Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
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Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#2You should call yourself whatever based on the situation.
If you are hanging out with a group of consultants, you call yourself consultant; if you are a special effects programmer, and talking to a model, you say you're in the movie business; if you are interviewing with the author, you call yourself programmer.
The best way to connect with others is to understand how they perceive things and find ways to relate to them, not enforcing your own world view onto them.
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#3Funny thing. It took me ages before I actually had the balls to call myself a programmer.
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#4A few comments:
1. To me, however, a programmer is who I'm looking for, while a resume full of revenue increases and cost reductions sounds like an "anomalously high-cost parasite who types some mumbo-jumbo into Excel and PowerPoint, claiming credit for others' work". This is in no small part because you are a programmer. The vast majority of people who pay other people for work that involves programming are not programmers (and that does not make them any less smart, or any less lucrative.)
2. Abstracting a greater point from Ron Garret's career history is tricky, if only because the vast majority (by which I mean myself) of programmers will never reach his level of competence.
3. There is absolutely a chance that the value of the company which employs you will increase by ten times over the course of your employment. This chance is vastly overestimated by workers, especially in startups.
Overall, I think Yosef is misconstruing a lot of patio11's original points (though the points Yosef makes, especially about forming relationships with coworkers, are still quite true.) Perhaps the biggest takeaway: the path to success in a chip architecture career is entirely different than the path to success in a SaaS/freelancing career.
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#5I was having a beer in this small Brazilian town, mid-afternoon. Two girls come to my table. We try to chat ; they can't speak any foreign language and my Portuguese is awful.
- Me: What is your job ?
- The girls: Programma
- Me (for the next 30 minutes): Oh great, me too ! Which languages ?
Even "Java" didn't seem to mean anything to them. Strange. I assumed they had special programming languages in Brazil.
10 years later, in Palo Alto. I read some article about Brazil society. One word catches my attention.
Programma = Prostitute. Oh.
So yes, don't call yourself a programmer. Especially in Brazil when you don't know the language.
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#6I have been a professional programmer for 32 years. When I stop calling myself a programmer I will call myself dead (if I could).
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#7I was having a beer in this small Brazilian town, mid-afternoon. Two girls come to my table. We try to chat ; they can't speak any foreign language and my Portuguese is awful. - Me: What is your job ? - The girls: Programma - Me (for the next 30 minutes): Oh great, me too ! Which languages ? Even "Java" didn't seem to mean anything to them. Strange. I assumed they had special programming languages in Brazil. 10 years…
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Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#8I was having a beer in this small Brazilian town, mid-afternoon. Two girls come to my table. We try to chat ; they can't speak any foreign language and my Portuguese is awful. - Me: What is your job ? - The girls: Programma - Me (for the next 30 minutes): Oh great, me too ! Which languages ? Even "Java" didn't seem to mean anything to them. Strange. I assumed they had special programming languages in Brazil. 10 years…
Not that this has anything to do with your story, but Lua was originally written in Brazil because of governmental restrictions on imported software which precluded the use of more mainstream languages. They did, in fact, have special programming languages in Brazil.
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#9I think Patrick's article is one of the best-written I've seen about the realities of the intersection of programming and business for people who have come from a strict tech background with zero business exposure. In my experience what he says is spot-on in almost every way.
Businesses exist to make money. Yes, very often making stuff is an integral part of the business model, but its still a business. To excel in a business you need to be responsible for growing its bottom line. This can only happen through increasing revenue or decreasing costs.
This probably applies more to consulting than any other field. If you go to a potential client and try to sell them on the fact that you are the best Java developer in 5 states, they are going to look at you with glazed eyes and stop listening. Tell them you think you can bring them a 10% increase in revenue with a simple piece of software, and you will get much further. This is in fact how large consulting firms make sales every day. I assure you they don't send in their developers to sell clients, they send in people who are flashy and know how to appeal to a decision-maker's interests.
I think more than anything his article explains things that are necessary to successfully convey value to purse holders who don't speak techie. If you restrict yourself to describing yourself in purely technical terms, you will sound great to other people who understand you but will never resonate with those who don't.
Re: Do call yourself a programmer, and other career advice
#10I was having a beer in this small Brazilian town, mid-afternoon. Two girls come to my table. We try to chat ; they can't speak any foreign language and my Portuguese is awful. - Me: What is your job ? - The girls: Programma - Me (for the next 30 minutes): Oh great, me too ! Which languages ? Even "Java" didn't seem to mean anything to them. Strange. I assumed they had special programming languages in Brazil. 10 years…
Well, they are relationship hackers.