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Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

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Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#31

Post by blt »

cwitty88 wrote: post #5
raxxorrax wrote: post #2

Well, look at the positive side, as a CTO you probably don't have much time to code anyway. Jokes aside, did something happen before? Did a software not perform or caused problems? You say growth is fast. Sounds good and that means to make compromises here and there in software that might not fit your aspirations of quality. Is this a new position? Or did you see a topic that was just beyond you in any conceivable wa…

I've been CTO since the beginning but it was almost all coding in the early days. Now it is much more of a management role. I actually just started the process of stepping down and going back to being a developer because I dislike the management side of things a lot. I think I am questioning my abilities because we built things in questionable ways and now everything that I have done is being scrutinized by all new t…

> everything that I have done is being scrutinized by all new team members. It's really hard to deal with that constant barrage of "why did you do it this way"

Reading old code with a critical eye is an important part of working on a mature code base.

If an arrogant developer reads some questionable code, they will think "the author must have been stupid." They will ask this question as a way to satisfy their narcissism.

If a thoughtful developer finds some questionable code, they will think "the author must have had some motivation that I don't know about." They will ask this question to help them understand the system design and do better work.

Both attitudes lead to the same question. You could start by assuming your new team members are thoughtful and want to learn. They will understand that "we were under time pressure" or "we didn't know about xxxx technique" is a valid answer to "why did you do it this way."

If you discover that your new team members have narcissistic tendencies, then you have a much bigger problem than justifying your own past decisions.

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#32

Post by whalesalad »

Serious answer: drugs, specifically psychedelics like Psilocybin. There is a reason use of these medicines is often called "tripping" - it will take you to a new place and offer you new perspectives.

None of the comments here will give you the faith in yourself that you seek (that is not to say they are not good, or not beneficial). You are the only person who can give you that.

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#33

Post by lief79 »

cwitty88 wrote: post #5
raxxorrax wrote: post #2

Well, look at the positive side, as a CTO you probably don't have much time to code anyway. Jokes aside, did something happen before? Did a software not perform or caused problems? You say growth is fast. Sounds good and that means to make compromises here and there in software that might not fit your aspirations of quality. Is this a new position? Or did you see a topic that was just beyond you in any conceivable wa…

I've been CTO since the beginning but it was almost all coding in the early days. Now it is much more of a management role. I actually just started the process of stepping down and going back to being a developer because I dislike the management side of things a lot. I think I am questioning my abilities because we built things in questionable ways and now everything that I have done is being scrutinized by all new t…

I'm not in a startup, but you should comfortable answering/acknowledging something along the lines of we needed it working quickly, and this did the job for x amount of time based on the time available at the required throughput.

We have the time now for refactoring ... or we'll add a ticket to the backlog, etc.

Second, everyone looks at some code, wonders what idiot did this ... and at some point discovers it was themselves x months/years ago. If you're the primary coder, you'll be getting this a lot. Accept that you've learned and improved since then.

Hope this helps.

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#34

Post by giantg2 »

"I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?"

Me too. I don't know. Force yourself into situations where it's sink or swim and that nobody is willing to step up to?

I don't since I have a family to support. If you're a CTO, that sounds like you've already made it.

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#35

Post by spir »

- maybe do a fun, small coding side project

- possibly your thoughts and feelings might be hormone-related. If male, consider getting T checked?

- optimistically, maybe you have built such a strong team that you doubt yourself in their context and it's time to move on :)

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#36

Post by raxxorrax »

cwitty88 wrote: post #5
raxxorrax wrote: post #2

Well, look at the positive side, as a CTO you probably don't have much time to code anyway. Jokes aside, did something happen before? Did a software not perform or caused problems? You say growth is fast. Sounds good and that means to make compromises here and there in software that might not fit your aspirations of quality. Is this a new position? Or did you see a topic that was just beyond you in any conceivable wa…

I've been CTO since the beginning but it was almost all coding in the early days. Now it is much more of a management role. I actually just started the process of stepping down and going back to being a developer because I dislike the management side of things a lot. I think I am questioning my abilities because we built things in questionable ways and now everything that I have done is being scrutinized by all new t…

Oh I have been in a similar position myself. Was a single dev in a startup and I needed to cut corners. I implemented everything. From embedded controllers to user interface and I even used code that some students wrote as a proof of concept to save time. Codebase was a mess. It worked in the end, but barely and maintenance was horrible.

I demanded help when the product was on the market and the new dev began to refactor parts of the software. Was awesome to have help and the new dev teased me when he discovered my greatest sins and most idiotic decisions that I committed. Wasn't meant seriously from his side, but at some point it nagged on me nonetheless because he was a bit of a smartass at times.

Helped me to reflect what I implemented with the resources and time that I had. You will rarely be happy with the code and design decisions you made yesterday anyway. Learn from the mistake and move on. A dev that never wrote bad code probably didn't write much to begin with. People that constantly question design decisions often might just want to prove themselves to you or honestly want to know why you did it. I often answer something like "I was full of optimism about it at that time".

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#37

Post by jhoelzel »

Ask your teammates. Communicate. The role of the CTO grows at the stage were you are immensly but the hardest switch you have to make is to manage people and not projects. Because, you know you hired people for the projects.

Its OK to not know something, CTO's and principal engineers are not gods of their trade but people who use the synergies presented to them. That is not an archive of man pages that you have produced for your minions, but the combined effort of everyone (technical) involved.

Realizing that you may lack a certain set of information is a perfect point to reach out to someone in your team, who does. You will see that the exact opposite of what you are expecting will happen: people will you value more because you can be reasoned with. See it this way: even if you could theoretically barely program, I wold wager that you have more tech skills than some CTOs the past has brought up. Really successfull ones too.

Even if noone other in your team has the answers to your problem, the solution is still communication. Either hire talent or use freelancers and consultants. That is what we do. But the result its still the same, it's your team that is facing the problem, not the problem facing the team.

On the risk of sounding a bit funny, but maybe you should consider taking a management course?

Re: Ask HN: I've lost faith in myself as a developer, how do I get it back?

#38

Post by cwitty88 »

whalesalad wrote: post #32

Serious answer: drugs, specifically psychedelics like Psilocybin. There is a reason use of these medicines is often called "tripping" - it will take you to a new place and offer you new perspectives. None of the comments here will give you the faith in yourself that you seek (that is not to say they are not good, or not beneficial). You are the only person who can give you that.

I've been super interested in trying Psilocybin as an long term anti-depressant. Looking forward to more research coming out on this topic.
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