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As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

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Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#61

Post by dogles »

erader wrote: post #50
cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

Hi there! Support manager here. I've been leading support teams for years, led support QA teams, built troubleshooting processes and worked very closely with dev teams. A lot of what I wanted to bring up doesn't apply so much to solo dev's, but I want to vouch for non-devs and anyone that might start working on team. Support brains and developer brains are actually not that different. I see on HN way too often that d…

It’s support’s job to focus on one thing at a time, meanwhile it’s a coder’s job to try and keep dozens of things in mind at a time. Context switching IS hard regardless, but like you said, one of the roles has it baked into the job description.

The crux here is that Programmer committed to X work done by the end of the week, and Support is effectively subtracting their time to accomplish X. This is a managerial problem, and not an easy one, because it’s not predictable.

My estimate, if you’re a programmer working 40h/wk on a live product, 8h of coding is a good week. Expect the majority of your time to be spent planning, reviewing, and supporting. If you’re sacrificing one of those to get more concentrated coding time, make sure that is communicated. YMMV.

In any case, if you don’t have managerial support to get engineer resources to fix problems, then it’s not support - it’s therapy. Sometimes that’s the best you can do.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#62

Post by cyberferret »

erader wrote: post #50
cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

Hi there! Support manager here. I've been leading support teams for years, led support QA teams, built troubleshooting processes and worked very closely with dev teams. A lot of what I wanted to bring up doesn't apply so much to solo dev's, but I want to vouch for non-devs and anyone that might start working on team. Support brains and developer brains are actually not that different. I see on HN way too often that d…

Thanks for your thoughtful reply, but I think there are a couple of points that you may have missed in my original post.

> Support brains and developer brains are actually not that different.

Agreed. I wasn't talking about intelligence or analytical skills per se, but rather the 'mode' that you think in when in either situation.

When developing code, my mind is racing ahead and planning out things that are far beyond what I am working on. In essence it is multi tasking, and juggling several tasks and ideas at the same time. I am 'ahead of the aircraft', to use pilot speak, and I am constantly trying to anticipate problems that may occur and critical tasks that I know I will have to complete. Complete with all this is jumping around between several editor, terminal, browser, emulator windows etc.

However, when doing support, I have to be completely and utterly present with the person on the other end of the support call. I can no longer 'free wheel' and distract myself with other tasks. I have to display full empathy with the customer, and ensure that I am accurately picturing in my mind what they are trying to say.

If the customer is a slow talker, or non technical, then I have to kick in extra energy to make doubly sure I am being effective in providing the best possible support experience.

My analogy above about race car driving and knitting is not outside the mark. Both are skilled tasks, but they both require a completely different mode of thinking and presence of mind to be able to execute to the best of your ability.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#63

Post by dogles »

SyneRyder wrote: post #18
whalesalad wrote: post #13

Working at the Apple Store as a sales person has helped me IMMENSELY in my career, not only in terms of understanding how human beings approach technology but from a sales standpoint as well. In the first startup I was a part of, every single member of the 3 person team did email support for our school teacher userbase. Do it. Everyone needs to do it. Doing this kind of work is very grounding and humbling. When you b…

To emphasize "don't think it's beneath you to talk to customers", there's the story of when William from Microsoft took a phone support call: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20091123-00/?p=...

OTOH, he was too busy to take the follow up call.. ;)

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#64

Post by koliber »

blt wrote: post #60
kqr wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. This is something I can have trouble with even personally. I have noticed that when I get home from a long day of cold, analytical problem-solving, I mbrain bad at shifting my brain to empathetically listen and provide emotional support for my wifes problems.

I wrote myself off as "bad at being supportive" for a long time. Eventually I realized that being supportive is a trainable skill just like software development or healthy eating. I am still not great at it, but getting better. I respectfully urge you to examine yourself and try to modify your habits rather than looking for excuses.

Agreed that it is trainable if you are bad at it in general.

I don't think the parent was saying that he is bad at emotional support and being empathetic. He said he is having trouble switching from the developer brain mode into the empathetic human brain mode.

This is something I noticed myself as well, especially when working from home. When I worked in an office, the commute home provided time to decompress and switch off my focused analytical brain. By the time I would get home, I would be in the proper mindset. I guess you could say that there are benefits to a commute after all!

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#65

Post by laumars »

cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

> And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'.

They can be different but I don't think they necessarily need to be. Thankfully Im seldom customer facing these days but when I am and when I used to be I would "debug" human patterns with the same analytical approach as software development. Even ones that turned out not to be technical queries in the end.

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#68

Post by jventura »

erader wrote: post #50
cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

Hi there! Support manager here. I've been leading support teams for years, led support QA teams, built troubleshooting processes and worked very closely with dev teams. A lot of what I wanted to bring up doesn't apply so much to solo dev's, but I want to vouch for non-devs and anyone that might start working on team. Support brains and developer brains are actually not that different. I see on HN way too often that d…

> Support brains and developer brains are actually not that different.

Others have already commented on this sentence, but I would like to add that the real problem is context switching. For instance, because I know I take too much time switching contexts on my mind, I always have to plan accordingly, like reducing the number of different tasks everyday, or plan some time between very different tasks..

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#69

Post by LoSboccacc »

kqr wrote: post #46
cyberferret wrote: post #11

I did it for 10 years, but more recently have moved away from phone support as much as possible (or delegated to others to do). The main reason - I am a solo developer. And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. It was basically impossible for me to get into 'flow' state during a normal working day. Even one phone call during the day took me away from my creative, pr…

> And the brain mode for 'developer' is VERY different from the brain mode for 'support agent'. This is something I can have trouble with even personally. I have noticed that when I get home from a long day of cold, analytical problem-solving, I mbrain bad at shifting my brain to empathetically listen and provide emotional support for my wifes problems.

that's one of the reason I walk home, so I have time to disengage from work. (edit: I also live close-by now, but before it was public transit, for the same reason)

Re: As a solo developer, I decided to offer phone support

#70

Post by SyneRyder »

dosuken123 wrote: post #67

I want to know whether he offers the phone support for English customers or Japanese customers

The article says he only offers it in the Japanese version:

"I wrote my phone number in the help section of the Japanese version only, since I live in Japan and it is a JP number. I might try it in English too in the future..."

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