4 ms·

I've been working as a software developer for about ten years, and I've started to get a little annoyed when my manager asks me what I'm gonna work on improving

I've been working as a software developer for about ten years, and I've started to get a little annoyed when my manager asks me what I'm gonna work on improving this year. Like what can I say? That I'll try get better at coding? That I'll get better at project management? At some point the marginal utility is just not there anymore. Even if I did get twice as good (whatever that means) at systems design, it's not like there is _that_ much systems design to go around at work that it would actually be noticeable. What do senior developers say they'll work on improving in their performance reviews?

rokkamokka 2mo ago
Like every other such question, simply make up whatever they want to hear
- kurthr 2mo ago
  Ask Claude to choose a set of improvements that it would rate highly.
  - readread 2mo ago
    LLMs really shine at speeding up corporate bureaucratic busy-work and nonsense. We’re in a golden era when same busy work has not yet expanded due to LLM influence. Let’s appreciate it while it lasts.
    - alt227 2mo ago
      Then hopefully the fears of replacing developer jobs are unfounded, and in fact we can expect (hope) for middle management jobs to be replaced instead?
      - axus 2mo ago
        I wonder what prompt an AI middle manager would need, to not push back on the crap its manager is telling it needs to happen.
        shermantanktop 2mo ago
        Well if it’s anything like where I am, the crap that the managers are asking each other to do is “do more AI stuff.”
Benanov 2mo ago
Soft skills, mostly - you just find things that you're weak on (since you know enough to know where you suck) and just work on those.
jaffa2 2mo ago
Just tell him you are working on juggling 5 balls.
- patrickmay 2mo ago
  Scrolled for this answer.
ChrisSD 2mo ago
Like all such metrics, the specifics don't really matter. All that matters is that you can tell a story, over the course of the year, on how you've "improved". The goal is to use the story to highlight the work you've been doing while passing it off as evidence. This kind of story telling is something people in management positions tend to be very good at but it's also a skill people not in management should have some proficiency in.
- bsoles 2mo ago
  It is going to be easy this year. I'll make up some bullshit story about how I used Claude to improve my productivity, and how learned and used AI tools to speed up the feature delivery process. It doesn't have to be true...
ludston 2mo ago
Instead of talking about skills, or personal efficiency, talk about technologies that you're going to introduce to your product, or some specific difficult problem that you're intending to solve. Another next career step is to take ownership of things without needing to be asked or told, to create and execute plans, to raise and address problems pro-actively etc. And if your workspace doesn't give you opportunities to do it, and you want career progression, then go somewhere else.
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
- zelphirkalt 2mo ago
  Talk about technologies you want to introduce can go more than one way. It can make you sound informed or it can make you sound like someone, who is performing CV-driven development. I know the type. Like for example needlessly wanting to push GraphQL into things that are simple REST APIs.
  - ludston 2mo ago
    And that demonstrates the difference between a developer that is ready for promotion vs one that isn't. You need to be able to make the correct choices for your employer (even if they are not the best choices, or most interesting choices), and being able to recognize these is a skill.
- cobertos 2mo ago
  It really shows you're a team player when you take on more work for the same amount of money. Only a possibility of future reward, and _if_ you can spin your performance reviews correctly and _if_ management doesn't inexplicably dislike you.
- bluefirebrand 2mo ago
  You're offering the very common advice This only works if your managers are actually invested and interested in having you grow. If you start trying to take ownership of things without being asked you might also just be told to stay in your lane. If you start raising problems pro-actively you may be told to pipe down. Yes, there's always "go somewhere else" except bad managers are more common than you think.
fusslo 2mo ago
Your boss needs paperwork to justify pay raises, promotions, etc to their boss & HR. Isn't the whole purpose of that question to leave a paper trail that both you and they can point to? That's what I've been told, and such I always answer those questions in a way that has a concrete 'goal' that I can point to and either makes ME more valuable to the company OR delivered some thing that is valuable TO the company.
- boogieknite 2mo ago
  exactly. i just tell them something that translates to potential marginal increases in utilization and reduction in costs like automated workflows etc
  - Isamu 2mo ago
