Programmers are not machines that just write code. We have feeling and emotions as well! ;)
We all need to learn a lot of new things, sharpen the saw, focus, make good choices about our career path, and simply, have fun.
While most of books describe technical side of coding, not many address the psychological/business/economic side of our profession. In this niche one great book appeared, it’s called “Soft Skills”. The book is written by John Sonmez from simpleprogrammer.com
The structure
There are 71 chapters grouped into 7 parts:
- Career
- Marketing Yourself
- Learning
- Productivity
- Financial
- Fitness
- Spirit
Plus three nice bonus Appendices at the end.
You might be suprised by the number of chapters. But actually, little chapters make the book very easy to read. You do not need lot of time for that. Have 5 minutes? Just open one chapter and you can easily absorb it. The order is also not that important. This reminds me similar approach from "The Passionate Programmer"
What I like
I was amazed by the author’s approach that is shown across the book. He presents realistic ideas instead of those nice and cheap talks from many books about motivation… Sonmez writes that if you want to succeed you need to work hard, there are not so many short paths.
We all spend some time doing nothing, browsing net instead of doing actual work, make mistakes about our career… or we are too optimistic about starting our own company/startup and quickly realise it was a mistake. In the book I could find several good ideas how to fight all of those problems. You might all heard it somewhere else, but here you have this unique, practical approach added.
Some example chapters that I especially like:
- Quit your job: maybe it’s not good idea to just go to your boss and resign. Maybe it’s better to do it gradually? Create side project and spend several hours each day…
- Chapters about learning process.
- How to efficiently use Pomodoro technique.
- Chapters about marketing yourself. I think not many people pay real attention to this. Having a blog is very good idea in fact. So at least, I think, I am doing the right thing at the moment :)
- How to motivate when you work from home
- Personal story of the author. His success was not that obvious and easy, he worked really hard to achieve the current comfortable state.
What I don't like
Hard to tell exactly :)
This is not a technical book, so I cannot write that ABC chapter is completely wrong or in XYZ there is no logic… The book describes ‘soft’ ideas that might work for you or not. You can also disagree with some part of the content. I have several chapters that I skipped, was not interested or simply do not like, but it might be completely different for you.
Summary
My final mark: 4.5/5
This is a great and easy to read book. Implementing all ideas might not be that simple, but the book has a lot of positive energy that can really help and motivate. What’s unique about this book is that instead of showing only nice and idealistic motives, it presents realistic, practical and sometimes even painful side of (programmer) work.
You can put this book along such great books like, "The Passionate Programmer"
Pros:
- Great chapter about quitting your job!
- Honest descriptions
- Realistic approach towards life
- Compact, easy to read and understand chapters
- Described skills are proven and used extensively by the author
- Ideas can be applied not only to programming proffesion.
- I like appendices!
Cons:
- Depending on your previous knowledge, some chapters might sound too easy, too basic or shallow. Or you can simply disagree.
And BTW: look at Soft Skills's Amazon Site
Your turn:
Have you read this book?
What is your opinion about it?