The Passionate Programmer
Rating: 6 out of 7.
There are software developers and software developers. Some are just doing their job. And some are true virtuosi. How do you get to love your job? How do you get to be really great at it? This book has some answers.
This book is a must read. And it's not just a must read once. It is a must read over and over again.
Content
The book is divided into five parts. Each part has a few chapters. Most chapters end with an Act on It!
section with tasks to perform to turn the theory of the book into real. Although the book is written in such a delighting and motivating style and thus wouldn't really need it, the book is enriched with real life reports from a few successful software developers.
Part I - Choosing Your Market
is about the current and the desired state of your skill portfolio. Based on some fundamental economic theories about markets, supply and demand, the chapters guide you through analyzing your skill portfolio and, the market. The goal is to be able to position your skill portfolio, know your strengths and weaknesses and find out where to invest.
Part II - Investing in Your Product
is about how to improve your skill portfolio from current to desired state. The chapters give good guidance on how to continuously improve your skill portfolio.
Part III - Executing
is about the interface between you and management - your boss as well as self-management. It gives hints on what you can do on your every day job to actually move something.
Part IV - Marketing… - Not Just for Suits
is about your self-marketing. Out of all topics covered in the book, this probably is the most important one, because software developers regularly under-estimated it the most. Will you be remarkable if nobody takes notice of it? You will be reminded of Schrödiger's Cat.
Part V - Maintaining Your Edge
. The last part of the book makes clear what the reader already guesses: Once you're on the edge, there's no guarantee that you stay there. Far from it! If you don't do anything about it, it's guaranteed that you'll not stay on the edge for long. The hints and guides in this part help you going through the iterative cycle of self-improvement over and over again, and critically reflect yourself.
Critique
The book is very good at its topic. I'm sure it will be frequently referenced. What I missed are an index, a glossary, taxonomy, a more scientific approach and more system for the every-day use. (Probably I'm expecting very much, I know :)
Conclusion
Reading this book was a lot of fun and extremely motivating. Even if you would only do a bit more from the book than you already did before, you would probably already notice a positive change in how you and others experience you and your work.
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