Hi everyone. My name is Patrick Aku, and this
episode we cover team building, user impact, career progressions
and titles, and much, much more. Joining me today is Alexandra
Vargas. She's staff software engineer
over at Grafana Labs. And honestly, this was one of my
favorite conversations. She's kind, she's empathetic,
she's been through a lot, and I love the way she tells stories.
So enjoy. I got some really solid advice
that I always carry with me. And it was very, I think early
on in my career, one of the first teams that I worked in and
probably one of the fondest memories because it was so
early. But I got feedback and I said,
Patrick, like sometimes you work in isolation.
It's like you're on an island and I know you're working on a
problem and you're trying to figure it out, but I know you're
stuck and you're not asking for help.
Like you need to ask for help when you get stuck.
If people can help you within a few minutes, ask for help, like
ask for perspective, ask for feedback faster rather than
later. And I was like, man, that is
right. And I tried to, I tried to argue
this right because I feel like I should know these things.
I'm trying to figure it out. I feel like I will learn or I
will remember better if I figure it out myself.
It's something that I mean throughout high school and
school was always like, OK, figure it out yourself or do the
research and then ask because then you did your homework.
That's what I felt like. I also did, but they were like,
it's not effective. Like we have to be effective as
a team. We are part of the team.
The team is responsible for the execution.
If I can give you the guidance in a few minutes, then let's do
that route. And I was like, yeah, in the end
it, it does make sense. So I started asking more and at
some point I got more comfortable in asking.
And nowadays I honestly don't really care.
Like even at my new position as a product manager, most of the
time I I lack the context and I ask and I ask over and over and
over again until I understand. And it might be me, it might be
the other person. Usually it's somewhere in the
middle. But as long as I don't
understand, I cannot execute. And I need to understand to be
able to do whatever I need to do right.
It's very important. Did you ever had this like a
pressure on the title that you hold and that specific approach
like? All the time because CB as a
consultancy company. So I come in as a consultant and
then especially at the beginning, I'm like, I'm
probably supposed to know everything, right?
Why do you come in otherwise? So yeah, that that was always
daunting. But I learned that not everyone
thinks that of you. And probably you think that of
yourself the most. And then I give that a place and
I'm like, now I really don't mind, right?
If I am there to help, then I need to understand.
And I can only understand by asking, so I will.
Yeah, I think that's that's the the part that as well for me is
the is the hunting part. And that in my case, what I
gave, what I give up by accepting this was the whole
titles, like the the title part, like it's a it's a controversial
site. Every time that when I talk to
someone and they're like, Oh yeah, you know, like what are
you? And then you have to say your
title. And I really dislike that
because somehow this put a barrier between people in my
opinion. Like if you are from, I don't
know, director, wherever, it feels like I cannot talk to you
because of whatever reason. I don't know.
Yeah. It's like, oh, you're special.
Maybe I'm going to say something that is not great and you are
going to judge me saying, Oh my God, this girl have no idea.
That kind of thing. And then if you have a title
that is like above, like you, you join the career and it's OK
if you ask questions because you are an intern or you are just
learning. That's like in my head, it's of
course OK. Everyone knows.
Yes, yeah. But then if you go into three or
four years, then you are like core or depends of the company,
senior, but I will say core. So core people is like, OK, I
need some assistance and if they ask questions, OK.
But then as soon as you start to go into above like senior,
staff, principal, all of these titles, there is this like thing
that I kind of like a ceiling that Oh yeah, because you are
there and you have like 8 or 9 or 10 of 20 years of experience.
Somehow my brain thought because you have those titles, you are
an expert, therefore you should know everything about it.
And and that's like the title has so much weight in what is
maybe my interest or my learning career.
Then the the title itself, like sometimes the title is just like
based on salary. If they want to pay you more
because you are doing more impact, well, you need a higher
target else you will not get salary.
So money, but sometimes it's also about being in the room,
like, oh, we only invite leadership, whatever.
So if you are not in that title. So I understand that fact.
But from my personal perspective, I feel like those
titles, yes, they are important, but they are not the most
important. Like people should not or like
not people, like people can do whatever.
But me, I should not go towards. I want to reach the next level
because this is not it's it's not like doesn't make any sense.
Like why I want to do that level?
If it's because more money, OK, but if it's not money then why?
Then why? So is it like an ego thing?
Is it because I want to be called, I don't know, a doctor
or whatever? So in that I have to give up
that like if I want to understand, I will do the asking
questions. I might look like I have no idea
what I am like doing, but trust me, I I know I I am, I am asking
questions because I want to learn.
But then the title part, I'm like, OK, I will not go there.
Like no, I'm. But with managers, it's a bit
tricky because they ask you, So what do you want?
Do you want to move to the next level?
I'm like, no, yeah, I with my last manager, this was the
conversation at the beginning. Are you looking for a promotion?
I'm like, I am looking for learning opportunities.
If you consider that in one year, 2 years, I am ready for a
promotion, feel free to just sign me in.
That was my answer. And I was like doing all of the
things that I wanted because it was interesting.
And at one point she is like, OK, I think you are ready for,
for the promotion. And I put you there and I was
like hard business. Like you put me what in my head
he was like, you should ask me first.
But she's like, yeah. But you said when it's just it's
just putting the title of the job that you are already doing.
So I'm not like saying that you should do something else.
It's just you are doing something it deserves.
It deserves recognition. So but that was like
interesting. I was like, OK, when at the
beginning I said that I continue with my life and then she's OK,
you are ready. Like put the promotion and yeah,
you got the title and OK, good. Stuff the first time someone
called me a senior like it was the first time and it made me
uncomfortable, right, because of the weight of that title.
Like I don't I don't know if I am senior.
Like am I supposed to say, yeah, exactly what is a senior and am
I ready? I don't feel ready.
Or why am I all of a sudden I'm a senior and it's still the the
same. Like, do I also consider myself
a senior? I don't think so.
There's not a definition of the years of experience that you
need to have. I consider myself a person that
just really does their best and that's it.
I bring a certain baggage with me from experience.
It's maybe sometimes a more wide experience rather than depth,
and that's a different type of experience than another person
with that same senior title. So it even varies in what you
bring then. But the title brings a certain
weight with it. I've also seen organizations
where everyone has the same title and I really admire that.
