You’re staring at your editor. The code should work, but you’ve been fighting an error for a full day. You can’t figure out the problem no matter what you try.

Or you’ve been staring at an empty file, wondering what code to write. You’ve got a vague Jira ticket, a lack of context, and a codebase that is difficult to understand.

You’re blocked.

Now, what do you do?

It’s tempting—easy, even—to ping someone hastily. You drop a question in Slack like “Anyone seen this error before?” and hope someone tosses you a lifeline.
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Or it might be equally tempting to throw prompt after prompt at AI, hoping for a different result.

In this article, I want to describe some tools for overcoming obstacles in these situations. As you grow in your software engineering career, this skill becomes more and more important as you’re expected to work with increasing autonomy.

Let’s dive in.
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Team-Building Exercise

When it comes to being blocked, great teams proactively (not reactively) help each other stay unblocked.

• They swarm on toil to remove from their daily work
• They share solutions to common problems—and then figure out how to remove them entirely
• They participate in backlog refinement and planning since they know they will be the ones picking up that work soon
• They anticipate confusion about scope, context, etc., as best as possible, and welcome questions patiently when needed

While unblocking yourself is a skill, helping the entire team stay unblocked is even more critical.

Don't take shortcuts on things like daily work, planning large efforts, or even how you align on decisions.

This week, be purposeful in how you work to keep others unblocked. Keep PRs to an appropriate size, spend time writing your stories and planning work, and be active in your team meetings.

Intentionality like this doesn't guarantee people never get blocked or need help, but I do guarantee they will get blocked more and for longer without it.

Here are some more resources from me to help you build better teams!​

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Looking for your next tech job? You're in the right spot. I'm Dr. Kyle Elliott, the founder and tech career coach behind CaffeinatedKyle.com, and I love giving away free resources that help to ensure your job search and career success. Join 7,435+ fellow job seekers who have downloaded my free Job Search Launch Guide. Subscribe​

The Mindful Dev Dagna is an Engineer turned Coach for ambitious professionals in Tech. She has transitioned from programming computers to reprogramming human minds. Her book Brain Refactor is a recognized Amazon bestseller, helping professionals optimize their internal programming to thrive in tech. Subscribe​

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