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Communication. Learn how to share your ideas and opinions in a concise, engaging way. Learn to advocate for (or against) something in a way that will have peop

Communication. Learn how to share your ideas and opinions in a concise, engaging way. Learn to advocate for (or against) something in a way that will have people engaged (first point: never be combative, people will mostly dismiss you as immature or emotionally compromised). Yeah it doesn't sound like a "tech skill" but it absolutely is and I think too many "tech" people severely undervalue it, preferring instead pure "lone wolf" kind of skills that don't require the squishy, dirty aspects of dealing with other humans (speaking from personal experience here). You can accomplish a lot on your own with the right talent and skills. But you can always accomplish more if you can engage more people. Maintain a blog of interesting things you've learned, hiring managers will value the demonstrated writing skills.

davidw 5y ago
Was going to write the same thing, but you wrote it in a clearer, more concise way than I could have!
- AceJohnny2 5y ago
  I'll admit that I've honed my writing through online comments, though in a direction I'm not sure is valuable elsewhere ;)
jjice 5y ago
The concise part is one I've been working on. I find that I've said everything I need to and I keep presenting a feature by just repeating what I've already said in a different way. Same with text via email and Slack, but I've been pretty good at catching myself recently. Anyone have any tips for communicating more concisely?
- AceJohnny2 5y ago
  I've been working on reducing the habit of repetition. I think it comes from (feeling like) people not listening to you. Some things that have helped me: - care less that people listen to you (see also: The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A Fuck). If they didn't get you the first time, their loss. - Keep in mind that repeating points doesn't actually help most listeners, as you're just overloading them with information. (for advanced writers only: there's an art to repeating points for reader memorization) - Remove a random sentence. Does your point still make sense? Then the sentence wasn't crucial. Does it not make sense anymore? Then can you add a qualifier or clause to another sentence to make sense again? Counter to this: make your sentences as short as possible. Be liberal in splitting your sentences. Iterate these two steps. - Remove adjectives and adverbs - (always valid) review what you wrote 5, 10 minutes, and/or a day later. It's fascinating how a bit of distance makes you realize the flaws in your past writing. When you're writing, you still have your idea clear in your head, and your understanding of what you wrote is informed by the live idea. After you step away, you're left with just what you wrote, and it must make sense on its own. Addendum: are you feeling that people aren't listening to you because they're not acknowledging you? Many people are bad at acknowledging what they hear, so learn to do without. Conversely, learn to acknowledge what someone else is saying ;)
  - v-erne 5y ago
    >> I've been working on reducing the habit of repetition. I think it comes from (feeling like) people not listening to you. I used to belive this, but after some horizon-broadening reading/listening that went far outside of my usual technical inclination, I noticed that there are some that are deeply convinced that repetition is the key to effective communication with normal people (by which I mean most non-technically inclined ones). Just listen to managerial podcasts (for example www.manager-tools.com) or read any book on marketing or NPL programming. Most of it is probably bullshit but there is one theme that persists through all of this (repeats, if You will :)). I started to wonder if my drive to not repeat myself is somehow deeply connected to my technical life (I spent most of my life programming, DRY-ing my code, and reading complex technical books that cannot afford repetition because the material is too dense). And maybe this is not how the real world works - maybe the other 95% of it needs everything repeated till their ears and eyas bleeds - otherwise they will just ride through it like they ride through their facebook wall.
  - jjice 5y ago
    Great advice! I'll give this a go, thanks!
tmaly 5y ago
I agree with you 100 percent on this. Communication is sort of a super power. It can go a long way.
godDLL 5y ago
2022 is going to be even more about communication, with many of you working remote. And unstructured, dispersed, realtime communication is not going to cut it. The skill to develop is time-boxing and scheduling communication, as well as avoiding communication silos.

davidw 5y ago

Was going to write the same thing, but you wrote it in a clearer, more concise way than I could have!

AceJohnny2 5y ago
I'll admit that I've honed my writing through online comments, though in a direction I'm not sure is valuable elsewhere ;)

jjice 5y ago

The concise part is one I've been working on. I find that I've said everything I need to and I keep presenting a feature by just repeating what I've already said in a different way. Same with text via email and Slack, but I've been pretty good at catching myself recently. Anyone have any tips for communicating more concisely?

AceJohnny2 5y ago
I've been working on reducing the habit of repetition. I think it comes from (feeling like) people not listening to you. Some things that have helped me: - care less that people listen to you (see also: The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A Fuck). If they didn't get you the first time, their loss. - Keep in mind that repeating points doesn't actually help most listeners, as you're just overloading them with information. (for advanced writers only: there's an art to repeating points for reader memorization) - Remove a random sentence. Does your point still make sense? Then the sentence wasn't crucial. Does it not make sense anymore? Then can you add a qualifier or clause to another sentence to make sense again? Counter to this: make your sentences as short as possible. Be liberal in splitting your sentences. Iterate these two steps. - Remove adjectives and adverbs - (always valid) review what you wrote 5, 10 minutes, and/or a day later. It's fascinating how a bit of distance makes you realize the flaws in your past writing. When you're writing, you still have your idea clear in your head, and your understanding of what you wrote is informed by the live idea. After you step away, you're left with just what you wrote, and it must make sense on its own. Addendum: are you feeling that people aren't listening to you because they're not acknowledging you? Many people are bad at acknowledging what they hear, so learn to do without. Conversely, learn to acknowledge what someone else is saying ;)
- v-erne 5y ago
  >> I've been working on reducing the habit of repetition. I think it comes from (feeling like) people not listening to you. I used to belive this, but after some horizon-broadening reading/listening that went far outside of my usual technical inclination, I noticed that there are some that are deeply convinced that repetition is the key to effective communication with normal people (by which I mean most non-technically inclined ones). Just listen to managerial podcasts (for example www.manager-tools.com) or read any book on marketing or NPL programming. Most of it is probably bullshit but there is one theme that persists through all of this (repeats, if You will :)). I started to wonder if my drive to not repeat myself is somehow deeply connected to my technical life (I spent most of my life programming, DRY-ing my code, and reading complex technical books that cannot afford repetition because the material is too dense). And maybe this is not how the real world works - maybe the other 95% of it needs everything repeated till their ears and eyas bleeds - otherwise they will just ride through it like they ride through their facebook wall.
- jjice 5y ago
  Great advice! I'll give this a go, thanks!

tmaly 5y ago

I agree with you 100 percent on this. Communication is sort of a super power. It can go a long way.

godDLL 5y ago

2022 is going to be even more about communication, with many of you working remote. And unstructured, dispersed, realtime communication is not going to cut it. The skill to develop is time-boxing and scheduling communication, as well as avoiding communication silos.