Making Badass Developers - Kathy Sierra (Serious Pony) keynote
Summary
TLDRThis talk delves into the challenges of web development, emphasizing that there's no consensus on the skills required to be a web developer. It humorously dismisses the 'rock star' and 'ninja' stereotypes, highlighting the importance of cognitive resources. The speaker introduces the concept of 'cognitive leaks' and how they deplete our ability to learn and perform. The talk advocates for managing cognitive load by breaking down complex skills into smaller, manageable parts, and stresses the value of high-quality, high-quantity examples for efficient learning. It concludes with a call to recognize and respect the limited cognitive resources of fellow developers.
Takeaways
- 🤔 The debate on what skills are essential for a web developer is subjective and varies widely among individuals.
- 🎯 The speaker suggests that the focus should be on the ability to learn quickly and efficiently, rather than on specific skills.
- 🧠 Cognitive resources are limited, and effective learning requires managing these resources to avoid being overwhelmed.
- 🐕 Studies with dogs and humans show that even simple tasks can deplete cognitive resources, affecting subsequent decision-making.
- 🚫 Avoid unnecessary cognitive leaks in design and communication to prevent unnecessary drain on cognitive resources.
- 🛑 The speaker emphasizes the importance of not just learning, but mastering skills to move them from active cognitive use to automatic processes.
- 🔁 High expertise is associated with efficient cognitive resource management, which is crucial for both learning and performance.
- 🚀 Perceptual learning, where skills are acquired without explicit instruction, can dramatically speed up the learning process.
- 👥 Community and collaboration play a significant role in providing high-quality examples and support for rapid learning.
- 🙏 The speaker concludes by honoring the audience's cognitive resources, acknowledging the effort and focus they've given to the presentation.
Q & A
What is the main issue discussed in the script regarding web developers?
-The main issue discussed is the varying opinions on what skills and knowledge are necessary to be considered a web developer, leading to confusion and the idea that there is no single answer to what one must know.
Why does the speaker mention 'humanoids' and 'unicorns' in the context of web developers?
-The speaker uses 'humanoids' to describe the idealized version of web developers that can handle any task with perfect memory and cognitive resources, while 'unicorns' refers to the mythical perfect developer that doesn't actually exist. This is to contrast with 'humans,' who have limited cognitive resources.
What cognitive experiment involving digits is mentioned in the script, and what does it demonstrate?
-The script mentions an experiment where participants had to remember either two or seven digits. Those who had to remember seven digits were more likely to choose cake over fruit, demonstrating that cognitive load affects self-control and decision-making.
How does the speaker relate the concept of cognitive resources to web development?
-The speaker relates cognitive resources to web development by emphasizing the importance of managing these limited resources effectively to learn and perform tasks efficiently, suggesting that reducing cognitive load is crucial for developers.
What is the 'one tank' theory mentioned in the script, and how does it apply to learning and performance?
-The 'one tank' theory refers to the idea that problem-solving, thinking, and willpower all draw from the same pool of cognitive resources. In the context of learning and performance, it suggests that overtaxing this pool can lead to decreased effectiveness and efficiency.
What is the significance of the 'chicken sexing' example in the script?
-The 'chicken sexing' example illustrates how individuals can become experts in a task without explicitly knowing how they do it, highlighting the brain's ability to subconsciously learn patterns and make complex judgments.
What is the 'intermediate blues' mentioned in the script, and why is it a problem?
-The 'intermediate blues' refers to a plateau in skill development where progress seems to stall. It's a problem because it can lead to frustration and a halt in improvement, often due to relying on suboptimal or outdated skills that have become automatic.
How does the speaker suggest improving the speed of learning in web development?
-The speaker suggests improving the speed of learning by focusing on high-quality, high-quantity examples that allow the brain to pattern match effectively, bypassing the need for explicit knowledge of the underlying rules.
What is the key takeaway from the NASA and UCLA experiment mentioned in the script?
-The key takeaway is that with the right kind of training, even non-experts can rapidly develop high-level skills without explicit knowledge of the underlying mechanisms, demonstrating the power of perceptual learning.
Why does the speaker emphasize the importance of considering others' cognitive resources in the script?