And I'm like, how do the conversations happen with
regards to salary or impact or and I had this person, he was
from Dino. He knows a company where that's
the case. And also everyone earns the
same. And I'm like, man, that's like a
double right? You have the same salary and
everyone earns the same and still organizations operate like
that. I think it's fascinating and I,
I would love to see more research with companies that
don't have this, let's say title hierarchy to see how they
operate versus something similar.
But it'd be very hard to do like a proper AB test on that.
Yeah, especially because there are some things that are they
are they are not official, but it's part of the culture.
Like for instance, you can see in a team someone who is very
influential and maybe this person doesn't hold the title
and you know, it's very influential because this person
says something and the team just follows like there are no maybe
same level, right. But the this person is just
influential and they didn't don't realize this.
This happens one of my teams in the past, like I saw someone who
who was very influential, like he says yes and the team just
goes because they trust because he's very like he's very
skillful. And then but when he says no,
the team just like, OK, then no. What if he's not there?
Well, in this case, they managed themselves, right.
But like, when he was there, he was having that power, but he
didn't notice that sometimes you, you can say no, it's an
idea that you really don't care. And in one point he was saying
like, oh, but this is not a good idea.
So he was invalidated an idea without giving like the proper,
the proper space to evaluate if the idea was good or not.
It's just like, no, no, he's just from a developer's point of
view. He's just giving his opinion and
a feedback that I gave to him is like, I think you don't know
this, but you have a high influence.
Therefore, you have to be really careful what you say yes, no and
what you say maybe because I maybe give the opportunity to
evaluate the idea and give the other team members to even
consider the idea and no, immediately invalidate the idea.
And the person who maybe is raising the idea feels like, oh,
my ideas are not valid or there is not this space of
collaboration because you feel like if your ideas are always
shutting down, that's not good. So but yeah, this person didn't
have the title. Like there was no like this
hierarchy in official way, but in the day-to-day you could see
it. And I'm like, you don't, he
didn't notice. It's like a normal developer.
I'm like, no, I can see it. I can see it from far like the
dynamics of teams and so. What?
How do people become like that? Because I also have seen that
from an influence standpoint, but usually that does come with
then the title as well. I haven't seen often that people
in the same team navigate towards one person that has that
influence more so than others. I think there are like different
factors in my opinion. One is they are really well
communicated, like if you if you see them, they communicate
really well. So if they if you are facing a
bug, an issue, sometimes it's very hard for a developer to say
this is going to impact the user in XYZ, whatever.
But this person can take that back and say like who look, this
is very like very critical. We need to fix it because XY and
Z. So the developer that are being
helped, he's like, oh, you are helping me.
You know something, you know, like this stakeholder
communication that is quite hard sometimes for us.
So one thing is that the other is it's always ready to help.
Is that kind of people who are like you are blocked and they
are like please, no worries. Like come here, we are going to
do this together. Pay for Namin.
Like they are very always trying to sponsor people, always trying
to enable people. So of course if someone is
trying to help you, you are going to look for that person
like like thank you. And frequently because of that
they are leading projects that are impactful.
So success, right, if they always lead the project, these
people are successful on those projects because they know how
to communicate with people how to work as a team.
So I think this is a mix of many things that of course, if you
have the title, you will need to do because that's part of your
work. But if you don't, you start to
do that organically. And then people just, it's like
normal. They just start to look like at
you like, oh, you are kind of like a leader without the title,
but we don't care because you are like us.
And even if it's dangerous, you are like us.
But the but no, it's like it has a high influence.
So whatever this person says, you are going to be influenced.
And it's hard that we notice that.
Like when I look at I respect someone, yeah, sometimes I don't
think it's influencing me. But then if I really look back,
it's like, no, actually you do. Yeah, but also that comes with
trust, right? It's a, it's a certain track
record, yes. As soon as you come together
with a group of individuals, you don't become a team instantly.
It takes a lot of successes, a lot of failures, a lot of
sometimes heated discussions and decision making.
Yeah, and you have. It's fine if you disagree and
commit, as long as you test your outcomes, you are flexible in
your solution direction, and you can always pivot.
Then I think you can choose wisely or not, and you can
disagree and still commit. But that's how you become a
team. That that that part is very
interesting in your experience. Like, you know, imagine that you
have a team and you have a group of people who are focusing tech
like they are in into new technology, like edge
technology. And you have people who are more
focusing users and they are more focusing user experience and
they really care about the users.
Let's say that there is this discussion about like a project
that need to be out today, but because of user experience, the
people on one side says like you should not go because it's going
to degradation experience. But the people from the other
side, you will say, well, yes, it is in a team.
My experience is user customer developers, very few tech like
Edge. I really why you are doing this
because I can't that of course it's like the that's the most
how in your now that you are in this role.
Yeah. How would you manage something
like that? Like when because in your case,
you you care about your users absolutely, but also the team
cares about what you say and you you care about your team as
well. So how would you balance
something like that? Yeah, we try.
And so I the technology stuff and improving, let's say the
tech stack and doing more newer things or improving things, I
all fall, I funnel that under tech improvements and I try and
do both at the same time. Obviously, if deadlines allow
it. And we're at a phase where they
do, we do feature development and we do tech improvements and
we try and balance that. And there's definitely been
times where I've been called out and team would say, OK, we only
have feature exactly. So user value or user testing or
bug fixes. And we have this list of tech
improvements, which we also want to do.
And I'm trying to balance that like to the best I can.
I'm doing more tech improvements now because I feel like we've
been lacking on that aspect. I've been called out a bunch
more. We have been delivering proper,
everyone's happy so we can do more tech improvements.
And the best is if those tech improvements also directly will
relate to user value later on, which some of the times they do.
But it's a very delicate balancing act.
And I've noticed that if we don't do tech improvements, it
hits in the motivation of the team because they come up with
something they're really excited about something.
I do my best to make sure it's small, right?
We cannot do only tech improvements because we then we
don't deliver any value. And from the other side, I try
and advocate on doing the most important things.
Sometimes I've also gotten feedback where people say, OK,
this feature is not complete. I'm like, but if we haven't
proven value yet, then we can make it complete.
But if it's not being used, then that's waste of time and effort.
So we do things to test as soon as possible on production in a
very minimalistic way. I might be a bit more practical
than some other product managers.
They've worked with the product owners, but I like to be very
explicit with the way we communicate.
Why do we do this? To test these assumptions.
If it's not being used, we shouldn't build it.
