Things I Need To Focus On - Part 1

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Things I Need To Focus On - Part 1

Probably my favourite software engineering song at the moment is “So Long, London” by Taylor Swift. How is that possible? Because the raw passion in the song makes it impossible to hide my dreams and goals from myself. Try to hide anything from yourself while listening to that song! It will make you feel all of your deepest feelings. I love software engineering so so much. I love software engineering omg. 

And the more you listen to it and the more versions the more you will be able to feel your desires. So here the things that I need to focus on. Because I love software engineering more than anything else in the world and I will never ever give up on it. Thank you. So here are all the areas where I need to improve - not for coding courses, but for REAL software engineering. Thank you. x

As An Aside:

(doing this in two parts so I can get it published as it is taking me so long) 

I am working on this from my 6th floor Brighton office and starting out at the sunset while listening to every glorious cover version of the song "Smalltown Boy" by Bronski Beat that I can find. I mean, what's not to love?

I saw in my mind fairy lights through the mist

But when I listen to that song (“🎵 So Long, London”) then I realise that it is not my success as a software engineer that really matters. 

It is the love and care that I bring to this role. And I can already do that anyway.

There is no need to be a staff engineer to bring love and care and attention to your role. 

You can do that from the day you start coding. 

And I really hope that I did this. I really hope that I did this. And I really hope that I do this. Thank you. Because I think that bringing love to what you do is the fastest and best way to grow anyway.

Prioritising

I need to prioritise.

My priorities will always be my tickets.

My priorities will always be my tickets.

My priorities will always be my tickets.

And everything else to do with them please - thank you. My priorities will always be my tickets.

There is ALWAYS something ticket related I can be doing. ALWAYS. 

Thank you. Unless it is specifically agreed on that there is something else I can be doing - then I should ALWAYS be focusing on my tickets during my focus time.

I have a few meetings here and there and some downtime at the end of the day and some time to take notes between tickets.

But the start of the day is always focus time.

Taking a breath before I ask for help

This is a good one and I have been doing better at it today.

Before I ask for help I can take a deep breath.

Do I know the answer to this? Can I ask chat gpt? If I type the question out then do I suddenly know the answer to my own question? Usually I am very good at answering my own questions.

Sometimes I ask a question but then I already know it, I know the answer to it. Also if I am too tired to write I probably shouldn't. This can often happen to me at end of day with very important topics.

Focus time

The rules are pretty clear round this one.

I have a set focus time.

It is from 9 am to around 12 -3 every day depending on my meetings.

Usually it is until at least 12 or 1 or 2. Sometimes I have nothing on til 3. Of course I have an hour's lunchbreak in there as well. And of course I can take breaks if I need to - walks, coffee breaks, a pause, a brief meditation break (we're talking very short here of course) - whatever I need to.

The main thing is I am using this time properly.

The main thing is that I am using this time properly to focus and prioritising my tickets (see below) and using any time off during that time to continue to fuel my passion and my focus (nobody can work straight like this for 4 or 5 hours straight and focus so very very deeply).

I have exceptions;

  • Meetings that can't be moved; stand-ups; occasional retros and of course I might sometimes pair with someone that is very close to me in terms of my workload to get unblocked

A beautiful green and yellow nature themed image. There is an image of the heart chakra. Text reads: everything I need to focus on: part 1. The images are of green plains.
Prioritising work tickets

This is so so so important. If I am avoiding my key work because it is too hard; there is always something else I can do.

(That I will procrastinate on I mean - if I don’t force myself to focus on the hard work. But feeling productive doesn’t always mean you’re doing the best thing possible for your work!). ❤️

And I want to make sure that I am doing this in terms of my work time because this is the only thing that I am really meant to be doing.

This is the only thing that I have to do.

This is the only thing that I am paid to be doing, really, you know...

Prioritising software engineering projects

I wrote this late the other night, but what did I mean? What was I thinking? Hmmm...

Maybe I meant on this blog. 

Oh I remember! There are lots and lots of projects I can take on at work. I am good at product, accessibility.

I HAVE TO MAKE SURE THAT I AM FOCUSING ON SOFTWARE ENGINEERING PROJECTS.

I HAVE TO MAKE SURE THAT I AM TAKING ON SOFTWARE ENGINEERING PROJECTS.

I HAVE TO MAKE SURE THAT I AM DELIVERING SOFTWARE ENGINEERING PROJECTS, AS THIS IS WHAT I WILL LEARN FROM AND GROW FROM THE MOST.

Using tech time for tech time

I am very very lucky and fortunate and privileged to have tech time sessions to support me with neurodiversity, with the level that I'm at and with the fact that I changed tech stacks so rapidly and so on.

I occasionally used this time for more pastoral stuff, and this was a big mistake.

Firstly coding always makes me feel better about everything anyway. Secondly we can put in extra time for stuff like this (establishing ways of working, evaluating them) if we really need to. Thirdly, before I was fully committing to this, I was not getting the amazing satisfaction of being fully committed to a technical session and getting all the learnings out of it that I could. Of course, rebasing still keeps me up at night. I get it until I think about it. Omg. 

(I think that I get it now though please - thanks).

Coming prepared 

The last thing I want to do for now (or rather to say in this one of the two blog posts) is to come prepared to my technical sessions, every single time. 

This means that I come to every single one of my technical sessions with a topic I'd like to discuss. I can have more than one as well - as in I can have spare, I can have backups. It's better to have even more - not because we can cover them all. But because it's good to have backups and spare ones just in case.

Anything related to time-sensitive work takes priority.

But I have a backlog of python and other backend (AWS, Django, Databases...) related ones as well...




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