they would go and they know exactly what they would do

[00:04:56] to provide value some people would change careers altogether they wouldn’t be involved in software

[00:05:03] development at all some people would still be involved in software development but they would

[00:05:08] change their you know their role in some way maybe they would become you know something like a project

[00:05:13] manager agile coach something in that sphere others may become more like a mentor role there’s

[00:05:20] there’s so many different ways different avenues you could take but here’s what i want to encourage

[00:05:25] you to do

[00:05:26] this year as 2018 approaches i’d love for you to start thinking about how you can start

[00:05:34] incorporating other types of value that you can bring to your job now this is especially true for

[00:05:41] people who work at smaller companies people who work at agencies what are things that you can do

[00:05:46] that can provide more value in your career than just the code that you write what else can you

[00:05:54] take on what are the responsibilities of your career and what are the responsibilities of your

[00:05:56] this is not to increase your workload but rather to change the diversity of the types of work that

[00:06:03] you do right not to add more work to your plate but instead to to maximize your efforts and

[00:06:11] hopefully assuming that you are one of those people who would stay in the industry even if

[00:06:16] you couldn’t code hopefully what you’ll start to see is that code is just an output code itself

[00:06:24] is just a result

[00:06:26] uh of a lot of thinking and a lot of work that goes on before the code ever exists

[00:06:33] and it is important don’t get me wrong here it is very important the people who are writing the code

[00:06:39] they must be skilled individuals and that output is very valuable but it’s not the only thing it’s

[00:06:47] not the only thing that composes software development so that’s the first question and

[00:06:53] you should answer this for yourself and once again what if i suddenly couldn’t code what if

[00:06:58] i was unable to code what value could i bring to my career number two what achievement do i have

[00:07:04] placed on a pedestal that has caused me to make compromises what future achievement what goal

[00:07:12] what motivator have i placed on a pedestal that has caused me to do something that i otherwise

[00:07:19] would not have done do something that i didn’t really want to do necessarily

[00:07:23] or something that was kind of outside of my normal range of what i would prefer or

[00:07:29] even something that i wouldn’t do based on my personal values many people make compromises

[00:07:36] they wouldn’t make if it weren’t for a particular goal of particular achievement that they had

[00:07:41] placed on a pedestal maybe that achievement for you is a title at your company maybe it’s a certain

[00:07:48] salary perhaps it is you know owning a particular thing

[00:07:53] maybe it’s a relationship it could be anything it could be really any kind of achievement that

[00:07:58] you want to gain and sometimes the most powerful thing you can do to change your personal habits

[00:08:04] is to change your motivations i can share a personal example of this this exact thing in

[00:08:12] my own life sometimes i find myself caught up spending every single waking minute in a given

[00:08:17] day thinking about work some of this is my personality some of this you know thinking

[00:08:23] about work means thinking about bettering myself thinking about you know becoming a better person

[00:08:27] all of that is kind of internal in my head i’m thinking more than i am spending time with people

[00:08:34] around me now it makes sense for me to stop and take a step back and ask why am i doing this it’s

[00:08:40] easy to say well i want to be a better person my son is actually turning six months old on the day

[00:08:46] this episode airs so one of my personal motivations in the long term is to make enough margin

[00:08:53] in my life so that i can spend time with my family make enough extra money for example

[00:08:59] to pay off my mortgage early or make enough time in my in my workday enough flexibility in my work

[00:09:09] day that i can choose to be around my son whenever he gets off of school at three o’clock for example

[00:09:15] that would be something that i would want to do and that motivating factor i’ve placed that on a

[00:09:20] pedestal this idea that i have flexibility to spend time with my family and i can spend time with my

[00:09:23] family this is a motivation that i place on a pedestal and as you can see this is actually

[00:09:29] probably a pretty good motivation right uh it’s it’s hard to fight with the idea that

[00:09:34] spending time with your family is a good idea it’s something that most people would want and

[00:09:40] there’s nothing particularly bad about that motivation but what is interesting is that i

[00:09:46] can actually do that today it’s important to figure out what particular goal you have on a

