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Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

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Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#301

Post by JackFr »

whitepoplar wrote: post #193
JackFr wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had the reaction when reading a preprint of Domain Driven Design. It was packed with ideas which were just coming into focus in my own mind after 10 years in the industry, but I didn't have names for them or have them systematized. It's a terrific feeling reading a well-written book like that and going 'Yes! Yes! Yes!'. (Since then, as with many things in our industry, it seems the book has been turned into a buzzw…

The book itself has turned into a consulting money grab, or DDD as a concept?

It looks like (to me) there is a DDD training industry, along the lines of, or as a part of the “agile transformation“ training industry.

Which in and of itself isn’t bad I suppose, but part of me feels that these are cynical attempts to unscrupulously monetize ideas who’s time has come by bombarding credulous middle management with buzzwords.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#302

Post by ogjunkyard »

unoti wrote: post #172

1. Book: Nonviolent Communication, by Marhsall Rosenberg PhD. Great things are built by teams. The more senior I become, the greatest challenges involve teamwork, and the programming is the easy part. I've read countless leadership and self help books, but the simple concepts in just the first few chapters were absolutely transformative to me. 2. The Fast AI for coders course and associated book. (Maybe this shouldn'…

Thanks for the recommendation on the FastAI for Coders course/book. I immediately bought it based on the Amazon page and have spent the last hour reading it. I FINALLY feel like a book about AI/ML/Deep Learning gets where I'm coming from, and that's enough to get started and keep me going (at least for now).

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#303

Post by laverick »

miguendes wrote: post #80
gtf21 wrote: post #67

As a founder / CTO the best money I have spent is on a really good coach. My coach (my cofounder's too, and now some of our leadership team) doesn't have particular expertise in founding or leading companies, but works with many founders, and she's not technical, but the things I think I have found hardest to learn are mostly around people management and leadership, which I think are underrated skills that require se…

I'm considering hiring a coach to improve my soft skills. The problem is finding the right person. Do you have any tips on how to find such person? Edit: software -> soft I mean stuff like better communication, goal setting, learning strategies, negotiation skills...

I used this service before and found it quite good.

https://findyourcoach.com

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#304

Post by Kaze404 »

pc86 wrote: post #300
locochef wrote: post #204

The single best thing I did for professional development was see a therapist. In tech, our jobs are knowledge-based. You can't hammer a nail into a board while you're sitting on the couch with your child, but you can certainly think about software architecture. I've found that my job bleeds into my personal life, and vice versa, and I believe it is far more common than most people realize. Stress piles up and it affe…

OP said they have a professional development budget, so it's presumably from an employer. Cute non-answer notwithstanding, I don't think their employer is going to allocate professional development resources for therapy.

What about their response makes you think it was a non answer? I specifically opened this thread to share the exact same experience, as therapy has helped my professional life much more than any book or tool I ever bought.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#305

Post by swyx »

david_shaw wrote: post #294

The best money I've spent on professional development is paying to travel to industry conferences at which I was accepted to speak. Like many people, I was nervous about public speaking earlier in my career. Out of a desire to improve myself and to "give back" to the community, I applied to speak at some industry conferences. Many people think about conferences as TED-talk style luxury events, at which speakers are c…

this is a surprising answer. in my world (react/frontend) most conferences pay for travel or at least help defer a significant amount of the cost up to a limit. your employer should also have a budget for conf travel.

but agreed on the reward of speaking at confs. just that people shouldnt find it a norm to pay to speak.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#306

Post by gpspake »

Somebody told me to go watch a specific course on Frontend Masters and I ended up watching over a hundred hours of courses. In addition to all the valuable practical things I learned, I was amazed at the content and it raised the bar for the level of quality I demand from learning resources. There are a lot of trash courses and books out there that aren't worth the time. Now I vet things more before diving in. That and my Jetbrains all products license :)

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#307

Post by stopachka »

The habit I’ve stuck with the longest, which continues to bear fruit:

1. If a book comes to mind, just buy it. No wishlists, no libraries. Feel free to get _both_ kindle and paperback, even the audible.

The returns on this habit are incalculable. I do this at an extreme level, which amounts to about 5k / year. That’s similar to a great gym membership or owning a small car. Expensive but doable.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#308

Post by antihero »

locochef wrote: post #204

The single best thing I did for professional development was see a therapist. In tech, our jobs are knowledge-based. You can't hammer a nail into a board while you're sitting on the couch with your child, but you can certainly think about software architecture. I've found that my job bleeds into my personal life, and vice versa, and I believe it is far more common than most people realize. Stress piles up and it affe…

Absolutely, I've grown hugely as a person since starting therapy, it facilitates you cutting the shit about yourself, examining yourself and the world around you and how you it influences you and you influence it.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#309

Post by jimmytucson »

locochef wrote: post #204

The single best thing I did for professional development was see a therapist. In tech, our jobs are knowledge-based. You can't hammer a nail into a board while you're sitting on the couch with your child, but you can certainly think about software architecture. I've found that my job bleeds into my personal life, and vice versa, and I believe it is far more common than most people realize. Stress piles up and it affe…

Ironically, the word "architecture" comes from designing and constructing buildings. Likewise, someone who frames houses can become preoccupied with beams and rafter angles while not operating a saw or driving in nails.

I guess what I'm saying is, everyone - including construction workers - should take your advice.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best money you have spent on professional development?

#310

Post by Kaze404 »

wenc wrote: post #290
mac01021 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible for you, without sharing personal details that you would rather not share, to give a more concrete and detailed account of the value that your therapist has provided to you? I've also always regarded myself as introspective enough not to be able to benefit from therapy. And, while I'm open minded to the idea that I am wrong about that, I just have trouble imagining or envisioning what I might be missin…

> I've also always regarded myself as introspective enough not to be able to benefit from therapy. Not the OP, but as an introspective person, I've found it was actually my introspection that predisposed me to benefiting from therapy. For me, my issues stemmed from negative self-talk, which is a misfiring of introspection . I would read the world and assign negative interpretations to how I was treated or how I messe…

This was an interesting read because it's exactly what I talked about in my session yesterday, but would never be able to explain with my own words. Thank you for sharing, and I'll bookmark your comment as a resource to guide people to when they're on the fence about therapy.
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