There is a sweet spot when it comes to failure.
Or at least that’s what researchers at the University of Arizona found out. They discovered that when people succeed 85 percent of the time and fail the other 15 percent, it’s the right balance to stay motivated. When the scales tip too much either way, participants would either become discouraged or weren’t challenged enough to keep learning.
And that’s what makes all the difference for successful engineering teams — finding the balance that helps them keep learning.
Built In spoke with two Los Angeles engineering leaders about how they built team cultures where continuous learning, experimentation and failing are celebrated.
Cie is a venture studio that serves as an innovation lab and accelerator for entrepreneurs
How does your team cultivate a culture of learning, whether that’s through hackathons, lunch and learns, access to online courses or other resources?
Our team philosophy stems from being full-stack thinkers; people that are naturally curious and whose passion extends outside of their specific role. This transcends engineering and lands us in all parts of the business, whether it be product, sales, people or other areas. We prioritize this mindset during the hiring process, allowing us to hone-in on people who are curious and collaborative from the very jump. It all cascades from there. We’re constantly leveraging a feedback loop that showcases any breakthroughs or cool projects/ideas we’ve cooked up through our communication platforms, lunch and learns, and cross-pollination (leading teams and projects across our start-ups). This doesn’t happen by accident; it’s a byproduct of wanting to learn more and we constantly cultivate that.
How does this culture positively impact the work your team produces?
We are always testing and constantly getting feedback, which doesn’t just come from our customers, but from the very people that create the products themselves. Every role at Cie is empowered to give feedback, to share what they’re working on, to fill holes — so the impact isn’t just felt in short release cycles, people are invested in what they’re building. The fun thing about constantly learning and sharing is that we create blueprints that make our overall processes more streamlined. And everything comes from that. It’s not just shareable code, but shareable processes altogether.
A specific example would be leveraging an automated code creation pipeline using AI with our developers leading those processes and output. The entire workflow has safeguards and is reusable across our teams. And the best part? We’ve adopted this workflow to QA and other parts of the business.
What advice would you give to other engineers or engineering leaders interested in creating a culture of learning on their own team?
When you foster a culture of learning, title and role shouldn’t matter. It empowers everybody. When you lead by example, provide clear guidance to your team, and positively reinforce, it’ll keep the spark alive. Make sure to reinforce both on the micro level, by giving feedback in the moment, as well as on the macro level, by ensuring the team knows what the context and strategic vision is 'the why.' Include your team early and often in the product life cycle. And lastly, positive reinforcement should be given even for what others might consider mundane examples. By reinforcing both small and large contributions, it means everybody at any time can contribute and collaborate.
ClickMint pairs proprietary generative-AI diagnostics with senior CRO operators to uncover friction, launch precision tests, and unlock compounding gains — helping high-growth e-commerce brands scale faster without buying more traffic.
How does your team cultivate a culture of learning, whether that’s through hackathons, lunch and learns, access to online courses or other resources?
At ClickMint, learning isn’t something we squeeze in around the edges — it’s part of how we work. In CRO and AI, the landscape changes so quickly that if you’re not learning, you’re falling behind. We’ve built a few habits that keep things fresh.
Every other week, we block off time to chase ideas called Experimentation Fridays. Some turn into features, some fizzle, but either way, we come out smarter.
Engineers take turns running short sessions on something they’ve been exploring during team-led deep dives — anything from traffic allocation models to new AI frameworks. It’s casual, collaborative, and usually involves snacks.
Everyone has a budget for courses, books or conferences through learning credits. The expectation is simple: learn something new and share it back with the group.
We use AI as a sparring partner. We actually use our own internal models as teaching tools — throwing tough questions at them, then breaking down the output together. It turns AI into more of a coach than a black box.
We try to keep it light and fun. The moment “learning” feels like a checkbox, you lose the curiosity that drives real growth.
How does this culture positively impact the work your team produces?
You can feel the difference in the work. When people are constantly learning, the quality of our experiments and the speed of our problem-solving just go up.
A good example: one of our newer engineers gave a quick talk on Bayesian bandits. That sparked a rethink of how we allocate traffic in tests, and within a few weeks, we were rolling out a new system that cut time-to-results by 17 percent. For a client, that meant six figures in extra revenue — just from an idea that started as a lunch-and-learn.
Another time, someone used Experimentation Friday to mess around with anomaly detection. That little side project is now part of our Bloom dashboard, flagging weak test variants before they waste budget.
The real magic, though, is in the mindset shift. People feel comfortable saying, “I don’t know this yet.” That makes it easier to admit blind spots, learn faster, and ship with more confidence. When your team feels that safe, they’re way more likely to take bold swings — and that’s where the breakthroughs happen.
What advice would you give to other engineers or engineering leaders interested in creating a culture of learning on their own team?
Keep it simple. Culture isn’t built from big slogans or one-off events — it’s built from the little habits you repeat until they stick.
ClickMint's Director of Engineering Adam Flaxman’s advice for engineering leaders.
- Make it safe to not know. The smartest teams admit gaps early and attack them together.
- Celebrate curiosity, not just output. Give people space to chase side projects, ask weird questions, and try half-baked ideas. That’s where a lot of the magic starts.
- Share the learning. Whether it’s quick talks, notes, or demos, make sure one person’s growth spreads to the whole team.
- Keep it fun. Hackathons, themed demos, lightning talks with snacks — it doesn’t have to be serious to be valuable.
If you get those things right, you won’t need to push a “learning culture.” It’ll just become how your team operates. And once it clicks, you’ll wonder how you ever built without it.
