Success in today's IT environment requires you to view your career as a business endeavor. In this book, you'll learn how to become an entrepreneur, driving your career in the direction of your choosing. You'll learn how to approach, build your software and development career, by a step-by-step system, following the same path that one would follow in building, marketing, and selling a product. The choices you make about which technologies to focus on and which business domains to master, have at least as much impact on your success, as your technical knowledge itself - don't let those choices be accidental. We'll walk you through all aspects of the decision making process, so you can ensure that you're investing your time and energy in the right areas. You will develop a structured plan for keeping your skills up to date, so that you can compete with both the growing stable of developers in so-called "low-cost countries" as well as your higher-priced local peers. You'll learn how to shift your skill set up the value chain, from offshore-ready commodity to one in high demand. As with any product or service, if nobody knows what you're selling, nobody will buy. We'll walk through the often-neglected world of marketing, and we'll create a plan for you to market yourself both inside your company and to the industry in general. Like it or not, the IT career landscape has changed. This is your handbook to avoid being left behind.

Table of Contents

Introduction Part I--Choosing Your Market 1. Supply and Demand 2. Coding Don't Cut It Anymore 3. Lead or Bleed? 4. Invest in Your Intelligence 5. Be a Generalist 6. Be a Specialist 7. Don't Put All Your Eggs in Someone Else's Basket 8. Be the Worst 9. Love It or Leave It Part II--Investing in Your Product 10. Learn to Fish 11. Understand Business Basics 12. Find a Mentor 13. Be a Mentor 14. Practice, Practice, Practice 15. The Way That You Do It 16. On the Shoulders of Giants 17. Automate Yourself into a Job Part III--Executing 18. Right Now 19. Mind Reader 20. Daily Hit 21. Remember Who You Work For 22. Be Where You're At 23. How Good a Job Can I Do Today? 24. How Much Are You Worth? 25. A Pebble in a Bucket of Water 26. Learn to Love Maintenance 27. Eight-Hour Burn 28. Learn How to Fail 29. Say "No" 30. Say It, Do It, Show It Part IV--Marketing...Not Just for Suits 31. Perceptions, Perschmeptions 32. Adventure Tour Guide 33. Me Rite Reel Nice 34. Being Present 35. Suit Speak 36. Change the World 37. Let Your Voice Be Heard 38. Build Your Brand 39. Release Your Code 40. Remarkability 41. Making the Hang Part V--Maintaining Your Edge 42. Already Obsolete 43. You've Already Lost Your Job 44. Path with No Destination 45. Make Yourself a Map 46. Watch the Market 47. That Fat Man in the Mirror 48. The South Indian Monkey Trap Part VI--If You Can't Beat 'Em 49. Lead 'Em 50. Manage 'Em 51. Learn from Open-Source 52. Think Global What I Learned in India Resources A.1 Bibliography

Author Biography

Chad Fowler is co-director of Ruby Central, Inc., and remains an active, driving force in the Ruby community.