I hate waste. I've always hated waste from the
developer seat. And also one of the fondest
things and and kind of projects that I've worked on was when I
was in the driver's seat, I was the sole developer because a
person went on holiday, became a dad, was off for three months,
and I was put there to kind of manage things in his absence.
And then when he came back, it was going to be the two of us.
So there he set up an architecture where we could AB
test a lot of assumptions. And this was specifically for
e-commerce. So every type of value we would
add would have to have a direct contribution to controversion
conversion. Sorry if it wasn't a whole new
feature in another zone. So specifically, let's say for
the checkout, we had a user feedback way where some of the
form fields that were missing needed to be filled in.
And we conveyed that in a certain way to the user.
And there was an assumption we can do it with red boxes or
green boxes as soon as you filled it in.
And I am partially colour blind so I was like, I barely see the
difference here. That was the B variant.
The A variant was what we had and I added a new variant
because I could. I was like, I'm going to add
some icons, check mark or an X and that's it.
We did an ABC test and we did that continuously regardless of
what outcome there was. I would be able to ship features
very quickly, sometimes without tests if I felt like we didn't
need it to test the assumptions in an AB test.
And then once it was a valid case, I would production lise it
better, I would up the quality, I would add those tests and that
would then be shipped. I feel like in a lot of
conversations, specifically with regards to the user behaviour,
especially now from the product side, everyone has an opinion
and to be honest, they are all assumptions and it's very hard
to then decide right If people gravitate towards someone that
has influence or a specific opinion or a better argument,
you usually test that one. But then again, I don't want to
shut down any other ideas their own assumptions.
But I think this is really cool because in your case, you have
AB testing, right? And this is like a, A in the
past, I used to work with a company who were, who was doing
AB test. And it was a completely game
changer that from the point of view as a developer, like first
you don't get attached to your code because it can't throw.
Like it can't be just thrown away after the AB test, it's
executed and it's like actually doesn't matter.
So you have to literally throw away the code.
And that was the first like, my God, all of my hard work.
And then you start to do, you start to be less like
perfectionist about the code that you write because you don't
know if this is going to add value or not.
Therefore, don't even try to make your test like your code
perfect. Doesn't matter.
So that was one of the benefits, but then I saw one of the
downsides if you are not careful and and it was the fact that
sometimes you know, like you have this depends on the culture
of the company, but you have a company that is shipping,
shipping, shipping all the time features.
And if you do through AB test, they will just intentionally
just say test, come on, it's proving value, continue with the
next AB test. And then like the technical
side, the stability side of the tech part is just for like for
forgotten. So the code that you wrote
because you maybe thought it will be thrown away, it's
adding. And when you have more code and
more code and more code, and it's not part of the culture to
revisit those features, to refactor, to do all of these
things, it's just become a mess. And even sometimes you forget to
remove the the if you have ABC, you forget to B1, you forget to
remove the A and the C. And then you have like codes
like. But why we have this here.
And yeah, it's like a lot of like tests that you are not
cleaning up after. So it's a cultural thing,
Absolutely. So it's like it's good, however
careful, don't be like it's not that Chinese.
It's not perfect. Yeah, yeah, it needs, it needs a
good routine, I feel like, right and good conventions.
And if you then uphold it, it can be very powerful.
Right now I'm working on a tool that's internal also less users
and we don't have AB testing. And then I'm like OK, am I going
to add AB testing and do it more based on data?
But we don't have that many users.
Like is it going to be a valid choice to do that?
And I'm, I'm kind of torn. Should I invest and then test
more with data or do I postpone until we have more users and
then ship that way? Yeah, because also like the
amount of people the the the audience can be so small that
it's just, it's not. Going to matter.
Yeah, it. Doesn't matter.
So one thing that in like in the companies that we, when we don't
use AB test like very often, what we do is we invest more in
user research, especially when you are like developing
something for a specific set of users, like a specialized users,
people who are like, you know, like physicists or something
like that. So for them, it's better to do
user research. And then we, I had the
opportunity to work with a user researcher and it's just
completely different. Like when you go to interviews,
I was just a child where just just seeing what the user does
and it's just so like good because you can see how the user
get blocked in flows that we thought they are super clear.
Should be good, no? They were not.
And then they're like clicking and oh, but I don't see it.
And we are like, look. That way from.
You so it was very good working in that small set of, but it's
costly because you need the a user research, you need users.
So we have to pay sometimes some of these users like, I don't
know, like Amazon bonus or whatever.
So something that it was because it's time and time is very
expensive. Absolutely.
It was really good and the results were definitely like
more aligned when you were implementing.
And something else is it builds empathy from the developer's
point of view. Like when I saw that user
struggling, every time that I'm implementing something, I'm
like, yeah, no, poor X name, yeah, it's going to suffer more,
so let's just do something to improve that.
That's so cool. Yeah, you improve empathy, like
you, you get empathy towards your users in that way.
But it's costly, so. How do you still keep that in
mind with those technical discussions that you have?
Because I feel like you're more on the user side, advocating and
fighting for, let's say user needs and based on the behaviour
that you know, but there's always other sides of the coin,
other opinions. And in the end, there can be one
outcome or you can try multiple outcomes and then test.
But how do you have those conversations within a team?
I feel like in the team, I kind of like have a good grasp of who
is caring about the user and who is caring about the tech side.
And knowing that is very important because I know that I
cannot like I advocate for my users, but I will not trying to
convince someone who is just caring about the about the
users. They will not care.
However, what I will do is like they care about something else.
Like for instance, like I care about users because I care what
I if I develop something, I know it will impact these users and
hopefully good. Sometimes it's not good and I
have seen that I'm like, maybe especially in accessibility when
you are not doing the things and you see someone struggling, it's
like, my God, you start the semantic HTML and that's it.
So in that I, I feel like cheated because it's like I, I
joined this career because I wanted to help people through
technology. So my, my background was not,
oh, I was a developer when I was six years old because computers
are cool. Like I was not coming from that.
I came from studying computer science, but sticking in
programming because helping users and that's me.
However, I have seen the other side like people who are since
10 years old doing like math problems and going to computers
and they love and they have joy in that, but and they frequently
have a lot of power to influence because of course they have
success rate, right. So when we are having these
conversations, one thing that I really try to make sure is like,
it's not about me having so much empathy with users.
