Hi my readers. Welcome back to my blog.  In this blog post I am going to talk about an interesting pattern called “Use Your Title”.

Most us, who have worked in big companies and most of you who will in the future, are gonna have a FANCY title at your job. Sometimes even the person itself will get confused by its own title as at the beginning might not describe well what it means.

The best advice given by the authors for this pattern is: “Don’t allow your title to affect you! & Don’t be fooled by an impressive title!” It happens a lot nowadays that people have to explain what they really do because not everyone is aware of what a job title might be and what are the duties and responsibilities. There are also a lot of other cases where people misinterpret the job titles. My job title in my company is Support Engineer. and when some people would hear the name Support they automatically told me ” So you like talking on the phone with customer huh?!” That’s where I had to explain what my real position was and what was I actually doing. As I come from Albania, at the beginning I used to ‘blame’ on the company for giving me this title, but later on I realized it was the people who were to blame.

As you might know by now, I am graduating this May with a major in Computer Science and Software Development concentration. While having a conversation at my office with my teammates we all agreed that our titles were a bit too much as we hadn’t graduated as Engineers but developers. However, we all like using the fancy title.

The other side of the coin is where you have such a high job position and your job title doesn’t fully express much about it until you say what you actually do.

In both cases, the most important thing is to explain what you do with your own words and not the title, fancy or not. It is always good to have a written definition of what you do and what your duties are as you might never know who you might come across to.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Danja's Blog by danja9 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello dear readers. Here we are again in another blog post with another Apprenticeship Pattern. Today’s Pattern is called ‘Record What You Learn” and by the name you can kinda tell what this is all about.

One day before I started my job, one of my friends gave me the same advice “Take a notebook with you and write down everything they explain. Sometimes even the easiest things can be forgotten. Also this gives a good first impression on how seriously you take your job.” I got to say that my friend was definitely right and I can say with prof from my experience at my job and also from this pattern that I am writing today.

This pattern talks about the learning process and how important it is for you to record what you are learning. When starting a new job or working in a new project, you will be facing a bunch of new material and believe me you won’t remember all of that. It is very important for you to keep notes about everything you are learning but not only. There are a lot of people out there who keep notes and when they go back to review, they don’t even understand their own writing or what they were trying to note.

It is true that is very important to keep notes but it is also as important to keep clear notes. The authors strongly suggest to keep a blog post about these new information that you are being exposed but I would say that a blog  is not required or necessary. In my opinion it is perfectly fine to have all your notes stored in a notebook as long as everything is clear and clean. I would say that another advantage of the blog posts is that while writing about you learned, you also reflect about it.

It is totally your choice to decide on how you would like to record and store all your notes. I personally was very happy to show up on my first week of work with a notebook with me. Even after 6 months I needed to look at that notebook once in a while. Another use of my notebook was for my new teammates that joined the team. As I passed it along, they also found it very helpful and started to create their own.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Danja's Blog by danja9 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello my readers and welcome back to my blog. Today I am going to write about another Apprenticeship Pattern called Expose Your Ignorance. I totally agree that it might sounds weird when you hear it but you will change your mind by the end of this blog post.

You have just started working for a company, its your first job and everyone expects a lot from you. You are now a Software Developer and its time to show your skills. Too much pressure I know!!

This chapter of the book talks about how you should not hide what you don’t know as that will make you more ignorant. Everyday of the job and everyday of our life is a learning process for everyone and you don’t make an exception. The authors strongly encourage every software developer out there (especially the inexperienced ones) to expose their ignorance by asking questions. By asking questions you are letting your team know that you want to learn and lower the level of ignorance.

Pride! Ahh pride, this is what holds most of the people back. I totally get it that it’s easier said than done, but you should really leave your pride aside when learning. Yes its true, you can go and do your own research about the matter but that it going to take you a bigger amount of time compared to the situation where you can just ask your teammate or your manager.