[00:09:51] pedestal to decide if there’s something that you want to do and if there’s something that you want

[00:09:53] another way to achieve that same level of satisfaction the thing that i’m trading that

[00:09:59] time with my family uh the thing that i’m trading in order to uh you know think about my career in

[00:10:05] order to try to create that margin is the thing that i’m actually pursuing a lot of times we have

[00:10:10] these goals and we’ve placed them up on a pedestal as kind of our driving motivating factors and we

[00:10:16] put them out into the future sometime and then we kind of mindlessly work towards those goals

[00:10:21] we work really hard to get a promotion and we work really hard to get a promotion and we work really

[00:10:23] hard to get a promotion and we work really hard to get a promotion uh we we work extra hours uh to

[00:10:26] get a promotion or maybe we work with a client that we don’t necessarily you know want to be

[00:10:32] involved with maybe we don’t believe the same things they believe we’re compromising our

[00:10:37] personal values or maybe we just don’t like them we don’t like working with them they don’t align

[00:10:42] with us in a professional sense and sometimes we’ll work with those kinds of people in order

[00:10:48] to achieve these goals and so our goals are driving us to make compromises and to achieve

[00:10:53] compromises today that if we were to take those goals off of that pedestal or if we were to try to

[00:10:58] find a different way to accomplish the same level of satisfaction without that goal being the way

[00:11:05] to accomplish it we wouldn’t be making those same compromises this will free you from making

[00:11:11] compromise compromises about the work you do every day and once you’ve explicitly identified those

[00:11:16] motivations that cause you to make compromises you can determine more identity driven motivations

[00:11:23] that avoid those unnecessary uh trade-offs if my goal is to spend more time with my family

[00:11:30] then perhaps i can do that today so i encourage you to examine your motivations and determine if

[00:11:37] maybe there’s another way to accomplish the same level of satisfaction for example let’s say that

[00:11:43] you are motivated by a particular uh promotion is it the promotion is it the actual title that

[00:11:51] you want or is there another way to accomplish the same level of satisfaction that you want to

[00:11:53] another underlying factor that is driving you to desire that promotion maybe you’re actually

[00:11:59] desiring respect from your co-workers maybe there’s another way to gain that same level of respect

[00:12:05] without gunning for that promotion so examining that motivation recognizing what the true

[00:12:12] underlying factors are of your motivators you know why is it that you care about that particular

[00:12:19] thing finding other ways to accomplish those that could be a good way to accomplish that promotion

[00:12:23] so i encourage you to do that and i encourage you to do that and i encourage you to do that and

[00:12:23] change the way that you are operating in your career today okay question number three uh real

[00:12:29] quick question number one was what if i suddenly couldn’t code question number two was what

[00:12:35] achievement do i have placed on a pedestal that causes me to make compromises and then question

[00:12:41] number three what am i rushing what am i rushing what am i doing quickly on purpose let’s start out

[00:12:49] by saying this is a value that i hold here at the university of california and i’m going to talk about

[00:12:53] this is a value that i hold here at the university of california and i’m going to talk about

[00:12:53] the developer t rushing is not a good thing in fact in almost every single scenario you can

[00:12:59] imagine rushing is not a good thing the only scenario that i can imagine where rushing is a

[00:13:05] good thing is if there is an emergency if someone is uh is actually in pain or if their health is

[00:13:12] being threatened then rushing to help uh avoid a disaster that makes sense that’s an unavoidable

[00:13:21] situation but in almost every other scenario i’m going to talk about rushing is not a good thing

[00:13:23] but in almost every other scenario i can imagine rushing is not a good thing now we can figure this

[00:13:27] out by explaining why rushing isn’t a good thing let’s talk about what rushing means what what does

[00:13:34] it mean to rush well so put it simply if you’re rushing you’re implicitly or explicitly saying

[00:13:40] the thing that you are doing right now is not worth the time that it is taking you to do it

[00:13:48] right let’s let’s talk about that for a second you are implicitly saying that the thing you

[00:13:52] are doing is not worth the time it is taking you to do it. So you’re incentivized to do it faster.