-The speaker emphasizes the importance of considering others' cognitive resources to foster a supportive community and to help each other learn and perform more effectively by reducing unnecessary cognitive load.
Outlines
🤷♂️ The Debate on Essential Web Developer Skills
The speaker begins by setting a scene at a party with web developers and others, where a discussion arises about the skills necessary to be considered a web developer. The conversation quickly becomes contentious as opinions vary widely. The speaker humorously points out that even experts don't agree on what skills are crucial, and the audience is reminded that there's no single 'right' answer. Instead, the focus should be on the ability to learn quickly, as the field of web development is constantly evolving.
🧠 Cognitive Resources and Learning Efficiency
This paragraph delves into the concept of cognitive resources, comparing developers to 'humans,' 'unicorns,' and 'humanoids.' The speaker emphasizes that humans have limited cognitive resources, unlike the idealized 'humanoids' with perfect memory and unlimited capacity. The importance of managing these resources is highlighted through an experiment about memory and willpower, suggesting that even small tasks can deplete our ability to make good decisions. The speaker advocates for reducing 'cognitive leaks' to optimize learning and performance.
🚧 Overcoming Learning Plateaus and Speeding Up Progress
The speaker identifies common issues that hinder learning and progress in web development: a pile-up of tasks that overload cognitive resources ('pile up on B'), the 'intermediate blues' where progress plateaus, and the slow pace of learning ('too slow'). Solutions are proposed, such as breaking down tasks into smaller, manageable subskills and regularly revisiting mastered skills to refine them. The speaker stresses the importance of high-quality, high-quantity examples for rapid learning, drawing parallels to historical examples like 'chicken sexing' and 'plane spotters' during WWII.
🚀 Accelerating Learning Through Perceptual Learning
The speaker introduces 'perceptual learning' as a method to accelerate skill acquisition, bypassing the intermediate stages of learning. Using examples like 'chicken sexing' and 'plane spotting,' the speaker explains how experts were created without them knowing the rules they were following. The key takeaway is the importance of high-quality, high-quantity examples for the brain to pattern-match effectively. The speaker calls for a community effort to provide such examples and concludes by reminding the audience of the human aspect of learning, emphasizing the scarcity and value of cognitive resources.
🤝 Caring for Cognitive Resources in a Community
In the final paragraph, the speaker concludes by urging the audience to be mindful of each other's cognitive resources. The speaker asks the audience to look around and consider the cognitive load their peers carry, encouraging a supportive and understanding community. The talk ends on a heartfelt note, thanking the audience for dedicating their valuable cognitive resources to listening and learning.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Cognitive Resources
💡Web Developers
💡Unicorns
💡Expertise Development
💡Perceptual Learning
💡Cognitive Leaks
💡Pattern Matching
💡Humanoids
💡Intermediate Blues
💡Learning Efficiency
Highlights
Discussion on the varying opinions on what skills are necessary to be considered a web developer.
The humorous suggestion that there are no definitive answers, and everyone has their own perspective on web development skills.
Introduction of the concept of 'humanoid' developers, who are expected to have perfect memory and cognitive resources.
The idea that most resources treat developers as 'humanoids' rather than humans with limited cognitive resources.
The importance of cognitive resources in learning and the concept of one 'tank' of cognitive resources for all mental tasks.
The classic 'marshmallow experiment' and its implications for cognitive resource depletion.
The impact of small cognitive tasks on overall cognitive resource availability.
The concept of 'cognitive leaks' and how they can be reduced to improve learning and performance.
The three categories of developers: human, unicorn, and humanoid, with a focus on the challenges faced by human developers.
The framework for efficient learning and performance improvement, involving moving skills across three stages of mastery.
Addressing the problem of too many tasks causing a pile-up and preventing effective learning.
TheIntermediate Blues: the plateau in learning and how to overcome it by refining skills that have become automatic.
The challenge of learning speed and how to accelerate the process of moving from novice to expert.
The extreme example of 'chicken sexing' as a demonstration of how expertise can be developed without conscious knowledge.
The importance of high-quality, high-quantity examples for rapid skill acquisition through perceptual learning.
