DEV Community: Wellington

Humble Opinion vs Impostor Syndrome, how to perform a code review?

Wellington — Thu, 25 Mar 2021 21:29:50 +0000

Programer's Ego

Ego is a common topic among programmers, we all know that one who thinks of himself above the rest because he is capable of implementing a Red-Black tree, while there is no issue with this alone, you need to be mindful of not creating a toxic environment around you.

Impostor Syndrome

Many of us try to balance this being Modest or Humble by never allowing compliments get to our heads. At the same time, we should be careful not to suffer the Impostor Syndrome in which we cannot measure our capabilities.

When not to be Humble?

You must walk that thin line between those 2 extremes when a co-worker asks for your opinion

Could you review my Pull Request?

That's not the moment to doubt or be humble Comment, Approve, Request Changes are three valid options which we should evaluate, review, and sincerely provide feedback based on our previous knowledge and experience.

The good practices that apply, flows, code and algorithms optimizations, all those little things that give us comfort on the weekly releases.

When to be human?

That shyness and humble has their place, you must grab to it while you are performing the review,

Evaluate the code, not the developer
Be reasonable on why each change
Highlight those clever solutions

Summary, be Proud of your Opinion, be Humble expressing it

Be proud of what you have accomplished, was built from your experience, reading, writing, doing, living those Eureka moments fixing bugs, and solving complex issues.

Be humble the way you communicate your opinion, be human, connect with the people you want to share your knowledge with. Remember you were also the new guy who had leaders to look up. You want to be listened not just heard.

WIP

Wellington — Thu, 25 Mar 2021 21:21:50 +0000

The Most Important task of a Lead Software Engineer

Wellington — Sat, 31 Oct 2020 17:13:19 +0000

The case

Whenever you see the role description for a lead Engineer, you will often find responsibilities such as "implement the best practices", "perform code reviews", "participate in standups"; While I agree that those tasks are part of the daily routine for any Lead Engineer they are far from being responsibilities of a True Leader

Light the spark

The most important task of a Leader is to light the spark within his team to not only follow his orders or assignments but to lead by themselves.

Empower your team to make the big decisions without your direct input in each step, a decentralized team can grow horizontally as any well-architected framework should.

Task Oriented vs Growth Oriented

A good task-completion, project-oriented approach will only get your company so far, that is "Ok" when you don't want to grow. A well-distributed capable team of leaders will make it possible to explore areas you've never thought of, take on impossibles challenges for just one thinking head, and above all your company will be able to take on more projects.

What to do?

To accomplish that you must:

Push your team to communicate their ideas to you, to the project manager, to his teammates.
Be always open for debate
Let them take control of pushing their changes to production
Help them to develop a system thinking outside of their localhost
Encourage the team to be critical
Let them know that you are not always right
Provide clear, honest, and individual feedback for each.

Not every senior wants to be a leader

The desire to command must come from within, is not something that you could impose as any other Jira item, not every senior wants to be a leader.

Is your role to spot the signs "The proactive", "The new guy's coach" "The go-to", "The one who says I want" is no use trying to push the technical developer who only cares about the Big O to lead, your task is to inspire and provide guidance when required.

Two Pizza

Building leaders is the only way a two pizza team can become a large enterprise.

Why Mountain Bike is the perfect sport for a Software Developer

Wellington — Sun, 04 Oct 2020 14:46:41 +0000

A bit about me

I've been in the professional software industry for over a decade now. I've worked in multiple areas of a software lifecycle, Quality Assurance, Java, Javascript Backend/Frontend, Team Lead, Cloud Engineer, and Architect.

The Software developer mindset

We all love the challenge behind the next puzzle or algorithm to implement, solving complex scenarios, and trying to predict the user's behavior into our applications. While learning the next Javascript framework can be exciting is also grueling nevertheless.

Having to expend 8 or 9 hours designing, planning, implementing, and monitoring software solutions can be quite demanding for your body, no matter how many times you switch your desk from sitting to standing.

A Balance

The moment you realize how idle and sedentary your life has become you might start to think about exercise but, which one to choose?

While cyclist, in general, brings many benefits to your body

Reduces chances of a heart disease
Increment muscle strength and flexibility
Burn more calories
Reduces the body fat
more ...

Mountain Biking (MTB) brings additional benefits if you are an individual that works all day solving complex scenarios within your head, you need something that allows you to free those thoughts.

Welcome MTB

In a healthy way, trust me when I tell you there is no better alternative to clean your mind than going downhill at 20 miles/hour on muddy or loose terrain, you have to focus all your senses on the task at hand, pick your line, control your bike, follow your companion, brake or let go.

Going uphill you will be challenged by the fear, the pain, the feeling of giving up, but you are used to mental puzzles and knows

The mind is stronger than the body.

A Sunday epic 100 mile ride can be daunting but you are ready for it, plan your route, take it slow, one pedal at the time, one Jira task a day, take breaks, and split your workload into manageable sprints.

The Community

Another key aspect of the programmer life is working in solitude and trying to do all by himself, mountain biking teaches you to trust your teammates. It's a community and when you are out there miles away from civilization you need to care for each other, you need to be able to rely on others to support you and share those little victories conquesting a short hill breaking your own limits.

Pain is ephemeral, memories live forever

When your legs hurt because of the training, you can still sit relax at your office, home, or backyard, do your job and continue solving puzzles knowing...

Pain is ephemeral, memories live forever.

Wellington Aquino
Lead Software Engineer / Architect / MTB enthusiast
LinkedIn / Strava