[00:13:58] And this happens all the time. We rush the way that we write code. We rush testing, for example.

[00:14:05] We rush when we’re driving to work. Maybe we rush because we’re afraid of a consequence.

[00:14:12] But we do very often rush things, even small things. Sometimes we rush when we’re walking

[00:14:19] from one place to another. I like to think of those moving sidewalks in the airport because

[00:14:25] those actually help us move faster than we would normally. And once again, sometimes the reason

[00:14:31] we’re rushing is because we want to avoid a consequence. Not necessarily that the thing

[00:14:35] we’re doing right now isn’t worth our time, but rather that is unavoidable that we must do this

[00:14:40] thing by a certain time because we have other external dependencies. But most of the time,

[00:14:47] most of the time, when we are rushing something,

[00:14:49] that we are doing is because we don’t believe it is worth our time or because implicitly we are

[00:14:56] being told that something else needs to be done quickly. So one of two things must be true when

[00:15:02] you are rushing. One of two things must be true when you are rushing. Number one, the thing you

[00:15:08] are doing is not worth doing yourself. So you should either delegate it, automate it, or quit

[00:15:14] doing it. Let me say that again. The thing you are doing

[00:15:18] is not worth your time.

[00:15:19] It is not worth doing yourself. So you should delegate it, automate it, or quit doing it all

[00:15:25] together. Either that’s the case, either it is not worth doing yourself, or the thing you are doing

[00:15:30] is worth taking your time, and something else needs to be eliminated to allow you the time

[00:15:37] needed to focus on what is worth focusing on. One of those two things must be true.

[00:15:44] Now, we are not perfectly efficient individuals. Sometimes we do have,

[00:15:49] you know, strange impositions of time placed on us. Like, for example,

[00:15:54] the airplane is late when you arrive at the airport, so walking on that moving sidewalk

[00:16:00] makes total sense. It makes sense to rush from one gate to another, because if you don’t,

[00:16:05] the consequence of missing your flight may be, you know, worse than the consequence of rushing

[00:16:11] walking. And that totally makes sense. But when we are talking about those professional things

[00:16:16] that we do, or the everyday activities that we do, we are not perfectly efficient individuals.

[00:16:19] We involve ourselves in, if we examine what we are rushing, we will often find new ways of

[00:16:26] thinking about our activity. We can find new ways of thinking about being mindful of the things that

[00:16:32] we’re doing. So the next time you feel rushed, the next time you feel the tendency to move faster

[00:16:39] than really what it takes to do something well, or what it takes to do something mindfully,

[00:16:44] and what it takes to do something naturally, that urge to try to speed,

[00:16:49] I want you to focus on why. Figure out, is this worth my time? What is causing me

[00:16:55] to feel the need to rush this? And is there something that I need to eliminate

[00:17:00] to give enough time to this activity? If things are appropriately spaced in your life,

[00:17:09] this includes in your personal life, in your professional life, in your social life,

[00:17:14] if things are appropriately spaced, then a constant sense

[00:17:19] of kind of calm urgency. And the idea of calm urgency is that you never have a sense that

[00:17:27] you’re behind, but you also always have something to do. You always have something important in

[00:17:35] front of you, something that you value, something that is necessary and is the best use of your time.

[00:17:41] And to not do that thing would be a misstep, but to rush that thing would be a misstep as well.

[00:17:50] Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Developer Tea.

[00:17:53] This episode was constructed for developers who want to think about this kind of stuff.

[00:18:00] Developers who want to become great in their careers. My goal on the show is to uncover that

[00:18:05] personal purpose, that career purpose that you have as a developer to help you figure out what

[00:18:12] that is, first of all, and secondly, to help you figure out how to use that in your career,

[00:18:19] to inspire you to create better work, and ultimately to become great at what you do

[00:18:24] each and every day. Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode. I hope you find

[00:18:29] some time to ask yourself these questions, and I hope that you have your own set of questions

[00:18:35] that change the way that you think on a daily basis. Thank you so much for listening.

[00:18:41] Until next time, enjoy your tea.

[00:18:49] Thank you.

Visão de gráfico