I was trying to convince another team to take a different approach to a problem. I tried to make my arguments with code, prototyping alternatives to prove my point. My suggestions fell on deaf ears. But that’s because I was doing it wrong. I should have taken the time to build relationships with that team so we understood each other’s perspectives. Without that we were talking past each other. I remained unswayed by their arguments, they ignored mine.
– Brett Slatkin, Programming is primarily a social endeavor
This is a good general rule, definitely not limited to just programming. It reminds me of the saying “people don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care”.
Just because programming is a strongly technology driven arena doesn’t prevent it from having the same human interaction issues that every other human endeavor has had.