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Avoid Overthinking and Make Decisions Faster Overthinking is not the same as being cautious and methodical about making a decision. By contrast, despite the amount of analysis overthinkers do, they may never get any closer to actually making a decision. If you’re an overthinker—or even just want to make decisions faster—try these tips to be more decisive. |
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During Times of Major Change, Keep People Informed During times of major change, readily available information can help reduce the fears of those affected about what it means for them. If you’re involved in implementing change, it’s wise to keep people informed—not just about the change itself, but also about its impact on processes, responsibilities, and expectations. |
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The Manager’s Role on a Self-Organizing Agile Team Scrum and other agile methods focus on team roles and dynamics, and because of the emphasis on self-organizing teams, there’s sometimes a misconception that there’s no need for a manager. In reality, good people management can help an agile team thrive—the manager just has to know how to empower the team. |
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Preventing Workplace Miscommunication When one person says something that the other one misinterprets—a very common type of workplace miscommunication—the conversation often moves on with neither party realizing what happened. Being able to discover a misinterpretation and straighten it out before it escalates into a serious tangle is an important skill. |
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Interface Grief: Is It Agile, or Just Bad Software Engineering? There are people who will use "being agile" to justify software engineering practices that could be perceived as lazy or even bad. The specifications are going to change, they say, so it would be a waste to engineer more to begin with than the minimum viable product. What's expediency and what's just poor practice? |
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Let the Outdoors Help You Reduce Work Stress Studies have found that natural environments can promote positive emotions and heighten physical and mental energy. If you're feeling stressed in the office, try to go outside briefly, take a short walk, commune with the trees if you’re able, and get back to work. You just might feel reinvigorated. |
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Balancing Process and Tools The limits of a tool may lead us to realize that we are not working as effectively as we can, and often, changing a tool is part of the solution. But there are good and bad ways to select a tool and how you use it. In particular there are risks when you focus first on tools before considering the problem. |
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Bananas and Critical Thinking People skilled in critical thinking are willing to accept new findings and evidence, even if it means reassessing previous beliefs. They aim to rely on reason rather than emotion in making decisions, and they seek to detect inconsistencies in reasoning, including their own. It's an important skill to have in software. |
