To market yourself effectively, and thus, improve your career prospects, you need to know how to communicate effectively. It's not just that communication "gets the word out" about you - it has value in and of itself.
At the risk of this becoming a regular feature here on Fridays,
Raganwald covered the same topic as the chapter from
MJWTI that I'm covering this week. (This also happened a few weeks ago, when we discussed
not overcommitting yourself).
There are many ways to communicate - and you should practice them all. In the post linked to Raganwald above, Reg talks about physical communication (as opposed to virtual) and suggests volunteering to present in front of a group as a means to improve your communication skill. It's something I get some small practice with at school, and something which I'd like to eventually do more of in a professional capacity - but I've yet to take the time or show the
cojones and actually do it, outside of what's been required of me.
Anyway, he covered it better than I will, so I'd suggest reading it over at his blog. I'll continue with the real point of this one, about not being a "grumpy old code ogre [whom] everyone fears" (Quoting Fowler, pg 125).
Managers and customers are
responsible for something gravely important which they ultimately have to trust to some scary IT guys for implementations... In this situation, what's the most important attribute they're looking for in a team member? ... It's not whether they've memorized the latest design patterns or how many programming languages they know.
They're going to be looking for someone who can make them comfortable about the project they're working on... They're afraid of you.
Recognizing this deficiency in the relationship, you can bridge the gap by reversing the polarity: try looking at your customer or manager as the one on whom you depend for information about it and without whom you could not do your job (that's the case anyway).
I try to do this, but it's hard to tell how effective I've been. Chad suggests finding some email you've written to a manager or client, telling your mom it was written by a colleague, and asking her how it could be improved. That may work, but I don't know if I'm willing to try it. He also says going through old mail yourself will help give you a more objective perspective into your own mail.
Of course, this type of thing isn't for everyone. As one commenter over at Reg's post points out:
Rag, see, we don't want to improve our careers, exactly because an improved career would mean more communication and less code. And we became programmers exactly because we wanted to be spared of that "Hey, how are you, is everything fine?" kind noise most biped animals call "communication", and rather talk to a computer which does not expect any more information than it actually needs to do it's job.
That's the kind of programmer I used to be. Obviously, I've tried to move away from that in recent years. However, it's certainly not a view about your job to be ashamed of: I think an overwhelming majority of us got into this because we were socially awkward. But, I'm not sure the types of jobs where you can do that are going to be around forever. I hesitate to say, "much longer," because I have no idea, to be honest.
The point of it all: This goes beyond simply
speaking up. You want to be the "adventure tour guide:" hold hands when you need to, help them navigate the treacherous landscape. Being helpful and somewhat outgoing puts people at ease, where terse messages loaded with talk about details they know nothing about does the opposite.
You want to be open, not shut off.
Do you have any tips for communicating well with non-technical people?
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i'm at a major corp. i literally worked my way up to where i am. i started out on the frontline, as a warehouse employee. my desire to know more about computers lead to me becoming a system/lan administrator. from there i started coding. communicating with non-technical people kind of comes natural to me (except those that think flicking the switch on the monitor is turning the computer off).
aside from those handful of people, i find the hardest people to communicate with are those who think they are technical. you know the guys who have their personal webpage that has 487 different javascripts that were stolen from place to place. the kind of site that looks like the vegas strip the way things are flashing. i think those people are hardest to communicate with, because they really, really want to communicate on the technical level.
i have a classic asp app that i maintain, and one of the guys i get called by from time to time is one of those guys. he's always saying theres a problem with the javascript, but it doesn't have a lick of javascript in the entire app. he calls it the l-d-a-p system, because there is a link to our corporate ldap for handling uid maintenance (setting pwords, etc) on the login page.
sorry for ranting. i'd be interested in good ways to not talk down to those types. i find it difficult to not do that... ok.. i took a deep breath... im in my happy place.
Posted by shag
on May 02, 2008 at 10:29 PM UTC - 5 hrs
I agree with Shag. Communicating with people who know their lack of technical knowledge makes the conversation smoother. They generally give feedbacks like: "Can you explain XYZ?" or "I don't know what ABC is.". For the people who think they know a lot but in fact know little, the conversations are much more awkward.
What I found to be working when approaching such a person is: instead of denouncing them by some trick, sit down with them and say "I think there is a gap in our understanding". Work closely with them on the reasons that their knowledge is wrong. Try to give them that piece of information that they lack.
Generally, after this, they will generally listen to you more in a conversation. If this doesn't help, I guess it's best that you avoid this person as much as possible.
Posted by Dat Chu
on May 04, 2008 at 01:37 PM UTC - 5 hrs
The ideas you both relate sound a lot like what we discussed last week at
http://www.codeodor.com/index.cfm/2008/4/28/What-d...Basically, the conclusion was that "the level of learning and idea absorption you can attain has little to do with age. Instead, it is influenced more by your perceived level of experience"
In this case, the person knows enough to be dangerous, but not enough to know how little they know, or they are afraid of looking dumb by asking questions, or some combination of both and perhaps some other things.
In the end, we can all have short tempers, but we have to take responsibility for that and just try to be good with them, even when its hard.
One thing I think might help would be to make it clear before the conversation started that you're open to questions, and invite them to interrupt you to explain. Tell them you expect them to not understand everything, and that sometimes you have trouble explaining things, etc, etc. That way, you put the blame on yourself and leave the door open to them to help fix the situation.
If they still can't (or won't) accept that invitation, I don't know what else to try =).
And great story Shag!
Posted by
Sammy Larbi
on May 05, 2008 at 05:09 PM UTC - 5 hrs
@sammy, glad you enjoyed my frustration. i think you make a fantastic point, to which i was going to respond myself.
@dat chu, i don't think avoiding the person is the best choice. i think its an easy way of giving up. i would agree with @sammy, that we have to learn ot be more patient (pointing at myself here).
ultimately if there is a problem with communication, its my fault. i was not clear or did not articulate my idea clearly. its a bit harsh, but i say all the time that i like to stupid proof my apps. i need to get better at stupid proofing my communication. additionally deal better with my own frustrations when there is a barrier.
Posted by shag
on May 06, 2008 at 11:26 PM UTC - 5 hrs
and make up your mind.. is it sam or sammy? i was a bit late in realizing that was you. :)
Posted by shag
on May 06, 2008 at 11:28 PM UTC - 5 hrs
@shag: Not enjoying the frustration, but the bootstrapping first paragraph in particular =).
I think what you described is the best attitude to have - its certainly the one I try to have. I'm not always successful.
I go by either name. Most people call me Sam. The people closest to me often address me by Sammy. Online, I used to just go by "Sam" until I noticed someone else doing it on websites I also read, so I started using my full name in comments to avoid any confusion.
Posted by
Sammy Larbi
on May 07, 2008 at 07:00 AM UTC - 5 hrs
