Brett over at Cranking Widgets wrote a great piece about how to talk to a programmer. This is my favorite section:

Don’t Demand Anything - Unless Fred reports directly to you, you’re not going to get anywhere if you crash into his Star-Wars-laden cubicle with guns drawn. The second you start getting pushy with old Fred, the second he’ll “suddenly realize” that your problem is going to take 2-3 days to resolve. So, in short, be nice to Fred and let him steer the conversation. After all, he knows how the system works and you need his help - if anything, bring an extra Mountain Dew along with you to help grease the wheels.

While I don’t have any Star Wars stuff in my office, let alone much in the way of any decorations*, the message rings pretty true. Thinking in a larger scale, Brett’s three truths are probably some good rules to follow in general when dealing with all coworkers, and not just programmers.

* I have a plant that I inherited from a previous employee, two family photos (one on my wall, one on my desk), and a Red Sox wall calendar. Oh, and the obligatory whiteboard. That’s about it, did you expect anything different?