Forwarded: What I’ve Learned in 45 Years in the Software Industry
A lot of things to pick up from Joel Goldberg’s article after he retired from the tech industry. The entire post is gold mine for “knowledge workers”, perhaps more so for software engineers who can directly relate to much of what is written. Here are my takeaways from the perspective of a Journeyman, that I would like to implement in my life/job:
- Guard against the Curse of Knowledge
When you know something it is almost impossible to imagine what it is like not to know that thing.
As you get more familiar with the internal knowledge of any system, you start developing a jargon within your team/frequent collaborators. While this can help streamline the process, the cost is the added complexity - a layer of abstraction.
Being a dependable team player is as much valuable as being the smartest person in the team, if not more.
Communicate proactively with all the stakeholders of your work.
Build simple solutions in favor of clever ones.
Having read this article a fair few times throughout the day, there is still a lot of wisdom on offer. It will be a matter of time in my career before I can absorb the values and internalize the principles.