It's also me thinking that if users have a good user
experience and the product is good, money is coming.
Therefore, you are going to have a job, well paid, hopefully more
interesting projects are coming to your site.
Win, win, win. Exactly.
So if we make something that is good and you love technology,
trust me, you are going to have much opportunity into exploring,
into learning because good companies invest on that.
So it's going to be good for you, good for us.
Sometimes, of course, I have to negotiate.
I cannot be like, oh, you know, all of the time it's users,
like, no, sometimes I need to listen and I try to put myself
in the shoes of the person because it's not sometimes it's
not about users. The technical side sometimes has
this like high risk threshold of if we don't introduce this right
now, the whole thing is going to be unstable because this, this
disease. And I understand because I am an
engineer and I'm like, I know what you are saying.
Like if we don't introduce the factor, performance is going to
go bad. And maybe for some users, like
big ones, that's important. So yeah, I, I understand.
And maybe it's not going to happen in one month, but maybe
it's going to happen in two or three.
And they have good reasons. So I have to say, OK, let's see
what we can, how we can negotiate as well and how can we
mitigate user experience but also bring this.
And it's just always negotiating.
Like it's never a like a truth from each side.
I always think like if you said something to me, feedback or
whatever, the truth is always in the middle.
Like it's not me, it's not you. It's like here and whatever is
there, I can work with that. That's a very healthy
perspective. It's like if you think you are
always right, you're. So not and I also I have a
really hard time working with people that that are that way.
I like when people are flexible that can put themselves in the
other shoes. Like literally empathy.
See it from their perspective. And then indeed we come
somewhere in the middle and then we test.
And as long as we're flexible, I think should be all right.
Yeah, You know, sometimes I think like because people who
work in this industry are very passionate, the conversation can
be be really heated. Oh so much.
Because of the passion. And it's good thing because it's
worse if you have people who don't care at all.
That's dangerous because it's like, oh, whatever and whatever,
whatever. And you really are impacting
people and they don't care, so. No, they're gone.
I'd rather have the like the opinionated, the strong
opinionated. It's like depends of how strong
right, of course, and depends of the power.
If if the strong opinionated is the city of the company, I'm
sorry, but I don't think I will work with you.
I will just go move away. Like that's an option like,
yeah, if you're in a company that you don't fit because the
company is just, I don't know, profit and we don't care about
anything. Is this kind of like companies
success? Oh, you know, we should create
this like microtransactions for kids, that kind of thing.
That's a company that I will be. No, I'm out.
No, I'm. Sorry, we can choose so and in
this industry we can choose. Absolutely.
Like which is to work with and not to work like under, because
that's at, at least in this stage, at the beginning, it's
different. When you are starting, you are
like, oh, please give me a job. And then at least in my case, it
was like that, like they just pay you really little and then
you get one year of experience and then you move.
But in the Netherlands, I think it's different.
I think it's. Not that bad to be honest.
I mean I started out in operations and then I moved
internally to more of the development side.
But even at this company, like I've worked on projects that
from a world perspective and doing good are not doing that
great. And I'm like, man, this is
probably looking back, not the project that I want to work on
in the future. But at the time with that team,
new technology, it was really exciting.
And I didn't look at it from I have to give good to the world
perspective. So it wasn't the best project,
but it was a really good project at the time.
So also that comes with experience.
Yeah. I think also with age as well,
like the whole, you start to think a little bit more about
that at the beginning, everything is too exciting.
Like I don't know how it was for you, but for me my career in
terms of confidence was like I started like the whole
programming world and I'm like, Oh my God, I know so much.
And it was 12 years ago, so basic, you know, like HTML.
And then Angular was out and I was like, Oh my God, I am
leading projects in Angular. So it's that chart and you start
like, oh, I know so much. And then you go into a pond and
it's like. To the floor.
Because you know you know nothing.
And then you look at all of the knowledge is like, Oh my God, I
have no idea. And then you start to say, no
worries, I can learn more. So you start again.
And it's always like these dips. And I remember I was tired
because it's like you feel very incompetent all the time with
all of the new things. Every single day was something
new that I didn't know and every single day I was trying to keep
myself updated with Hacker News, all of these things and I'm like
reading them. I don't get what is this?
And now with the whole AI, it's like.
Even more even. More, even more.
And I remember I asked like a colleague, he was, he's in the
industry, 20 something years, someone very.
Smart. Yeah.
So he has seen a lot and he's very smart and curious.
And so I asked, like, how do you like first, how did you keep in
this industry? Like, yeah, like 2720 something.
And then what do you think is the best tip that you can give
me for keeping here? Because sometimes I really want
to quit. I'm like, I, I have no idea what
I'm doing. It's too much.
It's like very overwhelming.
And then he said that in every like, of course you can see his
career is 20 something, but he, he has stages like what we are
talking at the beginning, like you don't see maybe the
project's too much, but you see the tech and you're still
growing and growing and growing. And it's like always in these
stages, he found something that was interesting.
And tech is always interesting because these new things, you
could see it as a, Oh, I have no idea what is this?
Oh my God, poor me, I really want to know everything.
Or you could see like, Oh, this is very interesting.
What can I learn from this? So he has this mentality of
always like being curious. And that was a tip that he gave
me like just cultivate curiosity.
Curiosity is not something that you just you are not born with.
So if you think that you are done, like no, you have to
cultivate that. And in tech you have to like if
you see something that is interesting, instead of like
running away, just go deeper and see, oh, what is this?
And then you never know where that path is going to take you.
And that was very, like, disappointed you didn't like
that. No, I like it, yeah.
But I was expecting more like, you know.
Like a silver bullet. Yeah, These, these, these
that's. But no, he he was like very
wise. Reality.
Yeah. And I'm like OK, so it's hard
work. Yeah, what you continuously.
Continuously, but then make it enjoyable with the whole
curiosity. So.
But yeah. I mean, I've always been
innately curious and I, I don't know, it doesn't cost me
anything, right? To understand why is for me
really important because otherwise, like I'm just
executing. I cannot just execute without
understanding. And sometimes it takes time and
sometimes it takes patience and not everyone has that can be
very frustrating if a person without patience listens to me
while I say why? And if I don't understand it, I
cannot build it. Like that's just, it might be
who I am, but it's very important for me.
It's like one of my, I don't know if it's a value or like
something intrinsic. It's something I need, which is
also why I wanted to do this product role because from a
developer sense, I always expected this from my product
person, my product owner, product manager, whatever
product lead. And now I'm in that seat.
