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Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

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Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#31

Post by T-A »

h0phead wrote: post #10
dankruss wrote: post #6

Code. Teach yourself how to code. Create a project that you would find useful. Given your finance background, create a system to manage your personal finances or automate some of the tasks you perform at work. You have the mathematics background, so logic isn't a hurdle. If the glove fits... code.

Which language though? Coming from someone who knows a bit but doesn't work in the field.

I would say Python. Easy enough to be a good teaching language + a huge ecosystem for real work, spanning everything from web dev to machine learning.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#32

Post by solutionyogi »

patio11 wrote: post #28

When I look around me at conspicuously happy people I see a) cooking, b) exercise (less of a skill than a lifestyle but there you go), and c) a wide, wide variety of X plus Y such that you're better at Y than anyone who can do better at X and vice versa, for X and Y which are chosen to be commercially valuable. Professionally, if you want a skill with a stupid amount of leverage, public speaking is pretty high up the…

Could you please given an example or two for X + Y? I am not following that.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#34

Post by elros »

solutionyogi wrote: post #32
patio11 wrote: post #28

When I look around me at conspicuously happy people I see a) cooking, b) exercise (less of a skill than a lifestyle but there you go), and c) a wide, wide variety of X plus Y such that you're better at Y than anyone who can do better at X and vice versa, for X and Y which are chosen to be commercially valuable. Professionally, if you want a skill with a stupid amount of leverage, public speaking is pretty high up the…

Could you please given an example or two for X + Y? I am not following that.

Let's say, a coder with significant law knowledge, such that he knows more about law than all the other coders and more about code than all the lawyers, in a given company.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#35

Post by normloman »

That's a question you have to answer yourself. It sounds like you're dissatisfied with your finance career. If that's true, don't make the same mistake again. Don't try to figure out what skills are worth investing in (in other words, don't try to calculate ROI). Work on whatever you're passionate about (and if you aren't sure what that is, work on whatever peeks your curiosity).

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#36

Post by civilframe »

I'd recommend putting some time into learning how to change your body composition, improve your fitness, and control your mood. Better physiology improves all other aspects of one's life. Also practical psychology (why people do what they do, etc) is helpful. After that, learn how to create software.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#37

Post by patio11 »

solutionyogi wrote: post #32
patio11 wrote: post #28

When I look around me at conspicuously happy people I see a) cooking, b) exercise (less of a skill than a lifestyle but there you go), and c) a wide, wide variety of X plus Y such that you're better at Y than anyone who can do better at X and vice versa, for X and Y which are chosen to be commercially valuable. Professionally, if you want a skill with a stupid amount of leverage, public speaking is pretty high up the…

Could you please given an example or two for X + Y? I am not following that.

For me the original plan was bilingual (English/Japanese) plus engineering but I ended up getting more career mileage out of being able to program rings around most SaaS companies' marketing teams. (A high bar that is not.)

You can pick many, many things here, though. Combining programming (any stack which lets you ship things) plus any other white collar profession works well, too. Try embedding in anybody's workday and just sit on your hands and watch the insanity as they do any data-processing work, for example. It's insane how much of day-to-day accounting work exists because of the lack of 50 lines of Ruby.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#38

Post by normloman »

crdb wrote: post #13

If I had 6 months and no obligations, I'd learn to draw and to storytell, and I'd make and publish (for free if I can afford it) a graphic novel adaptation of Asimov's Foundation. Current item 1 on my "to do once we exit" list. It's a brilliant set of books by one of the most brilliant authors ever, and IMHO has a philosophy and structure that is rarely found in contemporary books or graphic novels. It would be a cha…

In 6 months, you could learn the basics of drawing. Enough to make a simple graphic novel, to have fun and get the experience. But something tells me the source material demands a more complex approach. The best illustrators take years to refine their technique.

Not trying to dissuade you. If you love drawing, absolutely do as much of it as you can. Just don't stop after 6 months.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#39

Post by ellisv »

elros wrote: post #34
solutionyogi wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you please given an example or two for X + Y? I am not following that.

Let's say, a coder with significant law knowledge, such that he knows more about law than all the other coders and more about code than all the lawyers, in a given company.

I think this is a good example. I would just add that it helps to be able to deflect when the lawyers come to you with all of their technology problems and coders come to you with legal problems (or whatever appropriate mix of skills and problems). You don't want to end up having to fix all the printers.

Re: Ask HN: What skills would you invest in learning?

#40

Post by Omnipresent »

patio11 wrote: post #28

When I look around me at conspicuously happy people I see a) cooking, b) exercise (less of a skill than a lifestyle but there you go), and c) a wide, wide variety of X plus Y such that you're better at Y than anyone who can do better at X and vice versa, for X and Y which are chosen to be commercially valuable. Professionally, if you want a skill with a stupid amount of leverage, public speaking is pretty high up the…

The X and Y analogy reminds me of a tweet from Josh Willis about Data Scientists [1]

"Data Scientist (n.): Person who is better at statistics than any software engineer and better at software engineering than any statistician."

[1] https://twitter.com/josh_wills/status/198093512149958656

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