Develpreneur: Become A Better Developer And Entrepreneur

There is an old saying that we should underpromise and overdeliver.  This may seem obvious to us, but it is worth considering in our career and business.  In fact, this approach is one of the best recipes for success in both your individual career and that of your company or employer. Underpromise and Overdeliver to Separate from Competition There are many ways to appeal to customers, but this concept is not often put forward.  The underlying message follows these lines, but it is rarely stated.  Instead, we often see marketing focus on quality, features, and other things that are easy to market.  Value does touch on this concept, but it does not rise to the same level in my mind.  However, part of the problem is how to market this idea.  A good example of this idea is to promise that a customer always gets more than they expect.  How many companies promise to always exceed expectations?  This promise sets the bar too high for most of us.  Instead, business runs on setting expectations and meeting them. A Pra

Like any area of technology, there is a lot to know about databases.  We are not going to cover all of them.  In this episode, we will look at popular modern databases and keep to a non-technical overview. Databases Come In Many Types There are many database solutions available on the market.  These range from the familiar relational databases to lesser-used ones like object databases.  Each of these has its own set of strengths and weaknesses to be assessed for your needs.  The only way to be capable of this sort of assessment is to become familiar with the types out there and the projects that are best for each. They Are Easy To Use The good news is that we have a large number of free and open source options that are available.  There are also a similar number of tools including Toad and DBVisualizer that helps us abstract everyday database administration tasks.  When you combine these avenues for easy access, there is no excuse for integrating a database in your application and building your experience. Ho

It may be my background in technology, but I find automation to be the greatest way to improve productivity.  This time-saving mechanism is not new either.  We can look back a hundred years to see where assembly lines and automation allowed us to progress rapidly.  In fact, computers are made for automation. Automation is Not Just Technology Even though computers have given us a wealth of automation options, there are low tech methods available as well.  At its essence, automation is the concept of "killing two birds with one stone."  When we combine efforts or tasks through batching we get extra work done in the same time frame.  Thus, we automatically have less to do.  For example, I automate mail delivery by having my kids check the mail each day when they return from school.  It is no extra time for them and allows me to have mail delivered right to my desk automatically. However, Technology Should Be Embraced The goal of nearly every software application is to either save or consume our time.  For exampl

There are many ways to monetize the work we have been discussing.  For example, advertising is a typical avenue for a revenue stream.  However, it does not have a high likelihood of being substantial in most cases.  Instead, offer a product or service to generate real revenue quickly.  The problem is that finding work is easier said than done.  Never fear, here are a few suggestions to get you started. Finding Work on the Internet The Internet is an excellent resource for finding work.  The best place to start is work sites like Guru and Upwork.  These sites are built to connect job seekers and job providers.  However, they do require some effort and patience to find a good project for your skill set.  These sites often have small to medium size projects that can be done in days or a few weeks.  The requirements for these projects are small and well-defined in many cases as well.  Thus, you can look for needs that you can address without fear of learning new technologies. That being said, there is an art of s

The primary communication method and tool of a developer is code.  There are hundreds of such languages in use.  Thus, learning development languages is an essential part of a development career.  No matter when you started developing there were languages that existed, and new ones pop up each year.  This situation only gets more complicated when you consider frameworks and libraries for many of these platforms. Learning Development Languages is Never Ending A true developer is always going to be pushed to grow their skill set.  This fact applies to libraries and frameworks, new technologies, and learning development languages.  The biggest challenge of this need for continuous learning is to do so while still keeping up with the demands of our primary job.  We simply do not have enough time in a day, week, or month, to attend the boot camps or read the books required to accomplish these goals. Slow and Steady Wins the Race THere are many ways to overcome this obstacle of time vs. the need to learn.  Personal

We live in a world full of distractions.  That fact does not go away just because we have a goal or focus.  In fact, those little distractions can be harder to identify when they are in line with our primary goal.  These are the small time wasters and productivity thieves that hide as helpers. Focus Must Be Guarded Any entrepreneur lives with a steady stream of new ideas.  However, too many of us underestimate our natural creative state.  In fact, we all are creatives to some extent and have to deal with a steady of temptations to drift from our primary goal.  Our struggle can be with big and common time-wasters like Facebook or the latest Netflix series, but these are not the most dangerous.  In this episode, we look at the tasks that feel like they are helping, but are taking us away from our goal.  These functions are not a waste, they often have value and may even be essential.  They just are not worth pursuing at the moment.  Thus, we look at how to regularly review our focus and how to remove those dist

Whether you are just getting started or your business is decades old, customers are critical to success.  In fact, without your customer base, there is no business.  So let's look at some ways to build loyalty and grow your core of customers. A Strong Customer Base When we look at a customer base, we look beyond the numbers.  A core of 100 purchasers of your product is better when they are loyal customers and not one-time buyers.  Thus, we have to provide an experience and build a relationship, not just provide a product or service.  This challenge can seem to be a huge hill to climb when we start.  However, there are some tools and channels to start and grow our base no matter what we offer. This episode may seem aimed at those starting out.  That is not exactly the case.  We can grow to a point where we are comfortable with our size and reach.  At this point, we may think that our base is constant and needs less time and attention.  Unfortunately, that situation is never real.  Competing products and servic