    This is the correct thread. It has to be some words that don’t seem too fake and seem to plausibly suggest forward progress. There has to be some plausible support for decisions, that someone can point to, in order to make a decision. Taking ownership of a decision means having a paper trail where you can deny responsibility for something gone wrong.
xpct 2mo ago
That's the type of culture that made me leave my last job. Feels very inhuman when you see your manager every week, and they still make you fill in robotic questionnaires for potential salary raise. It's deeply demotivating to learn that your manager doesn't know you all that well and cares more about filling in checklists, at least for me.
- forlorn_mammoth 2mo ago
  sorry you experience it as demotivating. I think this is because your expectation of who has what responsibility is not aligned with workplace expectations. The thing is, your manager has to fill in some paperwork and other admin processes to get you that raise. The manager is probably willing to do that work for you. You can make this easier for them by helping them fill in that template. Making your manager's job easier IS part of your job, especially making it easier for them to get you a raise. So yes, the main part of your job is to do the work explicitly assigned to you. And another part of your job is making sure that the work you've done is easily legible to the company. family/friends relationships have other 'rules'/courtesies.
- fendy3002 2mo ago
  I understand that people who like to stay on their job dislikes this kind of questions, and I also sympathize on why tech sector now doesn't have places for them and asking people to keep improving. However for those who are superstar / plan maker, this discussion is actually beneficial. This is the moment where among all of things available, prioritized items will be officially registered, rather than your manager make assumption on what needs focus / not. The field staffer has more knowledge on that so managers may also missing some points that can be unraveled during this discussion.
  - geodel 2mo ago
    > However for those who are superstar / plan maker, this discussion is actually beneficial. ... I hear all this and it seem useful also. But from what I have seen in last 5-8 years is that immediate supervisor/manager have hardly any power or resources to anything meaningful for employees beyond filling basic HR templates that go nowhere. This could be different for very early career employees or startups where one's manager could be just the founder or CTO and the like. But for mid career and above employees in typical established business, managers seem merely human timesheet for work done. They have full mandate to get work done creatively , enforce corporate policies from up top but little in term of listening/approving any of their employee's considerations.
shermantanktop 2mo ago
Is your manager really asking about your self-improvement? Or are they asking about you improving what you can do for them, your team and your company? Your job description is a baseline but if you’ve nailed that, there’s usually more you can do that’s outside of that. Or you can be content with doing your job well, and make up some bs so your manager can write it on a form. Both are valid.
reticulates 2mo ago
A good manager doesn’t ask what you want to get better at, they ask what they can do for you. A manager who asks these sort of dumb questions is just going through the motions, you should do the same, say whatever they want to hear and then don’t think about it again. You can, alternatively, try and make them into a better manager by changing the question but they might not be receptive.
- elmo-shrugged 2mo ago
  "What you want to get better at" can turn into "what they can do for you", though. Like if a conference or training course would help you start or improve on your goal, and they can approve you to get it paid for.
ryandvm 2mo ago
It's all bullshit. They have to ask because somebody is asking them how they're going to eke more productivity out of their underlings. It goes all the way to the top (the shareholders). Just play along and talk about how you want to improve your mentoring skills or some other completely immeasurable platitude. Ultimately this productivity-eking obsession is the organizational equivalent of free radical cellular damage. It's just a constant process of degradation to the integrity of whatever caused the business to be successful. Like death, it is unavoidable.
__s 2mo ago
Every year I just say I want to improve my work life balance & work out more Doesn't happen, but hey at least I'm being honest about what I'd like to improve
bell-cot 2mo ago
Delegating more of their less-challenging tasks to junior developers. (But wrapped in appropriate buzzwords & boss-speak.)
kixiQu 2mo ago
This is interesting to me because in my job as a senior dev I can tell that there are greater opportunities for me if I can improve my skills. As a result, I think this may speak to your work environment more than the nature of being senior.
chadcmulligan 2mo ago
My side project so that I can get out of here
marginalia_nu 2mo ago
I've been programming professionally for 15 years and even before that I've been coding since I was barely a teenager, and I still learn new things all the time. I'm a much better programmer now than I was 5 years ago.