So I get to ask everything and I should have all or most of the
questions in my head. It was all before I stepped in
this role. Now I understand I cannot have
all the answers. So that's also how I communicate
it because I don't think I've had this communicated to me like
this. Like with what we know now,
these are assumptions and we're acting based upon this.
So this is what we're building and that's how I get people to
work with me. That's how I get people to
understand. If I don't understand, I'm not
going to say I understand. I'm going to say I also don't
understand. That's why we're doing this and
this to figure it out. And that's the part of the job
that I really like. From the flip side, I really
miss executing because now that I'm, let's say, orchestrating,
I'm not really hands on executing.
And sometimes it feels like I'm not doing anything.
And then my the people in my team say, yeah, well that's
really good because we know exactly what to do and you
facilitate that. It's like, yeah, but I don't
have the same feeling of fulfilment.
So that's I kind of torn what I want to do next.
How do you measure success in your like personal like in
personal career like because what you are mentioning is
something similar what I am experiencing in the new role.
Like one year and a half ago I became the tech lead in my team.
So my team it's, it's very high like in terms of seniority, like
I have principals and I, you know, people above me and I'm
like, and, and you're staying. I'm a technic.
So of course for me it's kind of like a role of facilitating,
yes. But also I, I am expected to
code because you really need to get in depth in some specific
projects, especially the high risk, high impact.
So, but sometimes I feel like I have to this glue work is
called, you know, like when you have this enablement, when the
team is just like, it's kind of like putting oil in different
places. If the team is blocked, you have
to like unblock or if the team needs help and they don't have
the patience or the skills wherever.
So sometimes I do that facilitation and that requires
time. But then before I used to
measure myself in code how many like impactful projects I am
creating, implementing, coding. Yeah, maybe if I work with
someone else that's OK, but it's just like, at least there was a
line of code for me there. Right Now it's harder because
sometimes I collaborate with projects, but I don't add a
single line of code, especially the smaller ones that they don't
need to people. Yeah.
And I'm like, oh, but yeah, this is all you, the person of
course, who is doing the code. But it's hard for me to say, oh,
you influence that project for me.
Like, oh, maybe I'm taking what is it the whole credit and I
don't want to do. That I don't want that.
But when you talk to people who has more experience in this role
and especially managers or pro, they're like, yeah, this is a
thing that you need to learn because you have you need to
think that if you were not there or either this person will be
slower or like the project will be not the shape assist today.
Like you need to acknowledge the influence that you have there.
And then I can accept that. But how can I make sure that
what is my level of influence? Am I'm doing a good job or not?
Like is this like, you know, really realistic?
Is it really I am giving back bringing value or not like?
I agree. Like I, I don't think I have a,
a finite answer for that. I, I recently sent out feedback
forms, right? And people are like, Oh yeah, we
do that for performance reviews for me, we don't have that for
performance reviews. So I also said it's not going to
impact my salary, it's not going to impact any bonuses.
It's honestly just for me and I'm curious, right?
I sent it to the whole team. I sent it to a lot of the
stakeholders that I interact with.
And it was a few of the standard more feedback questions, right?
What, what is going well? What is not going well?
I'd like to add something personal.
So I said, what do you remember about our collaboration
specifically? And some people said you laugh a
lot, which is good for the vibe. Like stuff like that then came
out. And I also got feedback from
stakeholders that said you made some decisions.
And I felt like my opinion was not taken into account and like,
I know exactly what happened and indeed I chose otherwise.
But maybe maybe I should have communicated better or maybe I
could have done XY and Z. I'm happy that they gave that
feedback and I didn't lose this person, right?
I didn't break this relationship.
So they still felt safe to give that feedback.
Based on that, I think it's still a personal feeling, but
based on that, I can say I think I'm doing a good job.
Next to that, I have some conversations where exactly
because I want to understand why I asked some questions.
And throughout that, either we reach a different decision or
things get steered in a different way because of those
questions. Like I do like to do those
thought exercises. If I were there or if I wouldn't
have asked that, would it still come to this conclusion?
Are we doing something different because of that influence?
And is that a good thing or bad thing?
I don't know. At the end of the day, I feel
like from a technique side and also from product side, you're
more responsible for outcomes rather than output, right?
Output is more measurable, features, functionality.
That's the stuff that I miss, honestly.
And that's also that fulfilment that I miss.
But the outcomes take longer and those are then harder
measurable. Yeah.
Like years. Right.
It can be years. Yeah, as long as I feel like,
like I want to do this. I have that curiosity.
I'm passionate about this. I feel like I'm in a good place.
So I will do what I think is best for the organization and I
will be flexible in my approach. I will listen to people and not
just push. That's the best I can do.
I think if people have that mindset that in the end we'll
make some decisions, we'll test our assumptions and we'll steer
accordingly. What I don't like is the people
that don't have that flexibility, right, that push,
and then that don't want to explain why they don't have
patience. I don't really have patience for
people that don't have patience. It's like a psycho.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. But yeah, it's it's definitely
hard to measure. It is and I wonder like you know
the like for instance, one thing that I noticed we are having
this conversation lately with one of my friends about in my
case, I care and the perception is that you care too much.
Okay, so you care too much from. The team.
From the job. So we are human, so we have our
job and, and as I said, people who are in tech frequently are
very passionate and they invest a lot of time and sometimes they
invest not only work time, but they invest extra time.
And if you work with cultures like the US, they are really
about investing time. I'm very serious and in my case,
when I am originally from Colombia, so I used to work for
American like companies and I got that like hustle.
You have to like care and like 3:00 AM working.
Of course, that's like a good, that does make you a good
employee, a good developer and they will make sure that you
know that. So of course I was coming from
that background and it was always, I was younger, of
course, so hustling, hustling, hustling.
And then I came to the Netherlands and the Netherlands.
The first, like, cultural shock was I was sick and I went to
work sick. Yeah.
And my lead said like why you are here?
Yeah, exactly. Go home.
And I'm like, well, I can still work.
And like you are sick. You are first making everyone
sick. Yeah.
And the second is like, no, you don't look like you can work.
I'm like, oh, but I will just excuses.
And this person was like don't be the hero.
This was his worst. Don't be the hero.
We need you in 100% conditions. Just go rest of the day and if
tomorrow feel good, come. If not, then.
