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Technical leadership: reviews, mentoring, incidents and influence · Expert · Lesson 88 of 98 · 15 min video, then about 4 hours of practice
Giving feedback and handling friction
After this you can give specific, timely feedback that changes behaviour, and handle disagreement on a team without it becoming personal.
Why it matters
Engineers often avoid giving feedback, so problems grow until they are serious. Radical candor's framing helps: care personally and challenge directly. Feedback should be specific (this behaviour, this impact) and timely. Friction on teams usually comes from unmet needs (certainty, autonomy, fairness, belonging) rather than bad people. Understanding that makes conflicts solvable. Trap: feedback as a sandwich of praise around criticism. People learn to ignore the bread.
How to use this resource
Kim Scott's TED talk on caring personally while challenging directly.