Refactoring Mindsets: Prioritizing Mental Health in Software Development

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Vanessa’s presentation, Refactoring Mindsets: Prioritizing Mental Health in Software Development, will delve into the signs and symptoms commonly experienced within this professional group. The session will identify and define a range of mental disorders, offering a clearer understanding of these conditions. Furthermore, we will explore various coping strategies, equipping Developers & Engineers with the tools to manage their mental health more effectively. This presentation aims to foster a deeper awareness and provide practical solutions to support mental well-being in the Tech Industry.

This talk has been presented at C3 Dev Festival 2024, check out the latest edition of this Tech Conference.

FAQ

The speaker of the presentation is Vanessa Rath.

The main topic of the presentation is 'Refactoring Mindsets,' focusing on prioritizing mental health in software development.

Mental health is important in the tech industry because it is a fast-paced and dynamic field where many professionals suffer from mental health issues like anxiety, depression, and burnout. These issues can significantly impact productivity and overall well-being.

Vanessa Rath shares her personal experience of suffering from ADHD, which she refers to as 'attention deficit in high definition.' She takes medication daily to manage her condition and run her business successfully.

Mental health refers to your general state of well-being and should be looked after regularly. Mental illness, on the other hand, disrupts your mental state and interrupts how you feel, think, communicate, and behave.

According to Vanessa Rath, 51% of tech professionals have been diagnosed with a mental health condition at some point in their career, and 71% said their productivity is affected by a mental health issue.

Common mental health issues in the tech industry include stress and burnout, imposter syndrome, and isolation.

Recommended ways to tackle mental health problems include promoting work-life balance, showing more empathy, upskilling employees, getting regular exercise, taking screen breaks, being kind to oneself, having a mentor, and getting enough sleep.

Tools and resources mentioned include the Pomodoro Chrome extension for regular breaks, the Open Sourcing Mental Illness website, and helpful threads on Quora about managing mental health as a software developer.

Vanessa Rath advises that recovery is a lifelong journey that takes place one day and one step at a time. It is important to be conscious and actively monitor your mental health and emotions.

 Vanessa Raath
Vanessa Raath
20 min
15 Jun, 2024

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Video Summary and Transcription

The Talk discusses the importance of prioritizing mental health in software development, highlighting the increase of mental health issues in the tech industry. It emphasizes the need to address mental health conditions and their impact on productivity. The challenges faced in the tech industry, such as imposter syndrome and burnout, are highlighted, along with strategies to promote well-being and support in the industry. The importance of self-care, seeking support, and managing mental health is emphasized.

1. Introduction

Short description:

I'm going to be talking to you about a really important topic, a topic that's close to my heart, and the title of this presentation is Refactoring Mindsets. It's all about prioritizing mental health in software development because I think that this is a big topic that many people don't talk about. I quickly want to do an introduction. My name is Vanessa Rath and I want to give a shout out to Ella Pavlova, who recommended me to be speaking at this conference. I'm a talent sourcing trainer, training teams from all over the world on how to be better sources of talent. I've trained over a thousand people from over a hundred countries. I also do a lot of speaking at conferences and have just come back from presenting in Istanbul. I'm off to Spain later this month to deliver a presentation. Now this is where I live. I live in a beautiful place called Plattenberg Bay, part of the Garden Route in South Africa. One thing I find amazing is how people don't talk about mental health in the fast-paced software development industry. I stumbled across a quote from 2022 that shows the impact of mental health issues.

Good day, folks. I'm really excited to be with you today and I'm going to be talking to you about a really important topic, a topic that's close to my heart, and the title of this presentation, as you can see, is Refactoring Mindsets. And it's all about prioritizing mental health in software development because I really think that this is a big topic that a lot of people don't talk about. They seem to be scared about it. They skirt around the obvious. And I really want to put a spotlight on it today. So I hope that you enjoy my presentation and thank you for being here.