Stay home. That for me it was like, Oh my
God, these people are like so weird.
It's different. It's just totally different
because in Colombia what I will do is like if I feel sick, I
will go to the pharmacy, they will put an injection and I am
going to be OK. Oh wow.
For a while, OK, and probably after many injections I might
have some resilience. Too many.
Well, you know, like it's like you are never recovered.
So of course I was coming from that background of always
working extra and because I care, it was work.
So I care about users, I care about what I do.
My sense of responsibility is high.
And then you combine with these with a very culture of
workaholic U.S. company. So when I came here, it was
quite like hard to to let go. And in my case, the, the thing
that made me stop and maybe consider or alternative of
working was like I got sick. So I I got into like born out
experience really bad in like 4 or five years ago or something
like that. And I remember that in that
point I was like, maybe maybe these people here know something
like the Netherlands because they have more these life and
work, not life balance, life and work.
Like I have my kids and 5:00 PM bye bye.
Like I, I will not care about your bugs or whatever.
Like no, like of course in some scenarios if you are in cold,
but it's not saying that they don't care.
They care, but they are very strict with their life.
And at the beginning I was like, that's so like inefficient.
We can do everything we cannot. So I remember that after that
experience, I started to look into ways of being like someone
who of course focus on learning and then is passionate and then
cares. But I still have trouble because
now it's better, it's more balanced.
I still have trouble in caring too much.
Like, if you care too much, there is a point that you are
going to face with these inflexible people and they will
say, we don't care about this. We are going out with this
specific issue even though we know it's going to harm users in
the meantime. But money, yeah.
It doesn't matter. Doesn't matter and like you, we
are not like here to be like charity, whatever, we are paying
you to do this. It's a business.
It's a business and you have to be aware of that and of course
you accept it, but really in a not good way.
It's like it's stress. It's like, Oh my God, these
people, why? They don't care, why?
Whatever. And I started to complain with
this friend like, oh, but I don't know why other people
don't care. And I think it's like the answer
is like, it's because you care too much.
So it's not like they don't care.
They do, but it's like they also are realistic.
You care too much. You think that there is this
level of success or this level of perfection.
That's not realistic. You have to be more down to
earth. It's good that you care, but you
cannot be like. Not.
An extremist because then it will not happen.
That life is not like that. And I'm like, I know.
It's a healthy perspective. Yeah, and this is, I know, like
rationally I know, but this is a pattern from our old self that I
still working towards. Yeah.
And it's, it's taking time, but like it took me like 20
something years in the past year to be there.
So I I think I need another 10 or something to just go into
like. Reprogram.
Yeah, like which level I care and life is outside and work is
outside. There is no this like balance to
which balance like no SO. Yeah, it's it's interesting that
you say that because the the qualities that you describe,
right, caring about your end user, making sure they're taking
care of making decisions with their best interests at heart in
an interview process. From a company standpoint, I
would love that. I want people to have that.
And it's the same with responsibility.
It's the same with accountability.
If a person has too many or or too high sense of
responsibility, they might take in every ask for help, right?
They might say, I'm going to help there, I'm going to help
there. They might have a million things
then running in parallel, and no one actually feels they've
they're being helped. Or they're going to crunch
themselves to make sure everyone feels helped.
And then the time they spent is just a ridiculous amount, and
they might actually burn themselves out because of that.
Yeah. It's like those core qualities,
yes, a person needs to have them, but indeed also with a a
healthy perspective. If it's too extreme then it
might be self harming and that's hard, especially if that's how
you've been programmed or that's how the upbringing is from a
career perspective, then you need to reprogram and that takes
time. Yeah.
And it's not even sometimes like the career, it's also culture,
like the events of the culture that you were raised.
Like sometimes their responsibility sense is super
high. And it's like you there in
Colombia, we have this like, you don't quit.
That was in my house. Like we don't quit.
We do things like if you put me into a job, I will do my best.
And this was like my mom's standard, like you should do
your best, you should be grateful.
You should, like you should, you should, you should.
And of course, like put that into a work environment that is
very high demanding, that is complex.
So actually you get tired just of thinking of making decisions.
And you put that culture there is like a nice bump in one
point. You are like, I cannot, I cannot
do all of these things. And you want to and you want to.
But this also like is, is hard. Like I remember the first stage
of my burnout. I was like, I am not in burnout.
No denial. I am not.
You are wrong. The reason that I'm feeling so
freaking tired is because I need to rest.
So I will just go and rest. But now when you stop, like your
body just throws you all of these things.
And yeah, it's like everything that you are ignoring because
you think that you are a superhero.
It's not like you really need to like stop.
How long did it take you to accept that?
I think it was like probably because I had a conversation
with my manager like, hey, I something is weird.
And then he's like, oh, OK, I think I understand, no worries.
Just going to sick leave immediately.
I'm like there is no like. Yeah, I'm not sick.
Monday I can go, it's like a Thursday or something like that.
And he's like, no, he, he has experience with someone like
with Bonance in the past. So of course he, he knew and I
remember that, that from that point until I went to the GP
like 3 weeks later, because I was like, I don't want to
accept. And when I went to the GP, she
was, oh, you know, you are the third person today who is coming
with this kind of problem. So it's very normal.
And I'm like, no, it's not normal.
It's not. And in my case, my identity from
a Latin American country, like if I broke my leg, I will be
like, of course I cannot work. Clearly, yes.
Yeah, but if it was something mental like in my mind it's like
no, no, no, you are not weak. And I saw that as a weakness and
it was like really taking so long.
So the GP reassuring that is normal.
You need to take care. And then, of course, the company
sends you to, like, different processes.
And then I started to go to a therapist in Colombia and I
thought she will support me. I love that.
I really. Yeah.
Because I thought, like, she will get me.
She will think. She knows.
Of course, this girl is like, she is doing well, look, it's
successful. Come on.
She should not be doing this. And she when we had that
session, it was like, oh, yeah. Like, so tell me more.
And then she was explaining all of this.
And like, so you are not denying this?
That's weird. Yeah.
But for me, it was like, oh, no. But I it took me when I had that
session with her, I was like, OK, if a professional from my
own country is saying this, OK, I need to listen.
And that was the point that you acknowledge that.
And it's freaking hard. Acknowledge that you are sick in
that way. And it's freaking hard because
your body start to recover. But what gets you into being
sick is not like the last months.
