I've been working as a software developer for about ten years, and I've started to get a little annoyed when my manager asks me what I'm gonna work on improving this year. Like what can I say? That I'll try get better at coding? That I'll get better at project management? At some point the marginal utility is just not there anymore. Even if I did get twice as good (whatever that means) at systems design, it's not like there is _that_ much systems design to go around at work that it would actually be noticeable.
What do senior developers say they'll work on improving in their performance reviews?
Is your manager really asking about your self-improvement?
Or are they asking about you improving what you can do for them, your team and your company? Your job description is a baseline but if you’ve nailed that, there’s usually more you can do that’s outside of that.
Or you can be content with doing your job well, and make up some bs so your manager can write it on a form. Both are valid.
Instead of talking about skills, or personal efficiency, talk about technologies that you're going to introduce to your product, or some specific difficult problem that you're intending to solve.
Another next career step is to take ownership of things without needing to be asked or told, to create and execute plans, to raise and address problems pro-actively etc. And if your workspace doesn't give you opportunities to do it, and you want career progression, then go somewhere else.
Like all such metrics, the specifics don't really matter. All that matters is that you can tell a story, over the course of the year, on how you've "improved". The goal is to use the story to highlight the work you've been doing while passing it off as evidence. This kind of story telling is something people in management positions tend to be very good at but it's also a skill people not in management should have some proficiency in.
Your boss needs paperwork to justify pay raises, promotions, etc to their boss & HR. Isn't the whole purpose of that question to leave a paper trail that both you and they can point to?
That's what I've been told, and such I always answer those questions in a way that has a concrete 'goal' that I can point to and either makes ME more valuable to the company OR delivered some thing that is valuable TO the company.
That's the type of culture that made me leave my last job. Feels very inhuman when you see your manager every week, and they still make you fill in robotic questionnaires for potential salary raise.
It's deeply demotivating to learn that your manager doesn't know you all that well and cares more about filling in checklists, at least for me.
Then hopefully the fears of replacing developer jobs are unfounded, and in fact we can expect (hope) for middle management jobs to be replaced instead?
Lesson is actually: if you want to blow people's minds then practice secretly. An appearance of effortlessness. Sprezzatura. Whatever it is, it seems to be the only thing that impresses the average person.
Reminds me of when I play my mandolin when I’m camping. I’m sure fellow campers think I suck, despite having played for ten years. But I’m not going to play stuff I can play in my sleep, I’m playing stuff that still needs work. So, in consideration of others, once in a while I’ll rip off a fast version of Old Dangerfield or some other song I know really well just in case someone is in earshot.
Why do you think other people want to hear you practicing songs that you're not good at? I'm imagining someone trying to learn the recorder by the campfire.
Why do you think other people want to hear you practicing songs that you're not good at?
I’m assuming people don’t want to hear me at all. To be clear, I’m just sitting at my campsite, not showing up to the campfire circle with “anyone want to hear poorly-played music?” Though if someone else is sporting a ukulele, well, I think all bets are off at that point.
I don't. I'm not playing for their entertainment, I'm playing for mine. I get bored with a song long before I get good at it, and so I divide my time between songs I'm starting to get good at, and songs I'm terrible at. I've never reached good at anything though.
I learned juggling in approximately 12minutes with a friend who knew juggling from before. He spotted me like you would spot someone in a gym: he put the balls in my hands, told me to hit one up, caught it mid flight (effectively freezing time), and told me "ok now hit the other ball up and catch this one". After 6-7 tries my brain was reprogrammed, and by the day's end we did juggling in pairs.
I guess the moral of the story is that a great teacher can push your limits way further than you could yourself? Or that it's easier to learn in a group setting?
3 ball is a lot easier than 5 ball. A good teacher helps, but plenty of books exist that are good as well. Most people are not interested enough to try for 10 minutes.
This can easily just be gentle ribbing where the juggler and "critic" are familiar/friendly enough that the juggler understands the dude respects his juggling skills and knows the critic is just making friendly banter when he sees him making more frequent drops.
I can juggle pretty well with three objects, but I have no idea what the next step would be. Four feels like it would be no fun, because it is just juggling two balls in each hand. What is the recommended next step?
I've been working as a software developer for about ten years, and I've started to get a little annoyed when my manager asks me what I'm gonna work on improving this year. Like what can I say? That I'll try get better at coding? That I'll get better at project management? At some point the marginal utility is just not there anymore. Even if I did get twice as good (whatever that means) at systems design, it's not like there is _that_ much systems design to go around at work that it would actually be noticeable.
What do senior developers say they'll work on improving in their performance reviews?
Is your manager really asking about your self-improvement?
Or are they asking about you improving what you can do for them, your team and your company? Your job description is a baseline but if you’ve nailed that, there’s usually more you can do that’s outside of that.
Or you can be content with doing your job well, and make up some bs so your manager can write it on a form. Both are valid.
Instead of talking about skills, or personal efficiency, talk about technologies that you're going to introduce to your product, or some specific difficult problem that you're intending to solve.
Another next career step is to take ownership of things without needing to be asked or told, to create and execute plans, to raise and address problems pro-actively etc. And if your workspace doesn't give you opportunities to do it, and you want career progression, then go somewhere else.
