Category Archives: CS-448

Apprenticeship Patterns: Concrete Skills

This week I continued with chapter 2 of Apprenticeship Patterns. The pattern I read was Concrete Skills. The context this pattern gives is wanting to join a talented team that can provide you with better learning opportunities than you currently have. The problem with this is the team you want to work with has no incentive to take a risk and hire someone who may not be able to contribute to the team’s work or even indirectly contribute.

The solution to this problem is simple yet challenging. You need to acquire and maintain concrete skills. Some of the skills you will need will just be to get you past HR filters and managers that look for buzzwords when hiring. Others will be to assure your team members you can be put to good use and not need to be watched over. The skills you bring will answer the question “If we hire you today, what can you do on Monday morning that will benefit us?” Later in your career hard skills will become less important than your reputation and your portfolio of previous work and qualities.

The action suggestion to reach the solution is to collect the CVs of people’s skills you respect and identify five discrete skills noted. Then determine which ones would be immediately useful to the kind of team you are looking to join. Then put together a plan and a toy project to demonstrate the skills you have quired.

The reason I chose this pattern is that I am in the process of looking for a job. I want to find a good company to work for and join a team of developers where I can learn and grow not only my career but my skills as a developer. I could relate to the problem because where I am at in my career as a programmer I do not have any industry experience so I will need to do everything I can to better my odds of getting hired and being able to contribute to a team of professionals. I will have to look into taking the actions this pattern recommended in order to expand my concrete skills to the ones I will need in order to stand out to hiring managers.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Ryan Klenk's Blog by Ryan Klenk and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Sustainable Motivations Pattern~

Hello!

This week, I read about the Sustainable Motivations apprenticeship pattern from “Apprenticeship Patterns: Guidance for the Aspiring Software Craftsman” by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye.

The context of the pattern is that while we’re still starting out as an apprentice, we have to explore many different things to expand our skillset. Because of this, we come across a rocky path of handling new projects with tough demands to address and things we are unsure of how to approach. Even though you have some love for your job, this exploration gives you troubles and you find yourself feeling pressured, stressed, and even doubtful of your career path.

The pattern also brings up an example of some people being trapped, wanting to move on to something else, but being held back by their motivation of money–they want to switch careers but their current job pays well. It spotlights the importance of matching up your motivations to those that will help you in the long run– to reach mastery.

The action you can make for Sustainable Motivations is to concoct a list of things that motivate you. You should then leave some time to write some additional motivations later on. You should also take the time to reflect on the motivations that you yourself really want versus what other people think. Analysis of the motivations should be done to figure out how much of these are truly what you want and which are the five most important motivators of your life. The list can be referred back to when you find yourself struggling again.

I think that this was an interesting pattern. I do find myself doubting where I’m heading at times, especially when I face some difficult new tasks and need to branch out to something completely new to me. I like that this pattern brings up that we do find ourselves loving/feeling passionate about our job/what we’re working on, but there’s also a mix of that and being unsure of what we’re doing anymore. I find that more relatable because there’s times where I find myself loving how everything gets put together in the end, and working on certain tasks, but sometimes the process feels really discouraging. From now on, I think I’ll make a list of motivations to keep me going and know that I shouldn’t let my motivations keep me from growing as well. I think more self-analysis wouldn’t hurt. I don’t disagree with anything in the pattern. It’s a good reminder to prioritize your values and where you want to go.

From the blog CS@Worcester – CS With Sarah by Sarah T and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Apprenticeship Patterns: Your First Language

This week I dove into chapter 2 of Apprenticeship Patterns and read the pattern Your First Language. This pattern was about just starting out and only understanding a little bit of one or two programming languages. I thought I would go back to the basics for this week and this pattern would be a good read for that.

The problem this pattern presents is the feeling your job or finding a job depends on your proficiency in a specific programming language. The solution the pattern gives for this problem is to pick a language and become fluent in it. It says whatever language you pick should be your main one for years and will become your default skill you work on when practicing. The pattern mentions the choice is a challenge because it will be the foundation of your early career. Some of the examples the pattern talks about for how you can work on becoming fluent in a programming language is to work on a toy application and write tests for your programs so you can understand what is going on better. A big part of this pattern was finding an experienced coder that you can work with and help mentor you and how it can make the difference in spending minutes on a problem or days. The pattern also mentions the importance of not getting stuck on only using a single language and preventing you from learning a new one.