It's always patterns of work. And I remember that the first
3-4 months, I could see like the patterns that caught me into the
place that I was. Yeah, and it was.
I discovered that this is a very interesting story.
I went to Portugal for like, I always wanted to do this work
away. So it's like you go work for
hours and then you just stay in the place.
So I went into this like a town near port and it was a family
that they live off grid so no electricity like with with solar
panels. And the idea was like I will go
there and help them 4 hours a day and then I will just enjoy
myself. And because I was recovering, I
thought that yeah, I can do one week there.
I will just go and do that and I was feeling bad like I was like
I come back and I will just go back to work.
That's nothing yes, of course. So I went there and the first
day that I arrived, I like the family.
They have kids, you know kids are messy and I am an engineer.
So it's like very. In a specific.
Square so I was like, oh I can help you.
So I organized all of the things to spend like 5 or 6 hours just
doing that organization because the kids were with the fire
somewhere. The next day they put me into
like having onions and put it in the ground, something like that,
like it's a farming and it started to rain and I thought
it's going to be a problem. I need to finish my task because
I need to be responsible. These people are feeding me, so
of course I cannot let them down.
I have to. And next day I was sick.
Oh yeah, in the rain. Of course, because I didn't and
expertise putting onions like no, no, I'm not an expert on
that. Like the IT was really hard work
to be honest. And the next day the family was
like, OK, so you cannot work anymore rest.
I'm like no, no. But we already our agreement was
I will come here for one week and you are going to feed me and
I will work 4 hours a day. So tell me what else I can do.
And they're like, but you are sick and I will take a pill.
And they're like, we don't believe in pills that you should
like be resting. I'm like, I have my pills just
let me know. And they put me into a job and
the job was there was this tool house, such a messy house.
Like, you know, when they have like all of these like small
screws and everything. Yeah, it was a house.
And my goal was to fix it. So just to organize it.
So what ended up happening was like in the next three or four
days, I was just collecting all of the screws, organizing,
cleaning. Like literally working eight
years. Yeah, 8 or 9 hours a day.
Damn. And they didn't notice until the
last day that release the girl because I always going to
dinner, but they thought I will work for hours, go will go to my
camper and rest and then like enjoy it myself as you should
as. An.
Arrangement but I was like, I cannot let this house down.
I need to finish this as a project because what they will
think like so in one point that there was one of the kids coming
like what you are doing here. I'm like, I'm just fixing this.
And then they brought their mom and then was like, why should
why you're like here? And at the end of that like
experience, the tool house was fixed.
And I felt proud, of course. Oh my God, look at this
beautiful. I did this.
And then I was talking to my therapist and then she said that
was the worst question that someone asked me.
How long do you think is that tool house going to be organized
like like that? Do you think they got into that
like situation because like they just needed Someone Like You to
fix it? And other thing was do you think
someone else could do this after you because they have these
volunteering problems? So after you there was someone
else coming and the, the fire told me that like I think you,
you exceeded here like you shouldn't someone else will
finish that work. You should not have done that.
At that point. I noticed like my burnout was
not because technology, it was because me like my own patterns
of work, even in a farm. Like I put tech patterns into
form the same, the same person like overworking, not being like
honest or not saying no or like just literally just letting go
and not having that control of like I need to finish.
I need to finish. It was so freaking like eye
opening and hard because like, oh OK, I think I need more work
and more like yeah, I need to recover properly.
It's such a beautiful experience though, because honestly, like,
I grew up in the Netherlands, my parents are Turkish.
I've heard my parents say Turkish people don't get
burnouts. I have colleagues from Brazil.
They also say Brazilian people work hard, we don't get
burnouts. Like it's a cultural thing.
And I have never experienced burnout, right?
I hear stories, I hear perspectives.
I'm trying to be more careful with regards to the time I
spent. There was a time where I had a
YouTube channel I was doing editing for that.
I was editing this podcast, I was finding people, I was
working recording all of that. And my partner said, you don't
have weekends, like we don't have free time together.
I don't see you, you only work. And I was like, this is a
problem, right? And I wanted to do that.
I was doing the things because I I love doing the things.
I didn't want to let go because I hate choosing things that you
like, you should be able to do. But I didn't have enough time to
do all of that. So I had to let go stuff very
painfully. I was like, OK, I need to ask
for help. I can't do this anymore.
I have to give this away. I have to say no to new things
because nothing fits right now. I'm full.
I'm full to a point where the weekend is over and I don't feel
rested and that's not good. So I did that.
But it's because someone that I care for that I hold, hold in my
heart said I don't see you right.
It's a problem. Basically, that was the eye
opener that I needed to change whatever I was doing.
If I didn't have that, I don't know where I would have ended.
Like that's the hard part. I've always been brought up with
hard work. Like I look up to my mom.
She's the hardest working person that I've ever seen in my life.
She beat cancer twice and she's still working and has four kids.
Like it's insane. I can never compete.
And then I'm still very careful for her because I'm saying
please don't burn up. Please, like, don't get yourself
to a point where you can't do any of the things that you want
anymore. And from her perspective, she's
like, I don't think I'll ever get a burnout.
I'm like, damn, that's a sign. That's a signal.
It's like, yeah. You're already saying this.
Yeah, Yeah. Exactly.
Yeah. So it's sometimes things have to
happen and escalate, but I really don't want them to.
But it's a very I I can see the cultural thing there.
It's hard. It is really hard.
And you know what, It's interesting.
Like my mom is always is the same as me, the same like, oh,
she's just doing moving all the time.
Like your mom, like that kind of cultural thing.
Yeah. You should move.
And like, if you stay, you die. Yeah.
Exactly. And but in her case, she suffers
from like migraines and migraines are like freaking
hard. So you have to rest.
There is no other option. So in her case, resting is is
painful, not because of the migraine, like the migraine is
of course painful, but because she has to be like staying like
and I always like giving this like advice is right, Like you
should be just like do nothing if you are experimenting this
episode. But then me, I get sick and then
I'm like, oh, recommendation, you should do nothing.
I'm like, well, technically nothing about work, but what
about learning? Like my brain just start and I'm
like, Oh my God, I'm like my mom, like literally it's just
like I cannot like I really need to make sure that I am putting
the effort to stop. And sometimes I succeed.
