> Grant Rettke <grettke@acm.org> wrote:
> 
> On Wed, Feb 18, 2009 at 10:03 AM,  <hendrik@topoi.pooq.com> wrote:
> > What you're facing is people who are so battle-scarred that they have 
> no
> > emotional or intellectual energy left to even imagine there's a better
> > way.  They know their pain.  They simply don't believe there's a cure.
> 
> That sounds like hopelessness.
> 
> How do you teach hope?
>

How to awaken hope:

1. Show that you understand their pains.
2. Tell a story about how one of their pains (or something similar) was overcome, ideally by you personally.
3. Work with them to make a small constructive step, with a tangible and fairly immediate pay-off.
4. As hope emerges, their trust in your guidance will hopefully grow, step by step.

It sounds like with unit tests and code reviews you are doing this.  You may need to give a _lot_ of 
support to get good tests happening though.

Be open to learning from this pass through (if perception of arrogance is a problem).


-- Dan