Any good developer has to start with an environment for their work.  These requirements can be an expensive obstacle to overcome.  However, Amazon has made their extensive network and resources available to all of us.  There is a cost, of course, but it is easy to scale.  They even have a free tier of services. Your Personal Data Center The suite of services provided by Amazon called Amazon Web Services is often called AWS.  These offerings cover dozens of needs of modern developers.  Better yet, these tools are easy to use and secure by default.  This topic is a great place to start your development roadmap.  It is also where any company should turn as they are being launched.  This episode looks at some of the essential first steps and features to review so that a secure foundation can be built. The Free Tier The bulk of the services and usage of AWS are not free.  The costs vary on a sliding scale based on usage.  Thus, even the highest end services are made affordable.  However, we do also touch on the fr

There are many measures of success.  Fame and fortune often top this list.  However, when you think about it, a life of contentment is the real measure of success.  Once we reach this conclusion we need to dig into what makes us content.  This is our personal key to happiness. Contentment Comes From Your "Why" The are many ways to achieve contentment.  However, anyone that is truly content has found and addressed the "why" in their life.  This goal may be a happy family, financial security, the ability to give to or support others, or many other achievements.  So our first step needs to be figuring out the "why" that drives us.  This is the reward we achieve for a job well done. I must warn you that your "why" is not always obvious.  It also may evolve as you go through life.  As we have seasons of life, we also seem to have seasons of "why."  Thus, whether you know what yours is or not, this is a good time to reflect on it. In this episode, we look at the value of "why" and how it may lead you to product and

Any good business generates revenue.  However, this fact can impede growth.  The desire to work hard and increase revenue can be a tactical decision that ignores good strategy.  In this episode, we look at some steps you can take to keep yourself from losing the big picture. Strong Companies Require Business Development The problem with strong revenue is that it is a short-term value.  I can sell a million dollars worth of product in one day.  However, that does mean I will ever sell even $1 worth of product again.  This example is obvious and simplified.  Nevertheless, it is a microcosm of working in your business rather than on it. The current revenue numbers we see may keep us happy, content, or too busy to look ahead.  That approach may be sufficient, but what about the competition?  When a company decides to coast where it is at that leaves opportunities for others to whittle away at the customer base.  IBM had a chance at owning the desktop market but decided to ignore it.  That opened the door for Micr

Our focus on technology can make improvement appear to be impossible.  The industry is moving at an incredible pace so keeping up is hard enough.  Thus, getting head is too much to ask.  We have found that technical improvement while staying current is not impossible.  It just requires us to keep a steady pace of improvement. Technical Improvement Requires Steady Use The challenge in growing our skills is to stay current in our existing skills while still learning new things.  When we are intentional about our growth, these two factors can be addressed as one.  Although incremental steps are the focus of this episode we also will need to take a big picture view.  We will look at setting up annual goals so those daily increments build on each other. Our daily work schedule can vary in its focus.  We tend to be at the mercy of our boss or customers.  Our learning approach does not have to be the same.  In this episode, we look at how to plan out our learning and build on our skills every day.  When this approac

Our efforts to become a better developer and entrepreneur are only valuable if they lead to living better.  Therefore, we cannot limit our discussions to just those two topics.  In this series, we will look at how to work better.  Also, we will explore how to accomplish that without sacrificing a fulfilling life. Living Better is Our Ultimate goal The worst thing I can imagine is if someone follows our blog and podcast, is successful, but has an empty life.  The goals of skills and success are pointless when our health and relationships are ignored.  Nevertheless, our time is limited so we will also look at ways to make the most of this valuable resource.  Our ultimate goal is to squeeze all we can out of life in a way that leaves us happy and fulfilled. I am living the happy and fulfilled life, so I want to share what has worked for me.  Your experience and journey will be different.  However, I hope my success helps you believe that you can do the same, and sooner than you expect.  

Becoming a better developer requires us to understand the business side of our solutions.  Therefore, this series of topics is highly valuable.  They also help our goal of becoming a better entrepreneur.  This first episode provides an overview of what to expect from the business-focused category. Why Business-Focused? One of the big complaints about developers is a lack of building solutions for the "real world."  Thus, we want to spend time looking at how to tie our latest technical advances back to well-grounded business needs.  In the long run, this will help us avoid building solutions in an ivory tower.  This approach also helps us build solutions that sell.  Therefore, adding to our bottom line rather than purely an academic exercise. Although our site starts out with a blog and a content business, this is not our only focus.  We will discuss the product and service-based businesses as well.  Our goal is to provide value every episode regardless of your entrepreneurial bias.  If you find this interesti

We will start the tech track of episodes with an overview of what topics to expect.  This discussion also helps tie our past blog post articles into these upcoming podcast episodes.  We want to set a suitable destination as we embark on this journey.  Thus, this too looks at what we think makes for a better developer. Be A Better Developer We start from ground zero.  However, it will not hurt to try out our Launching an Internet Business series of tutorials.  The tutorials ask for only a few minutes a day and are a great tool for building a habit.  They also help you see where we are coming from.  All of this as well as some of the areas we like to visit in becoming better ourselves.  This is not a journey you will take alone, we are all in it with you. I also see this and the next two episodes as a sort of introduction to who I am and my goals in this podcast.  Develpreneur has been created out of a love for all of us to do a better job as developers so let's not waste any more time.

The Podcast Overview This episode starts us on our journey to become a better developer.  We look at the planned release schedule and structure along with why this podcast came into being.  The episodes will cover three main topics that make up a great developer. These are technical skills, entrepreneurial drive, and life-hacking/life balance tips and tricks. We have a busy road ahead so this provides a high-level overview. The next three episodes will involve going more deeply into the topic areas that will be visited each week.