---
title: Describe the best team you've ever been part of. What made it great?
description: Interview · Culture & Collaboration · Question 35
section: mind
tags: [interview, culture-and-collaboration]
genre: reference
stability: stable
lastUpdated: 2026-04-17
url: https://fardiniqbal.com/docs/mind/interview/culture-and-collaboration/describe-the-best-team-youve-ever-been-part-of-what-made-it-great
---


My jiu-jitsu training partners.

I know that's not the answer you're expecting, but it's the most honest one I have. On the mat, there's a team dynamic that I haven't found anywhere else. Everyone is trying to get better. The person trying to choke you is also the person who shows you the defense afterward. Hierarchy exists, belt ranks matter, but it's earned through thousands of hours of practice, not through politics or title inflation.

What makes it great: immediate feedback. You try a technique and it either works or it doesn't. There's no ambiguity. No quarterly review where someone uses diplomatic language to tell you something they should have said three months ago. On the mat, the feedback is the arm bar. You either defended it or you didn't. And then you drill it again.

Translating that to engineering teams, what I'd want is: clear signals about what's working and what isn't. Honest technical disagreement without ego. A hierarchy of competence where the best idea wins regardless of who said it. And a culture where getting submitted, the jiu-jitsu equivalent of shipping a bug or making a bad architectural decision, is treated as a learning event, not a failure.