Latest / DevQuestions with Tim Corey / 067 How Do I Add Value As An Employee? How Do I Make A Good Impression?

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067 How Do I Add Value As An Employee? How Do I Make A Good Impression? · DevQuestions with Tim Corey

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Dev Questions Podcast with Tim Corey.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Join us each episode as we tackle the questions you are asking about a career in software development, understanding the industry, and new technology.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you're just starting out or you want to grow stronger as a developer, this is the place to get your questions answered.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: Now, here's your host, expert developer and online educator, Tim Corey.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: How can I become the best possible employee I can be?
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: How do I make a good impression on a new boss?
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: How do I add value to my team and to my employer?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: These are questions that have come up recently on videos that I've done, including the one recently on how to get a raise as a developer.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought it'd be good to lump them together and talk about each of them because I think they're all interrelated.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: And part of this comes down to a very tricky bit, which is how do you maintain this appropriate balance?
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: The balance between being a great employee while also not selling your soul out to your employer or not uh destroying the rest of your life to your employee to your employer in order to gain nothing, really.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: So let's talk about that balance and let's talk about how to succeed in your job, how to make your boss uh happy and thrilled that you're an employee.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: So let's talk first about the work-life balance.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a very big proponent of the fact that we don't uh live to work, we don't just live to spend all of our time, all of our effort, all of our mental energy at a job.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: And if you do that, if you do work or live just to work, then the rest of your life really crumbles and you end up with a pretty miserable life if you're not careful.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't want that for you.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: On the other hand, there is the key that we need to work well where we work, otherwise, our boss isn't real throat with us, we don't have a great interaction with them, we have a lot of strife and anxiety, we potentially lose our jobs, we have a lot of problems at work, and that's not good either.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: So we want to have this balance of working well when we're at work, but also leaving work at work and not just living to work.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: So let's talk about um the ways to do this.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: And the first way is that when you're at work, so let's say you work 40 hours a week, you work uh nine to five every day, Monday through Friday, you have the weekends off.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: Well, when you show up to work, be present.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: This is something that has gotten more difficult over the years because the fact that we have um cell phones that are always connected to the internet, that have things like Facebook and Twitter and you know, texting and all the rest, where you kind of get dragged away from work.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_01: You're thinking about other things.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: This can drag you down as far as an employee, it can suck away your concentration, it can suck away your um motivation at work, and that can hurt your um standing in the eyes of your employer.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: And for good reason, if they're paying you to do something and you're not really doing it, that's a problem.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: So be careful on when you show up to work, be present.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: At the same time, when you leave work, leave work there.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_01: Don't continue to dwell on it if you can.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: I I still do at times, I still go, oh, I had I have an idea about that problem.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: I want to solve that problem.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'll write something down or I'll make a note or I'll even jump in and do it.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: But um, because I work from home.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: But at the same time, you try to be present at home as well.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: So when you're at home, you are fully present with your family, you're fully present in your relaxation.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: So those are some key, like just overall.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: But let's talk about key ways that we can make a great impression on our boss, on our team, and really excel at our jobs in two different scenarios.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: The first scenario is you're brand new.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you just switched jobs, maybe you you have a job for the first time.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: What are some things you can do to really make a great impression?
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: And right out of the gate, the first thing that you want to be careful of is don't try to change everything.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you have some previous experience, maybe you just came from college and you've learned all the new stuff.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever it is, don't come in and say, okay, we need to change everything, everything is wrong.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, my professor said this, my Tim said that.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, let's change it all.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: Don't do that.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: You need to have some humility there and learn before you start saying, let's make systemic changes throughout.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: Let's um say that everything you were doing is wrong.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's very difficult to make a good impression while telling a person that the way they've been doing it is wrong.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's hard.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: So instead of doing that, learn why those things were made.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: I have gone through my code and I've said I've gone through code that I thought was somebody else's, and I said, man, they made some really bad choices here.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: They made some really bad choices here, and then I find out it's my code, and I go, oh, shoot, that was me.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so then I have a little more sympathy, but then I may still be down myself, man, that was bad choices.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I try and redo it and find out, oh, there's this problem, and there's that problem.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: And before I know it, I'm making the same exact choice I made two years ago.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I realize, oh, there's a reason why it's not the perfect code, because there's these exceptions.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so having that understanding changes my viewpoint and go, okay, I shouldn't judge the person who did that, whether it's me or somebody else, I shouldn't judge them too harshly because yeah, they made the best of what they could.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: I used to live in an old house.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: House was built in the 1850s.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: Well, when I first started working on repairing some of the plumbing and uh replacing some walls and other things, I was very frustrated.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, why did they do this way?
