Big Swinging Developer

A Big Swinging Year

2011 was a big year for me and since it represented a lot of what it means to be a Big Swinging anything I felt a post was in order.  To be clear, “big” doesn’t always mean “good”.  2011 was rough.  The startup that I had been working on for months vaporized in a matter of days.  I had the worst job of my development career.  I had clients who didn’t pay for months.  At the other end of the spectrum, I got to work a lot with one of the most talented developers I know.  I got coached by the most successful person I know.  Finally, I ended the year with an ideal client portfolio which should set up 2012 to be even bigger, and definitely better, than 2011.  Here are some things that I learned.

Give As Much As You Can, Then Stop

The year started with me wrapping up a contract that I had been on for more than a year and jumping back into the startup world.  I had been working on the startup during off-hours for a couple of months and had picked up some great new skills (MongoDB, IronPython, ASP.NET MVC 3, etc.)  I had negotiated my ideal combination of great salary and good equity stake and was ready to work on the company full-time.  I had no problem working for free for several months and paying some travel expenses because I really wanted to make the deal happen.  Then, it all unravelled in the course of a few days.  The partner on the business side decided that the salary I was asking was too high.  This was months after I thought we had agreed and after this partner had told our only investor that he wasn’t needed.  In the past, I probably would have compromised to make it work since I had already invested a bunch of time and effort, but I’ve matured since then.  The combination of recognizing sunk costs and having an unwavering requirement that I trust my partners led me to withdraw.  It was hard (and somewhat scary) to abandon the path that I had committed myself to for many months, but I had given all that I was willing to and once I was asked for more it was time for me to stop.  Since I had set a “if I don’t have signed paperwork by this date then I’m out” deadline, it was clear that it was time for me to leave even though it wasn’t easy.  Know what you’re willing to give, but be honest enough about it that if you’re asked for more then you stop.

It’s Hypocritical To Not Get An Outside Perspective

After leaving the startup path, I needed to figure out what was next.  Quickly.  The nervousness of not having work lined up really drove me.  Crazy.  The problem with being both driven and crazy at the same time is that you thrash.  You end up expending incredible amounts of effort for near-zero progress . . . or worse.  I was fortunate in that one of my business partners is an incredible coach and he made it clear that we needed to talk.  I don’t remember anything we discussed during the hour except him saying, “With options comes power.”  My problem was less about not knowing what to do and more about *needing* to do something. I took his overall advice of “get a few clients who will pay so you’re not dependent on any of them” and started working on my client portfolio.  After I got things back on track I realized how hypocritical it was for me to not seek an outside perspective from the beginning: That’s a big part of what I sell!

Find Enough Clients Who Can Pay

For the rest of my career, I am likely to have at least 2 clients.  An ideal number for now is 3 or 4, but it takes at least 2 in order to have options, and therefore power.  One of my clients is a startup and startups sometimes run out of money.  There’s a big difference between a client who is unwilling to pay and a client who is unable to pay.  If they’re unwilling to pay, the relationship has probably been destroyed and things quickly turn into strictly business decisions.  If a client is unable to pay, however, things are a little different.  It is in the nature of startups to reach beyond their grasp and sometimes they fall.  I happen to really like this particular client so I checked in with them once a month, but never in a mean or threatening manner.  Because I had other clients who *could* (and did) pay, I had the option of waiting.  It took a good 3 or 4 months, but they raised another round of funding, sent me a check, and we’re back to working together.  If I had been demanding or unpleasant during their inability to pay, we probably wouldn’t be working together now AND it wouldn’t have changed the fact that they couldn’t pay.  If you have enough clients who can pay, you have the option of working with some who may not . . . and they’re often the most enjoyable.

The Happiest People I Know Are Where They Put Themselves

I read a lot of blogs and talk to a lot of people about their work and their lives.  One thing that really crystallized this year is that people who are in a place intentionally are much happier than those who have “ended up” someplace.  And it’s not just the rich ones who started something that became big, it’s also the folks who decided what they wanted to do with their lives and set themselves up around that.  This is sort of an extension or evolution of, “Do what you love and the money will follow” because I think that that phrase needs a bit of updating.  I’ve seen plenty of people who love technology or software development, but are f’ing miserable because they’re in a situation not entirely of their choosing.  Chances are you know someone like this.  He liked computers and software and learned to code.  He found a job somewhere because he needed a job and things were somewhere between fine and great in the beginning.  Over time, he got worn down by the company environment until he ended up with a position he would have never consciously chosen.  But he’s stuck.  He’s afraid to go somewhere else and now he’s just kind of “ended up” doing what he’s doing.  Contrast that with someone who has created her own position to do work she enjoys, even if it doesn’t pay a lot (as long as it’s “enough”).  She’s invested in making things work.  She’s set up her work to integrate with her life.  And she has options.  If things don’t work the way she thought, she can always redesign and renegotiate the position.  She’s there by choice and since she chooses to do what’s she’s doing she’s better at it and happier overall.  When I find myself in a job because I need it, it’s not very long until it starts to wear on me.  When I’m working on a project that I helped create, however, I’m committed to it and energized by it.  I’m not suggesting that choosing your work is the answer to all your problems or the one true path to happiness, but I have observed (and lived) that people who consciously choose their work are happier than those who don’t.

