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I recommend reading 'The Wealth of Nations'. As an economics textbook, it is fairly dated, but it makes the point that ten people with a specific specialization

by verbify 10y ago

I recommend reading 'The Wealth of Nations'. As an economics textbook, it is fairly dated, but it makes the point that ten people with a specific specialization can do more than ten people all doing the same work at once. Therefore the value you can provide increases with specialization as you can be part of a team than can provide more. My salary increased once I marketed myself as having a specific specialization, but the difficulty of finding a job increased too. It is a basic application of supply vs demand. As, say, a PHP developer, you're competing with millions of other PHP developers around the world. There are plenty of jobs, but there are also plenty of people who are competing with you, driving your price downwards. If you narrow it down to knowing a lot about a very specific framework or PHP system - for example, you know a lot about Laravel or Drupal, then you're competing with fewer people, and people are willing to pay more for an expert, but there are also fewer potential jobs. There's also an associated risk. If you specialize in Laravel and Laravel goes out of style, you will have to remarket yourself as a PHP dev again... Some people specialized intensely in Microsoft Silverlight, and they ended up like this - http://www.commitstrip.com/en/2015/07/28/betting-on-the-right-horse/ http://www.commitstrip.com/en/2015/07/28/betting-on-the-righ... (it's not a total loss, as some programming paradigms work across languages). With the risk comes increased reward.

shubhamjain 10y ago
> I recommend reading 'The Wealth of Nations'. As an economics textbook, it is fairly dated, but it makes the point that ten people with a specific specialization can do more than ten people all doing the same work at once. Therefore the value you can provide increases with specialization as you can be part of a team than can provide more. I think it's improper to retrofit a dated analogy into something innately complex like software engineering. It ignores the communication overhead needed in creating software which was almost absent in low mentally-taxing work of 18th century. Let's say a team wants to build a website. Are you sure you'll have better odds at making it in time with a specialist for HTML, CSS, and Javascript? Brook's Law is at play here — finely grained task spread across dozens of people who have a little idea about everyone else's work is bound to prove disastrous. The role of specialist is crucial, but only when the her knowledge in a singular aspect can save a lot of time for the whole team.
- verbify 10y ago
  > Let's say a team wants to build a website. Are you sure you'll have better odds at making it in time with a specialist for HTML, CSS, and Javascript? Yes, I'd prefer an expert in LESS and SASS and another expert in Angular or whatever javascript framework, rather than two jack of all trades. They're different skills. In fact, most software shops do specialise at least to the level of frontend and backend and usually further depending on their size and the size of the project. There is still a role for a 'senior foreman' to oversee the process, but that was always the case, even in Smith's time.
zhte415 10y ago
Dug well into later pages of the Wealth of Nations is the pretty brutal passage below. Smith's works are a lot more complex than often paraphrased as, as are many modern classics. (Currently writing a book on BPO, so a topic of interest.) Quote follows: > “The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, nobdle, or tender tentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgement concerning many even of the orginary duties of private life.”

by verbify 10y ago

shubhamjain 10y ago

> I recommend reading 'The Wealth of Nations'. As an economics textbook, it is fairly dated, but it makes the point that ten people with a specific specialization can do more than ten people all doing the same work at once. Therefore the value you can provide increases with specialization as you can be part of a team than can provide more. I think it's improper to retrofit a dated analogy into something innately complex like software engineering. It ignores the communication overhead needed in creating software which was almost absent in low mentally-taxing work of 18th century. Let's say a team wants to build a website. Are you sure you'll have better odds at making it in time with a specialist for HTML, CSS, and Javascript? Brook's Law is at play here — finely grained task spread across dozens of people who have a little idea about everyone else's work is bound to prove disastrous. The role of specialist is crucial, but only when the her knowledge in a singular aspect can save a lot of time for the whole team.

verbify 10y ago
> Let's say a team wants to build a website. Are you sure you'll have better odds at making it in time with a specialist for HTML, CSS, and Javascript? Yes, I'd prefer an expert in LESS and SASS and another expert in Angular or whatever javascript framework, rather than two jack of all trades. They're different skills. In fact, most software shops do specialise at least to the level of frontend and backend and usually further depending on their size and the size of the project. There is still a role for a 'senior foreman' to oversee the process, but that was always the case, even in Smith's time.

zhte415 10y ago

Dug well into later pages of the Wealth of Nations is the pretty brutal passage below. Smith's works are a lot more complex than often paraphrased as, as are many modern classics. (Currently writing a book on BPO, so a topic of interest.) Quote follows: > “The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, nobdle, or tender tentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgement concerning many even of the orginary duties of private life.”