The potential for perceptual learning to revolutionize how we learn complex tasks in web development.
A call to action for developers to support each other's cognitive resources and learn effectively as humans, not 'humanoids'.
Transcripts
are there any unicorns
here be
proud okay more than one all right so
um imagine that you're at a
party oh there it is imagine that you're
at a party with a bunch of web
developers and a few normal people and
somebody says this and by the way these
monitors down here aren't working so
forgive me for looking at what's
happening so somebody says that and then
they say
that and then they say this which you've
all heard right how hard can it be so
now imagine what you are thinking at
this
party and you've all heard
this so then he goes okay well then what
do you have to know and this is where it
gets interesting because of course every
single person at this event whether
they're a web developer or not has an
opinion about this so they all start
talking and they all start giving their
ideas about what you really have to know
I mean you absolutely cannot call
yourself a web developer if you don't
have these things whatever it is but
they're all starting to argue about it
because they don't all
agree and I'm not making fun of node by
the way just a little bit um
so there starts to be this argument
among even this very small group of
people
so if we can't agree on what you have to
know then we will ask the
experts because who else is going to
tell us and so this is what they say you
absolutely cannot call yourself a
developer if you don't at least know all
of those things right now so um you have
to be a rock star as every ad will tell
you um you have to be a ninja you have
to be a hacker you have to be a hacker
Ninja
and the internet is wrong spoiler alert
um so if you ask 10,000 people you get
10,000 different opinions on what you
have to know to be a web developer at
any given time so this should be
comforting because it means there is no
one answer at all but the people who say
these things especially the people on
Hacker News they know they are firm in
their commitment but they don't actually
know they just think they do so what do
you have to know that is the wrong
question question so a better question
is you know you are going to have to
learn stuff so how fast can you do that
how much and how fast can you do that
and still
survive well it starts here there are
three kinds of developers there's human
there's of course the unicorn and
there's humanoid and the problem is
humanoids have consistently available
always up cognitive resources Perfect
Memory etc etc humans they're cognitive
resources are so scarce and precious and
limited I'm not going to talk about
unicorns cuz you don't exist so you've
uh you've been mistaken for a humanoid
everything every almost every 99.9% cuz
someone's going to go not all open
source documentation treats me like this
um everything treats you like a humanoid
probably your boss your employers your
clients
School everything you've ever done every
book um that's helped you learn to
program including potentially mine have
treated you like a humanoid and not a
human so a little refresher on cognitive
resources because that's the perspective
that we're going to use because it is
the only key you have to actually
learning really quickly and really well
so most of you are probably familiar
with this but just a little refresher so
this was one of the experiments that
really started it all um so I'll imagine
that I split the room and this half of
the room I give you an a little memory
test and it only has two digits you just
have to memorize two digits pretty easy
this whole side of the room seven digits
not seven numbers just seven digits
pretty easy so I give you that test give
you that test then you're all done and
the researcher says can you come down
the hall you know for further processing
the experiment is over but of course
it's never over and then they say oh by
the way would you like a snack and
you're offered fruit or cake so I think
you probably all know what
happens this side of the room you guys
chose a lot more cake these are the
really Slim fruit eaters so um the
difference was just five extra digits
that's how much it took so again at
first they thought well it's just about
the glucose in the brain which has
something to do with that but really
what they learned is that it's all one
tank cognitive processing for solving
problems for thinking doing the hard
stuff and willpower all the same tank
one pool of resources burn one you burn
the other and it works with dogs too so
for example this is actually my dog um
it they did this experiment with
different breeds of dogs take a dog and
have it sit just sit obediently just
just sit doesn't have to do anything but
sit take another dog and it has to go in
the crate for 10 minutes at the end of
10 minutes they release the dogs to play
one of those treat puzzles which they
had cruy rigged so it actually couldn't
ever be solved by the dog and then they
waited to see how long the dogs would
work on that puzzle so the dogs that had
to sit in the crate worked on that
puzzle twice as long as the dogs that
just had to sit obediently so think
about that if you have a dog right your
dog just sitting there is burning
through self-control cognitive resources
and then can't think and where whereas
sitting in the crate required no use of
cognitive resources the dog was able to
in self-control the dog was able to use
