The single greatest benefit to my career as a developer has been learning to draw. I draw on whiteboards, in moleskins, on printer paper, on the back of resume

The single greatest benefit to my career as a developer has been learning to draw. I draw on whiteboards, in moleskins, on printer paper, on the back of resumes... anywhere and everywhere. I do this because I need to convey complex ideas to important teams who are NOT programmers: Product, Marketing, People Ops, and the C-suite. Helping people understand my ideas through illustration creates buy-in from them and trust in me. You can be a great programmer, but if people don't know and don't trust in what you're doing you'll never be given the space to execute.