Posts Tagged ‘software engineering’

Growing Your Skills When Self-Confidence as a Developer is Lacking

Posted: April 19, 2024 in Uncategorized
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Good. You admit it. Now go do something about it. You may or may not know your weaknesses. If you do, go brush up on those. Challenge yourself with tasks of increasing complexity. If you don’t yet know, ask a trusted mentor/friend/coworker/manager where you feel you need improvement, or at least a starting point on where to begin. There’s nothing wrong with asking for help – that’s how you grow. You did it as a kid, and you have to do it as an adult. A growth-driven mindset vs. an ego-driven mindset will take you far. You’ve got this!

This is a copy of my answer on LinkedIn Experts from April 19, 2024.

Choosing Your First Programming Language

Posted: April 3, 2024 in Programming, Software Development
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I originally posted this as a LinkedIn contribution. Making sure you can read it on my blog 😀

If it’s your first programming language, the language itself doesn’t matter. It’s the thought process that counts. The training to:

  • think logically,
  • break a problem or process into its component parts, and
  • understanding how those parts intermingle.

If you’re just looking to learn another programming language, you don’t need to spend money. There are FANTASTIC free tutorials out there. Check out Microsoft Learn https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/training/ as a good starting point. You can follow entire tracks, or just one-off topics. There are videos, code examples, coding environments, tips and tricks, and more. To be fair, MS Learn is not the only option, but I only have 750 characters and you have a search engine.

Transitioning from School to the Workplace as a Software Engineer – a fireside chat

Posted: October 6, 2022 in Development, Uncategorized
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I recently enjoyed a “fireside chat” at the Indy .NET Consortium, a meetup I run for local .NET developers.

I’ve had some good conversations with interns and others recently who have struggled with or had insights into this transition. My experience as a young developer was a bit different, because I didn’t take the traditional path of high school -> college -> workforce. Mine was high school -> college -> co-op -> left-school to work and create career -> go back to school -> leave school to work again -> work for startup -> work for consulting firm -> start a business -> shut down business and go back to workforce.

Our October 5 meetup talked about how the traditional path can be a bit jarring. The way I explained it to my employees was “In school, you can get an A, B, C, D, or F. And that’s OK. You learn from it. But in the workforce, you either get an A or an F. You can have as many Fs as you want, as long as you end up with an A. Sometimes, within reason, I’ll accept an A- or B+, but it’s rare. We’re paid to deliver, not pass lessons.”

You can watch the entire discussion below: