The Rational Software Engineer Strategies For A Fulfilling Career in Tech 1St Edition Mykyta Chernenko Full Chapter

The Rational software Engineer:
Strategies for a Fulfilling Career in Tech

1st Edition Mykyta Chernenko
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The Rational
software
Engineer
Apress°
The Rational software
Engineer
Strategies for a Fulfilling Career
In Tech
Mykyta Chernenko
Apress’
The Rational software Engineer: Strategies for a Fulfilling Career in Tech
Mykyta Chernenko
Oslo, Norway
ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4842-9794-0 ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4842-9795-7

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-9795-7
Copyright © 2023 by Mykyta Chernenko

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Table of Contents
About the Author ........cccssccsssecsseneensneeeseneeensneeseeneesesseesesneneeeseussensees xiii
Acknowledgment .......:ssssscccesessscecensescenensnsseneesnsneneesneusnassrensnensnenenseey xv
ImtrOduction ......ccccsscccssssessssesssssesenseessnseeusssseuseseessseesseneessseesseoesenenes xvii
Part i: Passlon...1:sccscosseescssccsssonsessssseronsscoscossenscoussevsieosscsseozsnesessass 1
Chapter 1: Job Satisfaction .......:cssessscssssssssscsssenesssssscssssssnenssssssensneseses 5

Main Aspects of Job Satieiagnion ssc, 5
Software Engineers’ Aspects of Job Satisfaction ...........:ccssssssssssseseseeteneeseenseaees a
Woll-Boitng tft @ TOaimh siissisisacssiessisssassseascninencnsansucvedstsnscacanasnvusianstesandiauanasussiaruantanes 11
SOUT Ane hn: GaN ecx asain cavernreceneeecarnicenca
nao icieaseacanaabi ied nanienmaaAaCRIa 14
Hae Ba 0 Fad Allof M867 stcssisiaisisscceienncanatancaninindanacanarannuanacnavnintecaetaanaauce 15
SOU ITR TREAD Sawer scence ecard a CR 16
PR NaN srs caecrar aan ec rmcaua toma ie Nea ncaa RN NETRA 17
Chapter 2: Work Time Organization. ..........sccccssssssccccssessseseessssenerensssaes 19

Whorbiitteg MOUs ssssscicsssscisisacstessrenctncneaisaicnnnacasuswesbinscacaaasnvesccanrcesantiauanssasnaruaninen 19
Peete We ts ciiteatinraszencencatccanesranriccenenncanavaneaniendaiaaaraanenannaintecaetamanaaese 21
NARS ec eae crn cciteatarasvanmen canteen naiaitaieea eaeanaai Ni ada aiaaanad a niatenaetaanaaLTE 21
I UR a ssn caercerar aan cca eae NR cance aN RARE 22
UR TN casa caserancrac rn cacinatemcom anna ence tenRaRcncian aaa TREN 22
Pesala cence sername ance terion drNa RTE 23
PRETEEN scence ecieapamacensecneannnnennaennepaneatnneniiin cenenantenneatanwaedisaniaRenReReNIN 23
iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Write Things DOWM...........cssssssssssssssesssesssssssssssscsseeseeseesssaeaseenststscaeaseseeeesaeaeaesanens 24

Tre ill MSs 6 secession 25
Overtime; Birr No Thanks eseseeeveeee erences 26
Puessst Taos Yesnr ain Sig scarce 28
Combine Different Activities siciscsssssiscscseisccssssexssensntnsssacsosssvesssecssacsesdsacacsasvavsesions 29
BGG AION sssisiccicssnceccassianenvicsiwxsnaecisavacuasonanacesidsuaanensuntiswasstadssacansdevasancsnesteaninte 29
WCC HOt G seesesssarsrasarenerctesccccecesecncenivarevaviverneanmmnmmncnciareteianeteTaNciasis 30
Howto: Hades Procrastination sis ssesisssveicscssnesuaccrstcavasvavorsvavivcrscssevecucasntevetensiabeve 31
PRB sees icincesevsveneseenciccanaravieacnrtsnntsiesate
cca sueataetiuiaeaTa aU aUecTaaseeNeaaCateeeTENTiNNeE 34
Ariiiistal Intelligent (AN) sisi secreac csccesrarscnarenarnacanenamnnnacecnnancariananaimaenaaae 35
SSRI
ARI sce ocaseecrnscmncenesaenaonearananaanaraaLd
ana one ancasa TRE 37
FRAN US cnsecsccseecnane nanan rannnnarnnisnanmaakanaanianini
wand uaeeeiaNaioamNaNENMaaRCNNNT 39
Chapter 3: There Is No Perfect Project ......c.sssscscsssscsscessssscecesnesseeens 41

How to Effectively Onboard on a New Project ........cccsssssssssesssessestetseesssseseeeees 42
Strategy in a Chaotic Startup Environment..........c.ccsscscsssesssesessssesssssssseeeseeesesees 44
Strategy on a Project with a Big Time Zone Difference and Little Trust.............. 48
Taksaiaiys Tt Te EXA asc ccc ncscesecncsncancnasnivemnrcenceenaceremncereanaccemnaceanaae 51
Tall to thre: Maintainer Past isi tccnccniaanacannsenennapennenncaiannnncanmnanninannniannsncnnaie 51
DOR ems Ty: VOUT TUN en cas pcicncnneaonrannorananirnceeeeairnansiiannceauneenaannanasananeiinie 52
Fa Terres Tine Bers eating 00 Uc sceccecereeronmmmmenenmaaanncunmmmnenel 52
TI ena cso nec ea meee 53
Ceca ober As LTE OEE W sennssccnensnssnsscessnstecsnerasernsesstaisochssonnisiessnsassavedsennesece 55

Fosanigy Wheat: Is Be a ccseicanesicrccnerctecconmn
mecca enna caren 55
SSIS ACTIVES sess cericrnrrmennnernanraneanniniannunaRmRRaaRNaN
RENNER 56
How Initiatives Can Bring Unexpected Results ............:.::sssscssssessseetetseseesseseeeees 59
II ena rosso esac
en meee 60
FTN cca rps scams rrr eneeeninesercesnonneae! 61
iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
MOUMERIOUEO Che EEGUNTOINNNE aaieiccns cess cas site ec ccni sinned nals 63
Early Red Flag ........:ssssssssssssssssesseseseseseseseesssnssscsescseeeeessasaesessnenseanseseseeetseasaeaeass 64
You: Nood a VaCalion ccsecssiscsisscssccsessienssasencsenessteccsucuastssututnsstattestaresatesssacsesinces 64
You Don't Feel That Your Job Is “Play” sicscsccsssnssasssosssnsecosssesscnssnanansccssstenactens 65
You Are Becoming Cynical .............csscssssssesssessssssesesssssseseseseassssstscsessatsenseneees 65
CAUSES ......esesesesesseeesesesensseseseseseseseessssesesesessseseneneaessseasessensseeeeeneeeeeseseeeneeeseeneaseees 65
High Workload sss renee ccrc 65
DNATA GSAS PEO isi ss a scacccmaascesscerncoacaanceameasctncentaicaubabucceeeecaes 67
ED peed een Canna Te none eset nernrnencren neaceennsnccnnennrnenmennnenenansnonsnnaennns 68
Laink. oF Com innitt scascsssece raceme anrreecearerr
eae cm 69
Laisa Gia ecsasancccanicrncenrvaecancrnaceainciaiiaiaamacanavasea
id armainicaat aaa 70
0 pee renee ononesenenee ere encreenenemam 71
Lack Of ValUeS .......eseseseseseseseseseseseseeesenssssstsesseesesnseseseeeseststeseeeeenenenseeneeseeaeaes 71
OS SS iatescccrerencavaninenisicreisresecueciveenavarucarivonnessacecacadivedecavaNaanisetneceNsiaiait 72
What if | Have: Birrioiit Altay? ssssictcnicintessicccsansucsnaceavannrarueainianaaaiauaecainianacaicics 73
RINTRT crac ar irene ern ak inca a ic WRT a 74
PUSS as cs rcancanacoracnenncemc caine csaeiamaneneeiaca Terabe mana 75
Chapter 6: What to Avoid in the Long Rumt.........ccscccssessseessssseerenessees 77

Not Exaggeccganngy iri Plat Tn 8 vstsisiisissciesnacacaranacarnenvadansinnarannuaaacmannanicaceanccaauss 77
Marital Woh cdiccnrnsassenimncssercnearecnceniveretanncnteaermticieiavniianinistesaasiis 79
MICH WINGS GE sccccscncesvarsvascercncescrnciareicenniesiecaiesieaseaiaiauntuiuiseacaiseainiteaasieiit 80
EOE UNET SSSR sc raccrsrcec ace tnaercecncncenarencneaca
rena riara mee 81
Bin Fang] WOES ccc csraccareverrancsrac ers caaieacancomac nna nnnac web aaeanch nn aeaa Ture 81
Vere Start Seaa ay OG csscspseineaneaconrannereaanninnmanaeanansiinnnmaneanaannanamanamacnni 82
Salf-Sabotaging Bahai siisisceesncnnanssnaccananncansnnnsnnnesanniancnsinrasnansenntsnnicnaaunsananis 82
SOUTER is rescn ce aeaicnrerneencnisneancanianeneananninnensianandin
Man STERNER 83
FP econo
EEE 84
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 7: Career Change. ......ssssssssssssssssssssssssessesssscsnseesensssnsssssssneness 85

Feeling Stuck ..........ssscsssssseseseseesssssssssscsessesesesssssesessesesestseacsesseseesssaeaseeseanseaeasess 87
Do | Want to Be a Software Engineer at All? ............eessssesesseseseeesesetenetesenseneeeees 88
Big and Scary Careor Change ccsisnscniencscensisescaianssacsasacnesatadcuscansassnsainsssesencions 89
PGR
ea RN crassa cc rccn cerca cierneremnca camara eaninemraaa res 90
Shifting My Focus from the Back End ............csssssssesesssesetseeeseesseseeeeeseeneenees 91
‘Shaped Dewola
im oii sssssssesessreerseeee
arenes aarp 91
Software Engineering in a Broader Sense..............ssssssssesesessesessseeseeseseessenens 92
PATS nse se cece nena nnernnnnecenenoneanorsesn! 92
SKC POOING cess sess aes eee armen aren areca eaneueucnrna 92
SUNN INA Yess pore ean eer outa eer er earn enm eo 93
PORT OCG sisisiscecnessceccasscticnsueinniasnanispucavacuasennsieassidsuasienstatiswasstadssaansdcvadcisanssneanins 94
Chapter 8: How to Find a Dream Job.........sccsssssccsssssssnsessseseersnesseeeens 95

Try to Be Not in @ HUITY..........cccssssesesescssssssesesesesnseseessenesesnssstsceseestsessaenenseanens 96
Why Personal References Matter MUCH...............c:cssssssssssssssssssesesesseesssensssessees 97
Brine Up Votre OV viscce escenario
renee censors 98
Define What You Are Looking Por siisissssscirccsssercrceeseoerrencenaerras 99
Searels aed Ay sis iscsisssicsncascasccncaaninsncntensvacsasuseacstarkiasascuesabadsnacsassssnsasassteincsi 102
The Reference Check Is for Your Benefit............sssssscssssesesssesesesesesesesessnasasans 102
OW 10: BG LRRD wicsccsserweccieicnrisnnvensanimacesneniaceicuveseararaaviucmasarecacauvevetertiats 104
Asynchronods ComiininiGa
nny sisisisesccsiarscccainiincsnciaanaccnawantesinisivascacawatcinsaeais 105
TeCHIGal OUI setescrcsssencaccencrceerivensanimncecereicateentennnaancnaaarermmtietetraias 107
Pane PR ncn coc carrera ecrcsccconea naman ara ceatararaenancRNRREERNe
RUE 108
TSE ASS ARON specter cscaran sence ern maarmenacncrN
NRT 109
Flere tio Mengprn incites ek Sead NY assis scanner stsienssninnnceninnaeiivarnntannnneeciannniaaniniaeine 110
How to Get an Even Deeper Understanding of a Team............scsssssesesseseeeeeeees 110
Resa Your Corrnbraacct Weill sisi scsissnenneressisnesacarnnnncnsannaswansannunnnoenaseansimmnnvvunenasins 111
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Use the Test Period ...........c:scsscscsssssessssssssssessssesesesssesenessesnssstsesceeeseseseasaenenseatanes 112

COUT V cccesocaccsereosarearaca as eau rence aera maces ne onra scr 112
ApTarOnOGS sexes urea
tear cEco 115
Part Il: Mindset .......cssssssscccseeesssseneeesseneneeeneeeessnnneeeseenseneneneseas 117
Chapter 9: Lifelong Learning .........:ssccccssessscccsssssccecsnsesseeesensseneeesenees 119

CUTIE cata cansccnccrecennnncareicaetenerecmnarivarcanansacitaaaaraaR
nit raNNnNRaN aN 120
Sorierss Doni Neen 16 GRA rsccrecrcccsceacarcem
cre maacncsannenacntrnnemacnceenarameaeis 121
A 2 cca crcc en erraneracirmccatamcem asin nase teNaaRmabanaan aN RaRIT Aaa NRE 121
Licssab Tada aad. Ean RC NN i eaeec rcs ccceacamcem acres neoacenananecntrnenacnceenaca
mR 122
SOUT YS ics ntact
ne cee nanstI aR Nee emaNL RNIN 123
Chapter 10: Collaboration.........ccsssssscccssesssccsesssccceesssessessensseneesssnsees 125

Becoming a: Plaasant Coll eaquie sisiisisssveicusescaccnacaviiniacanscnnccaisnandanaraiancanicicanaiaiss 125
How to Deal with Unpleasant People...............csssssscssssessssssscssessaseseseessessasseaes 128
EVAR
TI WG EOI occas cence sresrracmmancnaracerenencnienaecracRencan
INRIA 129
Bobearnan year Bess Went PRN aan seesnrcnensinrnnnrnnrcnr
cen nitiensnanaanannsipaicanisinmenevnnt 132
The Essentials of 1:1 MeetingS.............csssssssssssssesesseseseseseeesesnssssseaeeseeeeees 132
FEMI ISSOGS wisciiscciscnatita ncacaauneneiincannanccunan snsincasanansicuadsthdaeariaiicsenanesrwansnsiny 133
Wilhaer Your Miatriaiggat Saif NG tess rsancrracnccn cc erccacarsrenaccewaescanecacarrnreananes 134
SUPINE csr cenacncraceaneremccacirmecatamce
aca nase NRE Ras TRS RRC a 135
PRR
ST NOES ccna paacncecinsrnnemacnnncientinnn
une caenneRenanalanasivatcaRRSeRRN 135
Chetan 112 Wane a ssscccssssescsscccsssennsesnienssnisiensinnesnnnnsiniseenacenanaemiane 137

Lak Of ValiGs AWA ONS sssiicictencccscatiiarncerainicaciinccaaaranacaniitednaancncaaacd
Raa 138
Focus oni Practical. Consideratigits i sciscsiccsccicnesecarennsscnissenansanecaccrcnnsnacensicctcnas 140
Led ON assoc cncrcceran ce rranorecrmncceeramcem arcs mace teuceacanabanecndrnmaen
Raa 144
PPTSSae UES BTN OTN canes cerceires rr marceara ce remmerncninandrneamncenINRRRTA 144
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Don’t See How They Contribute «0.0.0.0... csesssesesesesessesssssseeeseeessasseaeseestenstseneess 142

SUTIN cscs cases curceruseererrereermeaS 142
Pater Ste 8 secses cece cece scorer aateeee cece err easter aerate 143
CORREO Te TRCN cetera nea ata sipped 145

SICOP oo. eesesessssessssscssesesssesesescssssnsesssesesessescseaeseseesestacseessesseseseaeacuseaeanseacaeeeeseesaees 146
EX@rCISE ....sesesesesesesesesesesesesesesessssessstecssensesnsseseseseessseueeesenenessaeasasecssasnsseeeneneeeeese 147
NUtritiOn .......esesesesesesesesesesesesesesensesssssssessseansesesesesessseneseseneaeasasieasesseesneeseeneneeeeess 148
Re TONSDS wesscrsscucsecereecee rene 149
Psychologital Care siccsisccesuscsnennrnn ee 150
Othiet Practices aca seeeccceecaree rete 151
SSUUNWM NI cis sca sincera cr sian aetnaiti 152
PRT ONC OS siscvessccecsscsacexensiccaxinsnanecputinacdnoca
nes cassuascsantisvalstedssasanadcveteneameansnsin 153
Chapter 13: Company Attitude..........cssssescesseesenenesenesseessserssensneneeens 157

VBR sesso ee essere tree rear eee ere 157
Interteams and Dopartiments scsccicisccccssvacurcsrescnsccsrccevcndstrasectcanaradcctaacactcarenarien 158
WARN ieescr eee acue recor renee 159
CONAN asics icra cece cane in aaueiaudns saaaatnaazaaiaoti 160
Chapter 14: Handling Failures ..........ccsssescsseeseseeesenesseessserseenenenseens 161

Curiosity Always Leads to Mistakes.............ssssssssssssssssesssesssesssssssssseaseseseeeeeaees 161
Flowy to Heirudlls Femi sssccssssscerescopse cece career caster
ease 162
Otis Fea 5 cs sees rere eects 163
PRT ONC OS siscvessccecsscsacexensiccaxinsnanecputinacdnoca
nes cassuascsantisvalstedssasanadcveteneameansnsin 164
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Part WN: L@arning......ssscsssccseeesssnceeeeeseeseseneneeeeesscnneeeseenseensneneneas 165
Chapter 15: What to LOait scccsssssccsesssesssessssssccscseccssscccsssscesesesssenstcesses 167

“a Pema ton nea a A rs rrancrec ecco ceraranacmraenacrnwesecmniananavnrannes 167
SSRI NI ate siccccncarccm eau rranaraciecscceatomaam ac naa maaac i Nesacanaianase urna Raa NRE 169
UVES TOS ccc cracanurranaraciemccceatomamac
nna maaarnesanmnaianan Tara ean R aa 169
Groce Extunrrentiont Gath sss ssn ciennscsnanronscninnanneaenmercosnnsannscnnniannanennnannnansacpuaneices 172
Neislettor 2) BUGS asiiiiencessessnnesmecennnnennnnnwnannnncnnenannnsienonananaaansioninanisnnmanevnnl 172
Roeser
oe EERE 173
Mr cerns
nop enn renee nee enon oeeaea EE 175
OR ences on ese rca meseaenoneen oneness 176
Conferences .........ccssssesssssesesesesesesessseseenseeeseeesenesensscseassenensseeeeeseeeseseseseeeseneeneaees 177
Search and LLMS .......esssssssesesesesessseseseseseeeseeenesensseseassesensseeeeeneeeeeseseseeeeeneenenees 178
SUMIMALY.......:sescscsescscsssssscssscescsesescsesenesssnscsesessseecseseassenseacatatseeeseacaeaenenenseatanes 178
Chapter 16: Learning Effectivelly .......ccssssssccccssssccrssssseccersnssneessensees 181

Dic een 0 UT tn rss nna non onReReRR CTE NNRERRRR RE 181
DESERT NE A escent
eseneerne men eniopenseeenasoEa 181
ROCIC os. eseseseseseseseseeeseeeesesenesenenesesesesenensneeeseseseseseseseeseeeseesieaeanecatananansnenenenseeees 182
Take Notes ......cecscssesesseseseseseseseeeseseseeeseseseessssssseseeseneeseenenseeneeenenseneneneaeeeneeseenes 183
Find Some Peers..........sssscscssssseseessssssesessneneseseseseseeeseneeeseeeseeeessssseatanenanseeneneeseaees 185
COMMITMEN «0. eeeeeeseeeseseseseseseseseseeesesesesesenesessneneseeeseneneseeeseneeeseseneeeseseneeeeaees 186
SHIT V swcrsccscc arcane eerie teense 186
RSlOTONCOS cise eet rece 187
MEUMERIOMEOE 1/7; FEMOUUUNGA

OG secretes aninncanetcni
nine nicest 189
How to Get Feedback...........csscsesssessssesessseseseseseseseseseeeeesesesneesneessansnssseseeneesenees 189
Anonymous Feedback...........sssssssssssssssssesssssesesessssssestssesesesesesssensnenetatseasseeseses 191
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Feedback Processes ..........ssssssessssssssesssssssseseseseseseseeeeesensseseasaenseessesnsseeeneneeeeese 191

Rw: io Ginko scree reer 192
SIUDIINIANY csesicaceesn rerun aaa arp oeeeeereeeae 193
PRR
E aN UA ccs ae cocci
ee eee s 194
Chapter 18: Learning from Other People ...........cscssssssscsssensserseenssens 195

Be the Worst in the Group ...........:ssssssssssssesesssesesessnsnsessstseecescsessasseneeeeetenanseneass 195
Mentor inn........sescssessssssssssesesescscnesessssesssesessesessseseaesesensessatscsesseeessasaeaeseanananaeaeass 196
How to Choose at! Ment? siccssctccccccescsnceravevesaveversvensiaracineciiraincieeietwraiats 196
Winer tho: Fired ch MNGi
it ss sseiescnccninnsnnnnnnrinnenisunvaammmarsonaneanssinnninennnenasins 197
How to Have a Mentoring Session? ...........:sssssssssesssssssesesessnseteestststatseneess 198
Pair Programming...........ssssescssscscssssssssssessesesesssesesesesensessatssseeeeseseasseaesaeanananseneass 198
Learning by Others’ Mistakes ..............ssssssssssesesssessssessssssseesesessasseeeseetetanseneass 199
Paani GG ecasssocucrrerear pec erreur 199
SUDAN Yessir carrera aaa eee rpree en eeae 200
Chapter 19: Sharing Your Knowledge..........sssssseseessessserseeeeeeeesees 201

YOUISEIf .......eseseseseseseseseseseeeceneseneeesesesesesssenenensneneseeeseseeeseseseeeeeeesesesasesaseneneneeatas 201
Friends and Teain........sesesesesesesessssssssssesssssesesesesesessesseetenesensasseasecsssenseeeeneneeesese 202
lint COMID ANY scecusnnsocunreerpece erreur 202
VOMIGCONIGSS rescore tare eee euro 203
PRR secs ener 203
PA RTARTA isin craic sasrencaaiaicsi cur acasicueidsnanin acanasisauiiccaanssensmauassnasmiaiuaiii 204
SOCial PRAMOTING wsseiscnssisasicencnsncsisnsennveweratacedascaniueututnisiasenabavassbeccsacuasdavaratsassavsesio 204
SSR decane anne tiacncarnncenaceaiiercaniieanarcauiarmainaenainnanrmNeSetaaises 205
PTT SIUC vat csarsrecsescnceccanwraicieicrisnseciscaiecacesseciwiatetciuaieaaraaibecaeacemceteatiaveTevtiatE 205
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Chapter 20: Learning from Code........scssssssssssssscsesssssssensesessneessenees 207

Onboarding on a Project QUICKIY............:scssseseteteeseseseseneneseeeeeseeeeeseseeeeeeeseeneeees 207
Teammates and Documentation ..........cscseseseceseseseeeststseesssesssssssceseseneeseeees 208
Pea a cercereacernnnacencarenncenenannreamamenminacreancamnneasen
naam 211
Paes LSS Nose tc cceraceranesmcarcercmcarnemnacemarcnara
cer anceneni antec 212
SOIT Sess ceneancnnenrtennc pce anmaicancn nannies oie eanaan Nae emestNERRNNNERNT 213
Chapter 21: Rotation........cccscccssseceesscesesseessnscessnsceesssseusessersnsnerssseess 215

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About the Author
Mykyta Chernenko, originally from Kharkiv, Ukraine, now resides in Oslo,
Norway. Beginning with back end with Python, Mykyta soon expanded
his toolkit to include fullstack development and diverse languages like
Go, Kotlin, and TypeScript. Beyond his main technical focus, Mykyta has
experience in DevOps, data engineering, and product management.
Throughout his professional journey, Mykyta has been a part of
various intriguing projects through his experience in product, outsourcing,
and consultancy companies. He contributed to the Azure integration of
Nutanix’s cluster discovery project and played a central technical role
at Factmata, taking over the engineering and infrastructure. He further
continued to work in product teams at both Mercell as a tech lead and asa
senior software engineer at Arundo Analytics.
Apart from his project contributions, Mykyta has shown a strong
passion for teaching and sharing his experience. He has taken on
mentoring roles throughout his career, guiding and supporting over 20
professionals in the field, and expressed himself through his blog, “The
Rational Software Engineer,” on Hackernoon.
Understanding that software engineering is driven by people and
their thinking, Mykyta consistently tries to broaden his horizons in the
psychology and neurobiology realm through books and courses.
Mykyta is a cofounder of Nemlys—a promising tech startup dedicated
to helping couples improve their communication through personalized AI
questions for their dates.
xiii
Acknowledgments
This book has been an amazing journey for me, and I’m very happy to
finish something that I think can benefit other fellow software engineers.
But this journey would have been much worse without all the tremendous
support and help I got from others.
First of all, I want to say thank you to my wife, who managed to bear
with me through the process, which included me constantly rattling about
the book, reviews of the book, and providing me with advice. You helped
me and treasured my concentration when I was in the flow, and you also
motivated me when I went through more challenging days. And most
important, you gave me the confidence that I can accomplish such a big
task in the first place.
The story of the book started much earlier than when I decided that
it was going to become a full-blown book. Initially, the idea was to write
a series of articles, and a lot of my friends helped me with that process.
Back then, writing was much more of a novel and exciting journey for
me, but it also meant that there was a lot of work put into the review of
my drafts and providing me with helpful insights. So I’m really grateful
to all of my friends, who helped to review the articles at that time and
also book chapters later on. I want to give special recognition to Maksym
Bekuzarov, who reviewed most of my initial articles, gave me rough but
very actionable criticism, and put the idea that something great can come
from the idea, and to Artem Korchunov, who was the first reviewer of most
of my chapters and provided me with insightful feedback.
Last, but definitely not least, is my official team who made the book
possible. I’m grateful to Apress and its members including Jessica Vakili,
Susan McDermott, and Laura C. Berendson for a good navigating with
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
the process and a smooth journey. I also want to say special thanks to my
official reviewer, Brad Dolin, who gave me a lot of new perspectives on
what I wrote and greatly complemented what I wrote in the spheres of
physiology, studies, and management.
Introduction
Software engineers are often seen as very smart professionals, and there’s
a good reason for that. Our job is all about solving problems. We take big,
complicated tasks and break them down into smaller, more manageable
pieces. Then we use code to create solutions. This requires a clear
understanding of the problem, a lot of logical thinking, and attention
to detail.
Becoming a software engineer is not a small feat either. The path to
our occupation demands rigorous education, intensive training, anda
relentless pursuit of knowledge. We can spend years studying complex
mathematical theories, intricate algorithms, and multiple programming
languages. But formal education is just the tip of the iceberg. Breaking
into the field often requires countless hours of hands-on practice, building
projects, debugging errors, and self-teaching new technologies and tools.
The high barrier to entry ensures that those who do become software
engineers have demonstrated not only academic aptitude but also
determination, adaptability, and creativity.
On top of our technical skills, we often develop a good sense of
resilience. Debugging, for example, is a significant part of our job. We
may spend hours or even days trying to find a tiny error in our code that’s
causing a big problem. This process can be frustrating, but it teaches
patience, persistence, and a methodical approach to problem-solving.
Every bug we resolve, every challenge we face and overcome, only
sharpens our analytical skills. It’s like a mental gym where we constantly
exercise and grow our cognitive muscles. And the tech world also changes
fast. New tools, languages, and techniques come up all the time. Software
engineers have to keep learning and adapting, or they'll get left behind.
xvii
INTRODUCTION
So there is no doubt that software engineers are smart. But with

everything mentioned earlier, with all the proven track record of high
intelligence, there is still a big portion of software engineers who are
not particularly happy about their job and who don’t seem like a good
example of what a happy and fulfilled software engineer is. And at some
point, I realized that I was affected by that as well. As nice as it was with
all of the friendly environment and great perks, I noticed that my passion,
satisfaction, and curiosity were decreasing. My state was not terrible, but
far from calling it happy and satisfied. And the worst of it seemed to be that
it got a little worse with every year. It didn’t bring as much joy to code as it
used to do, I started caring less, and I became less interested and curious. I
clearly had a looming problem, and I needed to find solutions.
I understood that there was clearly something missing—something
that goes beyond pure cognitive abilities and common knowledge I
had, something that would help me to foster a high level of passion and
satisfaction with what I did. So I began to search for answers, reading a lot
of material trying to understand what the best and proven ways to regain
the levels of my career happiness are and experimenting with myself to
find out what helps me personally.
And the main topics I discovered are exactly what we're going to talk
about in this book: Passion, Mindset, and Learning. Passion will cover
topics around satisfaction, burnout, organizing your time, and making
career changes. Mindset will describe helpful attitudes to lifelong learning,
collaboration, health, and values, while the Learning part goes deep into
what to learn and how to do it in the most efficient way both on your own
and from others.
Passion, Mindset, and Learning are the three pillars we are going to
focus on to not only succeed in the field but also truly enjoy the process.
When you read all of this, a thought can get into your head, “This sounds
suspiciously fluffy.” And I understand you here; all of the topics I outlined
can be covered in a very fluffy and abstract manner. But this is not the
xviii
INTRODUCTION
approach I've taken here. This book is going to be very information- and
protocol-dense, as this was my idea from the start to make the book
short, to the point, and actionable. When you finish the book, you will be
equipped with a wide range of specific tools and techniques that you can
exercise to improve your career and make it more enjoyable, meaningful,
and less stressful.
There is also a reason whyI chose the word “rational” to be in the
title of the book. To be rational is not just about being logical; it’s a
commitment to a certain way of approaching problems and making
decisions. It means to heavily rely on solid logic, ensuring that conclusions
stem from sound reasoning rather than whims or biases. It’s about turning
to scientific methods, which prioritize evidence and empirical data over
mere speculation. Being rational also signifies the wisdom to choose the
best tool available for a job, recognizing that every situation might demand
a different approach or technique. And this is the approach we're going to
utilize here.
At the same time, I don’t want to give you a false image that I’m some
kind ofa guru who has got enlightened and can teach you everything you
need to know. I’m clearly not. Like many of you, I’m a software engineer.
While I don’t have all the answers, I’ve dedicated a significant amount of
time to learning from reputable sources and brilliant minds on the topics.
So what I’m going to do is stick to these sources to provide you with the
most relevant scientific knowledge and the best insights in the field. If
there are two good opinions with their own pros and cons on a topic, I
will try to cover both of the positions impartially. And for the absence ofa
better source in some cases, I will also include my personal reflections and
experience to provide you with a complete picture.
Now, as you've got prepared for what you're going to get from this
book, let’s start our journey by talking about passion.
PART |
Passion
Most of us spend about 20% of our awake time at work over our lifetime,
and this number rises to 30% [1] during our working years. Given we spend
so much of our lives at work, it makes sense to do it in a way that brings
us joy, right? Unfortunately, many people don’t actively work toward
improving their job satisfaction, work-life balance, or passion for what they
do. These are factors that contribute to our overall happiness in life.
Many say that job satisfaction comes easy in the IT industry, and I
agree. There are many attractive aspects, like flat hierarchies common in
IT companies, HR departments dedicated to improving your experience,
generous fun budgets, numerous perks, and high salaries. With all these
benefits in place, why would we need to make any extra effort for job
satisfaction?
However, there’s a catch. Despite the apparent perks of being a
software engineer, not everyone in the field is satisfied. According to
research by PayScale [2], only 57% of software engineers said they were
either “Extremely Satisfied” or “Fairly Satisfied” with their jobs, while only
29% felt their job had high meaning. You might think that it’s impossible
to please everyone, and perhaps a 57% satisfaction rate and 29% sense of
meaningfulness is the best we can expect.
In fact, when compared to other IT-related roles, software engineers
fall behind. For instance, computer and information scientists report a
78% satisfaction rate, and computer hardware engineers report a 53%
sense of job meaning. These figures significantly surpass those for software
engineers. And to add even more to it, surgeons top the charts, 96% find
their job meaningful, and 83% report high job satisfaction.
PART! PASSION
The good news is that everything mentioned above is within our

control. Making sure you are passionate, happy, and striving at work
is a skill, and this skill can be learned. By changing our attitudes, using
appropriate strategies in different situations, and most importantly,
picking the right workplace, we can definitely get there. We are going to
cover the following chapters in this part:
Chapter 1, “Job Satisfaction”: We'll talk about

cultural differences, understand the roots of
dissatisfaction, and arm you with strategies to foster
team well-being, navigate the “us vs. them” mindset,
and understand the principle of “skin in the game.”
Chapter 2, “Work Time Organization”: Time

isn’t just about hours; it’s about how you use
them. I’ll challenge myths about working hours,
introduce the concept of focused work, and share
tools for effective task management, combating
procrastination, and ensuring high productivity.
Chapter 3, “There Is No Perfect Project”: Shatter

the myth of the “perfect project.’ Here, we will cover
effective onboarding, learning from challenging
projects, and making informed decisions about
when and where to shift your focus.
Chapter 4, “Initiative”: Explore ways to proactively

contribute, from mentoring to knowledge sharing,
and understand the ripple effects of your initiative
on your career growth.
Chapter 5, “Burnout”: Confront the silent challenge

of burnout. We'll illuminate its signs, dissect its
causes, and pave a path toward recovery, resilience,
and stress management.
PART! PASSION
Chapter 6, “What to Avoid in the Long Run”:

Identify and sidestep long-term self-sabotage
behaviors. From tackling challenging tasks head-
on to navigating toward more sustainable work
practices.
Chapter 7, “Career Change”: Navigate the minor

and major career change with confidence. We
will cover reassessing your trajectory, considering
managerial roles, or changing specializations
altogether.
Chapter 8, “How to Find a Dream Job”: Master the

nuances of effective job hunting, from CV crafting
to acing interviews, and learn to assess potential
employers for the perfect fit.
References
[1] https: //revisesociology.com/2016/08/16/
percentage-life-work/?utm_content=cmp-true
[2] www. payscale.com/data-packages/most-and-least-

meaningful-jobs
CHAPTER 1
Job Satisfaction
We've seen that being a software engineer is not without its challenges
when it comes to achieving job satisfaction. Let’s first delve into the
universal aspects of job satisfaction before turning our focus onto the
unique elements that apply specifically to software engineers and their
teams. Additionally, we’ll explore ways to enhance these factors and
discuss effective strategies for dealing with those aspects that are beyond
our control.
Main Aspects of Job Satisfaction

Numerous studies have researched this topic, particularly focusing on
the role of salary in job satisfaction. For instance, both the 2014 SAP
survey [1] and the 2013 SHRM survey [2] highlighted pay as the primary
factor. However, a recent study by the Boston Consulting Group [3], which
encompassed over 200,000 people worldwide, shows that employees are
putting more emphasis on intrinsic rewards and less on compensation.
In the study, participants from different cultures were asked to select
their top five criteria from a list of 26 potential factors. Here are the ten
most frequently chosen factors for workplace happiness:
e Appreciation for your work
e Good relationships with colleagues
e Good work-life balance
© Mykyta Chernenko 2023

M. Chernenko, The Rational software Engineer,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-9795-7_1
CHAPTER 1 JOB SATISFACTION
e Good relationships with superiors
e Company’s financial stability
e Learning and career development
e Job security
e Attractive fixed salary
e Interesting job content
e Company values
It’s key to understand that this list isn’t ranked—it’s just a list. Why?
Because what matters most can change a lot from one person to another
and from one culture to another. For example, in Switzerland, having good
coworkers is really important. On the other hand, folks in China care a
lot about learning and growing in their careers, while in the Philippines,
having a stable job is the top concern.
If you're finding it hard to figure out your top five job happiness factors,
here’s a tip: think about your work life without one of these things. If you
think you’d be okay without it, then maybe it’s not so important for you.
For example, I’ve met quite a few people who don’t worry much about job
security because they like the idea of changing jobs every few years.
However, I believe most of us would agree that these factors form the
core of a good and enjoyable work environment. So, our goal should be
to find a workplace where most of these elements exist and then work on
improving the rest. Later in this book, we’ll dive into each criterion in more
detail. We'll discuss how to spot them when you're choosing a new job and
how to foster them in your current workplace.
Now, let's dig deeper into aspects of job satisfaction that are specific to
software engineers.
Software Engineers’ Aspects

of Job Satisfaction
In another study, more than 1300 developers were asked to assess factors
that make them unhappy [4]. The findings were pretty interesting. The two
main reasons for unhappiness are being stuck on a technical task and time
pressure. We will cover how to deal with time pressure later on, but what
can we do about being stuck? There are multiple techniques to be more
efficient moving forward when you are stuck:
Research and Reference: Use resources such as