So what I'm actually going to start with first is I quickly want to do an introduction. So my name is Vanessa Rath and I want to give a quick shout out to Ella Pavlova, who is based in Amsterdam, who recommended me to be speaking at this conference today. And by way of just introducing myself, I'm actually a talent sourcing trainer. So I train teams from all over the world on how to be better sources of talent. So we look at things like, you know, why are recruiters trying to recruit you software developers of places like LinkedIn? You know, why aren't they looking in other places where you like to spend your time? So that's pretty much what I do. I've trained a lot of people over a thousand, in fact, and from one over a hundred countries. So my hours are very weird. I work all over the place and I do a lot of travel too. The other part of what I do is I do a lot of speaking like this at conferences, particularly in the recruitment space, talent sourcing, personal branding. And I've actually just come back from presenting in Istanbul and I'm off to Spain later this month to deliver a presentation. So yeah, always keeping busy and on my toes.

Now this is where I live. I'm very fortunate. I live in a beautiful place called Plattenberg Bay, which is in South Africa. It's part of what's called the Garden Route. And I just thought I'd share some photos with you just so that you get an idea of how beautiful it is and hopefully one day you'll come and visit us. So let's get started. And when I first chatted with Veronica about what would I want to present at this conference, for me what was really obvious, I mean I've now spent close to 20 years in the talent attraction, recruiting, talent sourcing, branding kind of space. One of the things that I really find amazing is what I spoke about previously is about how people don't talk about mental health, yet it's one of those really fast-paced, dynamic, unappreciated industries. And it does seem to be one of the industries that is really prone to people suffering from different mental health issues. So when getting ready for this presentation, I actually stumbled across this quote from 2022, so this is not a new thing from Stack Overflow. And if you remember what happened in 2020, we were all struck down with the COVID pandemic. But what I really found amazing was two years later, you can see the impact that this was having.

2. Mental Health and Disorders

Short description:

This year, more developers are identifying as having concentration and memory disorders, anxiety disorders, and mood or emotional disorders. The pandemic has highlighted the importance of mental health issues. I, as an ADHD sufferer, have personally struggled with it throughout my life and now take medication to run my own business. Mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety, matter just as much as physical illnesses.

And this year, we see more developers identifying as having a concentration and or memory disorder that was over 10%, anxiety disorder and mood or emotional disorder such as depression, which for me was really amazing. Because as we all know, Stack Overflow does their annual survey. They put it out every year. It's really interesting. But these were the increased numbers. So these numbers had increased on memory and concentration by 11%, anxiety by 10%. So this was the increased numbers, not the total numbers. And for me, this was like, wow, the pandemic has really, really pushed the mental health issues and really thrown a highlight on it, which I think is really important.

So then continuing and doing a little bit more research, I started thinking about my situation. And the reason why I wanted to talk about this topic was because I'm actually an ADHD sufferer. So I like to refer to ADHD as attention deficit in the high definition. So ADD and HD. A lot of females of my age actually suffer more from ADD as opposed to ADHD. A lot of my male counterparts have ADHD. And for me, it's always been something that I've struggled with. I mean, I struggled with it through school, through university, through a lot of jobs. And now I take medication every day in order to run my own business. I always say that I have to think my ADHD medication, my Ritalin, in order that I can be a successful solopreneur working on a global stage at the moment. So it's important to me because this is a disorder. And a lot of the problems that you see with businesses these days is that you can see if somebody's broken a leg. You can see if someone's sneezing and they've got a cold. But you can't always see mental health issues. So you can't see if someone is suffering from depression or extra anxiety issues. And these are the things that we need to be really aware of because they matter. And they matter just as much as a physical illness. So something that I'm passionate about from a personal experience.

Now before we move on, I just want to quickly, you know, let's put these two into their right places. Mental health and mental illness is something that is quite different. So mental health is actually your general state of well-being and state of health. Something that should be looked after.