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Leitura de 16 min

DCR: Traits of a Great Developer - Expanding Perspective

Summary

In this episode of Developer Tea, host Jonathan continues the Developer Career Roadmap series by discussing a key trait of great developers: having an expanded perspective. He argues that developers often get caught up in the technical aspects of their work, viewing themselves primarily as creators of code or systems, rather than seeing how their contributions fit into the larger product and team.

Jonathan explains that this limited perspective can lead to frustration and resentment towards non-technical team members, as developers may follow best practices dogmatically without understanding their connection to business value. He emphasizes that great developers understand their work exists in a context where technology serves broader goals, and they connect their daily practices to tangible outcomes that matter to users and stakeholders.

To help listeners develop this expanded perspective, Jonathan suggests two practical exercises. First, he recommends analyzing 3-4 consumer applications or services you appreciate and listing what makes them valuable, which typically reveals that most valued aspects have little to do with the technical decisions behind them. Second, he advises meeting one-on-one with non-developer team members to understand their roles and how everyone’s work contributes to the final product.

The episode concludes with the insight that elevating above the “average developer” mindset—which tends to be self-centered and overly focused on technology—requires recognizing that your team builds one thing together, not separate components that happen to combine at the end. This shift in perspective leads to better products and personal growth as a developer.

Recommendations

Exercises

  • Application analysis exercise — Jonathan suggests analyzing 3-4 consumer applications or services you appreciate, listing what makes them valuable to understand how technical decisions connect to user-perceived value.
  • Team member meetings — Jonathan recommends meeting one-on-one with non-developer team members to understand their roles and share your own work, fostering mutual understanding of how everyone contributes to the final product.

Tools

  • Linode — A Linux-based cloud hosting service with SSD servers, fast internal networking, and load balancing features. Jonathan recommends it for developers wanting to deploy applications, with pricing starting at 20 credit offer for listeners.

Topic Timeline

  • 00:00:00 — Introduction to the importance of perspective for developers — Jonathan introduces the episode’s theme: helping developers answer the question “what do you make?” with the right mindset. He explains this is part of the Developer Career Roadmap series and focuses on traits of great developers, particularly those working in business contexts rather than purely academic research.
  • 00:02:10 — Defining the key trait: expanded perspective — Jonathan identifies the core trait as “expanded perspective” and explains why it’s crucial. He notes that developers who answer “what do you make?” with “code” or “systems” rather than “part of the whole” likely have a limited perspective. This mindset prevents understanding how individual contributions fit into the complete product.
  • 00:04:10 — Consequences of limited perspective and dogmatic practices — Jonathan discusses the negative outcomes of having a limited perspective, including following best practices dogmatically without understanding why, and breeding resentment toward co-workers. He explains that when developers view their work as cost rather than value, and don’t connect practices to outcomes, frustration with non-technical team members often follows.
  • 00:05:45 — Sponsor message: Linode hosting service — Jonathan introduces the episode’s sponsor, Linode, describing their Linux-based cloud hosting services. He highlights features like SSD servers, fast internal networking, load balancing via NodeBalancer, and affordable pricing starting at 20 credit using code “developertea2017” and mentions a 7-day money-back guarantee.
  • 00:07:47 — First exercise: analyzing valued applications — Jonathan presents the first exercise for developing expanded perspective: list 3-4 consumer applications or services you appreciate and note what makes them valuable. He explains this reveals that most valued aspects have little to do with technical decisions, helping developers connect best practices to final value outputs like stability and performance.
  • 00:10:19 — Second exercise: meeting with non-developer team members — Jonathan suggests the second exercise: meet one-on-one with non-developers on your team to understand their roles and share what you do. This helps translate technical work into business value and recognize how everyone contributes to the final product. The goal is reaching a shared understanding that the team builds one thing together.
  • 00:11:26 — Conclusion and call to elevate above average — Jonathan concludes by emphasizing that becoming a better developer involves changing how you think, not just practicing code. He contrasts the average developer’s self-centered perspective with the elevated mindset of valuing team collaboration over pure technology focus. He encourages listeners to avoid viewing meetings with non-developers as wasted time.

Episode Info

  • Podcast: Developer Tea
  • Author: Jonathan Cutrell
  • Category: Technology Business Careers Society & Culture
  • Published: 2017-09-18T09:00:00Z
  • Duration: 00:13:03

References

Podcast Info

Transcript

[00:00:00] what do you make if you’re a professional developer you probably are on a team of people

[00:00:13] and not all of them are developers and it’s important to have a good answer to this question

[00:00:19] what do you make in today’s episode i’m going to arm you with the mindset that you need to

[00:00:26] answer this question we’re talking about traits of great developers this is an extension on our

[00:00:33] developer career roadmap series if you haven’t listened to it i recommend you go and check it

[00:00:38] out you can find it at spec.fm of course you were listening to developer t my name is jonathan

[00:00:43] my goal on this show is to help you become a better developer and that is a holistic thing