If my close friends were to read this blog post would say: “Look who’s talking!”. Yep I got the same issue, I am very afraid to the idea that my teammates will think how inexperienced or ignorant I am so I just keep going on my own and stress myself until I find the answers of my questions. However I have realized that working in a team with a great environment makes it way easier to address to your teammates or manager for questions you might have.

So yeah..long story short: Ask questions about what you don’t know or need to know! But keep in mind to try to shorten the list of the things you don’t know soon. There will be times where the list will get longer than usual and sometimes shorter but as you choose the shortest path to expose your ignorance, you will notice that by the end on the trip you will be an expert. Don’t get discouraged, ASK!

From the blog CS@Worcester – Danja's Blog by danja9 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

h

Link to the blog: https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/apprenticeship-patterns/9780596806842/ch04s05.html

From the blog CS@Worcester – Onwards to becoming an expert developer by dtran365 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

One of the most important lessons that I have learned from being in a computer science program is to surround myself with people who value computing as much as I do and push me to challenge myself and learn more about the field. When I first started working on my computer science degree, I tended to isolate myself from other people in the major and work on projects or assignments alone. However, over time, I did eventually start to find “my people,” or the people who were also pushing themselves through the program, focusing on improving their skills as well. This week’s apprenticeship pattern, “Kindred Spirits,” emphasizes how essential it really is to have people who not only support your growth in computer science, but also understand what it’s like to go through what you’re going through.

The problem that Kindred Spirits seeks to address is the situation where the apprentice feels like they are “stranded” without help or guidance from mentors or other supporters in the community of computing. They may feel like they are walking the CS path alone, which, in such a huge, rapidly-changing field, can be detrimental towards the apprentice’s success.

The solution is, in short, to get in contact with people who are involved in the same road of knowledge, as well as joining communities that encourage that growth. For some, this form of reaching out may be easy, but for others, it may take more effort to put themselves out there. For me, I tend to have difficulties with joining new groups, especially if I don’t know anyone from the group. But, as I’ve been progressing through the computer science major, I have acquired some great friends along the way who know how difficult this journey can be. For example, one of my pals, James (here’s his blog), and I have consistently collaborated on assignments and projects for a lot of our classes, and getting through those courses definitely would have been more difficult without the support from someone who is also working hard to learn more about CS. I’m also looking forward to meeting and working with my new co-workers, who I’m certain also possess that passion and determination to learn more about computing and want to share that passion with others.

Thanks for reading!

From the blog CS@Worcester – Hi, I'm Kat. by Kat Law and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

For this weeks blog post I will be looking into he Use Your Title pattern. The context behind this one is that as a result of your dedication to learning, you’ve been hired or promoted into a position with a title containing the words senior, architect or lead. The problem that will arise from this is that the job title doesn’t actually match what you see in the mirror. When you introduce yourself into this new setting you feel as if you have to apologize or explain the difference between your skill level in your actual job description. A solution to this is that you shouldn’t allow the title to actually affect you. Its just a distraction that should be kept on the outskirts of your active conscious. Use the title only to gauge your organization not yourself. Don’t get fooled by a fancy title, your mother might think you deserve it but the impressive title and responsibilities mean your apprenticeship is over. They serve only to remind you that there is a shortage of craftsmen in the industry. While on the other side of this coin is an unimpressive title despite the fact that you may have surpassed your colleagues. The frustration that comes from a lack of recognition should remind you that the industry has a problem. Using this as a measurement of your own organization and fitting it rather than allowing the frustration to bog you down. Another variant that comes from this theme is the informal versus formal titles. For example you may have grown into a position of authority on your own team despite the formal title remaining. These informal titles can be hard to actually ignore, because they are constantly reinforced by peers and colleagues. These titles remain even if they conflict with your own self assessment, keeping with your mentors and kindred spirits will be critical to keeping you grounded in reality. The recommended action to all of this is simply write down a long and descriptive version of your job title. Making sure it accurately reflects what you really do at work and your skill level. This is again another pattern that I agree with and can see myself using in the future.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Matt's Blog by mattyd99 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.