One of the reasons I chose this pattern is because I can relate to the problem it presents. As a college senior in my last semester finding a job in the software industry will be coming up very soon. I have used several programming languages over my years of school so I have not had to focus on a single language. After reading this pattern I think java should be the language I focus on and become more fluent in because it is the one I know best already. I think I should follow the advice of the chapter and look into working on a small project so I can get better at java. Another thing I would like to do is find a mentor to occasionally help me out. I think that could be very useful for my career. Overall I thought this was a good pattern to read about and it gave me ideas of what I can do to improve my programming skills and create the foundation my career will be built on.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Ryan Klenk's Blog by Ryan Klenk and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Expressing Enthusiasm in the Workplace

This is one of the more interesting patterns in the book. It’s a pattern that discusses the interpersonal relationships between the apprentice the masters or journeymen. I try to portray a lot of enthusiasm when it comes to the workplace. Currently, I work at a sub shop. It’s not my preferred job, but it’s a job, nonetheless. It’s different when comparing this pattern from a software development setting because I feel that I’ve exhausted everything I’ve been able to learn from this job. I try to develop some enthusiasm when it comes down to it though because it’s easier to go through a rush when everyone is in a better mood.

The same thing could be said when it’s time for me to work with a software development team, I can imagine. It’s easy to find people who don’t exactly feel enthusiastic because as the book mentions, they have been working at their job for way too long, they are caught up in many projects and deadlines, and they have no time to stick behind incompetence. After working a couple of jobs, I’ve seen this happen more then I could count, and it’s not a good feeling to conform to everyone else’s mood of dread and pain about a task or subject when feeling the complete opposite.

This pattern can be applied to almost anything in life. The young and incompetent apprentice who feels very enthusiastic about their job is once again shut down by their team. They might feel rather timid in trying to discuss or propose ideas to the team because they are afraid that the team will shut down their enthusiasm. When I’m going through this, I usually began to talk to people I feel that I can express my ideas very clearly too, who won’t attempt to shut them down, or who I feel won’t react negatively toward them. It’s easier to be told wrong by one person than by a bunch of people, and if it ends up being a good idea then I start by telling more people about it until I feel confident that it should be proposed at a more public level.

Sources:

Hoover, Dave H., and Adewale Oshineye. Apprenticeship Patterns: Guidance for the Aspiring Software Craftsman. O’Reilly, 2010.

From the blog CS@Worcester – FindKelvin by Kelvin Nina and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

WEEK-3

Hello, a blog for the third week; it seems cluttered because I am almost done with school since this is the end of February. Anyway, I’m starting to read chapter 3 for apprenticeship patterns. While reading, I found one of the helpful patterns was “Sustainable Motivations.” It has a set of motivations that can withstand the inevitable challenges and difficulties in pursuing a particular craft or profession. In the context of software development refers to a group of internal and external factors that keep software developers motivated and engaged in their work over the long term.

Sustainable motivations can vary from person to person. Still, some common examples include a passion for programming, a desire for mastery, a sense of purpose, financial stability, social recognition, and a positive work-life balance.

Even characteristics of sustainable motivations are resilient, flexible, and adaptive, allowing developers to overcome obstacles, stay committed to their craft, and continue to grow and develop their skills.

Creating motivations is crucial in software development (challenging and complex), requiring high technical adaptability. By cultivating sustainable bases, developers can avoid burnout, stay focused on their goals, and build fulfilling careers that bring personal and professional satisfaction.

However, I would like to disagree with some parts of the pattern as having different motivations for their work, such as personal fulfillment, without necessarily aspiring for mastery or long-term growth. Because the way is overly simplistic or idealistic, it assumes that motivations are static and can be easily categorized and controlled. However, the truth is motivations can be complex, dynamic, and influenced by various internal and external factors that are often beyond our control.