StackOverflow, GitHub, or official documentation to
see if others have encountered similar problems. AI
tools such as ChatGPT can be useful for answering
coding questions and even spotting and fixing bugs. I
often turn to it first when I have a technical challenge.
Take a Break: Sometimes the solution to a challenging

problem comes when you step away from it. Your brain
continues to process the problem even when you are
not consciously thinking about it.
Rubber Duck Debugging: Try to explain the problem

to someone else or even to an inanimate object like a
rubber duck. This can help you to see the problem from
a new perspective and might lead you to the solution.
Simplify the Problem: Break down the problem into

smaller, manageable parts. Solve each part individually
and then integrate the solutions.
Write Tests: Writing tests for your code can help to

isolate the issue and give you a better understanding of
where things are going wrong.
Desk Code Review: Get another pair of eyes on your

code. A fellow developer might spot something you’ve
missed or suggest a different approach.
Use Debugging Tools: Step through your code with a

debugger. This allows you to examine the state of your
program at various stages and can help pinpoint where
things are going wrong.
Revisit Fundamentals: Go back to the basics. Ensure

that your understanding of the problem and the
technologies you're using are correct.
Rewrite the Code: If the code is too complex or

convoluted, consider rewriting it. Starting from scratch
can sometimes be the quickest way to solve a problem.
Learn from Past Mistakes: Keep track of your coding

challenges and how you overcame them. This can bea
great resource for solving future problems.
Avoid Being the Gatekeeper: Try to always have

somebody whose knowledge overlaps with you on
project areas; it’s especially great if they are more
experienced than you are. This is achieved well with
rotating teammates often, so that everybody touches
most of the code base, or keeping a code domain
overlap table, which ensures that at least two people
know one area of the code base.
When being stuck combines with time pressure, it can be a recipe for
even greater stress. This is especially true when you're up against a tight
deadline and can’t seem to figure out a crucial bug. I’ve experienced this
a lot in the past, particularly when I was part of small teams. I didn’t know
then how to react when my manager asked to add one “small” feature right
before a release deadline. Now, I understand that last-minute features

are usually not a good idea. They tend to be full of bugs, they often cause
the team to work overtime, and most of the time, they can actually be
postponed to the next sprint without causing any major issues.
I have a clear example of a last-minute feature that should have been
pushed to the next work cycle. Just before a product release, we discovered
that our app was incorrectly handling time zones. This was a critical issue
since one of the app’s main features revolved around a calendar and time
booking system. After trying to fix the time zone handling in a few places,
it became clear that the problem wasn’t a specific bug but rather an overall
faulty approach to handling time zones. As a result, I had to approach
the management and deliver the “exciting” news right before the release.
Although there wouldn’t be any immediate impact on users (since the
platform didn’t have any real users at the time, and to be honest, it never
got them), we needed to deliver the project to the client. We were already
weeks behind schedule and were losing money on the project due to
the delay.
Management was reluctant to spend another week’s worth of funds
from the company’s budget on this issue, so they asked me if it was
possible to fix the time zone handling by the end of the day. The hero
within me couldn’t resist the challenge and proudly declared, “Yes, I can
finish it by 6:00 or 7:00 p.m.” A voice of reason in my mind was trying to
remind me, “You don’t understand the system well enough, and changing
the time zone mechanism could have unpredicted consequences.” But at
that moment, the possibility of a boosted ego seemed to be stronger than
the voice of caution!
The situation unfolded as one might expect. I managed to change the
time zone handling relatively quickly, leaving myself an hour to adjust
the tests, many of which I was seeing for the first time. My changes broke
around 20 tests, but I was determined not to give up. After two hours, I
managed to fix all of them, but a couple of tests were still failing for reasons
that didn’t seem related to time zones. I was on my own; there was only
one other engineer on the team, and she was a junior just like me, who
didn’t understand the tests well enough to offer any help.
After another hour of fruitless efforts, I haven’t managed to resolve
the issue. At that time, everyone else in the office was gone except for
my manager. I approached my manager, feeling completely defeated, to
tell her that I hadn’t been able to meet the deadline. I didn’t understand
why the code was broken, and my head was spinning after six straight
hours of coding. To me, this felt like a total disaster. I was worried about
disappointing my manager whom I greatly admired and saw as a role
model. I expected her to be as disappointed as I was, but to my surprise,
she took the news calmly, simply responded with a brief “okay” and left for
home. Why? Because it turned out that I was the only person who put the
stakes so high.
The client didn’t even check the app that day. The management
team had already switched to their Friday evening relaxation mode. The
only person who thought the time zones were crucial was me, and there
was no good reason for it. When I fixed the test issue on Monday, which
turned out to be due to incorrect concurrent resource access, nobody even
noticed that it was not done on Friday. It would have been entirely fine to
move this feature to the next sprint and take that Friday evening off, but my
ego and lack of experience led me to make the wrong decision.
Reflecting on how I handle situations where I’m stuck on a task or
a bug, now that I work in larger teams with more senior members, I
almost always have someone to turn to for help. My network has also
expanded over time, so if I can’t find support within the team, I usually
know someone more experienced whom I can reach out to. Having more
personal experience also helps me avoid getting stuck. Last but not least, I
try to rotate responsibilities within the project with my team members so
that none of us becomes the “gatekeeper” for any part of the project.
Not all of the factors I’ve mentioned are within our control, such as
the seniority of our team members, but it’s beneficial to be aware of them
10
and to adopt processes that can reduce the likelihood of getting stuck ona
problem and not meeting the deadline.
The third significant issue highlighted in the report is dealing with
poor quality code and inadequate coding practices. Code debt is a major
contributor to poor code quality. Nobody enjoys writing bad code, but
sometimes it’s unavoidable. It’s crucial to manage the code debt in your
project effectively. Here are some ways to do that:
e Conducting code reviews with a focus on code quality
e Allocating 20% of each sprint for refactoring
e Discarding code that’s meant to be discarded (as much

as you'd like to build on your proof of concept, it’s often
better not to)
e Seeking help from other teams or external consultants

for a fresh perspective on your architecture, design
document, or your code in general
These strategies can greatly enhance code quality and, in turn, job
satisfaction.
The final aspect we'll discuss in this section is what's essential for
maintaining a healthy team dynamic.
Well-Being in a Team
A majority of software engineers work as part of a team. These teams can
vary in size, but one thing is certain: it’s challenging to enjoy your job if
you're part of a dysfunctional team. Google, recognizing the importance
of effective team dynamics, conducted a research project called “Aristotle”
[5]. They identified five key factors that significantly contribute to team
efficiency. Here they are, listed in order of importance:
ll
1. Psychological Safety: I feel safe taking risks ina

team and fail.
2. Dependability: My teammates get things done as

they promised.
3. Structure and Clarity: I have a clear path of what to

do and a clear role.
4. Meaning: I find my work meaningful.
5. Impact: My work makes an impact.
Team efficiency is a strong indicator of a team’s well-being, particularly

when we see that the main elements of efficiency are psychological safety,
dependability, and clarity. We should aim to nurture our team processes
and structures to enhance these three areas.
For instance, we can boost psychological safety by allowing team
members to make and learn from mistakes instead of punishing them.
There’s no need to fear asking “silly” questions or experiencing failure—it
happens to everyone. Leaders can set the tone by demonstrating that
they too are not infallible and that they can discuss their mistakes openly.
This promotes a similar mindset in the team. The worst thing a leader
can do for psychological safety is to create a culture of fear. I’ve found
that creativity, initiative, and motivation tend to evaporate in such an
environment. Likewise, don’t hold back from expressing “silly” ideas. Out
of every ten “silly” ideas, there’s likely to be at least one good one, making it
worth sharing them all.
Psychological safety can quickly vanish in a team plagued by
emotionally toxic behaviors. That’s why it’s important to provide
feedback to your peers if a joke comes off as offensive or a comment
seems aggressive. It’s crucial that everyone feels comfortable defending
their personal boundaries and that others respect and adapt to those
boundaries. While it can take a lot of courage to speak up at times, doing so
is incredibly valuable.
12
Dependability is about having a team of responsible individuals. Only

commit to what you can actually deliver and communicate your progress
sooner rather than later. It’s better to exceed expectations slightly than to
fall short. For example, don’t commit to completing a feature in three days
if you think it’ll take four. It’s wiser to estimate five days, so your teammates
can trust your estimate and be confident that the task will likely be
completed in five days. They'll be pleasantly surprised if you finish in three
days and won't be disappointed if it takes five. Another important thing is
to stick to your general promises. I find it rare that people say that will do
something without the intention to do it, but it’s fairly common to forget
what you said. This is why note-taking is a very useful thing for the tasks
that appear. Write down your promises on the list, and it will be much
harder to forget them. Or if a task is a little bit bigger, it is a good habit to
add it straight to the tracking system.
In terms of structure and clarity, having a clear product vision and
well-defined work roles can greatly help. Each team member should know
their responsibilities and the overall goals of the project. I once worked
on a team where our product vision was unclear, and it was extremely
demotivating. We tried to develop a tool for collaboration on a tender, but
not knowing the domain in-depth, what users struggle with, and what their
typical jobs were quickly led us to a dead end. We were developing features
just for the sake of not sitting without work; we didn’t know whether it
would bring any value or not. Quickly, we went into lengthy architectural
and refactoring discussions to improve some details of features we
didn’t know the value of. It felt like we were moving aimlessly, not really
understanding why we were doing what we were doing. This uncertainty
greatly reduced our sense of purpose and impact. Luckily, we soon had a
skilled product manager join our team, who conducted user and market
research and helped us to align what we were doing with the other teams.
After that, there was a significant increase in enthusiasm and motivation
among the team members because they finally could answer the big “why.”
13
Another important aspect is to strike a balance when it comes to the

“us vs. them” mentality. It’s important to foster a sense of camaraderie
within a team. You should stand up for your teammates, shield them from
external criticism, and portray them positively. Essentially, it’s fantastic if
your team’s dynamic makes you feel as though your teammates are your
friends.
However, too much of this mentality can bring problems for a team.
If you reach a point where you perceive your team as the “good guys”
and other teams or management as your “enemies,” it can lead to a
damaging cycle of poor cooperation within the company. Aim to avoid
such extremes. Yes, your team may feel like your close friends, but your
other colleagues in the company should also feel like good buddies. We
will also talk more about the cons of the “us vs. them” mentality in the next
chapters.
Skin in the Game

The concept of having “skin in the game” has gained popularity largely
due to Nassim Taleb who wrote a book on the subject. The idea is that
when you have something at risk, be it money or reputation, you’re more
invested in achieving a goal. I’ve found that applying this concept at work
can make your job far more engaging. When you have “skin in the game,”
you're personally invested in the success of the company, project, or
team. Your work gains personal significance as you see how your actions
contribute to overall progress.
But how can you create “skin in the game” when you don’t own the
company and aren’t inherently invested in its success? Here are a few
approaches:
e Take Initiative Risks: Accept responsibility for

important projects that could affect your career if
they fail. Assume management roles or become a key
14
engineer in presales rounds. You'll quickly see how

your success or failure directly impacts the company,
lending your work greater significance.
e Take Reputational Risks: For example, invite a friend

to join the company or promote the company positively
on public platforms. This makes you more committed
to ensuring that the company is a good place to work.
e Get Money Involved: Buy shares or options in the

company. This can be a potent way to create “skin in
the game.” However, it doesn’t mean you have to invest
all your savings. The goal is simply to invest enough to
make the company’s success important to you. This
strategy is actually pretty popular in tech companies,
who try to provide equity to their employees for this
purpose.
It’s worth noting that you should only create “skin in the game” for
companies you genuinely believe in and feel connected to. For instance,
if you know the company culture is demoralizing and you're planning to
leave soon, it’s not worth promoting them socially or inviting friends to
join. Similarly, if you see the company is failing despite your best efforts, it
wouldn’t be wise to invest in it.
How Do | Find All of These?

