Comment by canadian_tired | Hacker News Reader

Comment by canadian_tired | Hacker News Reader

This captures a lot of what I have always wanted to express. I am of same cohort as the author, and aside from being laid off once (which, honestly, was wonderful) I have managed to stay well employed 30 years in tech. I hold no degree. I have no specific super powers. But, yes... everything stated here rings true for me. I would, humbly, add some of my own.

Learn the people patterns. Every where I have worked has at least a few, if not all, members of Typical IT Cast Of Characters. There is the "know-it-all-but-does-not", "wise old sage", "management climber", "new guy", "one-job-and-doesn't-want-to-change", "hockey-jersey-guy-who-smells-but-knows-too-much", etc. Pick your own. Most of these people will avoid, tolerate, get along with, or maybe love the others. Or some combination thereof. I have found being the impartial mediator to be advantageous. Be the "Ferris Bueller".

Know the business as well as the tech. Technologists that can dive into the business language and work with both groups are invaluable.

Diagrams. Work hard on developing the capability to express ideas/concepts/flows in a diagram that fits on one sheet of paper. Do this all the time...even for one-offs. As the author states, it helps build your brand. It's advertising. When I see a one-pager I did 6 months ago on a desk covered with coffee stains, or pinned to the wall above monitor...I know I have made an impression. I worked with a few masters of this craft, and honestly, they are all magic on any team.

Share credit constantly. Don't ever appear that you need validation. Give good ideas away for team members to catch and grow. You will build a community around you that seek you out for guidance. Time passes quickly... that junior dev you credited for a schema re-jig 5 years ago is now a VP at BigCo. She didn't forget. Keep in touch, right?

> Share credit constantly. Don't ever appear that you need validation. Give good ideas away for team members to catch and grow. You will build a community around you that seek you out for guidance.

This is huge. I am the most senior dev in an organization of about 40 and one of my favorite things to do is to take an idea and hand it over to a junior dev to run with, then completely give them all credit. It is a huge boost to their confidence, they appreciate the gesture and public praise, and your bosses are well aware of what happened even if you never say anything. Amplify your impact by lifting others up.

Doesn't that feel incredible? Just one win like that can make a whole month or more of happy thoughts for me. I benefited from a manager like this early on...never forgot. Now, when I can, I pass it on.

> I worked with a few masters of this craft, and honestly, they are all magic on any team.

Any advice you'd like to share regarding this?

Sure. Let me clarify first: The craft I refer to is the ability to create clear, detailed diagrams that not only document a system (like a layer 3 diagram), but also to express a series of ideas or concepts that a group of people is trying to wrap their head around. Effective use color, metaphor, and just enough text. These people obviously are not just artists...they need to understand what they draw. This is rare skill. Pictures can sell ideas, gain consensus, and move things ahead faster than a dozen emails and conf calls. Especially with Management. You won't get the attention of management with a 20 page dissertation...much less change their mind. I know, I have tried. In one case, we were trying to convince an army of execs to invest (substantially) in a large re-write. We had explained in detail, why it was needed. In the end it was a single diagram that sold our idea. We showed them how ugly the code base was with a cyclic dependency diagram. That hit them square in the eyes. We got the funding after that.

These people are hard to find...but you can (as I have) try to emulate them. I can suggest some books...I started with Edward Tufte's. Beautiful diagrams...and why they are beautiful. You can also look into the various "Napkin Books" from Dan Roam.

When I find a particularly amazing diagram, I keep a copy of it for reference. It helps me structure ideas and how I will communicate them to my leadership or my team. You can, with care, put an awful lot of data on a single page.

Again, make a lot of diagrams. If a concept, workflow, procedure, etc moves from unknown to known (mechanism by which this happens is not important) , draw the picture and send it out. If it never gets used again, at least you practiced the drawing and people know you can do it. Develop a style. A color palette. Certain styles of arrows. The list goes on.

Tooling: I love Visio. Damn, it's a fun tool. There are a few web-based tools... Omnigraffle, Lucidchart... not as good. At least for me. You can bang stuff out fast in Powerpoint, too. I keep a big pile of templates that I have massed over the years. Never used photoshop...not even once. Although, I keep inkscape and gimp around if I have to muck with actual images...but I really try to avoid that.

That all resonates strongly with me.

I've had two employers where this skill was highly valued. (I even had a boss at one, who did his diagrams in effing MS EXCEL - not pretty, but often simple and effective). Most people wouldn't think of using Powerpoint, but in fact, as you say, it's a particularly effective tool. At least for relatively simple ideas.

Then I've had a couple of employers where absolutely NOBODY gave a crap about diagrams AT ALL. (as in, nobody ever did them, and everybody was constantly confused about what we were even doing). Any diagrams I encountered were halfhearted attempts and incomplete, and almost always out of date by at least a year. I tried to fill that gap but it just wasn't in the culture there.

I'm at a new place now that seems to have a better culture and I'm hopeful.

> Edward Tufte's. Beautiful diagrams

Did you mean _Beautiful Evidence_?

I also think diagram skills are impressive but almost every time I try to get my understanding into a single page diagram I just gets lost along the way and the resulting diagram lacks just One Thing to make it really illustrative but I can't pin it down.

My bad. What I should have said was "Edward Tufte's books. They contain beautiful diagrams". LOL...Didn't know about "Beautiful Evidence" until you mentioned it.

I know exactly what you are feeling trying to get that One Thing. It's what separates the good stuff from the great. I don't try to show everything on one diagram... even if it fits contextually. If you force people to have to think too much when they try to unpack your diagram, they lose interest. Draw, edit, adjust. After many years, I have a few "general starting points" in my head, and go from there. I still need to edit a lot...but I get there faster these days.

Any suggestions for great diagramm site/catalog (like dribbble for designs)?

I'm not quite as far along as you, but this deeply resonates with my experience. Great writeup, thank you.

Happy to help...at least a bit.

Thanks, I'm early-mid career, and this feels like really good advice. It almost seems obvious: be helpful, don't be an asshole, and you'll be fine.

> Be the "Ferris Bueller".

I don't follow. Which characteristics of Ferris Bueller are you suggesting to emulate?

The "What are you still doing here? It's over! Go home!" part. :D

> Oh, he's very popular Ed. The sportos, the motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, wastoids, dweebies, dickheads - they all adore him. They think he's a righteous dude.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHa1zTLrXO8

Beat me to it. But yes. Especially the wastoids.

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