#begin
Next we have arrived at the very last section of the last chapter. It’s called Pride and Prejudice. We as pragmatic programmers are proud of our work. David and Andrew say; we don’t shrink away from responsibility and instead rejoice accepting challenges and complex tasks. I think we as programmers can all identify with that statement. Neil Ford also has a similar quote and it goes something along the lines of: “Software engineers are drawn to complexity like a moth does to light, often with the same result.” I really like that quote. We are indeed drawn to complexity, but we want to untangle that complexity with a simple and easy solution. But that’s more difficult than it sounds. However, as pragmatic programmers we should always be proud of our work. This is also a core value of the software craftsmanship movement. We don’t just half-ass our work, deliver the bare minimum to satisfy requirements. We sign our work, promote it, are ambassadors and pour our passion in every project.
On the team level this means we need a shared sense of responsibility, ownership and accountability. We don’t want people to become territorial over some piece of the project. David and Andrew mention “The Golden Rule”: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” I agree, there must be a foundation of mutual respect for a team to work like a well oiled machine. I think we’ve all heard about Google’s research into high performance teams. They found that THE number 1 reason for high performance teams was psychological safety. This is the social aspect of engineering, and I think, exactly what David and Andrew mean.
They also say that anonymity can be a breeding ground for sloppiness. I think this is a great statement. You probably know of some situation where this lone wolf developer happily coded way for weeks until people started investigating the work he was doing and finding out it was misaligned with the architecture or project road-map.
As pragmatic programmer we strive for shared code ownership. The entire team shall be proud of the work we are doing and we are all acting as real professionals.
Real, Pragmatic Programmers.
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