Now that we’ve discussed both general and field-specific satisfaction
factors, the crucial question is how to find a work environment where all
these elements are present. While it’s essential to invest time and energy in
improving these aspects within your team and company, it can be difficult,
if not near impossible, to build them from scratch. The most pragmatic
approach is to join a team that’s already functioning well.
15
Evaluating certain aspects such as the level of appreciation,

dependability of your future colleagues, and work-life balance can be
tricky and prone to errors when done from outside the company during an
interview process. We’lI delve into this further when we discuss how to find
your dream company.
Since you already have insights into your current company—
its security level, the experience of management, and the overall
agreeableness of the people—there’s less to figure out when considering
an internal rotation. If, for any reason, your team lacks a healthy level of
emotional safety, start looking for teams within your organization where
members seem genuinely happy or where the teams are highly efficient.
Chances are, these teams are functioning well, which is what makes their
members satisfied and helps them progress quickly.
Summary
There are several important factors that can make you feel satisfied at
work. These include
e Feeling appreciated for your work
e Having good relationships with your coworkers
e Maintaining a healthy work-life balance
e Having good relationships with your managers
e Working in a financially stable company
e Having opportunities for learning and career

development
e Feeling secure in your job
e Earning a good salary
e Doing interesting work
16
Sharing your company’s values
Feeling safe to take risks and make mistakes
Being able to depend on your coworkers
Having clear roles and goals
Doing work that feels meaningful
Seeing the impact of your work
Ability to overcome being stuck with code
Realistic deadlines
Avoiding an “us vs. them” mentality
Feeling invested in the company’s success (“skin in

the game”)
Keep these factors in mind when you're deciding where you want to
work and when you're trying to make your own team better.
References
[1] www.news-sSap.com/workforce-2020-looming-talent-crisis-
research-shows-companies -unprepared-future-work/
[2] https: //blog.shrm. org/workforce/pay-jumps-to-top-factor-

contributing-to-us-employees-satisfaction-with-thei
[3] www. bcgperspectives.com/content/articles/human_resources_

leadership_decoding global _talent/
[4] https: //link. springer .com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4842-

4221-6 10
[5] https: //rework.withgoogle.com/print/guides/
5721312655835136/
17
CHAPTER 2
Work Time
Organization
Productivity as a software engineer can be influenced by many factors:
the duration of your work hours, your level of focus, and the frequency
and quality of your break. A well-structured workday helps to maximize
your efficiency and reduces stress and burnout. It includes planning your
tasks, setting realistic goals, taking regular breaks to rest, and minimizing
distractions. It also involves maintaining a healthy work-life balance and
ensuring that your professional responsibilities don’t encroach on your
personal time.
By structuring your workday effectively, you can achieve more in less
time and with less effort. You can also improve your mental well-being, so,
let’s delve deeper into understanding the components of a well-structured
workday and how you can implement them to enhance your productivity.
Working Hours
Imagine your typical eight-hour workday. Now, picture spending every
minute of that time buried in code. Sounds overwhelming, doesn’t it?
That’s because it is. We do a lot more than just coding during our work
hours. We attend meetings, respond to emails, enjoy our lunch, and take
breaks. The reality is that maintaining high productivity levels throughout
an eight-hour coding marathon is almost impossible. I’ve only met a few
© Mykyta Chernenko 2023 19

M. Chernenko, The Rational software Engineer,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-9795-7_2
CHAPTER 2. WORK TIME ORGANIZATION
people who can manage this pace, and those few tend to be extremely...
well, let’s say, geeky. For the rest of us mere mortals, coding nonstop for
eight hours, particularly without any breaks, is a recipe for exhaustion.
Recognizing this, there’s a growing movement [1] in some countries
to reduce working hours from the standard 40. One recent success story
comes from Iceland [2], where reducing the workweek to 35-36 hours has
shown promising results. So, it seems less could indeed be more when it
comes to working hours.
This brings us to a question: how much time does a software engineer
actually spend writing code? When I asked my colleagues and friends, the
consensus was that on their most productive, distraction-free days, they
could code for about four to six hours max.
Now, if you whisper these figures to some managers (particularly the
less experienced ones), you might just trigger a full-blown panic attack.
“What on earth are they doing the rest of the time?!” they may ask. But
here’s the kicker: most of the people on their teams are likely coding even
less than that. On average, employees spend only about 40% [3] on their
primary work duties. And that doesn’t even guarantee that this time is
spent efficiently.
My personal target is five hours of focused work each day. If I have a
stand-up meeting and a short lunch break at home, my working day can
be as short as 5.5 hours. I feel great after such days since my output is good
and I have plenty of leisure time afterward. But remember—it only works
with five hours of focused work. Otherwise, you can work for more than
ten hours and produce less output anyway.
However, my days don’t usually total 5.5 hours. I try to be engaged
with activities beyond just writing code and attending the daily stand-
up meeting. If my day involves important calls, professional reading,
knowledge-sharing sessions, and even a workout during the lunch break,
my workday typically clocks in around the standard eight hours.
20
Some people might say that “you can never be the best if you only
work for five hours,” but I want to highlight that striving to be “the best” at
one thing might not be the best goal. Trying to be the “best” at something
often means sacrificing other areas of your life, especially considering the
diminishing returns you get when you put in more effort beyond a certain
point. Instead, being an outstanding tech expert is just one aspect of my
life. I want to balance it with maintaining mental health, living a full life,
and cultivating deep social connections. So, my goal is to be a pretty good,
but more importantly, happy and fulfilled developer.
Focused Work
By “focused work” I mean the following thing: J do the essential stuff and I
work with a lot of concentration.
Most of us struggle with discipline and are often distracted, which
leads to spending time on nonessential tasks. Studies [4] indicate
that checking news websites, scrolling social media, and chatting
with colleagues can consume up to two hours of a typical workday.
Furthermore, one in three people reports [5] spending two to five hours a
day in unproductive meetings. I am not naturally great at staying focused,
so I need to utilize effective techniques that help to reduce context
switching and eliminate distractions, which I’m going to share next.
Meetings
Unless your presence is essential, skip meetings. If you’re uncertain
about your necessity at a meeting, chances are you don’t need to be
there. Although you may miss something semi-important occasionally,
the time you save will more than compensate for it. One way to identify
an ineffective meeting is the absence of a clear agenda, and you don’t
understand exactly what you are going to discuss. Be mindful of your time
21
CHAPTER 2 WORK TIME ORGANIZATION
and the time of others. If you’re the organizer, plan the meeting well, seta
concise agenda, invite only necessary attendees, and provide a summary
afterward.
Warning: There are some meetings you don’t want to miss. For
example, if the CEO of your company wants to share something, you might
consider attending—even if there is no agenda and nobody knows what’s
gonna happen. | “2’)
Notifications
Notifications are evil [6] in terms of focus and productivity. Turn off your
phone notifications and put your phone away to get rid of the temptation
of checking it. Let’s be honest, most of the notifications you get are not
important and don’t require your immediate reply. Your friends can wait
for an answer whether you can join them at the bar, and a new breaking
news title is just another clickbait.
Uninterrupted Time
It’s important to create time to focus when you are not interrupted by
colleagues either. A quick chat about a new version of Rust nightly and a
question by a colleague that can be answered by googling for 15 seconds is
not worth interruption and can wait until your break time. Book some time
for your focused work in the calendar, turn on a “busy” status on Slack (or
Do-not-Disturb alternative in your messenger), notify your team that you
will be open for questions in an hour, or put a note on your head that you
are busy.
Convey the information to others that you are not to be interrupted
now. Some of the extreme programming proponents might disagree with
this, but I believe that ad hoc meetings or hanging on a Discord channel
all day long for immediate communication are often likely to bring more
22
harm than benefits as they interrupt you. However, mind that if you don’t
respond to people, you can block other people’s work. There are situations
when a person cannot progress without your input, and it is fine if you are
interrupted in such cases. Also, if your role is the lead of the team, team
productivity is likely to be more important than your productivity. Being
always available can be a valid option in such a case.
Also, grouping similar tasks together can help avoid context switching.
For instance, if you have multiple emails to write, it might be more efficient
to handle them all at once rather than drafting one every hour and having
to repeatedly divert your focus away from other tasks.
Peak Productivity
You're most productive when you're fresh. Make use of this time for
demanding cognitive tasks. Studies show [7] that our productivity wanes as
the day progresses, so it’s wise to utilize the first few work hours effectively
for the most challenging tasks. I usually save this time for things that need
a lot of focus and big-picture thinking as they use a lot of brain power and
I want to do them as well as I can, for example, planning how to build a
component or talking about architecture choices, or figuring out tricky bugs.
Prioritization
Prioritize ruthlessly. Establish your tasks for the day and adhere to the list.
It may only take a few minutes to create, but it aids in tracking what needs
to be done and what to prioritize. If your current activity doesn’t contribute
to the completion of your daily tasks, it may be unnecessary.
At the same time, relying on a first-in, first-out (FIFO) approach with
the tasks that pop up during the day might lead you to focus primarily on
immediate but unimportant tasks as these are commonly popular. One
useful technique to improve the process is called Eisenhower Box which
23
CHAPTER 2 WORK TIME ORGANIZATION
introduces the noting of importance and urgency to a task. The idea is

to concentrate on tasks that are both urgent and important and then on
important but not urgent tasks, but deprioritize unimportant tasks, and be
mindful of spending most of the time on immediate unimportant tasks.
Figure 2-1 shows the diagram of what we should do with a task by its
category.
Important
(om Do
tgent Urgent
\o Delegate
Unimportant
Figure 2-1. Eisenhower Box illustrated
A practical way to prioritize your tasks is to assign “urgency” and

“importance” scores to each task on your to-do list and then multiply these
values to determine priority. This method may be a simplification, but it
generally works well for most tasks I encounter as a software engineer.
Write Things Down

Documenting things that arise during your day frees up your mental
operating memory and aids in acting on discussions and commitments,
as well as in prioritization. I try to jot down as much as makes sense, given
24
my tendency to forget. The typical things I write down or create to-do lists
for include
Tasks I've promised to others.
Things I need to follow up on but only want to revisit

after finishing my current task, like a production
warning or assisting someone with our project.
Aspects I want to further explore in my code but tend

to overlook, such as addressing a corner case, verifying
compatibility with another system, or needing to
provide additional testing for some part.
Project-specific knowledge, like how to connect to our

database through Bastion or architecture weaknesses in
our code discovered during an incident investigation. I
recall referring to my Notion notes at least five times a
year to check howI can tunnel a database connection
through a Kubernetes pod for local access.
I believe any note-taking app will suffice for a simple to-do list or
small topic/details structure. However, if more organization is needed, it
can be useful to employ more suitable tools. For instance, structuring a
knowledge database using a database in Notion is one approach. Taking it
a step further, the Zettelkasten method, which I describe in the Learning
section of the book, can be highly effective.
Track and Measure

Sometimes we have a feeling that we have worked for a whole day, but
when we are asked what exactly was accomplished, we don’t have a
clear answer. This can be an indicator that you were doing something
nonessential. During the working day, you can write down what you were
25
actually doing, for how long, and why you switched to the other activity.
Look at the “activity” report at the end of the day. Ask yourself whether you
have been working on the stuff you should have; if there were immediate
tasks, what they were and why they appeared; and if you didn’t accomplish
your task list, what hampered you to achieve it. You will likely find
something you can eliminate to improve your productivity.
If you find it difficult to keep track of your actions, you can install a
tracking system on your machine, which would take screenshots every
5/10/20 minutes, so that you'll be able to look at the “report” after work
and see your distractions. There is a startup called Rewind that basically
records all the info you have on the screen; you can scroll it back to find
what you have been doing. There are also apps such as RescueTime and
Rize that are trying to record and classify what you are doing by a category
or app. However, be careful as such tools can go against the security rules
of your company or even break a privacy law if you record a meeting
without explicit consent.
Overtime, Brrr, No Thanks