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: This was dumb.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: They shouldn't have done it this way.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then when I really start peeling the layers back and figuring out what's going on, I find out, oh, that's why they did that.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, for example, the entire house, nothing was square.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: There was not a square angle in the house.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: I actually hung something on the wall that was level and it drove me nuts because the ceiling wasn't square and the floor wasn't square.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: So what was actually level didn't look level.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: So you learn to cheat.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: You learn to kind of make it look good by the eye rather than look good based on gravity.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: So there's things like that where you go, oh, okay, that's why you did that.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's why that thing wasn't level, because the ceiling and floor weren't either.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: So those kind of things that you learn over time, if you just come in and say, nope, things need to be level, things need to be square, things need to be you insult the people who came before, and you haven't learned the lessons you need to yet to make those changes.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: So be careful, don't just come right in and say, let's change everything.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: Have some humility, learn the system first.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: On the other hand, you do have fresh eyes.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: Meaning, people who've been working in something for 20 years may not have thought of something.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: Again, this is not the time to say change it, but what it is a time to say is, hey, I have a question for you.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: I'm wondering, is there a reason why you did not do this?
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: Or is there a reason why you haven't considered this?
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: Ask not as a a veiled you should do this, but ask genuinely to learn the answer.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: In doing so, you may get answers like, I hadn't thought of that, or I'm not sure why.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: And at that point, you can say, hey, would it be alright if I create a little demo of how we could do this just to see if it's any better or not?
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: But again, you're the expert.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: I just want to know from your opinion.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: You see how that changes the perspective?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's not me saying you're wrong here.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's I have a question, I'd like to learn more.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: You're still putting them above yourself, you're still having humility.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: And at the same time, you're providing that perspective, that fresh perspective that they might not have.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: So that's another thing you can do when you're new in a position because you have those fresh eyes.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: And that may be two, three, five years down the road, you're still doing stuff like that.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: And that's great.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: Another thing that often gets overlooked, but I tell you what, if I had a name, a number one thing I would want a new hire to do, it's this document what you learn.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: Onboarding procedures are almost universally horrible.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: We just don't have time.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: And once you're in the job, you don't think about getting a new person up to speed necessarily.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: So you forget to document things, you don't write things down, and then when a new hire does come on, you're like, oh man, we have to um okay, we need to get Visual Studio installed.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: Cool.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: Which version?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: Where does it come from?
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'll find that out.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, now we need to get this installed, uh SQL Server Management Studio.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, where from, what version, and so on.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so you start documenting those things.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we got Visual Studio, this version, from this location.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: We installed it here.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: We got SSMS from this location, this version, and installed it here.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um these are the things that are the, you know, um the things that you wouldn't be able to find on Google, like our custom software.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: Here's the things to know about that custom software.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna have to learn that.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, document it.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: Because at the end of this, you will have documentation you can turn around and give to the next new hire.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's valuable, very valuable.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's something that I think that every new hire should do.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: Document what you learn.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's good for you because now you don't have to ask the same question twice.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_01: All right, questions are great as a new hire.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: Ask the questions, don't just assume or try to hide the fact that you forgot or don't remember or don't know.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: Don't do that.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: Ask the question, but then write down the answer.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: Because what's frustrating as a senior developer, as a manager, is not the question.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: That question is not frustrating.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: What's frustrating is answering that same question three, four, five, six times.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's frustrating because the first time you don't know.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: And it's you shouldn't have to know.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: The second time, you forgot.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: The third time, you're wasting my time.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: You are not doing anything on your own to retain that.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: You're just using me as your personal Google.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's not okay.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: I have things to do.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: So that's where documentation will really help because you will not have to ask repeat questions, and you can give those same answers to the next person, and they don't even have to ask those questions.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: So great stuff there.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: If I had a number one thing, that would be it.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: Document what you learn in a way that is clear, in a step-by-step manner, and something you can give to the next person.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: All right, finally, and this kind of goes back to the stuff we've already been talking about with new hires.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: Listen a lot.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: Listen to everything people say, take notes.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: Even if it's at lunchtime, or even if it's um kind of a more casual conversation, write down things that are important.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, record them, maybe ask a question or two, but try to listen a lot and speak sparingly.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: When you have a new hire and all they do is talk, then it feels like they're not actually here to learn, they're here to teach you, and that's kind of arrogant.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: So you want to make sure that you are listening more than you're speaking, that you are trying to learn the new system.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: Don't just override and say, Well, I know best.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: That comes across as arrogant, whether it is or not.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: So these are the things that I think new hires would really benefit from when moving into a new team, when learning a new system, when learning a new boss, learning how things work.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_01: Talk to people.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you get become an established developer, once you uh kind of transition, there are some things that would really help you as well.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: And the number one thing here is to continue to learn and grow.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: As a manager, the thing that I want to see from my employees is that they continue to grow as employees, they continue to become better at their job, not just by writing more code, which is helpful, but by learning new procedures, new ways of doing things, new systems, new ideas, and continue to grow.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: Because when you stop growing, you stagnate.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: When you stagnate, the business stagnates.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: When the business stagnates, it becomes in danger of dying.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: So you don't want that.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: You want to keep that fresh new growth to continue to push everything forward.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing is new employees may be coming on who have less experience than you do.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: Mentor them, whether it's official or not.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: Come alongside them, help them, make them feel part of the team, make them feel welcome.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: If you can better integrate someone, if you can get them to a place where they're comfortable in the team, they will perform better.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: And if they perform better, then the team as a whole performs better.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: So this can be huge.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: Invest in people, all right?
