Professional growth

[bearclaw79]

Hello all:

My question is about professional growth. I am a programmer with around 6+ years of experience, mostly in Microsoft technologies, and now I focus on .NET. My current job is with a federal IT contractor, and I am working for a government agency doing programming, design, etc.

At most positions, there have always been one or two people with more experience than me that I have been able to learn from and improve myself. But at my current position, there aren't any people better than me at what I do. At the very most there is one other person who is at the same level as I in terms if technical experience and knowledge. We get along great, and are constantly bouncing ideas off of each other, but it is hard for me to learn any new ideas from him, as we are generally at the same level. I suspect he feels the same way.

My employer has always been great to me, and I have no complaints with respect to salary, benefits, or overall satisfaction, but lately, this lack of mentoring has been getting to me. It affects me pretty much everyday. I am running two projects and I am the lead developer on both, which is cool -- I welcome the added responsibility of "lead." But I find I have to stunt my growth to accomodate team members who really have no clue about software development.

I don't mean to sound arrogant, I know there are many people out there much better than I. But not at my current job. Just the other day I spent over an hour trying to explain the concept of n-tier architecture, only to be told that it seems like a waste of time to do all of the sbtraction. Now, there may be something wrong with my presentation techniques, but overall, I think I am just dealing with a set of people who have not had the exposure that I have.

So here is my question, or questions, as it were. How can I grow professionally in a position like this? I see the opportunities for leading a team, and possibly educating them, but it seems really daunting. And frankly, some people are content to do nothing -- most have been with this government agency for 6+ years and do not care about anything other than collecting their paycheck. The idea of having brown bag lunches to talk about a technology is a waste of time to them.

Have I just entered a black hole in terms of professional growth?

Any advice is appreciated.


--
bearclaw79

 

[chiph]

Sounds like it's time to change jobs.

It's probably time to look at the private sector -- while there are people in the goverment who are forward looking, there are many more of them being employed by corporations, and so you'll have a greater chance of meeting them.

Chip H.


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[MDXer]

While having az mentor is a great thing sometimes one has to step up and be a mentor. How would you have felt and where would your career be had all the people you learned from in past postitions decided that they were dealing with someone who was unable to understand the concepts, or helping less experienced people was a hinderance to their own performance and growth.

The fact is that the more experienced a developer the more people tend to rely upon them. Less ecperienced peers rely on the for guidance ( a mentor), while management relies on them to lead projects and teams.

If finding time for others as others have made time for you is such a burden them maybe it is time to ask for less responsibility or find a new job where you can be just another developer.

Shoot Me! Shoot Me NOW!!!
- Daffy Duck

 

[CajunCenturion]

One other point that I'd like to bring up. Just because someone does not have the training and experience that you have doesn't mean you can't learn from them. New ideas can come from new blood, and often times, the young and inexperienced can offer a new perspective.

You story about abstraction is a good one. However, the question, "Is abstraction a waste of time?", is actually a very good question. You may find that you learn far more about abstraction, the pros and cons, when to use and when not to use it, when you give that question serious consideration, and offer an answer. Mentors often learn quite a bit from their students, especially if their students ask good questions.

Good Luck
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[hilfy]

I also find that answering questions here on TT can expand my own knowledge. I'll see something where I say to myself, "I think I know how to do this, let me look it up and see what I find" or, "This should be pretty easy, let me look it up and see what I find". I find the answer and then communicate it. But then, I'm the type of person who, when looking through reference material (dictionaries, encyclopedias, help docs, etc.) gets side-tracked when I see something that looks interesting - it's amazing some of the things that you can pick up that way.

-Dell

A computer only does what you actually told it to do - not what you thought you told it to do.

 

[benlinkknilneb]

[h]hilfy[/b], Glad to see I'm not the only one who reads the dictionary/encyclopedia. I sometimes spend exorbitant amounts of time clicking the "Random Page" button on Wikipedia.

bearclaw, MDX and CajunCenturion are both right on target here. Listen to the people around you; find out where they're strong AND where they're weak. Make it a point to use some of your newfound seniority/leadership/whatever to help them further their own growth. You could set up training seminars (get with your training director and see if you could schedule some classes for your staff from a local tech school or something. I know it feels like your technical knowledge is stagnating a bit, but if you start taking the initiative in some other areas, you could move up into management. Whether that's a goal of yours or not, well... that's up to you.

Ben

There's no place like 127.0.0.1.

 

[acjeff]

Sorry, I am not going to answer your questions here. I want to say that you are much much luckier than me. Having experiences in programming, being projects lead developer, used to have job mentors, getting good paycheck and being repected by boss... wow, so admirable.

