"The Silent Room"
There was this meeting once, I can still feel it in my stomach. Twenty developers in a room. The CTO had just told market analysts (it was.a publicly listed company) that we were building a technical hub filled with world-class talent. The mantra at the time was: we must do what we tell the market we're going to do. So I asked the group a simple question: “What are the traits of a world-class development team?” Silence. Not thoughtful silence. Not “we’re still forming our ideas” silence. Just… stuck. Eyes dropped. People shifted in their chairs. The air felt thick with hesitation. I filled the space with nervous facilitation, trying to rescue the moment. But it stayed awkward. We never really got to the heart of the question. Looking back, I understand it differently. It wasn’t that the team didn’t care. It’s that the question was dangerous. It asked people to step into uncertainty, to reveal their values, their vision, and possibly say something others didn’t agree with. And in that environment, where the stakes felt high and the expectations unclear, certainty felt safer than honesty. I left that meeting with a quiet resolution: But here's the trap: when I do that, I stop being a facilitator of emergence, and start becoming a controlling manager, shaping outcomes instead of co-creating them. What I’m learning is this: We can’t have autonomy and certainty at the same time. And when fear is in the room, we will almost always choose certainty. That’s not just true for managers. It’s true for developers too. Until next time, ✉️ Enjoying The Messy Middle? If someone sent this email your way and you’d like to get it direct, you can sign up here. |