Survival traits for a software engineer Published by:
Jibin George, Technical Manager, Avaya Inc
To be a software engineer is not difficult in this world of online learning platforms and all resources available at your fingertips. But to be a great software engineer is difficult unless you have certain traits in you.
Here, I would like to note some traits I feel would give you an upper hand among your peers.
Contents
Survival traits - software engineer
SURVIVAL TRAITS FOR A SOFTWARE ENGINEER
Be a learner always
The software industry is subject to rapid changes. Good engineers are typically amazing self-learners. They can learn new technology on their own and are not threatened by new technologies. They always see new technologies as an opportunity to improve their product/solution and thereby giving more to the customers. Great engineers can find a variety of opportunities, speak to the right people, and find a solution no matter what.
Be an innovator
As the industry itself is fast evolving hence your customers are also evolving fast. You can be an innovator in various ways. Be it a small improvement in the way you design things. Or you can achieve greater things like coming up with an entirely new design, or filing patents. Innovation has to become a habit. In our daily job, each can look for something new which will make the solution or product more suitable to solve the customer problem.
Be an expert in at least one area
It’s quite natural in the software industry people switching jobs for better opportunities. But the more you stay in the industry you have to have deep and broad experience in at least one of the areas which will make you stand out among your peers. It is not necessarily a technology or coding language like Java. It can also be the domain expertise which is also equally valued. Without any expertise, it will be difficult in the long run as after you gain significant experience you are recruited for specific roles rather than generic roles which is the case with campus recruitments or people with experience less than 5 years.
Be positive to coding
Earlier it was an accepted norm only developers do coding. And when someone doesn’t like to do coding but wants to hang on in the software industry people used to select testing or administrative tasks like network administrator etc. With so much automation in the field of testing, infrastructure as a code in the field of SRE (site reliability engineering) be a developer, tester, develops everyone needs to be a coder in some capacity to survive in the software industry.
Be a good team player
The software industry is no more a group of people working in silos and individual teams. People always want to work with others who are better than them. As that aspect is good in terms of new learning opportunities and to progress in career, at the same time there will be people needing help from you. So, we have to be a giver as well as a learner at the same time. You need the team’s help on all fronts. Be it a getting a good code review, test results, deploying software. Team collaboration has become the norm for any team to survive. So be a good team player and use the maximum of the collaboration tools available at your disposal.
Be clear on what you should become
Once you have gained significant experience say around 10 years till recently switching to a management position was mostly the option at least in developing economies. But now in a lot of organizations, you can choose various tracks like technical, product management, product owner, etc. Where each of the individual tracks there is equivalent positions and you can progress. So everyone needs to have a clear direction on which track they want to pursue rather than blindly choosing what is available.
Be a good communicator
You have to express your thoughts and ideas to others clearly and precisely for you to be understood by others. It’s not necessary you have to speak always. Some people might not be good at talking but very good at writing and conveying. So as per your skills you need to make sure you are properly communicating things to others and you are rightly understood by your team in of the available ways. Hope this information would surely help all who are aiming for new heights to become a better software Engineer
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Survival traits -software engineer
All the Best
Jibin George
Technical Manager, Avaya Inc
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jibin-george-3a589316/
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