VDubinator Coder

A Question One hot Summer's day in 2018, I was out playing a lunch round of disc golf with the disc golf club from work. There were a handful of us there squeezing in one last round on a course that was set to be removed a short time later. As the hot, summer sun beat down on us while we walked back to our vehicles after the round, one of the then interns turned to me and commented something akin to the following: "How long have you worked here?" he asked. "Just over 4 years." I replied. "So, Software Engineer, Tech Lead, and now Manager in a pretty short amount of time. What's your secret to success?" At the time, I think I said something like "working hard" or something similar that's a true but superficial answer. Since then, I've done a bit of thinking about it, I've gained more experience as a manager, and I've gone through some more leadership training. Throughout that time, I've occasionally thought ab

When searching Google for the value of a mentor, it's easy to find many opinions on the matter. Most of them talk about how indispensable a mentor is to the success of your career. It's been researched and discussed many times over and the conclusion is almost always the same: mentors are hugely valuable! They can point you in the right direction, help you avoid costly errors, push you when times get tough, and support you in the things you do. ... But what about when you don't have a mentor? Or what about when someone you consider a mentor has roughly the same amount of experience as you? What happens when you're the most senior person in the organization? One obvious answer to that is to seek external mentors and spend a bit more time networking to find them, but what if you want on-the-job mentorship? What happens then? Over the course of my career, I've met people with a variety of opinions on mentors. Some don't see the value in them and others want on-

I recently read an article entitle "Writing Useful Mission Statements"  by Nick Caldwell. I thought it was a great article and think it'll be useful for me in my current work. As part of applying it to work, I decided to take him up on his challenge to "spend the next 10 minutes writing an engaging personal statement that crisply defines your goals for the next month." So, here's what I came up with:  I feel that the mission statement is nice, but that it doesn't mean much outside of the context of my vision for myself. So, here's the current version of my vision: As a new manager at work, I've become very aware of a lot of things I need to do to improve. I've noticed that I've sometimes talked too much in 1:1 meetings and I'd like to change that. I'd like to become a better coach and help people solve their own problems instead of solving them for them. In the long run, I want to be the best I can be and be the type of lead

So you've been in the industry for a while now. Great job! You've probably rejoiced as you landed your first job. Maybe you've moved on since then (maybe even a few times) or maybe you've stayed with your first employer. Whatever the case, you've been in the industry for a number of years now. Maybe 5. Maybe 10. Maybe more. You've done some cool things (like building that awesome feature all the customers didn't know they wanted) and some not-so-cool things (like taking down production). On paper, you look pretty amazing! You've definitely been around the block a few times and have your own set of scars to show for it. But... have you improved? Have you learned from your mistakes? Have you challenged yourself in new and different ways? Have you put effort into learning new things? Over the years, I've had opportunities to be involved in the interview process at work. We've mainly interviewed college students looking for internships or t

Ever since my first job as a web developer, I've loved the language of JavaScript. The freedom, the flexibility, the power. With JavaScript, you can have it all! But, JavaScript had some weird parts to it. Well, they're not really that weird, but they're just different enough from C or Java that it throws a lot of people through a loop. However, once you learn more about the language, you can easily handle even it's strangest pieces. Because of my love for JavaScript, I decided to take Pluralsight's IQ assessment for JavaScript to see how I stacked up. I ended up getting a score of 219 which is good for an"expert" level. To be honest, I was a little disappointed with the result. I thought I knew it better than that! So here's a look at what I missed and what the correct answers are and why. Missed Questions Missed Question 1 This one I was just going to quickly on and fell for a similar answer. Suffice it to say, there is no eval() method

To lead, or not to lead, that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to write code That may change the very world as we know it, Or to seek for positions of leadership And by managing guide them. To lead--to code, No more; and by "to lead" to say we end The heart-ache and the changing requirements That Scrum is heir to: 'tis a Lean-Agile dream Devoutly to be wish'd. To lead--to code; To lead, perchance to dream--ay, there's the rub: For in that leadership what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this legacy code, Must give us pause--there's the respect That makes the coding of so long life. For who would bear the scrum master's bold whips, The sales pressure, the program's fickle heart, The pangs of quality, the changing dates, The insolence of process, and the spurns That patient merit of th'unworthy takes, When he himself might his own tests make With a blank keyboard? Who would fardels bear, To grunt and

"Wow! I didn't know there was creativity in software engineering!" Such was the reaction I received recently when I explained what I did for a living. And it's completely understandable. For most people, when they hear "computer programmer" or something similar, something like this comes to mind: We often picture dark rooms, stale pizza, and poor hygiene. Or we picture mind-numbing hours spent telling the computer what to do and finding small errors like a misplaced semi-colon. But the stereotypical views on programming are hardly the reality of it. While there are times when some of these stereotypes may be true, that's definitely not the norm. At least not in my experience. The reality is that software engineering generally goes best when engineers are allowed to be creative. That may not be the case for everyone every time, but it holds up in the general case. When engineers are allowed to be creative, they're often more engaged in t