As a software developer, what makes you satisfied and happy?
As a software developer, what makes you satisfied and happy?
What do you need to feel satisfied? What does satisfaction mean to you?
And, what makes you feel unsatisfied and unhappy? What happens if you are unhappy?
What makes me happy:
“Simplicity, at every level. I love being more simple, in any area in my life. I think we are too complex nowadays, inventing a lot of our problems.”
This resonates so much with me. Unfortunately, it is also super hard for me too do. I always have too many ideas, take on too much. Do you have resources that help you with getting better at it, or does it come naturally?
It doesn't come naturally, at least to me.
I don't think having too many ideas is a problem. I'm just trying not to be attached to them too much, after all our ideas don't define us as a person. We don't lose a part of ourselves if we don't follow them.
I write all of my idea and then I come back to them after some time, to see if they are still relevant to me. I combine some which are part of a bigger idea and I delete a lot of others.
I wrote an article on my blog about that.
It's mostly addressed to developers but I think everybody can find something relevant in there.
For simplicity, to me the key are:
You need to know where you want to go. If you know precisely the destination, it's easier to discard everything which doesn't go that way. For that, a simple and personal philosophy you build over the year with concrete objective, which resonate with you is essential. Mine could be summarized as "to quit the world better than I found it".
Try to know yourself. The best way for me is mindfulness, which I try to follow way before it became a hype. It simply be aware of your feelings, ideas and emotions to be able to detach yourself from them. It doesn't mean being emotionless; it means being aware of what is important for you and what is not. For me, the best resource for that is this one: https://www.holybooks.com/wp-content/uploads/Buddha-in-Blue-Jean.pdf
Hope it can help!
Love this reply. Thank you so much. I am working on cleaning my (5!) white boards today... Every little step counts, right?
On a serious note, I'd deep dive into your blog post and the Buddha in Blue.
I actually do mindfulness meditation each day for a few minutes. But it is still super hard for me not to be carried away by my thoughts.
Thank you!
The goal is not to be thoughtless, but to notice that you think about something and look at these thoughts without judgement. A lot of people think that meditation is not thinking, but it's more about looking at your thoughts, to know them a bit better and think about them instead of acting blindly on them.
Some minutes per day is perfect if you stay consistent. You can always do it longer if you want to, at one point.
In order not to be overwhelmed by my tasks and what I want to achieve, I try as well to accept that nothing is never finished. I consider my workflow as a flow of tasks which will never end.
It doesn't mean that there are no results. Quite the contrary, actually. I just focus on the flow itself than on the result, since the stress is most of the time on the result. I know that if I follow my flow (my routine), the result will come. If it doesn't, that's not a problem, I can adjust my workflow. If I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do, it's not a problem either since my flow is something which never stop, even if I stop it for a while.
If I stop following my routine for too long, that's still ok: I just need to find why I don't follow it, I don't hesitate to put things out (project where I'm not motivated anymore for example) and I will come back to it if I fixed the problem.
Another thing: I don't work with any deadline. At my daily job or even for my personal projects. That was the biggest life changer for me. Pressure can make you work, but not consistently, and that's what I want. Consistency.
It's difficult to explain but I hope it can help.
Thanks for describing it in such detail. I understand what you mean.
I like the no deadline idea. I try to incorporate that more and more in my philosophy as well. Because, what's the point of being your own boss, if you are a mean, pressuring one :-P
So, I work on taking the pressure of myself. Not always easy, though.
Sales & Marketing is the hardest part of an engineer. But how to code helps us achieve the goal also. I really like technical thinking.
What makes me happy: writing anything in Ruby. Seeing a beautiful UI come together. Getting new customers. Designing a clean JavaScript module. Winning huge contracts. Getting emails from happy customers.
What I need to be satisfied: completing everything on my to-do lists each day. Earning revenue from my projects. Working on hard problems. Thinking creatively. Starting new projects.
What makes me unhappy: sales and marketing, although I'm trying to learn enough to make them enjoyable. Tedious work. Overwhelm.
wow, thanks so much. I can totally relate.
To only thing, I never finish my to-do-list. The more I work, the more it grows. Unfortunately. I use to-do and done-lists now. The done-list makes me happy at the end of the day.
Sales
Doing sales or getting sales makes you happy?
Right now - Both.
But in...
2013 - Getting sales only
This was when I started to build apps and only wanted to code, and thought that I could just "build it and they will come." I made no money because I thought selling was sleazy and that I could be successful without talking to customers.
2017 - Getting sales only
My Saas had hit $1M ARR in 9 months because I talked with customers and solved real pain points, which caused a huge amount of referrals. My product competed on price though because I was afraid to price based on value and be sleazy. I didn't attribute "talking with customers and solving their pain points" as sales because of my belief that all salesmen are like the "used car salesman" down the street, even though I had in fact done sales here.
When you price based on value you end up having higher prices than the competition, a much better product, but have to start being a salesman. I didn't want to have to sell so I didn't.
2019 - Both
In 2017 to 2018 my market had been driven to a commodity as new competition entered the market and competed on price (just like me) and I was forced to survive. Luckily I'd been following some really heavy hitters in the sales coaching biz who taught me that pricing based on the value you bring to the table and really helping people solve their problems is way more fun that what I had been doing. It's much more full-filling for me to go and sell people a product that truly helps them instead of sitting behind my computer writing endless amounts of code and hoping someone cares about it.
The high you get when you close someone, see the money come into Stripe, and know that you are going to help them evolve is amazing. And this is coming from an extreme introvert.
This year I've jacked my prices up, added high ticket coaching, started to get on the phone with people, and have been so much more happy because I'm genuinely helping people now.
Wow, that sounds amazing! Thanks for sharing in such detail!
No problem!
Earning $ from development to invest in my apparel business.
Cool! So you develop to self-fund your other business?
Exactly :)