the model to solve the puzzle so think
about this if you are doing anything in
your own products or services or
anything that you make for other people
think am I doing things that are
unnecessarily burning people's cognitive
resources am I doing things that will
make them choose cake and often we
are and so this is a problem so the goal
is to reduce cognitive leaks all the
time and to always remember it is one
tank and it is so scarce and so easily
depleted so again here's how it works
right even if you're doing something
that you like to do even if you're doing
something it's not about doing something
that you hate it's about actually just
using your brain to think so but if this
happens right then you have less ability
to resist the drive-thru on the way home
and it works in
Reverse you've all had a client or a
boss say that um you can just do that
today right now
what you're thinking is something like
this but what you actually say is sure
no problem now if you say sure no
problem instead of what you really think
you just burned a lot more cognitive
resources which is why when you think
about it it really makes no sense for
people to hold all the kinds of meetings
they hold because every meeting that you
attend most of the time is bleeding your
cognitive resources dry so when you go
back and try to work right you can't
function so you you tell the client sure
no problem when you're thinking gosh if
you could only die on a fire then you
can't play chess that night this is how
it works and there are a gazillion
studies that support this it's all one
tank but it's not just these big things
right there's death by a cogn a thousand
cognitive micro leaks all the tiny
little things those could be tiny little
things in an interface just tiny little
things that you have to deal with so
here's an example anyone have an Apple
TV remote
right anyone here not lost it in the
cushions so this thing is so tiny right
so this is what people end up
doing they do it so much that this is
what I entered as the search
string people taping their apple remote
to bigger things because that's what I
had to do and there are so many there
was even a Kickstarter right
so it's not about the lost time looking
for the remote it's the it's the tiny
little cognitive resources all the time
and so people try to find these
Solutions so that they don't have to
waste cognitive resources on them but
those things add up to a huge pool so
think about all the little things they
matter so what we know is that where
there is high
expertise there is a great deal of
cognitive resource management for
efficiency when learning and efficiency
and Effectiveness when actually doing
the thing so that's what we're going to
look at is how to get way better way
faster from from a cognitive resources
perspective because without that nothing
you do will matter so this is the
framework that we're going to look at
right imagine you have three boards with
Post-it notes one is for the things that
you um can't do but will'll need to the
next is for things that you can do with
effort these are the things that are
burning cognitive resources and then the
last is for things that have moved into
the automatic mastered possibly
unconscious stage so the goal is to
always be moving things across that
board but there are a bunch of problems
so we're going to look real quick at
these three main problems and how to
solve them so the first one is you just
don't get better when people don't make
progress the main reason usually comes
down to this pile up on B there's just
too many things draining cognitive
resources now you just saw that
experiment with the two and the Seven
how just five extra
digits overwhelmed your cognitive
resources it takes so little and here
you are trying to learn so many things
so the pile up on B is there are too
many cognitive resources being drained
to ever effectively nail something and
get it over to the Sea pile so problem
number two is the intermediate Blues
this is when someone is making progress
and then they just Plateau something
happens and they just can't seem to get
any better and the main reason for that
is usually that something has made it to
see but it's not high quality or it's
not supporting them or maybe it's
outdated and now it's holding them back
and it once worked whatever it is but
now it may even be unconscious and if
not unconscious it's something that
doesn't take any cognitive resources
which was the point so nobody wants to
pull it back and refine it so we'll look
at that and problem number three is it
just takes too long we don't have that
kind of time not when you know quora and
Reddit and stack Overflow and Hacker
News is telling us everything we need to
learn so we have to fix those things so
we have to fix p up on B half F on C
these are actually relatively simple to
fix especially pile up on B this would
change your life if you really started
doing it like today um the too slow
we're going to look at that because
that's the one where all the magic
happens so pile up on B we need to fix
that because we have a bad balance too
many things taking cognitive resources
so you can't just ever finally nail
something and get it off the cognitive
resource plate so there are a couple
things you can do there's the obvious
one but this is not always easy to do
especially when other people are driving
what you're supposed to be learning is
you just keep more stuff on a you don't
try to learn it right you don't have to
learn the whole