Overworking not only severely reduces our output, but it also comes with
health risks and job dissatisfaction [8], not to mention increased levels
of stress and fatigue [9]. Furthermore, every additional hour put to work
brings less and less returns when you are already tired. Personally, I find
that after six focused hours of work in a day, my mental clarity starts to
wane. The more I try to force myself to keep working, the less motivated
I become.
However, we all understand that crunch times can occasionally
occur—working longer hours to meet a release deadline, fixing a critical
production bug affecting users, or attending a late, urgent meeting all of
these can actually be fun on their own if they happen occasionally. The
key here is occasionally. If you consistently find yourself in a crunch
26
before every release, troubleshooting bugs late into the night after most
production releases, or having late meetings multiple times per week,
it shows a serious issue with your processes or your management. The
solution? Improve those processes or talk to your manager!
For instance, I once worked on a project involving numerous
interconnected microservices in an “event-driven architecture.” Whenever
we deployed one microservice, we had to test the entire pipeline end to
end—the only way to ensure everything functioned together. This was
particularly problematic as several teams were working concurrently and
the shifting contract between microservices was often a point of failure.
If the pipeline broke post-release, our first response was to revert the
last commit and redeploy, minimizing downtime while investigating the
issue. This cycle—waiting for the CI/CD process to complete, testing the
pipeline, making another revert commit, waiting again, and retesting—
often took over an hour, leading to unwanted overtime.
My solution? I spent two days writing the first end-to-end test that
would run before deployment. After that, I no longer had to wait and
manually check the pipeline post-release. I knew that if there was an error,
it simply wouldn't be deployed. This process improvement eliminated
unnecessary overtime and made the end of my workday more predictable,
and I've seen similar strategies effectively mitigate overtime in many other
situations.
And it goes without saying that explaining to your manager that
constant overtime doesn’t fit with your desired work-life balance is a thing
that should be met with respect. If your employer expects you to overwork
and it is far from what you want to do constantly, it is a good reason
to leave.
What about working from home? It can be even harder to control that
you don’t work overtime. I’ve seen plenty of developers say something
along the lines of “It feels like I don’t work from home—I live at work.
There is no clear separation between home and work anymore.’ One
good recommendation that prevents me from getting into a loop of
27
constant overtime work is to make plans right after your working hours.
For example, since I finish at 4:00 p.m., I tend to make some plans for 5:00
p.m.: booking a gym time, getting together with a friend, or booking a table
at a restaurant. That ensures that I finish on time most days. Obviously,
if | have to work overtime to fix the production that I screwed up myself,
I can cancel my arrangement, but if it’s just a “very important” meeting
on whether we should introduce a new JavaScript library to handle price
formatting or write the functionality ourselves at 4:30 pm, then, sorry, but I
am on my way to the gym.
And there is one small but important point: If] work for 12 hours per
day, I simply cannot do other enjoyable activities. And I bet you want to
live life besides the job too.
Rest for Your Own Sake

Aiming for five hours of focused work per day doesn’t mean you should
accomplish it in one sitting. In fact, frequent breaks are beneficial as
they help you maintain productivity over the long term [11]. The well-
known Pomodoro Technique [12] can be handy. Having work cycles of
approximately 50 minutes followed by about 15 minutes of rest is a good
beginning [13].
If you find it challenging to concentrate for a solid 50 minutes, you
might consider using a free app like “Forest: Stay Focused” or a similar
alternative. “Forest” suppresses phone notifications and incorporates an
element of gamification into the process. I used it for a while but stopped
after realizing that I had no significant issue concentrating for 30-50
minutes on my own.
Also, I don’t generally monitor the duration of one “cycle” of work
and rest, and I simply take a brief break whenever I feel the need. This
approach works for me, but you might find it easier to manage your time in
a more structured manner.
28
When choosing an activity for your rest periods, try to select

something that is fundamentally different from your main work tasks.
Engaging in cognitive tasks such as writing code during work and reading
documentation during rest periods can be exhausting. Both activities
require considerable mental effort and don’t provide a true “break” for
your brain.
However, engaging in physical activities or creative pursuits during
your breaks can help to get back. Activities such as exercise, meditation,
taking a walk, singing, playing a musical instrument, or even just having a
casual conversation can serve as effective rest activities.
Combine Different Activities

