Are You a Sharp Developer?? (Part 1)

Many studies have shown that there is a 10 to 1 difference between good developers and bad developers.  How can you become a better developer?  Well,  there is many things you can do, and this is how you can improve your quality, and therefore get more return on your investment in terms of better jobs, and you can also be more selective about the jobs you take. 

1. Improve your communication skills - both speaking and writing.

One of the most important things you can do to become a better developer is to improve your communication skills.  This is a win-win situation.  You will find you will be able to better relate to others, to your boss.  You will find that you can explain yourself (or maybe defend yourself) against your boss and colleagues.  You will be able to knock them out in interviews even if you don’t really know what a deconstructor is or how on earth to deconstruct your class.

2. Constantly learn and improve your skills and yourself

You can only become a better developer if you are constantly learning.  The world is changing so fast, that you need to be constantly reading books, articles, going to conferences, and asking from others.  An easy way to do this is to find some nice sites you like, and subscribe to their RSS feeds on GMail or on your favourite RSS reader.  Make sure you always have a book by your side.  Even if its not a technical book, develop yourself personally.  Find out your weaknesses and improve them.  For many of us that might be our presentation skills, so build those skills!  Practice talking infront of a mirror or to yourself.  I have made so many suggestions to our current process just by keeping up on .NET blogs.  It will make you stand out from the rest of the crowd.  For example I suggested converting our site to a Web Application Project which will allow us to do tons of things like get a build script (automate our build process), break our project into multiple subprojects, etc, etc..

3. Share your knowledge and experience

There are different ways to do this.  Don’t think that keeping everything to yourself is going to help you.  Infact, sharing your knowledge and experience with others always pays off.  Don’t be stingy, and you will find much in return.  One way to do this is to once a week email your co-developers with some ideas on how to improve the code quality.  Another idea is to start a blog!  This will also result in an exchange of ideas and your bad ideas will be weeded out.   You can also contribute to forums or start a discussion.  If you aren’t willing to do this, you might think you are the smartest piece of cake until you realise just how shallow your ideas are when you discuss with others.

4. Learn from your mistakes

Back when I was doing my first web development job (4 month internship), I decided to make some changes to the ASP application.  However, I did not make any backups.  Let me tell you I learned really quickly to always make a backup.  Don’t be bit from the same snake hole twice! Learn from your mistakes and grow as an individual.

What are some of the other benefits to becoming a sharp developer?

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