Like all such metrics, the specifics don't really matter. All that matters is that you can tell a story, over the course of the year, on how you've "improved". The goal is to use the story to highlight the work you've been doing while passing it off as evidence. This kind of story telling is something people in management positions tend to be very good at but it's also a skill people not in management should have some proficiency in.
Your boss needs paperwork to justify pay raises, promotions, etc to their boss & HR. Isn't the whole purpose of that question to leave a paper trail that both you and they can point to?
That's what I've been told, and such I always answer those questions in a way that has a concrete 'goal' that I can point to and either makes ME more valuable to the company OR delivered some thing that is valuable TO the company.
That's the type of culture that made me leave my last job. Feels very inhuman when you see your manager every week, and they still make you fill in robotic questionnaires for potential salary raise.
It's deeply demotivating to learn that your manager doesn't know you all that well and cares more about filling in checklists, at least for me.
Like every other such question, simply make up whatever they want to hear
Ask Claude to choose a set of improvements that it would rate highly.
LLMs really shine at speeding up corporate bureaucratic busy-work and nonsense.
We’re in a golden era when same busy work has not yet expanded due to LLM influence. Let’s appreciate it while it lasts.
Then hopefully the fears of replacing developer jobs are unfounded, and in fact we can expect (hope) for middle management jobs to be replaced instead?
I wonder what prompt an AI middle manager would need, to not push back on the crap its manager is telling it needs to happen.
Well if it’s anything like where I am, the crap that the managers are asking each other to do is “do more AI stuff.”
Soft skills, mostly - you just find things that you're weak on (since you know enough to know where you suck) and just work on those.
Just tell him you are working on juggling 5 balls.
To be fair, I was never all that good.
People don't realize the exponential diffictlty curve with juggling. The highest amount of balls ever juggled is 11.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJsgM-3L38U
Wow. The wikipedia page has a nice list with links to videos:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juggling_world_records#Balls
Lesson is actually: if you want to blow people's minds then practice secretly. An appearance of effortlessness. Sprezzatura. Whatever it is, it seems to be the only thing that impresses the average person.
"The only secret of magic is that I'm willing to work harder on it than you think it's worth." - Penn Jillette
Reminds me of when I play my mandolin when I’m camping. I’m sure fellow campers think I suck, despite having played for ten years. But I’m not going to play stuff I can play in my sleep, I’m playing stuff that still needs work. So, in consideration of others, once in a while I’ll rip off a fast version of Old Dangerfield or some other song I know really well just in case someone is in earshot.
Why do you think other people want to hear you practicing songs that you're not good at? I'm imagining someone trying to learn the recorder by the campfire.
Why do you think other people want to hear you practicing songs that you're not good at?
I’m assuming people don’t want to hear me at all. To be clear, I’m just sitting at my campsite, not showing up to the campfire circle with “anyone want to hear poorly-played music?” Though if someone else is sporting a ukulele, well, I think all bets are off at that point.
I don't. I'm not playing for their entertainment, I'm playing for mine. I get bored with a song long before I get good at it, and so I divide my time between songs I'm starting to get good at, and songs I'm terrible at. I've never reached good at anything though.
Tangentially there was this recent post for a very hard juggling web game where everyone will likely suck:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48963122
Anecdote:
I learned juggling in approximately 12minutes with a friend who knew juggling from before. He spotted me like you would spot someone in a gym: he put the balls in my hands, told me to hit one up, caught it mid flight (effectively freezing time), and told me "ok now hit the other ball up and catch this one". After 6-7 tries my brain was reprogrammed, and by the day's end we did juggling in pairs.
I guess the moral of the story is that a great teacher can push your limits way further than you could yourself? Or that it's easier to learn in a group setting?
3 ball is a lot easier than 5 ball. A good teacher helps, but plenty of books exist that are good as well. Most people are not interested enough to try for 10 minutes.
What's more shocking to me is asking a person that is not even an acquaintance why they suck at juggling now.
I suspect he’s telling a story and chose to personify his own feelings into the words of another person.
This can easily just be gentle ribbing where the juggler and "critic" are familiar/friendly enough that the juggler understands the dude respects his juggling skills and knows the critic is just making friendly banter when he sees him making more frequent drops.
It could be, but I assume it was not because of how he introduced himself. "Hey? Are you that juggling guy from the gym?"
I can juggle pretty well with three objects, but I have no idea what the next step would be. Four feels like it would be no fun, because it is just juggling two balls in each hand. What is the recommended next step?
Some ideas, all with three objects:
- Throw one over your shoulder/under your leg/around your back/
- catch each ball with your palm facing down instead of up
- Out->in cascade (throw from outside, catch from inside) instead of the traditional in->out
- 3 columns
- over the top (tennis)
- Any "mess"
- Any "box"
Then all of the above, but with
- 3 clubs
- 3 cigar boxes
- 3 clubs on fire
- while riding a unicycle
That should keep you going for a while
https://libraryofjuggling.com/
https://libraryofjuggling.com/TricksByDifficulty.html
All tricks sorted by difficulty with animations. You can find good YouTube tutorials on most three ball tricks.
Whoop
Whoop