Here's to a Big Swinging 2012!

Options, Options, Options!

There are almost no advantages to being the son of a world renowned economist. One thing that keeps it from being a total wash, however, is that I got introduced to the concept of optionality at an early age. I honestly don’t remember when I became aware of it, although I can remember thinking the term “synthetic puts” sounded cool when I was 12 or so.  Even though I didn’t understand the underlying math until much later, I grew up with at least a subconscious realization that the ability to choose was worth something.

In my early 20s, I started trading stock options online.

I was horrible at it. 

I was buying options, which meant I was paying someone for the ability to make a choice. 

I was in my early 20s, which meant that I made really bad choices. 

So there I was, paying someone to let me make bad choices.  I stopped in my mid 20s after I grew tired of losing money.  The concept of optionality stuck with me, however, and I’ve incorporated it into my approach to both software and clients. 

On the software side, this often means decoupling.  I don’t favor decoupling because it’s cool, I favor it because I’m wrong a lot and want to be able to fix my mistakes as quickly and easily as possible. Decoupling gives you options because it reduces the impact of changes, meaning that you can make more changes. Particularly in business software (and espectially in large enterprise systems), you can bet that change is coming.  Requirements change.  Systems that need to be integrated change.  Business processes change.  If your system can keep up with this change, it's a lot more valuable than one that can't.

On the client side, I sell a wide array of options and clients like it even if they don’t realize that that's what it is.  Instead of saying, “Here’s the deal: You pay me X and I’ll deliver Y” I almost always offer choices.  The actual choices aren't important here, the important thing is that no matter what they choose the work they need will get done.  Sometimes that means paying for my own hardware, software, hosting, etc.  Other times it means travelling to be on-site with them or their clients.  The point is, that by offering them the option(s) to do things their way, I get to charge a premium over someone who simply sells billable hours sitting in front of a screen.

If you can provide optionality that's valuable, you can sell it and collect the premium.

As a bookend to the previous mention of options trading, I returned to it recently for a bit (now in my mid-to-late 30s) and did pretty well.  The difference?  Instead of buying options, I sold them through credit spreads since I now realize that my value is in providing optionality rather than using it.

Working Hard Isn't Smart

There are a handful of techniques that I rely on to make clients happy.  Of these techniques, the one that requires almost no thought, no training, and no special skills is to work hard.

It's also the most effective technique that I've ever used. 

There are people who are just as successful as I am that don't work nearly as hard.  These people are better at what they do than I am at what I do.  They are smarter, luckier, or something-ier than I am and I applaud them for it.  I choose a simpler path and one that is much more repeatable and transferable: I choose to work really hard when the opportunity presents itself.  I think too many people misinterpret the phrase "work smarter, not harder" to mean "don't work hard, figure out how to get things done without much effort".  My translation is "work hard, and if a better way becomes apparent then do that . . . but also hard, and just get more done".  There's a reason why this is called Big Swinging Developer and not Super Comfortable Developer.

To be clear, "hard" doesn't just mean hours.  Sure, there'll be times when nothing but brute force will do and you should be ready to plow through when it's time, but there's more to it than that.  Hard work is all about doing the things that others won't.  The messy, unpleasant, yet valuable tasks that lie around undone because doing them is unattractive.  As I alluded to in a post about brownfield development:

There's money to be made in doing things that others don't want to do.  A lot of money.

Go ahead and give it shot.  There's bound to be a loose end where you work that's been languishing forever.  Attack it.  Get it done.  Do it in addition to whatever else you were going to do that day or that week.  Rinse.  Repeat.

How To Get What You Ask For

In the last post I revealed that the key to becoming a Big Swinging Developer was to realize that you're now in the sales business (don't worry, it's a part time gig, you still get to code) and covered the importance of The Ask.  Another aspect that's covered in sales training is Overcoming Objections.  In the world of the Big Swinging Developer, there are 3 main objections to overcome:

• It's too expensive
• It's too much work
• It's too risky

There are likely to be other objections that are specific to your situation that are often given the blanket label of "Office Politics".  We're going to ignore those for the time being -- like a Physics teacher ignoring mass and friction to teach a more general concept. 

