Empathy-Driven Development

[presentation]
by
Andrea Goulet
Summary: 

Empathy is a technical skill. Don’t worry; you read that correctly. While empathy is often cited as a critical “soft skill,” it doesn’t stop there. Empathy is also an incredibly technical topic that is more accessible to analytical engineers—and more vital to building software—than you might think. Andrea Goulet, a noted expert on communication in the software industry, will debunk several myths around empathy, including that empathy is just a feeling, that technical folks can’t access empathy, and that empathy is just a high-level, touchy-feely fad. Andrea will demonstrate how empathy is a crucial skill for all developers of software, and she will give you practical and immediately actionable advice for making empathy a central focus of your daily software development communication practices. She'll also explore the place for empathy while you’re coding and testing. You’ll walk away with a solid understanding of what empathy is (and isn’t), how you can build your empathy skills, and a framework around having empathic conversations. It’s all about improving your communication by putting others in mind first.

About the Presenter

Andrea Goulet is the CEO of Corgibytes, a software development shop dedicated to maintaining and modernizing software applications and has been named by LinkedIn as one of the Top 10 Professionals in Software Under 35. She’s the founder of LegacyCode. Rocks and hosts a podcast dedicated to changing the way we think about legacy code. You may recognize her from prominent industry publications such as the First Round Review, Hanselminutes, Software Engineering Daily, and more. Andrea is a sought after keynote speaker is currently working on her first book: Becoming Technical: Build an Amazing Career in Tech Starting at Square Zero . In her spare time, Andrea enjoys blogging about the intersection of social science and software. She loves watching her kids explore the world and is a sucker for a good physics documentary. You can recognize her by the JavaScript tattoo on her wrist.

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