It’s not always about writing code. There are a lot more activities that you
can do at work, and I find it more productive and entertaining to combine
them. Writing code for five hours per day can yield good output, but if
work like that for five days per week, I can get a bit bored. I enjoy the days
when I can write code for three to four hours and spend three to four
hours writing articles, mentoring, interviewing, learning and mentoring,
knowledge sharing, and many other activities. Being involved in different
activities also makes me more satisfied with my work in general.
Education
I highly recommend setting aside dedicated time for education during
your workweek. A commitment of three to five hours per week is a good
starting point, and it’s beneficial to physically book this time in your
calendar to avoid interruptions during your learning sessions.
If your company does not currently have a common practice of
dedicating time to employee education, consider discussing and
promoting this idea with your manager. From my experience, it’s not
29
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
"Nowhere! You must have been somewhere!" Gloria cried. "Come
on, Pill, where were you?"
Flip knew that Gloria would persist until she had found out; so she
answered in a low voice, "in the chapel."
"The chapel!" Gloria screeched. "What were you doing in the
chapel!"
"You mean you went there when you didn't have to go?" Erna asked.
Flip nodded.
"What for?"
"Pill, are you nuts?"
They were all looking at her as though she were crazy and laughing
at her.
—Oh, please! she thought, I can't even go to chapel to be quiet
without its being something wrong.
Kaatje van Leyden one of the senior prefects responsible for keeping
order, called out, "Quiet!" and the girls subsided.
But she knew that that would not be the end of it.
Gloria said one morning as they were making their beds and Erna
and Jackie had not yet come up from breakfast, "I say, Philippa, you
don't mind my saying something, do you, ducky?"
"What?" Flip asked starkly.
"I mean because of us both being new girls and everything, I thought
I ought to tell you."
"What?" Flip asked again.
"Well, Pill, if I were you I wouldn't keep running off to chapel, that's
all."
Flip smoothed out her bottom sheet and tucked it in. "Why not?"
"The kids think it's sort of funny."
"I know they do." Flip pulled up her blankets and straightened them
out.
"How do you know?" Gloria asked.
Flip's voice was tight. "I'm not deaf. Anyhow I heard you laughing in
the Common Room with them about it."
"I never did."
"I heard you."
"You eavesdropped."
"I didn't. I walked into the Common Room and I couldn't help
hearing. Anyhow, I don't go running off to the chapel. I just go there
once in a while. There's nothing wrong with that."
"You know, Pill," Gloria said, cocking her head and looking at Flip
curiously, "somehow I never thought of you as being particularly
pious."
Flip looked startled. "I don't think I am. I mean, I never thought about
it."
"Then what do you go running off to the chapel for? Don't you go
there to pray or something?"
"No," Flip said. "At least I usually do say a prayer or something
because if I go there I think it's only courteous to God. But I really go
there to be alone."
"To be alone?"
"Yes. There isn't any other place to go."
"What do you want to be alone for?" Gloria asked.
"I just do," Flip said. "If you don't know why I can't explain it to you,
Gloria."
"You're a funny kid, Pill," Gloria said. "You'd be all right if you just
gave yourself a chance."
Jackie and Erna came in then and Gloria turned back to making her
bed.
9
Jackie pulled Flip aside one evening after chapel. They waited until
everyone had gone into the Common Room; then Jackie pulled Flip
into the dining room. The maids had finished clearing away and the
tables were already set for breakfast the next morning. Jackie
seemed embarrassed and unhappy.
"Philippa, I want to say something to you." They stood under the long
box of napkin racks, each little cubby hole marked with the inevitable
number. Flip stared at Jackie and waited. Jackie looked away,
looked up, over Flip's head, over the napkin racks, up to the ceiling.
"I want to apologise to you."
"What for?" Flip asked.
"My mother said I should apologise to you," Jackie said rapidly, still
looking up at the ceiling, her hands plunged deep into the pockets of
her blue blazer, "about our laughing about your going to the chapel. I
always write my mother everything and I wrote her about our thinking
it was funny and laughing and she wrote back and said who am I of
all people to laugh. She said if you got down on the floor in the
middle of the Common Room and bowed towards Mecca I should
honor and respect your form of worship."
"Oh," Flip said. She felt that she ought to try to explain to Jackie that
it really wasn't a burning question of religion that led her to brave
Miss Tulip's annoyance and go to the chapel but she was afraid that
Jackie would not understand and might even be angry.
Jackie had finished her uncomfortable quoting from her mother's
letter and she looked down at her feet. "So I do apologise," she said.
"I'm very sorry, Pill."
"That's all right," Flip answered, embarrassed, but making an effort
to sound friendly.
Jackie heaved a sigh of relief. "Well, I've got to go now," she almost
shouted. "The others are waiting for me." She tore off and Flip was
left standing under the napkin racks.
10
Saturday afternoons they had free time. Most of the girls
clustered in the Common Room, talking, shrieking, laughing, playing
records. Flip stood by the balcony window thinking that she had
been at the school only a few weeks and yet it seemed as though
she had been there forever. She felt in her pocket for her father's
latest letter that she had already read several times in the peace of
the chapel. When she read his letters, those wonderful wonderful
letters, full of little anecdotes and sketches, she would look at the
drawings of forlorn waifs, ragged and starving, and feel ashamed of
her own misery which for the moment at any rate seemed completely
unjustified. She had had a letter that morning from Mrs. Jackman,
too, written on heavy expensive paper saying that she hoped that
Flip had settled down and was happy, and signed, affectionately,
Eunice. Flip had read it in the hall by the mail boxes, torn it up and
thrown it in the trash basket.
"I love you—u—u—" the phonograph wailed.
"And then he said to me, 'your legs are fascinating'," Esmée was
saying.
"He was the most divine boy," she heard Sally saying, "until I heard
he had a whole set of false teeth and a toupee."
"During the holidays," Gloria screeched, "I smoke at least a pack of
Players a day."
Flip turned away from the window, slipped out of the Common
Room, tiptoed through the big lounge, and slipped out the side door
when the teacher on duty was busy talking to someone. The air was
crisp and a light wind was blowing. She took deep breaths of it and
walked swiftly, exulting in the unaccustomed freedom. She climbed
the hill behind the school, knowing that as she got into the pine trees
clustered thickly up the mountainside she would be safe from
detection. She ran until she was panting and her weak knee ached,
but soon the trees got thicker and thicker and she dropped down
onto the fragrant rusty carpet of fallen pine needles. As soon as she
had regained her breath she walked on a little further, rubbing her
fingers lovingly over the rough, resiny trunks of the pines. She felt
free and happy for the first time since she had been at school. The
air was full of piney perfume; the needles were soft and gently
slippery under her feet; high above her head she could see the blue
sky shining in chinks and patches through the trees; and the sun
sifted down to her in long golden shafts like the light in a church. She
lay down on her back on the pine needles and looked up and up and
it seemed that the trees pierced the sky. Oh, trees, oh, sky, oh, sun,
something in her sang. Oh, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. And she
was happy.
After a while she stood up and brushed and shook the pine needles
off her uniform and climbed still further. There was a small clearing
where the railroad track cut through on its zigzag way up the
mountain. She crossed the track and climbed higher. She did not
know where the school bounds ended and forbidden territory began;
she had forgotten that there was such a thing as a boundary line,
and she kept on pushing up, up the mountain.
Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, rushing in her direction with the
most hideous baying she had ever heard, bounded a wild beast. Her
heart leaped in terror, beating frantically against her chest, then
seemed to stop entirely, before she realized that the beast was Ariel.
"Ariel!" she cried. "Oh, Ariel!" as the bulldog knocked her down in the
ecstasy of his greeting. "Ariel, please!" The dog began bounding
about her, barking wildly, and she lay quietly on the fallen pine
needles until he stopped and stood at her feet, sniffing her anxiously.
"Where's Paul?" she asked, and she was amazingly pleased to see
the dog's hideous face with the drooling, undershot jaw.
Ariel barked.
Flip sat up; then, as Ariel waited quietly, she stood up, and looked
around, but she could see no sign of the boy she had met down by
the lake on the morning of the day she came to school.
"Paul!" she called, but there was no answer except from Ariel, who
barked again, caught hold of her skirt, released it, bounded up the
mountain, then came back and took her skirt in his teeth again.
"But I can't go with you, Ariel," she said. "I have to go back to
school."
Ariel barked and tried again to lure her up the mountain.
"I have to go, Ariel," she told him. "I'm sure I'm out of bounds or
something, being here. I have to go back to school." Then she
laughed at the serious way in which she had been trying to explain to
the bulldog, turned away from him, and started back down the
mountain. But Ariel pranced along beside her, always trying to head
her back up the mountain, catching hold of her skirt or the hem of
her coat, tugging and pulling, gently, but persistently.
"Ariel, you can't come back to school with me, you just can't!" Flip
tried to push the dog away but he barked, reached up, and caught
hold of the cuff of her sleeve.
"Oh, Ariel!" she cried, half exasperated, half pleased because she
knew the dog was going to win. "All right!"
And she turned around and headed back up the mountain.
Ariel bounded ahead of her, running on a few yards, then doubling
back to make sure she was following. Soon she saw grey slate roof-
tops through the trees and as Ariel led her closer she saw that the
roof-tops belonged to a chateau. When the trees cleared and Ariel
began to crash through the heavy undergrowth she realized that the
chateau was old and deserted, for the shutters hung crazily by their
hinges; some of the windows were boarded up; and at others the
boards had come off and the glass was broken and jagged. Grass
and weeds grew wild and high and late autumn flowers bloomed in
undisciplined profusion. Birds flew in and out of the broken windows
and as she pushed through the weeds they began calling to each
other, screaming, someone is coming! Someone is coming!
Her heart beating with excitement Flip pressed forward, following
Ariel, who suddenly leaped ahead of her, bounded across the
remaining distance to the chateau, and disappeared. Flip pushed
after him, calling, "Ariel! Ariel! Wait!" but there was no sound, no sign
of life about the chateau except for the birds and the banging of a
shutter against the gray stones. She crossed what had once been a
flag-stoned terrace to a row of shuttered French windows. One of the
shutters was open and hung by one hinge, and all the glass in the
window was gone. It was through this opening that Ariel had
disappeared. Flip peered in but could see nothing through the
obscurity inside.
"Ariel!" she called, then "Paul! Paul!" There was no answer and her
words came faintly echoing back to her. "Ariel! Paul! Paul!"
At last she turned and started back to school.
CHAPTER TWO
The Page and the Unicorn
SHE studied French verbs in study hall that night, but because of her
afternoon's adventure school seemed different and she seemed
different, and even while she was dutifully memorizing a difficult
subjunctive she was thinking about the chateau and about Ariel and
Paul, and when she thought about them her heart would lift suddenly
and begin to beat rapidly inside her chest so that it seemed like one
of the wild excited birds flying in and out of the broken windows of
the chateau. She sat at her desk and said, "Please, God, let me see
Paul again. Please. Please let me see Paul again."
That night she and Gloria were already in bed, and she was lying
there thinking that the next time she could escape from the school
she would go back and look for Ariel and Paul again, when Erna and
Jackie came in from the lavatory in their pajamas and bathrobes.
Gloria was staring critically at Flip's cotton underthings folded over
her chair at the foot of her bed.
"I can't stand anything but silk next to my skin," Gloria said.
"Mummy's always dressed me in silk. She says she's going to send
me some new silk undies from Paris."
"You and Wagner," Flip said. Jackie laughed.
Erna was tapping her foot on the floor impatiently. "Hey, we just
remembered," she broke in. "You're new girls and we haven't
initiated you yet."
"Oh, Erna," Gloria groaned. "Do we have to be initiated?"
Erna pulled off her barette, pulled her hair back more tightly, and
clasped the barette again as she always did when she felt important.
"Well, you don't have to be, but it just means we can't accept you if
you aren't. You want to be accepted, don't you?"
"Oh, okay," Gloria said. "I suppose we'll survive. Go ahead."
"Do you want to be accepted, Pill?" Erna asked.
Flip answered in a low voice. "Yes."
"Okay. I'll continue. Oh, first you'd better get out of bed and sit on
your chairs, please."
Obediently Flip and Gloria sat on the chairs at the foot of their beds.
Erna nodded in satisfaction. She stood, hands on hips, looking at
them, while Jackie lounged more comfortably on her bed.
"Do you promise to keep our dormitory secrets till the death?" Erna
asked.
Flip and Gloria nodded.
"And to do anything we tell you to do during the period of probation?"
Flip and Gloria nodded again.
"Good. Now we want to ask you a couple of questions."
Jackie took over. She sat up, her feet half in and half out of her
crimson woolly slippers, dangling over the foot of the bed, and
pointed at Gloria. "Who do you like most in the school?"
"You and Erna," Gloria answered promptly.
"I told you she'd say that." Erna nodded at Jackie.
Jackie pointed at Flip. "And you?"
"Madame Perceval."
"Percy? Well, she'll do all right." Jackie kicked one slipper onto the
floor and pointed at Gloria. "Where were you born?"
"London."
"Where?"
"London."
"Where?" Erna asked.
"London."
And Jackie asked again, "Where?"
"Oh, Brazil where the nuts come from," Gloria cried in exasperation.
"Where did you say you were born?" Erna asked.
"I've told you three times," Gloria muttered.
"You seem sort of confused." Jackie kicked off the other slipper.
Erna tightened her bathrobe belt. Miss Tulip had taken her over to
Lausanne that morning and the gold braces on her teeth had been
tightened; her teeth hurt and her voice sounded cross. "If you don't
know where you were born we certainly can't accept you. Where
were you born?"
"London," Gloria mumbled sulkily.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"It wasn't Brazil?"
"No."
"Why did you say it was Brazil?"
"I don't know."
"You mean you say things and you don't know why you say them?"
"No."
"But that's what you just said."
Gloria wailed, "You're trying to confuse me."
Erna put her hands in the pockets of her bath robe and smiled
tolerantly. "Why should we try to confuse you? We're just trying to
find out whether or not you're sure where you were born."
"Of course I'm sure."
"Where was it?"
"London."
"All right. We'll let it go this once. But we can't have people in our
room saying things without knowing why they say them. So be
careful." She turned to Flip. "Okay, Pill. Where were you born?"
"Goshen, Connecticut." Warned by Gloria, Flip answered firmly while
Erna and Jackie asked her seven or eight times.
Jackie slipped over the foot of the bed and pushed her feet back into
her slippers. She smiled ravishingly at Flip and Gloria. "Well," she
told them, "I think you've passed the preliminary examination."
Gloria stood up and stretched. "What's next?"
"You each have to prove yourself."
"How?"
"By some courageous deed. If it's good enough then you can help
with the initiation Saturday afternoon."
"The initiation?" Gloria asked suspiciously.
Erna grinned in anticipation and the light flashed on the gold braces
on her teeth. "Oh, the big general initiation. All the old girls in our
class are going to initiate the new girls who haven't done a
magnificent enough deed by Saturday lunch. It was my idea."
Saturday afternoon, Flip thought. That was when I was planning to
go look for Paul and Ariel. Well, maybe I can go tomorrow after Quiet
Hour though it doesn't give me too much time. I do want to see Paul
again. He was nice to me by the lake and I don't think he disliked
me. Going off to see Paul would be quite a Deed only I can't tell
anyone.
Gloria was smiling a secret pleased smile to herself.
"What's the joke?" Jackie asked, always eager for something to
laugh at.
Gloria twined her arms about her ginger colored head and tried to
look mysterious. "I was thinking of a Deed."
The door opened and Miss Tulip burst in. "Girls! The Light Bell rang
five minutes ago. Just because I wasn't able to get here sooner is no
reason for you to be out of bed. Get in at once. Do you all want
Deportment marks?"
"We didn't hear the bell, Miss Tulip," they chorussed, making a mad
scramble for their beds.
The matron waited until they were lying down and the covers drawn
up; then she switched off the light. "Now I don't want to hear another
sound from this room or I'll have to report you to Mlle. Dragonet.
Good night." And the door clicked shut behind her.
2
Every morning before classes, Call Over was held. All the students
gathered in the Assembly Hall and one of the teachers called the roll.
On Saturday and Sunday mornings Call Over was held as usual,
although it was not followed by lessons. On Saturdays the girls
trooped into the Common Room for sewing, and on Sundays they
remained in formation and marched from the Assembly Hall down to
the chapel.
The morning after Erna's and Jackie's inquisition, Gloria did her
Courageous Deed during Call Over. Fräulein Hauser, the gym
teacher, was calling the roll. She was considered one of the strictest
of all the teachers (though not so strict nor so quickly obeyed as
Madame Perceval) and when it was her turn to take Call Over the
girls stayed very quietly in their lines, answering smartly as their
names were called. It wasn't long, then, this Sunday morning before
Flip and most of the girls in her class, and the classes standing near,
noticed that Gloria, with an expression of unconcerned innocence,
was chewing something. Chewing gum was strictly forbidden and
although the girls frequently smuggled it in, none of them would have
dared chew openly in the presence of a teacher.
"Anne Badeneaux," Fräulein Hauser was saying, "Moire Beresford,
Anastasia Bechman, Hanni Bechman, Lischen Bechman, Jacqueline
Bernstein, Esmée Bodet, Ingeborg Brandes, Dorothy Brown, Gloria
Browne...." As Gloria answered to her name Fräulein Hauser looked
at her sharply. "Gloria Browne," she said.
Gloria, still chewing, answered meekly. "Yes, Fräulein Hauser?"
"You know chewing gum is forbidden?"
"Oh, yes, Fräulein Hauser."
Fräulein Hauser held out her hand. "Come here."
Gloria detached herself from the lines of girls and went up to the
platform. "Yes, Fräulein Hauser?"
Fräulein Hauser kept her hand outstretched. "Spit," she said.
Gloria spat, and there in Fräulein Hauser's upturned palm lay a gold
plate attached to which were Gloria's four front teeth. Gloria turned
around and smiled a brilliant, toothless smile at the assembly.
Fräulein Hauser said icily, "Get back into line. You may report to me
immediately after chapel."
"Yef, Fäulein Haufer. May I haf my teef, pleef, Fäulein Haufer?"
Gloria lisped. Fräulein Hauser handed her the teeth and Gloria
resumed her place in line.
Throughout the entire school shoulders were shaking in ill-
suppressed laughter. Erna let out one snort and turned almost purple
in her effort to keep the rest of her rapture inside. Tears of mirth were
streaming down Jackie's face, and even Flip felt an ache of laughter
in her chest. Fräulein Hauser looked at the Assembly coldly. She
clapped her hands and the sound cut sharply across their laughter.
"Silence!" she hissed, and her face was pale with anger. "Silence!"
She stared wrathfully at the girls until their amusement was
somewhat controlled. Then she went on with the roll. "Cornelli Bruch,
Margaret Campbell, Elizabeth Campbell, Maria Colantuono, Bianca
Colantuono, Goia Colantuono, Jeanne-Marie Crougier...."
3
After Call Over they marched down to the chapel where the
English chaplain from Territet gave them a sermon, and after chapel
Gloria was haled off by Fräulein Hauser and they did not see her
until they met in the dining room for Sunday dinner. Gloria stood,
looking bloody but unbowed, behind her chair as they waited for
Mlle. Dragonet to say grace.
Grace ended, Mlle. Dragonet pulled out her chair, and then all the
other chairs in the big dining room scraped across the floor with a
sound of ocean waves. Tables were changed weekly but the girls
were seated according to classes and the whole of dormitory 33 this
week was together, with Solvei Krogstad and Sally Buckman. Miss
Armstrong, the science teacher, was at their table for that week, but
she had gone down to Montreux to have lunch with a friend who was
passing through.
"Thank goodness Balmy Almy's not here!" Erna cried joyfully. "What
did old Hauser do to you, Gloria?"
And Jackie was squeaking simultaneously, "How did you do it,
Gloria? How did you do it? Tell us quick!"
Gloria clicked her tongue around inside her mouth and suddenly she
was grinning with the four front teeth outside her lips. It was a
macabre and horrible grimace. Another click and they were back in
place.
"You stinker, why didn't you tell us before?" Sally asked, pushing her
fingers against the flat little nose that made her look so much like a
pug dog.
"I was saving it," Gloria said. "It's my Deed so I can help with the
initiation. Will it do?"
"Okay with me." Sally nodded violently.
"What happened to your teeth anyhow?" Erna asked.
"I lost 'em in the blitz. We got bombed out the night before Mummy
was going to take me to the country." Gloria rubbed the tip of her
tongue over her teeth. "I don't know how I ever used to put up with
my own teeth. These are ever so much more useful."
"Daddy sent me back to America before the blitz," Sally said
enviously. "I was in Detroit the whole time."
"Alphabet soup!" Gloria cried as plates were put in front of them.
"The last letter left in the soup is the initial of the man you're going to
marry. Mine is always X. Imagine marrying a man whose name
begins with an X! At the last school I was at there was a girl who lost
an eye in the blitz, and she had a glass eye she used to take out
whenever she got in a row; she'd hold it in her hand and the mistress
could never go on rowing her properly. But I think she used to carry it
too far. One day at dinner the mistress at the table was rowing her
about something and she took her eye out and put it in her glass of
water. Now I call that too much. She was heaps of fun, though. She
got kicked out the same time I did."
"You got expelled!" Jackie exclaimed. "Ooh, what did you do, Glo?"
"Well, Pam—this girl—and I sneaked out of school one Saturday
afternoon and went into town to meet Pam's brothers and of course
one of the mistresses saw us and we got bounced. We didn't care,
though. It was a beastly school, not half as nice as this one."
"But weren't your parents upset?" Jackie asked.
"Who, Mummy and Daddy? They didn't care. There was only a
couple of weeks till the summer hols and they'd have had me on
their hands soon enough anyhow and this gave them a good excuse
to send me off to stay with some people in Wales for the whole
summer. I say, let's play Truth and Consequences, seeing Balmy
Almy isn't here."
Erna, Jackie, and Sally agreed vociferously. Flip looked across at
Solvei and watched her quietly eating her potatoes. She liked the
Norwegian girl who was the Class President and who seemed able
to assume responsibility without putting on any airs. Now Solvei said,
"Let's wait till after lunch. Black and Midnight's been cocking an ear
over here and looking disapproving, and you know how she hates
games at the table."
Gloria stuck out her lower lip. "That old minge. Always poking her
nose in other people's businesses. Why can't she leave us alone?"
"She has a special 'down' on our class," Sally said. "And she says
the middle school's more trouble than the lower and upper schools
together. What a dreep. Oh, my golly, will you look! Suet pudding
again. You can feel every bite of that stuff hit the soles of your feet
five seconds after you've swallowed it. I'd like a good American
banana split."
"Here it is dessert," Gloria wagged a finger at Flip, "And Pill hasn't
said a single word since we sat down. What's the matter, Pill? Cat
got your tongue?"
"No," Flip answered, blushing.
"I don't think I've ever heard Pill say anything." Sally grinned at Flip,
but somehow there seemed to be nothing pleasant about the grin.
"Can you talk, Pill?"
"Yes," Flip said.
"Well, say something, then."
"There isn't—I don't—I haven't anything to say," Flip stumbled.
"Don't we inspire conversation?" Sally asked. "A lot you must think of
us. Does she ever talk in the room?"
Erna was gobbling her suet pudding. "She sometimes answers if you
ask her a question, if you insist. Yes, or no. That's all."
"What do you do when you go out on a date, Pill?" Sally asked. "Or
don't you ever go on dates? Hi! kids, what kind of a line do you think
Pill uses on a boy?"
Flip said nothing.
"Well, what kind of a line do you use, Pill?" Sally persisted. "Maybe
you could teach us something. Well, for john's sake say something,
can't you!"
"Oh, do leave her alone," Solvei said impatiently. "If she hasn't
anything to say she hasn't anything to say."
"But how can someone not have something to say!" Gloria
exclaimed incredulously. "There's always something to say. Any time
I can't talk I'll be dead."
"Well, maybe Pill's dead," Sally suggested. "How about it, Pill. Are
you dead?"
"No," Flip said.
Solvei interfered again in her behalf, but Flip felt that it was only from
a sense of duty, that privately Solvei considered her just as much of
a 'pill' as the rest of the girls did. "Madame Perceval says your
father's an artist, Philippa."
Flip nodded, then said, "Yes. He is."
"How'd Percy know? Did you tell her?" Erna asked.
Flip shook her head. "No."
"Oh, Percy always knows everything about everybody," Jackie said
with admiration. "I don't know how she does it. And you can't ever
get away with anything with Percy but you never mind how strict she
is. Sometimes I think I love Percy almost as much as my mother."
"You have a crush on her," Sally said.
Jackie looked at the grey lump of suet pudding remaining on her
plate and turned up her nose in disgust. "I merely have a great
admiration for her."
"Oh, for john's sake, Jackie, I was just kidding. Can't you take a
joke? Let's change the subject. Tell us a story, Glo. Have you heard
any good ones lately?"
"Well, Esmée told me one yesterday," Gloria started.
Solvei broke in, "Not at the table. Save it for the Common Room if
you feel you have to tell it."
Flip looked at Solvei in gratitude. Mlle. Dragonet at the head table
stood up before Gloria could retort; all the chairs in the dining room
were scraped back and the girls filed out.
4
On Sunday afternoons all the girls were supposed to spend a rest
period in their rooms, but after the rest period there would be two
hours when Flip could try to escape and go back to the deserted
chateau. She sat curled up on her bed with the dog-eared calendar
she carried around with her in her blazer pocket and looked at the
small block of days that was marked off and then at all the days and
days that stretched out to be lived through somehow before the
Christmas holidays and her father would finally come. Sometimes
she was afraid that the Christmas holidays would never be reached.
She knew already that the one certain thing in an uncertain world
was that time always passed; but as day followed day, each one
exactly like the other, she felt that nothing, not even time, could put
an end to their unbearable monotony.
—Oh, please God, please, God, make Christmas come quickly, Flip
prayed, her hand still moving softly over her dog-eared calendar; and
because time did not wheel faster in its vast circle for her she
became filled with despair and homesickness and bitterness at her
misery and she shoved the book she had brought up with her off the
bed so that it fell on the floor with a thud. Across the room Gloria
yawned noisily over her required weekly letter to her mother; Erna
and Jackie, as usual, were whispering and giggling together.
"They're so childish," Esmée was always saying to Gloria, but she
was careful to keep on good terms with Jackie because Jackie's
father was a movie director.
Flip leaned over and picked up her book, smoothing out its pages in
swift apology, and waited for the bell.
5
She hurried out of the room after Quiet Hour, got her coat from the
Cloak Room, and started up the mountain. She knew that the others
would think she had gone to the chapel. She ran almost until she
stood at the edge of the forest where the trees thinned out and
mingled with the underbrush that surrounded the chateau, and there
was the chateau as it had been the day before, cold and beautiful
and deserted. She stood looking at the grey stones and at the birds,
her heart thumping; but no Ariel came rushing towards her to knock
her down with his greeting, and after a moment she began pushing
her way to the chateau, jumping like a startled woods animal each
time a twig snapped or the wind moved in the high grasses. Just as
she had almost neared the decaying walls of the building she heard
a low whine and there was Ariel standing in the shadow of a shutter
that hung drunkenly. The shadow seemed to move and she saw that
Paul was there, too, holding Ariel by the collar.
"Paul!" she called softly.
For a moment she thought Paul was going to go back into the
chateau; then he stepped out of the shadow of the shutter and held
out his hand in greeting.
"Oh," he said. "It's you."
She took his hand. "Who else would it be?"
"There are a great many girls in your school, aren't there? And you
might be any of them."
"I'm not any of them," she said. "I'm me."
"How did you get here?" he asked, still holding back Ariel who was
trying to leap at Flip. "How did you find me?"
Flip retreated a little because it did not seem to her that he really was
glad that she had come. "I didn't find you," she said. "Ariel found me.
I went for a walk yesterday afternoon and he found me and made me
come to the chateau."
"And you came back today," Paul said.
There was neither welcome nor rebuff in his voice but Flip felt that
she had been rejected and she said haughtily, "I'm sorry I'm not
welcome. I'll leave at once."
"No, please!" Paul cried. "I said I was glad it was you. I was afraid it
was someone I didn't know. I came here to be alone and I didn't want
just anybody coming around."
Flip said swiftly, "If you wanted to be alone I won't stay, then. I know
how it is to need to be alone. I need to be alone, too."
Paul reached out for her hand again. "No, don't go, it's good to see
you. I know I sounded inhospitable, but come and sit down." Still
holding her firmly by the hand he led her across the terrace to a
marble bench half hidden by weeds. "Now," he said, sitting down
beside her. "Do you like your school?"
She shook her head. "No. I hate it."
"And you really have to stay? You can't ask your father to take you
away?"
"No." She looked down at Paul's hand beside her on the bench. It
still held a warm tan from summer, and his fingers were very long
and thin and at the same time gave an appearance of great strength.
They were blunt at the tips, the nails square and clean. "I couldn't be
with father while he's traveling about," she said, "and I had to be
somewhere and Eunice suggested this school. Father always seems
to do what Eunice suggests about me...."
Her voice trailed off. Paul saw that she was looking at his hand on
the bench between them and for a second his fingers twitched the
way she had noticed someone's foot would do if you stared at it long
enough in a subway or bus or even in the classroom at school. Then
he reached down and fondled Ariel.
"Ariel is a beautiful dog," she said politely. "Where did you get him?"
"I found him in the street. He had been hit by a car and left there and
his leg was broken. I set it myself and took care of him and now he is
fine, he doesn't even limp, and when I showed him to Dr. Bejart—a
friend of mine—he said he was a very fine dog."
"But that's wonderful!" Flip cried, gazing admiringly at Ariel. "How did
you know about setting a leg?"
Paul looked pleased at her praise. "I intend to be a doctor. A
surgeon. Of course I must go to college and medical school and
everything first. Right now I don't go to school at all. I am trying to
study by myself and my father is helping me but of course I know I
must go back to school sooner or later. I think that it will be later." A
shadow swept over his face and it seemed to Flip as though the day
had suddenly darkened.
She looked up startled and indeed the sun had dropped behind the
mountain. She rose. "I have to go. I didn't realize it was so late. If I
don't get back quickly they'll miss me."
Paul stood up, too. "Do go, then," he said. "If you're caught they
wouldn't let you come back, would they? Will you come back?"