The objections above are listed in the order in which you'll need to overcome them.  In a business setting, if something is too expensive, it's simply not going to be approved.  If something is too much work, that has a loose correlation to being too expensive because the person responsible for approving the work will do a rough calculation in the wages required and throw back the opportunity cost objection.  Risk is the most nebulous objection on the list because it can mean anything from risk of losing money (see also "too expensive") to risk of looking foolish.

As with most posts in the Big Swinging Developer series, there is a key to the solution:

Whenever possible, take on the burden yourself

"It's too risky" doesn't hold water once you have a working solution or, in some cases, a prototype.  "It's too much work" isn't a barrier once the work is done.  That only leaves "It's too expensive".  This is where our final sales lesson comes in:

Sell money

Do you need a software component?  Don't ask for it because it's really cool and easy to use.  As for it because it will save 20 hours of development work and costs less than 20 hours at the average developer rate.  This is a reversal of the previously mentioned opportunity cost argument.  A faster build machine (or, even better, a farm) won't necessarily be purchased to make your life easier.  There's a much better chance of getting the funding if you can show the benefit in monetary terms.  Of course, before you ask you should drive the chances up even higher by using a trial version of the component or setting up a prototype of the build system on your own.  By taking on the burden, you'll remove the risk and the fear of it being too much work and it will put you in a great position to sell it as money.

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The Key To Becoming A Highly Paid Developer

In the last post I proposed that the key to going from being a good programmer to a highly paid developer was a change in behavior.  In future posts I'll get into the nitty-gritty detail of what to do, when to do it, and how to know what to do.  Before we get into the tactics, however, there are still a few strategy points to cover.  None is more important than this one, though:

You are now in the sales business

Most programmers view sales and marketing with suspicion at best and, more commonly, disdain.  Forget the people you've met form these departments for a moment and focus on the departments goals.  The best description of marketing that I've read came from Seth Godin who said, "The job of marketing is to get people to know, like, and trust you."  The job of sales is, quite simply, to close the deal.  There are lots of books about sales such as The Little Red Book of Selling and it will help your career to read at least one, I've read several and they all have one thing in common: The Ask.  This is probably the most important aspect of sales ever taught and in its simplest form it says:

You are unlikely to get something unless you ask for it

If you remember nothing else from this blog, please remember the line above.  There is, of course, more to the sales process than just asking for the sale.  The reason The Ask is so important is that without it, none of those other things matter.  The future posts that talk about specific tactics are all geared toward getting a response of "Yes" to The Ask, but without asking for something, there's nothing to say "Yes" to.

Are you shy about asking for things?  You're not alone, but by the time we get deep into the tactics section you'll feel more confident about it and you'll realize why The Powers That Be will actually appreciate you asking (Hint: It helps them figure out what you need.  In other words you'll be doing the hardest part of their job for them.)

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How to go from being a good programmer to a highly paid developer

This blog is dedicated to the career programmer - folks who make their living from turning nebulous requirements into working systems on a daily basis.  If Joel Spolsky is right, and 80% of the software in the world is written for internal use, then chances are good that if you're a programmer, you're working in a corporate development group.  The majority of programmers in corporate development fall into the "good" category so, once again, chances are that if you're a programmer then you're a good programmer in a corporate development group.

Chances are also good that if you're a programmer then you are underpaid.

Actually, underpaid indicates that you're not getting paid what you're worth so technically you're not underpaid - you're simply not making as much as you can.  The result is the same, though: less money is reaching you than could/should be.  How do I know this?  I've been a professional developer for more than a decade and in that time I've become a good programmer.  Not superb, not fantastic, not even great.  Just good.  Solidly, smack-dab-in-the-middle-of-the-curve, no-better-no-worse good.

Despite being a merely good programmer, I've become a highly paid developer.

This wasn't just a matter of luck, circumstance, or even "knowing the right people".  I became a highly paid developer the same way you can: By changing my behavior.  Being a Big Swinging Developer is all about behavior, not technical skills.  You definitely have to be at least good and if you're not then I recommend working on your development skills before putting ANY of the techniques on this blog into practice.  Long story short, you must be able to walk the walk above all else.  Being a highly paid developer is all about actually being more valuable than other programmers, but that means that you need to deliver that value reliably.

Are you underwhelmed by the generality of the "change of behavior = more money" revelation?  Don't worry, I'll get much more specific in upcoming posts and show you how to see your job in a very different light.  Use the link on the left to subscribe via RSS or email so you don't miss anything!