Comments on: The Problem With ‘Above Average Programmers’

By: Phil Nash

Phil Nash — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 13:58:17 +0000

All I can say is: I’m a mean programmer!

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 13:04:57 +0000

Spasibo, Andrei. (Sorry, no Cyrillic keyboard mapping here!)

By: Sumit

Sumit — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:58:48 +0000

Thanks for the nice thought provoking post.
My opinion is slightly different. I have an open mind. I let the world / people I work with decide what is my status as a programmer/problem solver/designer.

I think ( and this is solely my thinking ) – that once a person thinks that he is an expert – he can take 2 steps – become complacent and relish the aura round him OR he can take steps to get to the next level. For example – he can start contributing to open source projects, start new open source projects, deliver lectures/talks on conferences, meet more people / peers and may be teach in colleges/univ etc. This opens up the avenues for further learning the moment you expose yourself to a wider group of learned people and also start teaching. Teaching makes one a more expert and helps one to identify ones’ problems / weakness / shortcomings.

So I think it is also dependent a lot on the individual – how hungry the concerned person is for more knowledge/education/learning.

What do you think ?

By: Frank

Frank — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 03:59:37 +0000

I’m not a programmer, although I do a little bit here and there when necessary. I’m considered by others to be an technical expert in other things – one person once called me brilliant.

Fool!

My strengths are the ability to define problems, the ability to figure out solutions and the persistence to get the problems fixed. I find the harder I work, the more it appears that I’m smart and am an expert.

By: annoymous

annoymous — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 03:34:49 +0000

Just one thing i would like to add,
that is dont write that your are average in your mid year review .
You want to learn by considering yourself as an average or below average, will be perfectly fine. You should be have this in your mind not in your work or in your review!

By: Andrei Solntsev

Andrei Solntsev — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 08:55:31 +0000

Hi Dave,
thank you, I like your post so much that I decided to translate it to Russian.
This is transletaed article on a popular russian IT-related site:
http://habrahabr.ru/blogs/arbeit/98640/

As you see, there is a lot of comments (137 by now).

By: Pedro Newsletter 08.07.2010 « Pragmatic Programmer Issues – pietrowski.info

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 21:14:19 +0000

[...] Are you above average – probably YES? [...]

By: Dennis

Dennis — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 13:48:17 +0000

I think you’re describing “teenage” coders. They’ve learned enough to think they know something and are lazy. When they mature, they’ll get to the point Steve describes where they’ll understand how much they don’t know.

I’ve been programming professionally for about 14 years. I am an expert in a couple areas, but I know there are tons of things I don’t know and am constantly pushing myself to learn new things. I’m listening to podcasts and reading blog posts from people who are better than me. I’m in the middle of at least 5 books on new programming languages and techniques. Five years ago I was probably in this lazy mode that you describe, but I matured past that point.

Also, anyone who’s taking the time to read this blog most likely IS above average. But also is most likely not in the lazy phase that you describe.

Just like in life, there are some people who never mature past being a lazy teenager. It’s very sad. However, most people grow up and get hungry again.

By: Timmy Jose

Timmy Jose — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 09:12:14 +0000

This is retarded reasoning. It would seem that this is more of an issue with the person’s persona rather than his expertise. Resorting to such facetious gimmicks to refresh one’s passion for programming is absolutely ridiculous in my opinion. Consider people like Linus Torvalds, Bjarne Stroustrup, Richard Stallman and on the other end of the spectrum, Ken Thompson, Guy Steele, Donald Knuth and others. The first set – genius dicks. The second set – genius and affable. Still great programmers with no delusion of their own greatness.

By: PhiLho

PhiLho — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 09:06:49 +0000

Interesting, but I don’t agree with everything.
If somebody is really “above average”, it is because they coded a lot, but also because they took time to study, learn new things, deepen their knowledge. What makes you think they will stop now they reached this “high level” of expertise? Most of the time they learn because they like what they do and so won’t stop there.
“the expert’s mind is cluttered with old knowledge”
Why “cluttered”? Behind knowing several fields and being able to connect them (applying functional language paradigm to Java coding for example) might be what makes you an expert.
It is like stating that experience is useless, “better hire two cheap enthusiastic and clueless programmers avid to learn than a costly seasoned coder that will code slowly” (but perhaps writing better code, needing less maintenance…).