I’m talking about being a good software developer in terms of managing your career, reaching your goals, and enjoying your life.
John Z. Sonmez

Soft Skills: The software developer's life manual is a unique guide, offering techniques and practices for a more satisfying life as a professional software developer. In it, developer and life coach John Sonmez addresses a wide range of important "soft" topics, from career and productivity to personal finance and investing, and even fitness and relationships, all from a developer-centric viewpoint.

Community Reviews

from goodreads

Some reviews are positive but some critical,I copy some of them here, and I will read the whole book no matter how other readers thought about it.On the one hand, I'd like to gain some advise from the writer,and on the other hand, I regard reading this book as a opportunity to practice my poor English.

wanlong ma 2017-08-30

• Mohammad Khatib
  Enjoyed the amount of diverse topics this book had, from different career paths you can choose as a programmer to negotiating your salary to investing. It really gives you a bird's-eye view of your past, current and future career moves and what you could have done better and what you could do better in in the future. I wish I've read this earlier in my career, though I wouldn't be sure if I would relate to it as much as now, it felt that I am reading it at the right time, but a lot of the details I wished I've read more about early on.We tend to ignore these soft skills and focus on what we do best and are comfortable with, coding. I came to realize that these soft skills are as important as any other technical skills you might posses and develop. Really enjoyed the books concise and small chapters, it gave me an achievable goal to everyday (read 5 chapters every day).

• Josh Hamacher
  Clearly I'm in the minority, but I don't see how this book has attracted so many four- and five-star ratings here and on Amazon. I purchased it sight-unseen based entirely on the strength of the reviews and dove right in, but soon found myself skimming it, hoping to find the few passages that didn't read like they were copy for a TV infomercial commentator.

  It's not that this book is entirely wrong - in fact, there is some actual useful information here. The health and fitness section, for example, is pretty solid and generally avoids recommending fad diets or the like. But many chapters are almost entirely devoid of actual content, instead sounding very much like the overly-enthusiastic inspirational speaker parodied in so many comedies.

  I suppose, if you've never spent any time at all introspecting, have never thought about why you do the things you do and how you can do them better, this book might be more useful for you.

Section 1. Career

• Most software developers starting out in their careers make a few huge mistakes. The biggest of those mistakes, by far, is not treating their software development career as a business.
  很多程序员一开始就错了，他们没有将软件开发当做一档生意来看待。

• This is the first thing you must do in your career: switch your mindset from that of an indentured servant to a business person who is running their own business. Just having this mindset at the start will change the way you think about your career and cause you to be mindful and present in the active management of it.
  首要的是你要把看待自己身份从一个合同工的转变成为一个生意人。这样的思维转变将会使你注意看待自己职业生涯的方式。

• Most businesses need a few things to be successful.First, you need to have a product or a service.
  大多是生意的成功需要一些产品或者服务。

• The service you provide as a software developer has a tangible value, and it’s your job to communicate not only what that value is, but what makes it different than the offerings of thousands of other software developers out there.
  作为developer，你所提供的产品或者服务具有有形资产的价值，你要做的事情不仅是发现这些价值，而且还要让这些使之有别于其他成千上万developer所具有的。
  => 形成自己的品牌和核心竞争力

• You’ve actually got to be able to let potential customers know about that product or service if you want to make any money

• Think about ways you can improve your offering. Think about how you can specialize the service you’re providing to serve the needs of a particular type of client or industry. Focus on being a specialist who provides a very specialized set of services to a very particular type of client. (Remember, as a software developer looking for a good job, you only really need to land one client.) Also think about how best to spread the word about your service and find your customers. Most software developers create a resume and blast it out to companies and recruiters. But, when you think about your career as a business, do you really think that is the best and only way to prospect potential clients? Of course not. Most successful companies figure out how to get customers to come to them to buy their products or services; they don’t go out chasing customers one by one. You can do the same thing by making yourself a more marketable software developer through many of the techniques we’ll discuss in section 2 of this book. Even without getting into the specifics, the point is to think outside of the box and start thinking like a business. What is the best way you can attract customers and how can you tell them about the service you have to offer?

• Focus on what service you’re providing and how to market that service. Think about ways you can improve your offering. Think about how you can specialize the service you’re providing to serve the needs of a particular type of client or industry. Focus on being a specialist who provides a very specialized set of services to a very particular type of client. (Remember, as a software developer looking for a good job, you only really need to land one client.

• Think about a business that has a product or service they offer. How do they differentiate and advertise that product or service? If you had to describe the specific service you can provide a perspective employer or client in a single sentence, what would it be? How does treating your career like a business affect the way you Do your work Handle finances Look for a job or new clients

• You might have a very different set of goals for your career than I do, but if you’re ever going to achieve any of those goals, you have to know what they are

• We don’t tend to give enough thought to what to focus on and as a result our steps lack purpose or direction

• Whatever your reason may be for not defining goals for your career, now is the time to do it. Not tomorrow, not next week, but right now. Every step you take without a clear direction is a wasted step. Don’t randomly walk through life without a purpose for your career

• Your big goal should be something not too specific, but clear enough that you can know if you’re steering toward it or not. Think about what you want to ultimately do with your career. Do you want to become a manager or executive at a company? Do you want to go out and start your own software development business some day? Do you want to become an entrepreneur creating your own product and bringing it to market? For me, my goal was always to eventually be able to get out on my own and work for myself.

• Once you’ve figured out what your big, far-off goal is, the next step is to chart a course to get there by making smaller goals along the way. Sometimes it helps to think backwards from your big goal to your present situation. If you had already achieved your big goal, what would have been some of the milestones along the way? What path could you imagine tracing backwards from your big goal to your present situation?

• If you can make small goals that gradually move you forward in the direction toward your bigger goals, you’ll eventually reach your destination. It’s important to have various sizes of goals that lead you in the direction of your big goal.

• The smaller goals keep you on track and motivated so that you keep heading in the direction of your bigger goals. If you set out to accomplish a big goal and don’t have smaller goals along the way, you don’t end up having time to course-correct when you’re off track. Smaller goals also give you frequent rewards that help motivate you. Small victories each day and each week help us feel like we’re making progress and accomplishing things, which makes us feel good about ourselves and helps us keep moving forward. Smaller goals also don’t seem as daunting as a big goal.