I am also a programming guy with 2 years experience. However, I am writing VB6 (not even .net) all the time, getting low pay in hourly wage policy and with no sick leave benefit, even worse, playing one-man-band all the time in an assembly work room without my own desk or table and chair. All my knowledges are gained from books, online researches and forum posting. Don't even think about mentors appear in my working life.

Well, having bad situation does not mean there is nothing I can do. I have been finding ways to exit for a long time. Now I have decided to take a Bachelor's Degree (of course, my boss and company is not willing to financially support me, I will just take loan). Hopefully having better education qualification will help me a lot. What else can I do ... !?

 

[crystalized]

I definitely agree with the comments from several people above about learning by teaching. I have found that for me the process of helping someone else understand a topic really helps me solidify my own understanding of the subject matter.

But having said that, not everyone learns in the same way. So if you really do find that you want/need a mentor to advance your skills, then perhaps you should consider your options. Of course one of those options may be to stay in your current job but take some classes as well. Or look for someone who is willing to correspond with you on topics of interest (maybe from a user group - or maybe here on Tek Tips etc).

Good luck with your future progress

Crystal
--------------------------------------------------

Experience is one thing you can't get for nothing.

-Oscar Wilde

 

[Kocheace]

Hello Everyone,

I agree with everyone regarding teaching and learning from others. The subject line for this thread is "Professional Growth". Growing professionally involves more than having an in-depth knowledge of your field. In this instance it's IT (i.e. other fields are Medical, Legal, etc.) Having an in-depth knowledge is key to gaining opportunities to be able to function as the lead/go-to-guy in your department. Unfortunately it won't make you a WELL rounded professional.

You HAVE to continue to develop your teaching ability (especially in IT), communication skills, presentation skills, and the overall understanding of the "Big Picture" for your industry (How does my company make money? How do I make/save the company money? Why does my position exist and what opportunities are there and will be available for me?).

You have to think long and hard and ask yourself what is it that you really want? Are you taking an optimistic look at the task that your assign?

Ultimately you have to know what you want and set goals.

Say 'ello..... to my little friend!

 

[chiph]

I agree on communication skills. I used to work with a guy who called everything an object. Invoices, customers, payments, they were all just "objects" to him. He might as well have been using the word "marklar".

Learning to communicate, not just with other technical staff, is essential. When you get into the more-senior ranks, you'll need to know the language of business in order to be taken seriously. So when talking about a new project, start with the return the project will generate for the business, then go on to talk about how it will be a service-oriented web-based event-driven dynamic architecture.

A good book for anyone interested in the "engineering" part of software (as opposed to the "just write some code" part) is Steve Tockey's Return on Software : Maximizing the Return on Your Software Investment ISBN: 0321228758

Chip H.


____________________________________________________________________
If you want to get the best response to a question, please read FAQ222-2244 first

 

[rasETL]

No one mentioned taking some continuing education courses.

You could try to become a certified .NET developer, or start studying other areas - Data Warehousing, other tools, etc.

Learning from a mentor is great - when you have one to tap. When you do not, find another avenue.

 

[Stella740pl]

Of course this thread could be helping other people (I, personally, was very interested to read some of the posts, and CajunCenturion's post have been nearly an eye opener for me), but did anyone notice that original poster hasn't been logging on to Tek-Tips since the day the question was posted?

Of course, she/she could own more than one handle, to protect his/her privacy, or went on vacation.

 

[chiph]

That happens sometimes. But the answers will still be of use to someone. Even if this topic is covered fairly often in this forum. ;-)

Chip H.


____________________________________________________________________
If you want to get the best response to a question, please read FAQ222-2244 first

 

[bearclaw79]

Hi all.

Stella: I have been checking back in every time a new comment has been posted. I just haven't responded yet. So relax. I'm here now.

I appreciate everyone's comments. I'm giving it a shot on a day by day basis -- some days are good and I have some breakthrough moments, others are not so good and I spend a day explaining basic problem solving to people. Again not to sound arrogant, but some of my coworkers are not programmers, and I'm not sure how they got their jobs.

But there are others who are genuinely interested in learning, so those are good days. The other day I spent an hour or so with someone going over unit testing (NUnit), which was cool.

I'm playing it by ear. I'll see where it goes.


--
bearclaw79

 

[jaymaechtlen]

If the people you are leading don't know about/understand aspects of software architecture, development, etc.-
Maybe it is time to arrange some ongoing training sessions for the group?
This could be a company-sponsored series, and a learning experience for you too. Lots of ways to approach it.
Could be considered prof development, or teambuilding, or maybe just encourage/make available training for those who could benefit.

cheers
Jay