Why Everyone Else Knows More Than You Do, and What To Do About It
The developers you work with know stuff that you don’t, and you know stuff that they don’t. Obvious, right?
So why does it seem like everyone else knows more, and you’ll never catch up? Why does it seem like you’re a little kid on a tricycle, trying to pedal faster while the big kids zoom by on their bikes?
The answer is that it’s true: everyone else you work with does know more — collectively. Taken all together, everyone else knows more than any one person does.
The mistake you’re making is the subtle assumption that if one person in the group knows something, everyone else — or at least most people, other than you — must already know it too.
Let’s say someone asks a networking question, and you don’t know the answer, but one of your colleagues does. Then you’re having trouble getting API authentication to work, and one of your colleagues advises. Another developer helps you with a thorny NodeJS issue. Someone else teaches you how to fix a build failure. And another colleague whips up a quick script to get you some data you need. After a while you start to worry if you are the least knowledgeable person in your group… your company… maybe ever.
Everyone else is on their tricycles too
Here’s what you’re not seeing: Your network-savvy colleague might have been the only person on the team who could field that question. It’s not true that just because one person knew that, everyone else did. Also, that network pro might not have a clue about API authentication, or Node, or build failures, or scripting.
Even harder to see: you definitely know things others on your team don’t, and I’m not just talking about your bank account password or the name of the imaginary friend you had when you were little enough to ride an actual tricycle. You have job knowledge, industry knowledge, business knowledge that others around you do not.
For many years, I had a hard time seeing this. I assumed that everyone around me must already know all the things I do, for some reason. But again, it’s not true that just because one person (you, in this case) knows something, everyone else does.
The person who helped you with the API might not know React like you do. The developer who solved the Node issue might not write clean code like you do. The script-writing whiz might be totally lost if you start talking about code security.
Sometimes you’re the big kid on the three-speed bike, and one or more of your colleagues are on their trikes, wishing they could zip around like you do.
You can DO that?
Years ago, I worked with an experienced developer named Nick. Knowledgeable, skilled, kind, thoughtful — Nick was a role model for me. He’d written a lot of the code for the application I was working on.
One day, when I was still new to the team, we were in a staff meeting. The boss started talking about some technology I’d never even heard of. I was just a little kid on her tricycle, trying to keep up with the knowledgeable big kids, so I decided it was best not to interrupt the meeting to ask.
I was making a note to myself to ask someone later, when Nick politely interrupted the boss and said:
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. What is this?”
Yep. In a room with some super-knowledgeable peers, Nick had just admitted to not knowing something. The world did not end. Nobody rolled their eyes, or hinted that Nick should know this already, or otherwise had any judgmental reaction. In fact, a few people looked relieved. I’m sure I was one of them.
The boss apologized for getting ahead of himself and took a verbal step back to explain what he was talking about.
You know, I don’t even remember what the technology was. I don’t think anyone even mentioned it again after that meeting. But, twelve years later, I remember being floored that someone who I thought “knew everything” could just state calmly, in front of his colleagues, that he didn’t know something.
Ask, and ask publicly
In that moment, I saw that it was part of the role of a lead developer to speak up and ask when you didn’t know something, because your newer colleagues might not have the courage yet. Since I wanted to be a lead developer, I was going to have to get used to speaking up.
Later, I saw that the pressure to appear knowledgeable is universal, no matter what your experience level. If you’re new, you might feel you have to prove to your team that you know what you’re doing. If you’re more experienced, you might feel like others will judge you for not knowing as much as they thought.
Let’s smash the stigma around asking questions or asking for help. There’s no shame in not knowing something. The problem arises when you don’t take action to try to find out — either you don’t try at all; or you do try, but when you get stuck, you don’t ask for help.
How do we smash the stigma? Ask questions, and ask in a way that others see it. I know, it’s less intimidating to message a trusted colleague privately. When you keep it quiet, you maintain the illusion for others that everyone around them knows everything. When you model the behavior of humbly asking for help, you teach others that it’s okay to do the same. When others start to join you, you’re changing the culture for the better.
Pro tip: modeling good behavior, teaching others, and changing the culture for the better are things leaders do. When you speak up, you’re not highlighting your weakness, you’re demonstrating your strength. No joke. My boss told me recently that one of the key factors in hiring me was that I was not afraid to ask questions.
Furthermore, when you ask your questions publicly, others can benefit from the knowledge transferred. Someone else, when they encounter the same problem or question, will get stuck just like you did. When you ask in a more public way, everyone else benefits. When Nick asked our boss for more information during our staff meeting, the whole team learned.
Change that culture
So, raise your hand in that staff meeting, post that question to your team, or use (or establish!) a Slack channel specifically for developers across teams to ask questions and help each other out.
When a colleague asks something you don’t know, add a comment that you’d like to know as well. They, and others, will see that they’re not the only one with that question.
When a question comes through that you do know how to answer, share your knowledge! Some days, you’re the big kid on the bike, and someone else is calling out to you from their tricycle, trying to keep up.
Above all, always be kind, regardless of the question or who is asking. A question might seem basic or obvious to you, it might be answered by a simple web search, it might be better asked in another forum, it might have been answered two days earlier in the same forum… it doesn’t matter. Be kind. Establish the norm that questions are always responded to with kindness and without judgment.
That’s what a leader does.
