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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?

#521

Post by westcort »

kristopolous wrote: post #145
randomNumber7 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If this is out of some people's budgets, check eBay. Just google "library genisis" ;)

Back in the 90s tech futurists were talking about having "the library of congress on the size of your finger nail". Now we actually could do something in that realm (LoC is about ~10tb and there's 1tb microsd cards; we're probably talking "within 5-7 years" without any exaggeration) but there's so many courts and laws stopping it from happening, the great cambrian explosion of knowledge has been held back.

I started this by downloading all of the books the LoC put out until 1918 (locserendipity.com). Full text sources in an external drive took up around 200 GB.

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

#522

Post by guiambros »

miguendes wrote: post #92
guiambros wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$99/year via an ACM subscription [1]. And you get the printed copies of ACM magazines shipped to you every month. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22799753

Is it still worth to get it from ACM? I remember that they have recently restricted a bunch of sfuff on the ACM subscription. Examples: live online trainings, katacoda, notebooks, sandboxes and certifications.

Good question; I'm not sure. I only use books and rarely some video trainings. I just tried katacoda and, as expected, it doesn't work.

That makes sense; ultimately there's a reason why Safari subscription costs $49/month.

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

#523

Post by borja_froged »

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…

I 100% Agree. Spending time for yourself and having someone to help you do that is key nowadays to avoid burnout. Thank you for sharing your story :)

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

#524

Post by ubac »

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…

On a similar note, philosophical life coaching: https://www.pamelajhobart.com/

Read her site, you'll either immediately say "that's for me" or "absolutely not," and either way you'll be right. Does both phone and email coaching ("Interlocutor as a Service"), which is strange but super interesting and (for me at least) surprisingly effective

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

#525

Post by iateanapple »

azinman2 wrote: post #359
equality_1138 wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seconded. In particular, I've come to recognize the growing confluence of woke politics and tech management as major impediment on my ability to do my job well. Reading up on career coaching and psychology has certainly helped, but can also serve to overcomplicate the situation. My therapist provides highly personal and much more practical guidance in accepting the bs.

How do “woke politics” prevent you from doing your job well?

> How do “woke politics” prevent you from doing your job well?

I’m a hiring manager and where I work we have an unwritten “understanding” that if your candidate recommendations don’t include any women you are a sexist.

I just make sure I include a few female candidates even if none in the recruitment pool are capable because it’s not worth the trouble.

However, I imagine that for many “by the book” hiring managers this causes significant anxiety and stress.

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

#526

Post by Breza »

dave84 wrote: post #231
esond wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. This relatively short book has made more of a difference to my personal livelihood than maybe any other pice of literature or advice. You really don’t realize how much negotiating you do in day to day life. Its good to be comfortable with it.

That book paid for itself ten times over by the time I had finished reading it, practicing on insurance renewals and utility bills.

It's incredible how much you can save on your bills! I read the book and called my ISP. I was polite and didn't threaten to leave or do anything aggressive and ended up paying less for faster service.

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

#527

Post by Breza »

totally wrote: post #95
esond wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. This relatively short book has made more of a difference to my personal livelihood than maybe any other pice of literature or advice. You really don’t realize how much negotiating you do in day to day life. Its good to be comfortable with it.

The audiobook is good as well, you can hear the tone of voice, which is useful.

Totally agree about listening to the audiobook!

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

#528

Post by Breza »

cannaceo wrote: post #141
athenot wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fun part is you can turn that technique against them and it works like a charm. I've repeated this a few times now: dedicate a day to car buying and call 10 of them up telling them I'm buying a car TODAY, with these precise specs. No upsells entertained. And I let them in on the fact that I'm calling all the others and expect to make a decision by a set time. Always remain super polite but stay firm. In a way I s…

A lot of car salesmen ignore buyers like this. They see it as a waste of time to get pitted against each other. I’ve gotten the best results by starting with the dealerships with the lowest prices on TrueCar and then baiting them to invest time in me. Then they’re more committed and eager to close. Show your teeth later in the negotiation.

I like this approach. I check the inventory on a dealer's lot through their website, pick the car I want, learn what I can about it, and show up ready to skip the first steps. I ended up buying my current car from a no-haggle dealership since they had the best price even after factoring in negotiation (they had an overstock of the car I wanted and the new model year was about to be released).

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

#529

Post by raobit »

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…

You really made a good point ,even i have observed how psychology really helps in looking,observing things and changes perspective about everything

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

#530

Post by Breza »

jkingsbery wrote: post #48

As many others have said, books are the best things I've spent money on, but let me say more: Do books sometimes say things that are obvious? Yes. For example, when I first read Martin Fowler's book Refactoring, I had been renaming variables and moving methods from one class to another for years. But he gave a new framework for thinking about something that obvious. I've found the idea of separating out my coding flo…

I completely agree with everything you say here. Well put.
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