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: And then finally, like I said before, be invested when you're at work.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: So when you show up to work, make sure that you're invested in pushing the company forward, in pushing the product forward, in being the best that you can be while you're being paid.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: When you leave, that's fine.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Check out, be done.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: Wait until the next day they come back in to be invested again.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: But during those work hours, be invested.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: Now, here's a few more tips for everybody.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't matter where you are in the uh new to experienced ladder.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: If you have the opportunity, if you have any kind of repetitive task, see if you can automate it.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: The more you can automate, the faster you will get your job done, the more you'll have opportunities to do other things.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, a little example of this, this is really what launched my career.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, it's not an exaggeration to say that this is the reason why I am where I am today.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: Way back when I was 17, I was actually hired to be an intern to an electrical engineer.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: And the job was really it was an engineer trying to help out a kid.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: He that's really what he was doing.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: He was saying, Hey, I can I can help you out, I can at least show you what an engineer does, and by the way, give you a few bucks as well.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: So it was a great opportunity.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things that he did was he had a whole bunch of, quite frankly, boring, awful work for me to do, which is what interns usually get.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I got boxes and boxes and boxes of handwritten spreadsheets that I had to then put into the computer.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: And they were greasy, they were grimy, they were from a factory floor, so it was just a mess.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: But that was my job was input these into the computer.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: And that was my entire summer work was to put that stuff into the computer.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: But I learned some, I figured out patterns, I figured out how I could make things a little faster, not entirely fast.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't have like a scanner that could scan it all and do OCR.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: So I had to do it by hand, but I figured out ways to make it faster, to make it automated, to replace certain things with automations.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was able to get all of my summer work done in a much, much shorter period of time, which left me without any work to do.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when my boss said, Well, if you have I have nothing else for you to do, so let's let's create some more work.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: Let's see if you can figure out how to do this access database.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when I started building databases and start building code to support them, and started building UIs, and and I built out applications to help the business.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: And it became it came about because I did the grunt work and I did it, I was invested where I was when I was there.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't just slacking off and saying, Well, you know, no one knows how fast I can do this, I'll do it slow.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: I did it as fast as possible to get through it.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: And don't get me wrong, the reason I did that is because I didn't want to do it anymore.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so I figured I had to do it, so I could either drag my feet and make this a long process, or I could do as fast as I could and get over it.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what I did.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: I got I got through it, got over it, and got to the cooler stuff that I could do.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: I started building code, and from there I became a software developer.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: That's what that's where I really started professionally as a software developer, starting to build code and and really fell in love with what I could do with that and got the opportunity to do even more.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: So automate everything you can, and number two, approach every problem with a positive attitude.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: A person who is a downer drags everyone down.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: A person who is fatalistic, a person who is a complainer, they're not fun to be around.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: And yes, you may can you may have some camaraderie with hey, let's everybody complain about this situation.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: I get that.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: That's you know, that's that's part of being in a job, um, is having things to complain about.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: But at the same time, approach problems with the positive attitude of let's see how we can conquer this, let's see how we can make this better, let's see how we can improve this.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: I tell you what, you do those things, and your boss will love it.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I have to put a caveat here.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Not every boss, yes, there are some bosses out there that are horrible.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: I totally get that.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: But you know what?
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: Do what you can where you're at, be as positive as possible, even in a bad situation.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: Be still present in a bad situation, try to do as much as you can, even if you're looking for other jobs, because sometimes that just being present in a bad job and saying, I'm gonna do it anyways, will be a uh something that somebody else sees.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: And they could want an employee and they say, you know what, I want that employee, and that might open opportunities for you as well.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: That has happened to me.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: So, yes, you can have bad jobs, yes, you can have bad bosses, yes, you can have bad situations, but if you can still be fully present when you're at work, when you're being paid to be there, be fully present, approach things with a positive attitude, look to automate as much as possible, and then document those procedures, document things, create that documentation that everybody needs and no one wants to do.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: Those kind of things can really help out your standing in the company, your standing with your boss, your standing on the team as well.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so that's my suggestion.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, you can add value.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: That's a question that came up.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, can I even add value as an employee?
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, you can add value above even what you were hired to do, and that's by how you act, how you respond, and what you do that may be not in your job description, but is still helping the company.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for listening to this week's episode of DevQuestions.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a question about being a developer, maybe check out the past episodes.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: I have them both on YouTube as videos, as well as on your favorite podcasting application and podcasting site.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for listening and have a great day.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for joining us for this episode of Dev Questions.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: Tim is committed to making it easier for you to become a developer.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: If you would like to help make more content like this possible, please like, subscribe, rate, and share DevQuestions.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: You can also send your questions to questions at iamtimcorey.com.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, remember, you are too smart and your time too valuable to waste it making all the mistakes Tim did.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: When you're ready to learn to think and code like a professional developer, head over to imtimcorey.com and enroll in the course.