Asbjørn Ulsberg<p><span class="h-card" translate="no"><a href="https://sfba.social/@williampietri" class="u-url mention" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">@<span>williampietri</span></a></span> You are quite correct, and this is why the idea of software development being a “sociotechnical” practice is gaining traction. <span class="h-card" translate="no"><a href="https://hachyderm.io/@trondhjort" class="u-url mention" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">@<span>trondhjort</span></a></span>, <span class="h-card" translate="no"><a href="https://hachyderm.io/@nick_tune" class="u-url mention" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">@<span>nick_tune</span></a></span>, and others in the <a href="https://icosahedron.website/tags/DDDesign" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>DDDesign</span></a> community writes and talks a about this in length. It’s a tough nut to crack, though. </p><p>Software development is still being seen and marketed as a masculine, technical skill that can (eve must) be done successfully in isolation from the people the software is being built to serve. </p><p>This view alienates the very people our field of work need more of to prosper, and locks us into a dark spiral of negative reinforcing toxic masculinity of what I like to call “technical masturbation”.</p><p>An important realization of being a software developer is to acknowledge that since software development is a very young and social science, we understand perhaps even less of what we do than economists do of economics. </p><p>We are mere alchemists throwing ingredients into a cauldron hoping it will turn into gold.</p>