Its a lot more than nothing, but probably not much more than something.
But growth is not as simple as waiting it out and talent does not supersede the need for experience.
It matters, trust me.
I showed no particular aptitude or interest in the language, but was happy to pass through the lessons.
I chose French, effectively repeating the previous two years.
I have little to no memory of these classes, but I believe I passed through them with ease.
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I was offered a choice of languages to study and I elected for… a year of Introductory French.
The following year I entered Intermediate French and the skill gap between myself and my peers immediately dwindled.
Many of us make this same mistake in our careers.
We optimize for a skillset that is easy to gain or stay within the confines of limited expertise.
Theres not a right or wrong career path.
Conversely, some thrive and become leaders by developing their own paths as an individual contributor.
Quite a few folks just dont get the opportunities they need to grow as individual contributors.
Most were affiliated with Yale via either its computer science department or its high performance computing lab.
I was surrounded by very experienced, very educated, and very accomplished folks.
To follow along alone was an accomplishment.
Those folks were much more than smart.
But that didnt mean I couldnt follow along and learn.
So I tried to ask dumb questions and to restate things until I got them right.
It could be a piece of code, a system design, or even a business concept like margin.
Now you wont become a quick expert but you will gain a breadth of knowledge.
More importantly, youll learn how to ask questions and learn from those around you.
Give yourself space to do good work.
Real talk: everywhere you go there will be haunted forests, tech debt, and organizational challenges.
Every opportunity comes with constraints.
When you consistently do work that you dont take pride in, its challenging to invest yourself in growth.
Most people in this situation often begin to imagine some panacea that would fix things.
If only things were functionally pure or fully asynchronous, then we could do things the right way.
Or so the thinking goes.
Dont get stuck thinking that you cant do good work unless something you cant control changes.
Thats a pessimistic extreme, but its also a fear born out of experience.
But for most of us, those are tools to help us do something else.
Our stakeholders dont care about the tools, they care about the outcomes.
Its an old phrase, sometimes attributed to Grace Hopper, but variations have circulated for many years.
Its still true that asking for permission will likely get you stuck in the mud.
Its the request that slows things down, not the knowledge of the approach.
Ive taken to using a variation of this phrase: do whatever you want, but do it loudly.
You want to avoid surprise and rumor.
He mentors individuals and build strong autonomous teams that exceed expectations.
