I’ve already written about how important bragging is and what a great way micro demos are to brag. Bragging is even more important if you’re a teleworker. Communication takes very little effort when you are in the same office with your team. Your team watches you working, chats in the hallway, and talks around the lunch table. You probably brag a little without realizing it.

The danger of working remotely is that it can make casual communication with your team almost disappear. Working remotely means that you won’t get a chance to brag unless you make it. People won’t know what you are working on unless you go out of your way to tell them.

Web conferencing programs give you the chance to show the features you are working in real-time. Buy a telephone headset so you can type while you talk and show your team your code. Having everyone join from their office makes the set up time for these meeting really low.

Real-time isn’t the only way to brag. Bragging will encourage you to write more about your code. Send emails, write documents, and post to wiki pages. Write about what you are doing and why. And don’t forget to tell people why they should care.

Never be excited alone. Excitement is a great thing, share it with your team.

I recently posted about how micro demos can help you show your work and how bragging will get your team excited about your work. Are you ready to give it a try? Here are seven tips for making your micro demos successful.

1. Keep it short. A micro demo should never be longer than 10 minutes. Your team can always talk about the demo after you’re done.

2. Be excited. Don’t show something just to show something, save micro demos for when you are really excited about your work..

3. Be concrete. Show something real.

4. Don’t make it a separate meeting. Don’t make your team attend a special meeting, just add your micro demo to the end of an existing meeting.

5. Plan ahead. You don’t need a formal demo script, just have a good idea of what you are going to show. Planning ahead helps you say what you want to say and keep it short.

6. Make your micro demo optional. Your teammates will be much more likely to pay attention and give you useful feedback if they don’t feel like they need to be there.

7. Don’t be rushed. Short doesn’t mean fast. Choose a small enough topic that you don’t have to talk a mile-a-minute to finish on time.

I recently posted about why you should brag more. Lately my favorite way of bragging is micro demos. A micro demo is a simple and concrete software demo that takes less than 10 minutes. The best micro demos are even shorter. Aza Raskin posts great micro demos about the Ubiquity project. He gave an interesting one about bookmarklets that is really worth watching. It explains a simple feature, shows you how to use it, and tells you why you should care; all in less than two minutes.

Micro demos aren’t just for showing products to customers, they help you talk about features, code, and ideas with your team. In the office you probably invite your coworkers to look at your screen and show them what you are doing – if you don’t you should start. Don’t stop just because you are working remotely.

Show them a new feature you’re working on, something new you really like, or anything that you are feeling good about. Don’t just send a link to a design document, show them with a micro demo. Let them see how easy it is to use your new idea or how cool this new feature will be for your customers.

The easier you make it for your team to look at your work the more likely they are to do it. Micro demos put the code right in front of them and get them excited. Give it a try with your team. As always, I want to hear how it worked out. Post a comment and let us know.

Coming soon: Next week I’ll post seven tips for better micro demos.

Bragging is really important and you probably don’t do it enough. Afraid to brag? Worried that you will look stupid? Don’t want to be the type of engineer who is all talk? Here are four tips to help you start bragging and get more recognition for your ideas and contributions without overdoing it.

1. It doesn’t have to be perfect. Something doesn’t have to be perfect before you can show it off to your team. The best things to show off are good ideas that aren’t finished yet. That way your team will interact and help you make them better.

2. If you aren’t excited about the idea, don’t show it. If you aren’t excited you won’t get other people excited. Find ideas that really excite you and then show them to your team.

3. Don’t overdo it. Don’t be excited about everything. Pick and choose specific ideas you like and brag about those idea. Bragging about more than one idea a week is almost always too much.

4. Talk about the idea not about you. When you show your team a great idea, tell them about the idea not about you. Talking about how cool you are or saying “I had this great idea” will make it look like you are bragging just for the sake of bragging. Lead with the idea. Phrases like, “I think this will solve our problem” and “this might make our customers happier” are good.

I work with a really great engineer named Simon. He takes complicated problems and designs simple solutions. His code is clean, easy to follow, and just plain works. And I almost didn’t realize it because he doesn’t brag enough.

Bragging makes your work better for two reasons. You will make your code better so you have something to brag about and talking about what you are working on gives the rest of your team a chance to see it and help you make it better.

Not bragging enough is a very common problem for engineers. If you have ever given your status as, “um… I wrote some code” then you probably need to brag more. Bragging is a good thing, as long as you brag about something that you are passionate about.

My theory is that most people don’t brag out of fear. Nobody wants to be seen bragging about something stupid. It’s a legitimate fear. If your status is “today I figured out how to make my editor save a file” then you will look like you are bragging without a cause.

I love it when someone comes to my team meeting enthusiastic about the great way they solved a problem. Even if the solution isn’t great. When an engineer is excited about their work, making the code better is the easy part.

When you brag more you will try to make work worth bragging about. Bragging helps you get excited about your work. Giving every status report as “fixed bugs” wears you down. Find something you are proud of and show off.

Call to action: find some work you like and brag about it in your next team meeting. Tell people why it is good and why they should care. Get excited. And comment back here to let us know how it went.