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Microsoft Research Summit 2021 • Videos

Talk Series: Developer productivity

Dr. Paige Anne Rodeghero gives a research talk on “Remote onboarding of software developers and preparing students for hybrid work”. The onboarding process of software developers is a “necessary evil” for a productive software development team. The process is expensive and time consuming. New hires onboarding to a remote or hybrid team need to quickly learn their project, understand their tasks, form connections with their team, and learn the company’s culture. Hybrid and remote work can make these tasks challenging due to asynchronous communication and collaboration. Join Dr. Paige Rodeghero, Assistant Professor at Clemson University and former Visiting Researcher at Microsoft Research, to explore the onboarding process, productivity, and how we can prepare the future of software developers for the new hybrid work model. In this talk, you’ll gain insights into the unique challenges faced by new hires and managers during remote onboarding, the importance of strong social connectedness within teams, ways to prepare students for hybrid software development roles, and recommendations for a smooth onboarding process.

Next, Brian Houck gives a talk on “Happy and productive hybrid developers: How to have it all!” As the future of work shifts into a hybrid blend of onsite and remote work, new challenges will test our ability to have productive and happy developers. To address these challenges, we need to look for technical, environmental, and cultural solutions. Microsoft Productivity Engineer Brian Houck will share a practitioner’s perspective on how engineering teams across Azure are preparing for a hybrid future based on learnings from working remotely during COVID-19. Measuring developer productivity across multiple dimensions by using a mix of methods, Houck takes a human-centered approach to understanding and maximizing productivity and happiness in his organization. This talk will explore practical tips on how to address the anticipated challenges with hybrid work. How can developers balance their time between collaboration/connectedness and focused individual work? How should developer tools evolve to meet the needs of hybrid developers? Learn answers to these questions and more!

Lastly, Jenna Butler gives a research talk on “Gratitude and challenges for developers during COVID-19”. COVID-19 fundamentally changed how the world worked, and software engineers were one of the first groups to experience this shift. Within one week of the work-from-home announcement, Microsoft launched a study of over 400 software engineers to understand what challenges they faced during this unstable time as well as what gratitude they experienced. This study, which uses 3x weekly diaries to learn about the developer experience over time, is currently in its twentieth month. Join Microsoft Senior Software Engineer and researcher Jenna Butler as she shares some of the most common issues developers experienced and the surprising effects of the diary study on participants. With some participants submitting more than 150 diaries over the course of a year, we have seen the pandemic through the eyes of many different people. Come and learn which issues changed over time, which issues still pose opportunities for improvement, what engineers are grateful for during this unprecedented time, and how you can help improve productivity and wellbeing for yourself and those you work with.

Learn more about the 2021 Microsoft Research Summit: https://Aka.ms/researchsummit (opens in new tab)

Event:
Microsoft Research Summit 2021
Track:
New Future of Work
Date:
Speakers:
Jaime Teevan, Denae Ford Robinson, Jenna Butler, Brian Houck, Paige Anne Rodeghero
Affiliation:
Microsoft, Microsoft Research Redmond, Microsoft, Clemson University

New Future of Work