[00:00:51] right we’ve talked about it in the past very recently in the past we had

[00:00:56] introspection interrogation episodes about understanding yourself better having a holistic

[00:01:03] perspective of yourself and who you are and your place in this industry but today’s episode is

[00:01:10] going to hopefully expand that perspective a little bit and instead of only thinking about

[00:01:17] that self-interrogation and introspection in today’s episode we’re going to talk about a

[00:01:22] trait that all great developers lean on

[00:01:26] this is definitely a biased episode the type of developer that we’re talking about in today’s

[00:01:32] episode is less the academic developer and more the business developer and the reason i’m choosing

[00:01:39] this kind of bend on this subject is because you as a listener of developer t and especially

[00:01:46] if you’re listening to the developer career roadmap series you’re likely to fall into this

[00:01:52] category right you’re likely to fall into the category of developers who are less than or

[00:01:56] who are not working kind of in a vacuum right um you’re likely not working on purely scientific

[00:02:03] research right and even if you were a good portion of today’s episode is still applicable

[00:02:10] the trait that we’re talking about here is an expanded perspective it sounds so simple doesn’t

[00:02:17] it having an expanded perspective and the reason i asked you about what it is that you make

[00:02:26] your answer really kind of helps you understand your own perspective if your answer is that you

[00:02:32] create code or that you create systems or if you answer with anything other than you create part

[00:02:42] of the whole then you’re probably first of all a lot like most other developers but secondly

[00:02:48] you probably could benefit from taking some time to think about how your contributions

[00:02:56] fit into the whole product it’s very easy to get caught up in what we do as developers

[00:03:03] right part of this part of the reason for this is because developers have a strong culture

[00:03:08] part of the reason is because society at large is is now ramping up appreciation for what developers

[00:03:18] do right the the job market for people who code is really attractive for people who are outside

[00:03:25] of that job market and so i’m going to talk a little bit about that and i’m going to talk a little bit

[00:03:26] about the job market so developers have this sense that the code that we create or the technology

[00:03:32] that we perpetuate is really what we do and everything else kind of comes around and takes

[00:03:38] advantage of that however a great developer understands that all of their code all of the

[00:03:44] technology that they work with is in context if you have the mindset that you’ve done your job

[00:03:54] and so you can check the box off

[00:03:56] you’re going to find that that’s going to limit your capacity to build particularly good

[00:04:02] products it’s going to limit your capacity to grow as a developer some of the signs that you’ll

[00:04:10] notice for developers who kind of suffer from this limited perspective is following best practices

[00:04:17] dogmatically following them without understanding why they’re following them and very often this

[00:04:24] kind of position is going to be the one that’s going to be the one that’s going to be the one that’s

[00:04:26] for a developer ends up breeding resentment for their co-workers because so much of what we do

[00:04:32] as developers is viewed as cost in a typical scenario in other words if you are practicing

[00:04:40] a particular best practice that extends the amount of time that you need to make a particular feature

[00:04:47] right the upfront investment is extended you as a developer you may recognize the importance

[00:04:55] of those things and you may recognize the importance of those things and you may recognize

[00:04:56] the importance of those things but if you don’t recognize the importance of them and you’re only

[00:04:59] doing what you’ve heard is the right thing to do you’ve only adopted the practice because

[00:05:05] you know from reading a few books or from a fellow developer who has taught you some of this stuff

[00:05:12] you know that it’s the right thing to do if you’re only doing it for those reasons

[00:05:17] then it’s very easy to start to develop a sense of frustration and resentment once again for your

[00:05:24] co-workers or your co-workers and your co-workers and your co-workers and your co-workers and your

[00:05:26] for even your clients right because they don’t understand what you do and quite honestly neither

[00:05:32] do you so how can you develop an expanded perspective we’re going to talk about that

[00:05:38] right after we talk about today’s sponsor today’s episode is sponsored by linode you’re probably not

[00:05:45] surprised because linode has supported developer t for a long time and that’s because they believe

[00:05:51] in the development community they believe in it so much that they’ve created an

[00:05:56] excellent product for the best price on the market on top of that they offer 24 7 customer support

[00:06:03] now what can you do with linode well pretty much anything you can do with linux and more importantly

[00:06:09] anything you can do with multiple linux machines that are distributed with an internal network

[00:06:14] super fast internal network now these linux installations are on ssd servers so they’re

[00:06:22] incredibly fast on their own but on top of that linode has a lot of support for them and they’re

[00:06:26] they’re incredibly fast on their own but on top of that linode has a lot of support for them and they’re

[00:06:26] networked these servers together with an internal 40 gigabit network so it’s very fast internally as

[00:06:33] well now what can you do with that well you can do things like load balancing right this is actually

[00:06:38] called node balancer in linode’s product offerings and what that allows you to do is route requests

[00:06:46] to the server that is most capable and least loaded to handle that particular request at that

[00:06:52] given moment so it’s a really cool thing for scaling your products

[00:06:56] up but here’s the thing if you’re just a brand new developer maybe you’re in a boot camp or maybe