The Rational Software Engineer Strategies For A Fulfilling Career in Tech 1St Edition Mykyta Chernenko Full Chapter

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The Rational Software Engineer Strategies For A Fulfilling Career in Tech 1St Edition Mykyta Chernenko Full Chapter

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The Rational software Engineer:

Strategies for a Fulfilling Career in Tech

ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4842-9794-0 ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4842-9795-7

Copyright © 2023 by Mykyta Chernenko

ImtrOduction ......ccccsscccssssessssesssssesenseessnseeusssseuseseessseesseneessseesseoesenenes xvii

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Chapter 9: Lifelong Learning .........:ssccccssessscccsssssccecsnsesseeesensseneeesenees 119

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Chapter 13: Company Attitude..........cssssescesseesenenesenesseessserssensneneeens 157

Chapter 14: Handling Failures ..........ccsssescsseeseseeesenesseessserseenenenseens 161

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MEUMERIOMEOE 1/7; FEMOUUUNGA

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Chapter 20: Learning from Code........scssssssssssssscsesssssssensesessneessenees 207

Chapter 21: Rotation........cccscccssseceesscesesseessnscessnsceesssseusessersnsnerssseess 215

So there is no doubt that software engineers are smart. But with

The good news is that everything mentioned above is within our

Chapter 1, “Job Satisfaction”: We'll talk about

Chapter 2, “Work Time Organization”: Time

Chapter 3, “There Is No Perfect Project”: Shatter

Chapter 4, “Initiative”: Explore ways to proactively

Chapter 5, “Burnout”: Confront the silent challenge

Chapter 6, “What to Avoid in the Long Run”:

Chapter 7, “Career Change”: Navigate the minor

Chapter 8, “How to Find a Dream Job”: Master the

[2] www. payscale.com/data-packages/most-and-least-

Main Aspects of Job Satisfaction

e Appreciation for your work

e Good relationships with colleagues

e Good work-life balance

© Mykyta Chernenko 2023

e Good relationships with superiors

e Company’s financial stability

e Learning and career development

e Attractive fixed salary

e Interesting job content

Software Engineers’ Aspects

Research and Reference: Use resources such as

Take a Break: Sometimes the solution to a challenging

Rubber Duck Debugging: Try to explain the problem

Simplify the Problem: Break down the problem into

Write Tests: Writing tests for your code can help to

Desk Code Review: Get another pair of eyes on your

Use Debugging Tools: Step through your code with a

Revisit Fundamentals: Go back to the basics. Ensure

Rewrite the Code: If the code is too complex or

Learn from Past Mistakes: Keep track of your coding