What am I going to do in the next 6 months to be a better developer?
So I've been tagged by Ducas. I thought I'd avoid all this but you know what they say - "You can run, but you can't hide!"
The funny thing is I don't actually consider myself as a classic developer any more. My recent history has been as a CTO and more often than not that has meant talking about technology and how it applies to business rather than implementing that technology - after all, that's what my staff did for me :-)
When I left and joined Readify I did so as a senior consultant and even at Readify I don't spend all day coding. There's a lot of talking about technology that still goes on as well as mentoring, educating, guiding and listening. Coding definitely occurs but it's not as dominant a part of the day as one might think.
My professional development goals this year are focussed on becoming more of a thought leader in agile methods, improving my .NET 3.0 knowledge (especially cardspace & identity 2.0) and getting my head around SQL 2008.
The thing that most interests me is the agile methodologies. I believe strongly that development is a whole lot more than just learning technologies and cutting the best damn code you can. Development is about so much more than that - it's about communication, team work, broad knowledge, good tooling, good environments, great management, a focus on quality, a willingness to work outside your specific job function, a desire to continually improve everything you do and to strive to learn more. Great developers show all of these traits.
So what am I going to do in the next 6 months to be a better developer? Improve all of the above of course! Not just my technical knowledge and skills (which I'm still working the rust off) but the soft skills as well - and whatever opportunity I'm in, making sure I take the time to learn new knowledge just as much as I take the time to impart knowledge to others.