API right now you can do it in pieces
but the main thing we can do and this is
what you know 50 years of research on
expertise development has told us split
these things into small subtasks
subskills and take those small subskills
to see and then suddenly you become a
lot more effective and efficient that's
how you move through getting better now
how do you know what size of a subskill
actually is going to help make that
process happen so and this is the thing
to remember half a skill beats a half
ass skill um the way that you can tell
this is one way you can tell there are
many ways but this is one way that is a
really simple way is if you can take a
skill from you can't do it to mastered
like maybe 95% of the time that you try
it you get it right within three
sessions and each practice session it
within one to three sessions and each
session is no more than 45 to 90 minutes
if you can't if you haven't done if you
haven't nailed this thing you've just
got it in that amount of time the thing
is too big so you need a finer grain
skill so that you can just keep moving
them along that's how progress happens
and but it's you can see it's not what
we normally try to do so but here's a
bigger problem that this helps fix the
scariest thing about practice with a
bunch of stuff on B A bunch of stuff
that you just keep working on it you
keep working on it you keep working on
it you haven't really nailed it you know
you're getting better but you're still
crappy at it is that practice makes
permanent so whatever you practice the
longer you practice being crappy at it
or being or even just being a beginner
the better you get at staying a beginner
or mediocre so it's really important to
take fewer things and very quickly p
pass through that stage and jump up to
intermediate as quickly as you can now
half Fass skills on C this one um the
biggest problem is that we don't ever
want to revisit those things and when
they study very high expertise they find
people who are continually
rechecking the things they've already
automated and mastered to see does this
need to be refined does this still serve
me justes you know is this causing me to
now hit a limit and I can't go any
further so consider those things are but
think about what's on your C board right
now and these can be big things little
things things you do things you know
right um I'm just going to admit this
I've never admitted this before but um
I've been programming almost 30 years
and I just started using an IDE two
weeks ago I have been well I considered
Sublime that was my big upgrade to an
IDE um I've been using text edit in the
command line so I finally intell yes um
and after about 2 days I'm like I'm
killing myself of how many cognitive
resources I will never recover not doing
this but it was just easier right I just
did what I did so programming Paradigm
right now we're in the O FP thing coding
style semicolons typing whatever it
might be um how you hold a stylus of
your graphic designer all of those
things could be
anything but think about bringing it
back now that takes cognitive resources
to do it but this is the most effective
use of your cognitive resources if you
want to keep getting better so but if if
it's too slow how does this help you you
can be doing everything right moving
things across the board but it's too
slow and for you folks it probably
doesn't get more challenging for how
fast you have to learn new things than
for you the people in this room so how
um like I'm telling you something you
don't know so um we need to bypass
B where we can because if you can go
straight from can't do it to suddenly
you just magically can how awesome is
that and we can and we also want to
speed up a to B to C so it all starts
here this is the most extreme example
which I'm sure most of you are familiar
with but just for a refresher the most
extreme example of something that
bypasses c where you go from I can't do
it to I'm an absolute expert and I have
no idea how I got there so chicken
sexing determining the gender of a baby
chick apparently there are certain kinds
of chickens where that it's virtually
impossible to perceive it
now obviously it's not impossible for
the brain but it's impossible for the
people who are actually trying to figure
it out but people become really really
good at it so in Japan they took a group
of people and said these are the master
chick sexers we will have them teach
other chick sexers and so they tried and
they couldn't because either they didn't
know what rules they were actually using
or how they were actually doing it or
they were just guessing so they couldn't
teach people so instead they did
something else and this is where it all
happens this is the this is the template
even though this is very simplified it
scales up to things much more complex
they took the people who were going to
learn to be chick sexers and they just
here's the bin of chicks and they would
just pick up a chick and say I don't
know
female and the the chick sexer expert
would say yes no yes no and the person
was just doing it randomly just sorting
them I have no idea yeah male female
over time their responses were not
random they got better and better and
better and better and given enough time
became experts without ever knowing how
they suddenly got better so again that's
the most extreme example another one was
the World War II um civilian plane
spotters in England there were people
who got to be really good at a crucial
skill which is knowing is that incoming
