cateMay 29, 2025
So excited for my girl @grimalkina's talk at craft! I'm in the front row and will be live posting it! 💖
Show threadcate

How are we doing at "being technical"? @grimalkina - looks at how technical teams work, finds it fascinating!

Questions for engineers:
- what does your work help people do?
- how many people a day does your people help?

May 29, 2025 at 8:55amWeb
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
50:50 split on how people feel about this.
@grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Huge split between managers and devs in perception of this from @grimalkina's large scale studies. Managers answer around 75% yes, devs around 25%.
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
How devs are feeling about things - ai threat, code review anxiety, are we seen as people? @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Software devs are seen as braina in jars - @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
What a fascinating question! @grimalkina gathered people and watched them do their top of mind tasks. Triaging, solving bug, ramping up in codebase.
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
People had deep sophisticated strategies for learning, organizations did not give a shit. Sometimes even works against it. This creates a learning debt cycle. @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
In the most toxic versions people get a message they need to keep their heads down. Don't share the learnings. This has even bigger effects on the next people, especially juniors. @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Brains in jars organization creates "brittle productivity". When things go wrong, it goes badly wrong. How can we get to resilient productivity? When something goes wrong, the psychological structures empower human problem solving.
@grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Why do we get pulled into short term performance cycles?
- short term performance is not long term learning. Think measuring test vs real world performance.
- performance orientation - being fixated on making grade - is fragile under pressure. It works for a while but eventually you start to learn challenging situations. Bad for innovation.
- if believe in power of brilliance / brilliance is required, fields kill innovation. Think need to weed out people who are not "born brilliant". Assholes weed out other people. Compassionate people weed out themselves.
@grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Cat's law! @grimalkina is not pulling punches.
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Psychological accordances - like a kayak allows you to explore the ocean, psychology also uses affordances. @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Seed is the belief - like wanting to overcome code review anxiety. Soil is the reinforcement, the environment. Does it enable? @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
We are constantly conducting little tests and calibrating our expectations. Calibration creates the possibility of change. "We only have a culture because we are all changing it all the time" @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Massive lit review found these four affordances that help teams create long term achievement. This is developer thriving!
- learning culture
- sense of belonging
- self-efficacy and motivation
- sense of agency @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Developer thriving is correlated with productivity! @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Findings hold across demographics and industries @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025

We are navigating a shifting environment. Threat happens as psychological beings in the world. Identity threat! Are you going to be categorized, is your work going to lose meaning, are you going to be evaluated in a way you don't agree with?

Contextual sense making, asking what it means to be a software engineer. AI skill threat is an example.
@grimalkina

Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
High standards for the study. Thai is what good science looks like! @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Found high rates of AI skill threat. @grimalkina
Show threadcateMay 29, 2025
Asked questions to elicit if teams had a contest culture. Discouraging messages. Brains in jars teams. @grimalkina
Show threadSashinMay 29, 2025
@cate @grimalkina what does it have to do with cats though?