rokkamokka 2mo ago

Like every other such question, simply make up whatever they want to hear

kurthr 2mo ago
Ask Claude to choose a set of improvements that it would rate highly.
- readread 2mo ago
  LLMs really shine at speeding up corporate bureaucratic busy-work and nonsense. We’re in a golden era when same busy work has not yet expanded due to LLM influence. Let’s appreciate it while it lasts.
  - alt227 2mo ago
    Then hopefully the fears of replacing developer jobs are unfounded, and in fact we can expect (hope) for middle management jobs to be replaced instead?
    - axus 2mo ago
      I wonder what prompt an AI middle manager would need, to not push back on the crap its manager is telling it needs to happen.
      - shermantanktop 2mo ago
        Well if it’s anything like where I am, the crap that the managers are asking each other to do is “do more AI stuff.”

Benanov 2mo ago

Soft skills, mostly - you just find things that you're weak on (since you know enough to know where you suck) and just work on those.

jaffa2 2mo ago

Just tell him you are working on juggling 5 balls.

patrickmay 2mo ago
Scrolled for this answer.

ChrisSD 2mo ago

Like all such metrics, the specifics don't really matter. All that matters is that you can tell a story, over the course of the year, on how you've "improved". The goal is to use the story to highlight the work you've been doing while passing it off as evidence. This kind of story telling is something people in management positions tend to be very good at but it's also a skill people not in management should have some proficiency in.

bsoles 2mo ago
It is going to be easy this year. I'll make up some bullshit story about how I used Claude to improve my productivity, and how learned and used AI tools to speed up the feature delivery process. It doesn't have to be true...

ludston 2mo ago

Instead of talking about skills, or personal efficiency, talk about technologies that you're going to introduce to your product, or some specific difficult problem that you're intending to solve. Another next career step is to take ownership of things without needing to be asked or told, to create and execute plans, to raise and address problems pro-actively etc. And if your workspace doesn't give you opportunities to do it, and you want career progression, then go somewhere else.

deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
zelphirkalt 2mo ago
Talk about technologies you want to introduce can go more than one way. It can make you sound informed or it can make you sound like someone, who is performing CV-driven development. I know the type. Like for example needlessly wanting to push GraphQL into things that are simple REST APIs.
- ludston 2mo ago
  And that demonstrates the difference between a developer that is ready for promotion vs one that isn't. You need to be able to make the correct choices for your employer (even if they are not the best choices, or most interesting choices), and being able to recognize these is a skill.
cobertos 2mo ago
It really shows you're a team player when you take on more work for the same amount of money. Only a possibility of future reward, and _if_ you can spin your performance reviews correctly and _if_ management doesn't inexplicably dislike you.
bluefirebrand 2mo ago
You're offering the very common advice This only works if your managers are actually invested and interested in having you grow. If you start trying to take ownership of things without being asked you might also just be told to stay in your lane. If you start raising problems pro-actively you may be told to pipe down. Yes, there's always "go somewhere else" except bad managers are more common than you think.

fusslo 2mo ago

Your boss needs paperwork to justify pay raises, promotions, etc to their boss & HR. Isn't the whole purpose of that question to leave a paper trail that both you and they can point to? That's what I've been told, and such I always answer those questions in a way that has a concrete 'goal' that I can point to and either makes ME more valuable to the company OR delivered some thing that is valuable TO the company.

boogieknite 2mo ago
exactly. i just tell them something that translates to potential marginal increases in utilization and reduction in costs like automated workflows etc
- Isamu 2mo ago
  This is the correct thread. It has to be some words that don’t seem too fake and seem to plausibly suggest forward progress. There has to be some plausible support for decisions, that someone can point to, in order to make a decision. Taking ownership of a decision means having a paper trail where you can deny responsibility for something gone wrong.

