Team Guide: Essential Tips

TL;DR: Uncover the “commandments” that guide our daily actions and how they have made us a stronger team.

As we embarked on our journey as a team, we quickly realized the need to establish clear rules to optimize our performance. It’s crucial to understand that our actions are no longer just personal; they impact the entire team. Plus, let’s face it, routine can be as dangerous at work as it is in relationships. 😜

That’s why we decided to encapsulate our learning in what we call the area’s “commandments”. These emerged from recurrent situations with solutions that often turned out to be surprisingly simple. Every new team member gets acquainted with these principles, and over time, they even have the chance to challenge or enhance them.

And here they are:

1.You Shall Read Documentation: We’ve all fallen into the trap of wanting to solve everything on our own, wasting time on problems that were probably already solved in some documentation, be it external or internal.

2.You Shall Read Old Code: We often think we’re facing a unique problem. But in projects with a considerable lifespan, it’s likely someone has already found a solution… although there’s always room for improvement. 😉

3.You Shall Test Your Work Before Requesting Reviews: The classic “I didn’t test that click, but everything else worked fine”. Testing our code is a difficult art, and it’s easy to fall into the trap of testing only what we know works.

4.You Shall Not Do the ‘Ostrich’: Ignoring problems doesn’t make them disappear. Avoiding them is not the solution.

5.You Shall Raise Your Hand to Ask for Help: We’re a team heading in the same direction. You’re not alone, and it’s important to be willing to offer help as well. What goes around, comes around.

6.You Shall Read the Console: That mysterious error… if only there were a clue in the console. Surprise! There is, and it’s right in front of you.

7.You Shall Test Your Hypotheses: Wandering in theories is fun, but without testing them, they remain up in the air. Testing allows us to learn and progress.

8.You Shall Not ‘Fish’: Accepting “I don’t know” is liberating and puts us in a position to learn. Pretending to know everything is a sure path to stagnation.

9.You Shall Plan Your Developments Before Working: Better to waste time debating ideas than rewriting code due to lack of planning.

10.You Shall Respect the Commandments: We needed a tenth, and what better than a reminder to keep these principles present in our work.

Adopting these principles as habits is no easy task, and we’ve all failed at some point. But, looking at the big picture, they have served us well.

🚀