If your goal is to convince people and agree with your position, feel free to read the article but understand this is getting you nowhere close to your goal.
Convincing people of anything at a company starts way before by building rapport with people and other techniques. It is largely proven than with most people it is your current standing, perceived intent and subtle speech/visual cues that are more important than the actual content.
Want make it more likely people agree with you? Try to be helpful, ensure people consistently think they are better off agreeing with you. Ensure people are safe investing in cooperation with you (so no talking behind their backs, ensure if somebody achieved something you will attribute it to them even if they are not present). Ensure you listen to people and they don't get impression you are welcoming their point of view. Let people know when you make mistakes (I like to use this as learning opportunities). Congratulate people on their achievements even small, but never do this if you are going to sound banal.
Do this and you might be able to convince people of about everything and even if you make some mistakes they will let it slide.
(If it felt like "How to win friends and influence people" then it wasn't an accident. Developers are like any other people and same timeless tips apply.)
I thought that too, till I bumped into the "I'm right and you're wrong because my ego is huge" kind of person. Even worse: when they are higher in the hierarchy, they use their power to impose whatever they want. No tests, using jQuery 'cause it's the best, microservises are good even if it's a distributed ball of mud (named after Stark Trek starships), and so on.
I agree with you in theory, but in practice, sometimes, with some people, this strategy will tend to infinity on a time scale.
Here's how you deal with someone who is "always right" and has more clout than you:
1) Try to be friendly, try to create a mentor/mentee relationship with them, and get on their good side. If that works, maybe they will be slightly receptive to what you say. Regardless of the outcome, though:
2) Ultimately just do what they say.
I know that's anathema to many people in the field -- and it was a damn hard lesson for me to learn -- but you have to understand when you're picking a fight, and who stands to lose. (Hint: you're picking a fight by disagreeing with an Ego Monster, and if you have less clout than them, you're going to lose.)
By losing, maybe you'll get less favorable work and less recognition. Or maybe they will eventually "manage you out" of the organization. But you will not get what you want in any sense of the word.
Swallow your pride, go along with it, and maybe look for a workplace that's more accepting of new ideas. There is no winning.
Or the risky approach: Find someone with more clout than them that can actually listen and think. Go to them. Show them what the Ego Monster is doing, and have them get rid of the Ego Monster.
But as I said, it's very risky. You could lose your job. If the Ego Monster has a lot of clout, you might suffer permanent career damage. Think well before taking this approach. But it's the only one that offers any hope for your current workplace.
So many people, many of them younger, do not seem to realize there isn't an objective arbiter of what is right and wrong -- there's only politics -- and you aren't going to be rewarded for being right. And most people of higher level don't really give enough of a damn about your petty code problems (oh no, he likes inhertiance and I read something that asserts composition is better) to stick their neck out for you.
Don't do it for a petty code problem. Suck it up and deal with it if he likes a different approach than you do.
I meant it only for something big enough that it's threatening or damaging to the organization as a whole. That is, it's not just causing problems for you. It may not be right or wrong, but it's definitely better or worse, and not just for you. People above the Ego Monster care if the Ego Monster makes it harder for the team to deliver.
And why would it make it harder for the team to deliver? Because the Ego Monster doesn't listen, and isn't omniscient. That leads to the Ego Monster making dumb decisions - decisions that don't actually work in the real world.
That's the key difference. People will care if it actually impacts the org.
But so many juniors are convinced they need to fight seniors and management based on things they read a medium article about. I try to tell them to stop on the internet all the time. I wonder if they ever actually listen.
You are never going to satisfy everybody, that's not a realistic goal. The more realistic goal is to choose battles that are winnable and with good RoI.
Convincing people of anything at a company starts way before by building rapport with people and other techniques. It is largely proven than with most people it is your current standing, perceived intent and subtle speech/visual cues that are more important than the actual content.
Want make it more likely people agree with you? Try to be helpful, ensure people consistently think they are better off agreeing with you. Ensure people are safe investing in cooperation with you (so no talking behind their backs, ensure if somebody achieved something you will attribute it to them even if they are not present). Ensure you listen to people and they don't get impression you are welcoming their point of view. Let people know when you make mistakes (I like to use this as learning opportunities). Congratulate people on their achievements even small, but never do this if you are going to sound banal.
Do this and you might be able to convince people of about everything and even if you make some mistakes they will let it slide.
(If it felt like "How to win friends and influence people" then it wasn't an accident. Developers are like any other people and same timeless tips apply.)