Literally I'm like, OK, I will just do nothing today and it's
allow it. And one of my coaches said like,
you have to have an update. And that's the day that you say
Nope to everything, like are you going to do the laundry?
Nope. Are you going to wear a Nope?
Are you going to Nope? And that day you just do
nothing. And that's a healthy good day.
This is what this person said. And some because of that
concept, I'm like, OK, sometimes I can try to do that, sometimes
I fail. I'm like, I will do nothing.
And then but you know, like there is this podcast.
There is this thing. I am just here like little and
not moving, but it's the brain that is always like rushing,
rushing, rushing and it's hard. It's a really hard thing.
And you for me, the, the scary part is like if you don't have a
group around you that is not telling you, hey, I think you
are going sideways. Your brain just tricks you and
you're still just doing this. And that's the sad part.
I think like sometimes we just get into these stages like
burnouts or like depression or something because or either we
don't listen to the people around us because I am sure
people tell you yeah, or we don't have that like straight
point of someone saying to you like this that you are doing is
not good. Like not healthy.
Yeah, it's not healthy. Sometimes people do rounds and
we just see the nice thing. Should you do that?
Maybe you should tell again. And Dutch culture is good at
that though, yeah. But instead of like you are just
working too much and that's like in your face, there is no other
thing. And you could argue, but reality
is going to tell you otherwise. And so I think like a support
group in general for tech and for whatever, especially when
you are like a, they call it like high achievers, like people
who always want to learn who people grow achievers.
Yeah, they over achievers. I think like you need someone
who just slows you down because it's not possible.
It's not sustainable. No, yeah, not for the long run.
You will not last 20 something years like my colleague.
Like no, no. No.
You might ended up in a farm like and it's not bad actually.
If you ended up in a farm, probably you are slowing down,
but that's the best case scenario.
The other words is is sick. It's quite bad, yeah,
Absolutely. Yeah.
I think the more people are opening up about it, more
sharing and even conversations like these, the better.
It gives perspective to people that might be in a similar
position or might be close to actually burning out, which I'm
really thankful for because this 20 years ago was not a thing.
I don't think people talked about burnouts.
Just got sick and it's like it's a weakling and now we know it's
actually not healthy. Sometimes the way we do things
and it's because of good things, but good things in excess are
are still bad. Yeah, in the end.
When they start to harm you, your family or like, like around
this, you, you know that you should not be like pushing too
much. Like if you push too much, your
body is going to break. Yeah, it's going to.
There is this book, The Body Keeps the Score.
And it's about that. Like it's like you can't try to
trick your body. Like, oh, you know, I'm just
like just training like four or five hours a day.
That's not going to like, of course, at one point when you
stop, everything is coming. That's.
A great title. Yeah, and but the book is more
about emotional state. You, you just like, oh, I'm
feeling sad, I'm not feeling sad.
And you reject the emotions as well.
So I feel like this is something also that in this industry I
have seen like people in general, like the whole
emotional side is like, let's just don't talk about emotions.
Yeah, I know you're you're asking me how I'm doing and I
and you should expect from me like good, thank you.
Like that's it. Yeah, that's it.
You should not do that other thing, because if you really
answer is like, maybe it's not you're.
Gonna open up something someone doesn't wanna hear?
Exactly. It's like it was only a polite
way to say good morning. And so I think like in this
industry is better now because when I started it was worse, but
now it's better because you have more conversations, especially
like if you open up first. This is my experience.
If I open up about my experience with burnout, it's easy to have
conversations with people who already experienced that or who
are towards that. And then they trust you because
they feel like you will not judge.
You already are like you pass that or you are like
experiencing that. But if you don't and if you put
that like, you know, I know everything.
I'm an expert, I'm tech lit of whatever.
I'm a all of these like titles and layers and directors and
whatever people are like, wow, you are amazing.
I am the problem. And when you yeah, it's me.
And when you believe that it's done like there is no, there is
no conversation. There is no honesty between
people. It's like, well, in meetings, I
can see it. So it's like you see a meeting
and then you see all of these points and these images, and I'm
like, all of you are broken, so I will treat you as a person
first. But yeah, we all here are
broken. So let's just not do this.
And even if you don't want to accept it, we all are like we
still share this world. So we put into philosophy things
like, yeah, we have hard questions and we are afraid of
time. So yeah, no.
Like it's all the same. It's the same.
We are the same. For sure.
Yeah. I have really enjoyed this
conversation. I must say I I didn't expect it
to go this direction, but I'm really happy it did.
I want to thank you for your openness.
You also asked, I think, very interesting questions and I
really like the discussions that happened here.
Before we round off, is there still anything you want to
share? I think like first, thank you so
much for the invitation. I also enjoyed the conversation.
But I think like if you are starting this career and I will
agree with you that understanding the why.
Like if you in mind that if you are building something really
dangerous that you don't know, it's better that you are OK with
what you are building. Like if I am building the atomic
bomb, it's better that I know and I am OK with that.
So always ask why you are doing things as a developer, as
engineer, as engineer manager, because if you don't do that,
you might end it up maybe doing something or impacting people's
life without even realising it. So it's better to just be more
curious about why you are doing things.
Keep your of course, if you like tech, keep that.
Just add an extra thing. It's not removed, it's just add
an extra layer of why we are doing things.
So. I think it comes with the job.
Nowadays it's your responsibility.
It comes, however. Not everyone does it.
Because it's cultural like so far culture is evolving and I
think like it's going to doubt that direction.
But I think if you are already in the job for many years, if
you start to do that or if you are starting and if you start to
do that, it will make easier your life.
And also it will put you into the bucket of people who can
bring more value in my opinion. Like if I have someone like that
in my team, I'm like you are the person that I will put you in a
lot of projects that are very high impact.
Why? Because you care.
So, So I think that that's one thing.
And the next problem is about the last point and is we have a
limited amount of time at work, but also in life.
And in my opinion there is more than work in life like you
should have like the dodge life and then work separate.
There is no like working 11 hours in a farm or something
like that. That's like don't do that.
Anymore. No, don't do that if you can.
You don't do that if you don't have option.
OK, that's a different situation.
So. Yeah, that's fair.
I love that. Thank you so much for offering
that perspective as well, and thank you for listening.
Let us know in the comments section what you thought.
I'm going to put all Alexandra's socials in the description
below. Reach out to her, let her know
what you thought of this episode as well, and we'll see you on
the next one.