xpct 2mo ago

That's the type of culture that made me leave my last job. Feels very inhuman when you see your manager every week, and they still make you fill in robotic questionnaires for potential salary raise. It's deeply demotivating to learn that your manager doesn't know you all that well and cares more about filling in checklists, at least for me.

forlorn_mammoth 2mo ago
sorry you experience it as demotivating. I think this is because your expectation of who has what responsibility is not aligned with workplace expectations. The thing is, your manager has to fill in some paperwork and other admin processes to get you that raise. The manager is probably willing to do that work for you. You can make this easier for them by helping them fill in that template. Making your manager's job easier IS part of your job, especially making it easier for them to get you a raise. So yes, the main part of your job is to do the work explicitly assigned to you. And another part of your job is making sure that the work you've done is easily legible to the company. family/friends relationships have other 'rules'/courtesies.
fendy3002 2mo ago
I understand that people who like to stay on their job dislikes this kind of questions, and I also sympathize on why tech sector now doesn't have places for them and asking people to keep improving. However for those who are superstar / plan maker, this discussion is actually beneficial. This is the moment where among all of things available, prioritized items will be officially registered, rather than your manager make assumption on what needs focus / not. The field staffer has more knowledge on that so managers may also missing some points that can be unraveled during this discussion.
- geodel 2mo ago
  > However for those who are superstar / plan maker, this discussion is actually beneficial. ... I hear all this and it seem useful also. But from what I have seen in last 5-8 years is that immediate supervisor/manager have hardly any power or resources to anything meaningful for employees beyond filling basic HR templates that go nowhere. This could be different for very early career employees or startups where one's manager could be just the founder or CTO and the like. But for mid career and above employees in typical established business, managers seem merely human timesheet for work done. They have full mandate to get work done creatively , enforce corporate policies from up top but little in term of listening/approving any of their employee's considerations.

shermantanktop 2mo ago

Is your manager really asking about your self-improvement? Or are they asking about you improving what you can do for them, your team and your company? Your job description is a baseline but if you’ve nailed that, there’s usually more you can do that’s outside of that. Or you can be content with doing your job well, and make up some bs so your manager can write it on a form. Both are valid.

reticulates 2mo ago

A good manager doesn’t ask what you want to get better at, they ask what they can do for you. A manager who asks these sort of dumb questions is just going through the motions, you should do the same, say whatever they want to hear and then don’t think about it again. You can, alternatively, try and make them into a better manager by changing the question but they might not be receptive.

elmo-shrugged 2mo ago
"What you want to get better at" can turn into "what they can do for you", though. Like if a conference or training course would help you start or improve on your goal, and they can approve you to get it paid for.

ryandvm 2mo ago

It's all bullshit. They have to ask because somebody is asking them how they're going to eke more productivity out of their underlings. It goes all the way to the top (the shareholders). Just play along and talk about how you want to improve your mentoring skills or some other completely immeasurable platitude. Ultimately this productivity-eking obsession is the organizational equivalent of free radical cellular damage. It's just a constant process of degradation to the integrity of whatever caused the business to be successful. Like death, it is unavoidable.

__s 2mo ago

Every year I just say I want to improve my work life balance & work out more Doesn't happen, but hey at least I'm being honest about what I'd like to improve

bell-cot 2mo ago

Delegating more of their less-challenging tasks to junior developers. (But wrapped in appropriate buzzwords & boss-speak.)

kixiQu 2mo ago

This is interesting to me because in my job as a senior dev I can tell that there are greater opportunities for me if I can improve my skills. As a result, I think this may speak to your work environment more than the nature of being senior.

chadcmulligan 2mo ago

My side project so that I can get out of here

marginalia_nu 2mo ago

I've been programming professionally for 15 years and even before that I've been coding since I was barely a teenager, and I still learn new things all the time. I'm a much better programmer now than I was 5 years ago.