Software Developers

I was reading this post the other day and thinking about my particular challenges with software developers. Which I believe I have some insight into, actually being a developer myself. Also my company is not a web design company, so our technologies and requirements are a little different.

It’s natural I think for people to want to categorize developers, but I’ve found that particularly difficult. I find there are individual traits that seem to stand out, but no particular stereotype by which to categorize.

One trait that stands out, that in my mind separates the great developers from the not-so-great ones is a drive to learn. Truly, once you have sufficiently advanced in any field you begin to see that it will be impossible for you to learn enough to get by in general terms. So you begin developing vertical depth of knowledge on topics as you work on specific projects.

Good developers thrive on this. They get into a topic, and you can see them enjoying themselves. They experiment, scour for resources, experiment some more. Their project runs longer than they expected. They talk about their problems all the time, and talk about how cool the technology is they used to solve them, or how cool their approach was.

I don’t worry much when things go long. I try to build some of that in to our project timelines, but in the end in this fast moving field I’m happy the developers have picked up a shiny new set of skills. And I think they’re happy to be in an environment that embraces learning and professional development rather than being pressured into yet another impossible deadline.