Equity sounds like a virtue when fairness is the goal. Do not be deceived into thinking fairness is the goal of development. It isn’t. It isn’t fair to ask more of a hurting and unhealthy person than we should. It isn’t fair to treat a healthy person as if they are sick. It isn’t fair to water
Too often we treat people as if everyone is the same. The unhealthy get put in places of authority that they never should have access to and are given an opportunity to spread their dysfunction to others. The healthy are left alone without much direction or leadership. Leaders become stale when everyone receives what the lowest common
Everyone that a team leader comes in contact with is either healthy or unhealthy. The developer must know what to do and when to do it. This requires a deep repertoire and understanding of what is best and when it is appropriate. Unhealthy people need opportunities for healing and care and not opportunities for challenge and growth.
The best leaders are developers. You can recruit a great team but other recruiters can pull those teammates away. The developer has the advantage of being able to make sure every person on the team continually improves. Every developer must know where to start. This means that they must evaluate who is healthy and who is not.
I remember the first time that I got the wind knocked out of me. Just like everyone, I thought I was going to die. Eventually I got my wind back and calmed down. There is something to the correlation between lack of breath and panic. Logically, breathing is always a priority but strategically, it becomes even more
Every team deals with the moment when everything seems to go wrong. We respond correctly to “emergency” situations when we categorize our response in stages. The typical stages include: Breathe (limit emotion) Assess Triage (do what you can) Repair (do what you should) Learn When we categorize our response to adversity, we allow ourselves to manage our
It is important to keep a cool head when things quickly devolve in a chaotic moment. This is especially important when the stakes are highest. Safety should be the highest priority for any team and it is important that the person making the decisions at the most crucial moments maintains their cool. Panic gets people hurt and
I have a loser mindset when I only see defeat. This happens when I see the need to settle or when I let myself off the hook because today’s circumstances made my discipline harder to maintain. Now now…I am not saying that we are losers when we quit on the day. That only happens if we allow
We tell our minds different versions of each moment or circumstance. A defeat can motivate us to work harder and smarter so that we can eventually overcome an obstacle or opponent. That same defeat can cause us to become insecure and adopt a loser mindset. We always have a choice of what version of the story we
Everyone has a defining moment that they can point back to when they make choices. These moments can be earthshaking childhood memories that help shape our world view. They can also be small victories early in the day that help set the tone for how we see the rest of our day. The point is that we