Open Thread: How Do You Know Where to Focus?
We’ve written before about the importance of professional development for the web worker, including learning new things so as to stay at the top of your game. But I got an email from a reader today, asking
How do you decide which technologies to learn first? How do you get into the middle of the action?
In my own case, I choose where to put my professional development time by watching what my peers and industry leaders are interested in, through a combination of reading RSS feeds, monitoring mailing lists, and even listening to Twitter conversations. I’m also guided somewhat by client needs and knowing what will be used on upcoming projects. But what about you? How do you decide which areas to focus on for the next year or two to keep yourself from becoming obsolete?
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Go for something that interests you or solves a problem that you’re currently having.
Its difficult for those of use whose current toolset provides for our clients needs. Where do you focus then when improving yourself?
It’s the classic catch-22, you need to have experience using some technology to get a job using that technology. Or find a project or boss that’s willing to give you the benefit of the doubt (and the time) for your learning curve.
Or dream up your own project / contribute to an open source project in that language. :)
Basically a 4 step process for me.
1) Be aware of the “new” stuff.
2) Give it a glance and see if it catches your attention.
3) If so, learn a little more. Still interested?
4) Could it be used on a small project as a test run?
For example, about 3 years ago I was looking to learn a new programming language. I followed the above recipe. That lead me to Python and Ruby. Further research indicated that perhaps Python would be the more advantageous language to learn, so I got a book on it. After becoming more familiar with it, it didn’t “feel” right to me. Later I again researched Ruby. This time I liked what I saw. I used it for a small program, and I liked it. I used it for a bigger project, and still liked it. Since then the language has gained a lot of steam and turned out to be a marketable skill.
There are niches everywhere. Justin is on the right track saying to be aware, but ultimately, do what you like not what is hot. You’ll do better because you’ll be great at what you do, not decent because you have to.
Don’t do anything that seems to slow you down, unless someone’s going to pay a lot of money, and it looks like it’ll be around a while.
You should always have some tech you enjoy on the back burner, so that if the market develops, you can either take the fun job, or transfer some of your work over to this new tech.