The importance of unawareness

tl;dr: unawareness shouldn’t be a shame and should be rewarded.

I’m sure you have seen, or even been yourself, the person who knows anything their task or the development team needs. This is the all-knowing developer.

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The all-knowing developer

Who are those guys and which circumstances helped them to get this important role, worths a separate article. We can admit they are team superstars. Everyone respects their opinion and advices them in any phase of development. They are important for their teams and the company as a whole.

Is there room for anyone else? Lets see the opposite side.

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The unaware developer

This is the developer who admits he / she is not aware of something. I support that this kind of developer should be a team superstar too!
I will explain you why, later on.

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The funny part

People may hate the know-it-all developer because he may seem arrogant, but they don’t like the developer who is not afraid to admit that is unaware of a topic either! Some people will tend to believe that he / she is just stupid and illiterate.

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Having no unaware developers

To be realistic, the all-knowing developers are really few. With the tendency to believe that the unaware developer is a weak developer, everyone will try to hide their unawareness and pretend that everything is OK. Hiding unawareness will lead to problems, for sure.

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What could go wrong

Its not hard to think that the following may happen:

• the quality of the product can be affected
• they will never stop doing it because its a vicious circle
• other developers may start doing it too

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Affecting the behavior of others

The behavior of others can be affected, when not knowing feels like a shame.
If it sounds exaggerated, think of Asch’s conformity experiments which prove that people get influenced by the beliefs and opinions of the majority. Its a result of the pressure from the group that defines the standards and rules of conduct. Members of such teams are convinced that this behavior is the most appropriate and productive and even though they initially disagree with it they finally follow it.

Compliance is motivated by the need for approval, the fear of being rejected and the tendency of conforming to someone who is liked and respected.

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Unaware developers should be team superstars

Firstly and obviously they seem to be sincere persons, which itself can be enough. It may also mean that they will study and do research for anything they may need. This is really important as every company would like to have evolving developers in their workforce. Studying won’t only provide the team with solutions (and possibly the best one, if the research is extended) but it will also provide new ideas and stimuli for the whole team.

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Fix your non-admitting unaware team

Its important to cultivate the culture of rewarding unawareness. Encourage admitting unawareness. Show your trust to those people, encourage initiatives and help them assemble and present the ideas they may bring to the table. Last but not least, we have to show respect for their effort to acquire knowledge and close the gap with the rest of the team.