Bonding with The Secret Developer’s Team

Photo by Tunde Abati on Unsplash

I try to avoid “mandatory fun” after work meetings. It’s not just because I dislike my colleagues (that’s not actually true), but the truth is these sessions are never truly fun.

I had a miserable time this week at our fun bowling session, and it wasn’t just that we had to write our scores on paper.

Being Early is On Time

It might be Friday night, but showing respect for your fellow developers is still important.

So, when I stood in the bowling alley’s lobby and saw our booking time come and go, I took it personally. Not only that we made the booking in the name of the company, meaning we advertised our tardiness to anyone paying attention.

A Side with That Burger

When you’ve been asked to provide an ID in order to collect those bowling shoes I’d expect you to do so.

You can guess that the number of our devs who forgot to bring their ID was a non-zero number.

It’s a corporate face-palm moment.

The Cost of Lateness

I’m sure I’ve readers who think that The Secret Developer should let this go. Standards only matter in code, not going on a team trip.

Let me get this straight. This isn’t about missing a few frames of bowling. It’s about missing the memo on punctuality.

Whether it’s meetings, deployments, or post-work hangouts, the lax timekeeping that’s often brushed off as our ‘culture’ and I agree — we’ve a slacker culture that stops us from getting work done.

I’m tired of being the only person to make it on time to our standup. Sprint planning is the same. Retros would be if they happened. 

If we’re aiming for the pins of success in software development, maybe it’s time for a little punctuality. Or at least, we could respect everyone’s time and have some standards for our behavior. Frankly, it stops us from getting work done.

Conclusion

Standards, standards standards. Where do you stand? Let me know in the comments: just don’t be too late in doing so. Thank Q.