26 Nov 2024 #career
That’s question I found on dev.to. Here’s my full answer:
I’ve had mentors. But, not formally and without the label.
I can pinpoint two or three people in my career that were like “mentors.”
At a past job, I had the chance to work next to my team architects and learned a lot from them. From the value of reading other people’s code to rejecting requests politely. Here are some of those lessons, by the way.
And at another job, one day I decided to reach out to my boss’ boss with genuine questions, not related to the job. He was open and kind enough to answer them. He liked reading books too and we connected on that. From that point, we started to have 1-1s outside the usual meetings. He recommended a long list of books to me.
If you’re looking for a mentor, don’t ask anyone to “be your mentor.” That would imply commitment from one side. Most of the time, for free.
Instead of asking someone “to be your mentor”:
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Approach him with genuine questions: Bring your own challenges and how you’re trying to face them. Ask what he would do if he were in your shoes.
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Show interest in him: Ask your “not-mentor” about his career progression and choices. People like talking about themselves.
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Help him somehow too: When I found books my not-mentor would like, I also brought them to our conversations.
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Show you’re taking action on the advice or input you’re given: I followed up with my not-mentor, sharing lessons I learned from the books he recommended to me.
With those four steps, you will be in a mentorship—without even realizing it.
But, don’t worry if you don’t have a mentor or can’t find one.
Mentors are everywhere. The good thing is you don’t have to meet them. 200-500 books are a good mentor. I learned that from James Altucher, a mentor I haven’t met.
25 Nov 2024 #misc
It took me two years to learn English.
And by “learning English” I mean, a traditional language school gave me a signed piece of paper that says I speak English. After two years, lots of repeat-after-me sessions and grammar exercises, someone finally said I was able to speak English.
I didn’t start learning English from scratch. We’re taking English classes in school since kindergarten, probably.
But if I had to start from almost scratch to learn a language for work, here’s what I’d do:
With AI
- Make a list of common situations at work: Daily meetings, 1-1s, or retrospectives.
- Ask ChatGPT or Copilot to generate short conversations or stories for those situations using the most common words. For example, a daily meeting where you report that you’re stuck with a task.
- Use elevenlabs or any other text-to-speech tool to turn those conversations into spoken words.
- Rinse and repeat.
With YouTube
- Take a beginner’s course on a subject you already know. In your target language, of course. The goal is not to learn that particular subject but to learn new vocabulary.
- Turn the course subtitles or script into phrases to assemble and interchange.
- Rinse and repeat.
Et voilà!
24 Nov 2024 #writing
There will only be writes and write-nots.
That’s Paul Graham’s prediction about the future of writing in the days of AI.
Here are my comments on Paul Graham’s post:
1. “To write well you have to think clearly, and thinking clearly is hard”
Clear thinking is the most important reason to write. You need to order your thoughts before putting them on paper or in a document.
If you know how to write and how to speak in public, you’re unstoppable. I heard that from Jordan Peterson somewhere on YouTube.
Write to think and don’t outsource your thinking.
2. “Writing pervades many jobs”
That’s true for us, coders and software engineers too. Writing is everywhere in our software projects. From README files to user stories to product announcements.
And, the higher up you go, it’s less about coding and more about communication. And except for meetings, you’ll spend more time writing than coding.
3. “Almost all pressure to write has dissipated”
Sure, AI can generate blog posts, sales pages, and any other form of writing.
But, by design, AI generates average writing. That’s its goal. We can tell it by looking at the opening line of any AI-generated text. “In the realm of…” or “In the world of…” Nothing screams AI more than that.
AI will bring more average content. We’re already seeing it. Try searching anything in Google these days.
The printing press didn’t kill books. Social networks didn’t kill bars. Instragram didn’t kill photography.
AI won’t kill writing. AI will only make writing more valuable than ever.
23 Nov 2024 #misc
That was what Seth Godin answered during an interview with Jim Kwik for the Kwik Brain podcast. Jim asked him about mindset shifts for people stuck in the ideation phase, struggling to take action.
Then Seth expanded his answer by saying:
“Let’s start with a small solution first…Let’s figure out what’s the smallest habit change that would lead you to create the conditions for the system to support you in where you’re going.”
Seth used back pain as an example. Before going through back surgery, we should change shoes, lose weight, and walk. Those steps require 10 minutes a day. Less effort and commitment than surgery.
I connect that idea with James Altucher’s Daily Practice. By doing something every day for our body, mind, and spirit, we’re creating the conditions to support change in our lives.
22 Nov 2024 #misc
In professional settings, native speakers aren’t the ones who reject non-native speakers by their speaking skills. Other non-native speakers are.
The other day I referred a friend (with good English skills. B2, probably) to the same software agency I was working with. He got rejected. The recruiter (another non-native speaker) rejected him because he had “a strong accent like someone from India.”
Arrrggg! You know what…
Everybody has an accent.
I have an accent, even when speaking my native language. There’s no such thing as a neutral accent, maybe only on TV and in films.
The purpose of learning a second language is communication, not perfection.
Fluency is about connecting with others, not about making 0 mistakes. And, at the end of the day, nobody speaks perfectly in any language.