[00:07:02] you just started college in your cs degree you can get started on linode for five dollars a month

[00:07:08] that’s a gigabyte worth of ram on your server five dollars a month that’s cheaper than going

[00:07:14] to the movies just once and that gives you a month on a linode server go and check out what

[00:07:20] linode has to offer on top of this linode is providing you with twenty dollars worth of credit

[00:07:26] just for being a developer t listener you can use the code developer t two thousand seventeen at

[00:07:30] checkout to get that twenty dollars worth of credit that’s four months worth of a free server you can

[00:07:36] try it out and if you don’t like it they have a seven day money back guarantee as well spec dot

[00:07:41] fm slash linode thank you again to linode for sponsoring today’s episode so how can you develop

[00:07:47] an expanded perspective here’s a exercise that i want you to do there’s actually a couple of

[00:07:53] exercises that i want you to do the first thing i want you to do i want you to do is to do a

[00:07:56] three or four applications or services that you use yourself that you’re really that you really

[00:08:03] appreciate using these should be consumer level applications they can be developer tools but i

[00:08:09] don’t want you to think about you know apis or anything like that instead i want you to focus

[00:08:13] on things that are services that you use and i want you to write down a list of the things that

[00:08:20] make you appreciate those services or tools what you’re going to realize

[00:08:26] unless you write down a contrived list is that most of the things that you list have very little

[00:08:32] to do with the technical decisions of the development team behind that product now this can

[00:08:38] help you to begin to kind of internalize that concept that the value that you perceive as a

[00:08:45] customer is only kind of in the background determined by those developers now if you

[00:08:51] perceive for example that you like how fast something is then that’s

[00:08:56] heavily related to the technological decisions that the developers made most likely but the

[00:09:02] process that the developers used to optimize that product is less important to you what you care

[00:09:09] about most likely is stability performance these are things that the typical developer would care

[00:09:15] about in a product and those things are affected only by what is shipped in the end so what this

[00:09:22] allows you to do is start connecting those best practices

[00:09:26] that you have ingrained in your mind whether it’s from a book or from another developer or professor

[00:09:30] or a podcast like this one taking those best practices and connecting them to a final value

[00:09:37] output whether that means that the product is more stable because you’ve written tests for that

[00:09:43] product or it’s delivered more quickly because you you know work for a company that does iterative

[00:09:49] development having the perspective of connecting every action that you take to an output that

[00:09:56] is of value that is what a great developer does that’s the perspective that can allow you to

[00:10:03] expand your the practice that you have right the various best practices that you want to perpetuate

[00:10:11] to give them a solid foundation and reasoning for why they matter the next exercise that i want you

[00:10:19] to perform is i want you to meet with the non-developers on your team preferably

[00:10:26] doing this in a one-on-one scenario allows you to learn a little bit more about that person

[00:10:31] but the the focus of these meetings should be understanding what that person does and both of

[00:10:38] you should share this with each other so you’re communicating in a way that that translates from

[00:10:44] the technical side of what you do to whatever it is that they do right this is connecting value

[00:10:51] together and recognizing the value that each other contribute to the final value output so

[00:10:56] this is the final outcome i’ve said it before on a previous episode i encourage you to go and

[00:11:00] listen to it if you can get to the place where you believe that your team builds one thing together

[00:11:06] rather than believing that you all build different things and then somehow they fall together in the

[00:11:12] end if you can get to the place where your team recognizes and values that concept of oneness in

[00:11:19] the product that you create then you’re going to create a better product and ultimately you’re

[00:11:24] going to become a better developer

[00:11:26] thank you so much for listening to today’s episode this is really core

[00:11:29] to what this show is intended to be developing these perspectives this is the way you become a

[00:11:36] better developer it’s not just about practicing code it’s about thinking it’s about changing the

[00:11:42] way that you think elevating yourself above average the average developer has a self-centered

[00:11:50] perspective the average developer cares more about tech than they do about their team

[00:11:56] the average developer doesn’t want to meet with other people on their team because they feel like

[00:12:01] it’s a waste of time don’t be that average developer elevate above that thank you so much for

[00:12:06] listening to today’s episode of developer t thank you of course to linode for sponsoring today’s

[00:12:11] episode linode helps developers like you start creating things that are available online not

[00:12:19] just online but through network connections so it’s not just about building websites you can

[00:12:24] create microservices you can do anything you want to do you can create a website you can create a

[00:12:26] you can create a remote git a private remote git repository right go and check it out spec.fm

[00:12:32] slash linode remember they give you twenty dollars worth of credit if you use the code

[00:12:36] developer t 2017 thanks so much for listening make sure you subscribe if you don’t want to

[00:12:41] miss out on future episodes including the other traits of great developers again this episode

[00:12:47] is an extension of the developer career roadmap go and check out those episodes on spec.fm

[00:12:53] thank you so much for listening and until next time

[00:12:56] enjoy your tea

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