As software engineers, we pride ourselves on being able to understand computers. In this talk, I'd like to draw our focus away from machines and back towards humans to talk about one of the most under-appreciated qualities of an engineer - empathy.

We need empathy when we review each other's code.
We need "user empathy" in order to build the right products.
Last but not least, we need empathy with ourselves in order to fight the ever-present "impostor syndrome".

I will draw on research in social psychology to show how emphasizing empathy can help your engineers be a happier and more productive team, and finish up with some recommendations.