Thinking Fast and Slow with Software Development

I’ve just got back from my first Jfokus conference in Stockholm, Sweden, where I presented the latest version of my “Thinking Fast and Slow with Software Development”. The core concept of the presentation is based on Daniel Kahneman’s bestselling book, “Thinking Fast and Slow“, and I wanted to relate the discussion of decision making heuristics and bias contained in the book to software development.

I’ve included the slide deck below, and I believe the video of the presentation will eventually be available from Parleys.

Here is the original abstract:

In the international bestseller ‘Thinking, Fast and Slow’, Daniel Kahneman explains how we as human beings think and reason, and perhaps surprisingly how our thought processes are often fundamentally flawed and biased. This talk explores the ideas presented in the book in the context of professional software development. As software developers we all like to think that we are highly logical, and make only rational choices, but after reading the book I’m not so sure. Here I’ll share my thinking on thinking. Topics that will be discussed include; the ‘Availability Heuristic’, which can lead developers to choose the ‘latest and greatest’ technology without proper evaluation; ‘Optimistic Bias’ which can blind architects from the ‘unknown unknowns’ within a project; and more!

If you have any comments or questions then please do get in touch!