The trade in status - what this article calls “the importance game” and “the leveling game” - are a core part of what makes conversation hard. If you want to learn more - or are having trouble getting the feel for examples of why this is so important in practice and how to use it - a book recommendation:
A previous gig gave us Keith Johnstone’s book for theater actors and writers _Impro_ as part of our onboarding. Chapter 2, “Status”, is entirely on this concept, and how status exchanges are a key part of what makes scenes interesting and relatable for viewers. At the time it felt like an odd choice for an engineering role, but after reading the detailed examples of status exchanges and how they work, they became impossible to unsee.
And that was great, because I gotta tell you, HN: applying this skill has made me a much more effective technical leader.
Wishing for status exchanges not to happen isn’t helpful - they’re happening whether you see and intend them or not, so learning how to spot and use (or avoid them) effectively made it, maybe paradoxically, much easier to have difficult, important, multi-layered conversations with people - other engineers, other departments, customers - about hard problems and get them to a good resolution.
As the industry does some soul-searching about the way power is perceived and used differently by different groups, understanding this topic should be seen as core to leveling up.
A previous gig gave us Keith Johnstone’s book for theater actors and writers _Impro_ as part of our onboarding. Chapter 2, “Status”, is entirely on this concept, and how status exchanges are a key part of what makes scenes interesting and relatable for viewers. At the time it felt like an odd choice for an engineering role, but after reading the detailed examples of status exchanges and how they work, they became impossible to unsee.
And that was great, because I gotta tell you, HN: applying this skill has made me a much more effective technical leader.
Wishing for status exchanges not to happen isn’t helpful - they’re happening whether you see and intend them or not, so learning how to spot and use (or avoid them) effectively made it, maybe paradoxically, much easier to have difficult, important, multi-layered conversations with people - other engineers, other departments, customers - about hard problems and get them to a good resolution.
As the industry does some soul-searching about the way power is perceived and used differently by different groups, understanding this topic should be seen as core to leveling up.