Get Work Done: 5 Strategies for Getting More Efficient and Finishing

For the second week in a row, I’m tackling reader question Monday on a Tuesday.  This time, my excuse involves the mini-move my wife and I made over the weekend that I originally mentioned on Friday.

So traveling, unpacking and all that.  But, better late than never.  Today, I’ll talk about how to get work done.

Here’s a reader question that I received a while back.

Hello Erik!

I enjoyed your article on 10x developers. Environment is very much a large part of the equation.  My current question is:  What is the ideal way to increase one’s software efficacy? To increase their doneness?

A little context is that I’m feeling the need to become more “effective”. In the words of Steve Yegge of the “done, and get things smart” dichotomy, I’m comfortable getting things smart. I like cleaning up code and make systems more readable, leaving documentation, and removing hurdles for the team. But it takes me a long time to do so.

I’m at a startup venture right now and will be here for a year or two longer. After that I’d like to take a month off, then spend a 3-6 months (or maybe longer if the solution requires it) focusing on ‘closing the loop’, getting more stuff done, being a better programmer.

Some possible options I’m considering:

• Finding a new job with this as primary motivating factor
• Apprenticeship at 8th light or similar
• Grad school
• Some dev bootcamp
• Self direction + contracting
• Finding mentorship here

I would love to get your thoughts, if you wanted to increase your general ability to get things done, how would you do it? Where does one learn to get things done?

Clarifying “Get Work Done”

First of all, let’s do a bit of clarification.  In his blog post, Steve Yegge riffs on Joel Spolsky’s “smart and gets things done” theme.

Steve’s take about “get things smart” refers to burrowing into existing systems and improving them — making them smarter.

So the reader question here is envisioning a spectrum of sorts between “done” and “smart.”

• When forced to choose someone on the “done” spectrum would opt for quick and dirty.
• On the other hand, the “smart” folks would perhaps push the deadline in favor of having uncompromising standards.

You could interpret this question as “how do I stop perfecting and start shipping?”

But I think it’s more than that.  It’s a question of, once you’ve figured out how to “get things smart,” how do you get them done more efficiently and know where to make trade-offs?

So let’s take a look at that.  What are some strategies deliver more stuff?

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Impostor Syndrome and Expert Beginners

Happy Tuesday, everybody.  Let’s start the week with a reader question, the way I do every Monday.  This week, I’m going to answer a question about impostor syndrome and expert beginners.  And I’m going to do it on a Tuesday because I was on the road this weekend and didn’t get a chance to post ahead of Monday.

I was reading about “expert beginner” and it was fascinating and rude awakening in some parts. How does this compare with the feeling of impostor syndrome ? Are they even related?

First, let’s start with some background.  The question asks about two terms you may or may not be familiar with: expert beginner and impostor syndrome.

Expert beginner is a term I coined years ago in a blog post (and eventually made into a satirical Twitter account). You can read the blog post and the eventual series for extensive background on the topic, if you’d like.  But for our purposes here, I’ll describe him more briefly.

An expert beginner is a small king in a small kingdom.  If you go to work at a small software development shop, you might encounter him as the senior architect who has been there forever.  Management gives him the run of the place in spite of the fact that, as it turns out, he’s not really very good at what he does.  Management trusts him because it doesn’t know any better, and he equates this trust with objective demonstration of his superior skill and ability.  He seeks no oImputside input or validation, ruling with an iron fist from a position of mediocrity.

Impostor syndrome describes something entirely different.  Those suffering from impostor syndrome believe their achievements the result of luck or favor rather than merit.  They constantly feel like frauds or impostors.  Think of a programmer with 5 years of experience and a track record of delivering results thinking he’s not a “real” programmer.

Impostor Syndrome vs Expert Beginnerism

This is pretty simple, right?  These things are opposites.  Expert beginners overestimate their competence and impostor syndrome sufferers underestimate their competence. Case closed.

And I suppose one could close the case with that take.  But that isn’t my take.  I think something more subtle is at play.  I’d say that expert beginnerism and impostor syndrome are sides of the same coin.

Both represent a critical inability to meaningfully internalize feedback.

Now, before I proceed, I want to be clear about something.  Not everybody that is prone to coming off as a blowhard or who doesn’t recognize the value of a coworker’s suggestion is an expert beginner.  Likewise, people who have moments of self doubt aren’t all suffering from impostor syndrome.  If you didn’t suffer at least occasional self doubt, you’d be the sort of narcissistic maniac that I once characterized as a “master beginner.”

With both true expert beginners and true impostor syndrome sufferers, you have a sort of cognitive blindness.

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