plane a bomber or is that one of our own
so again they tried to have those expert
plane spotters teach others couldn't do
it they did actually know what rules
they were using or every time they said
they had a set of rules something about
there would be you know exceptions to
those rules that made it all fall apart
so they did the same thing with the
chick sexers they just had the person
who wanted to learn next to the expert
and they created new expert planes
spotters that way brains do things all
the time the best things the brain does
have nothing to do with us we don't get
to have a say and this is what drives us
crazy about people who really do have a
lot of expertise when you say things
like well how did you know how did you
do that how did you figure that out
right they just they don't know they
just know and all of you have things
that you have deep expertise at where
this is true for you the problem is we
often think we know even when we don't
so those were simple tasks right the
chicken sexing and the plane spotting
well extremely difficult but very simple
in terms of identification what about
more elaborate things because we're
talking about development so here's an
experiment that was done with NASA and
people from UCLA pretty spectacular but
it's kind of shocking how few people
have actually really looked at this they
took um these are the any pilots in here
so this is the six-pack the the
instrument the flight instruments they
took
non-pilots not beginning Pilots people
who have never actually even thought
about flying a plane and they put them
through this training program lasted
about two
hours very special training program very
much like the chick sexing right this is
what happened they outscored the
seasoned Pilots with a th000 to 2,000
hours of flight time
non-pilots on accuracy and speed of
knowing what those instruments meant in
terms of the
plane so that's really dramatic they
didn't even have any teaching at all
they went straight from a to c and then
they did it again with an aviation um uh
navigation task same
thing this is order of magnitude right
now could they could they leave and fly
a plane no but they had just learned two
really crucial skills that no longer
have to drain cognitive resources and oh
yes they're really awesome at it because
it's a really life-saving skill too so
they just jumped way up the curve so no
you can't learn everything that way but
you can learn so many more things than
people believe so it's not used this is
actually called perceptual learning so
that's the reason it's not used is
because for so long really the 60s is
when a lot of this 1960s a lot of This
research
started um and it's robust is they
believed that it was just about sensory
perception they just thought it was
about what the eyes saw or or heard that
or even kinesthetic they didn't realize
that the brain was pattern matching also
on deep underlying structures and
patterns and rules that it wasn't just
about sensory perception so why we're
not using this is um crazy so um brains
are great at pattern matching if we get
out of the way but they don't tell us
that they're doing it which is why you
have these
experts who have absolutely no idea how
they do certain things and you know you
you may have encountered someone or you
may yourself look at some code for just
a second Without Really studying it and
go that code smells bad right we use
words like that smells bad you may not
yet know why but you are certain it does
so that's an example of your brain has
pattern matched in a way that you are
aren't even cognitively aware of yet
although you could dig into the code and
find out why now this is the answer to
how to make it happen is high quality
High quantity examples and this is what
we don't do it has to be very high
quantity of all high quality examples
and we don't do that we see one example
we see two examples we see three
examples in a book or a course or on a
website right to actually get that order
of magnitude jump it takes about 200 to
300 Expos es in a very compressed period
of time that allows the brain to sort
signal from noise so that's where the
magic happens and we can do this as a
community and I've been trying to look
and it is really hard to find really
good quality examples in such high
numbers but they can be very small right
teaching a very small subset I shouldn't
say teaching letting the brain figure
out the pattern but to sort signal from
noise the example set has to be huge
otherwise the brain we see this the
brain looks at one example and thinks
well maybe that's important too and it
mistakes surface details for the core
underlying pattern so the answer is we
have to care about each other's
cognitive resources so right now I just
want you to look around at the people
next to you right now I'm going to sit
here until you do can't leave till you
do look around the people next to you
and realize that they are not humanoids
they are not unicorns they're humans and
just visualize them bleeding cognitive
resources and think about about how you
can help them and they can help you and
being at this event is really a great
way to do that and the next time
somebody says this to you right the only
reasonable response is that's adorable
and um I just want to honor that you are
all humans and you your cognitive
resources are scarce and precious and
thank you so much for spending some of
them on me thank
you thank you
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