The Hard Uncomfortable Work

You know those things that you are putting off that should probably be part of your job? The things you really should learn, know and wield that you only ever skim and touch when necessary? Even if you overall love the work you do there is usually some parts that make you go .. ugh.

This is the magic of collaboration. I will quote our good buddy Frank Hunleth (hi Frank) without his permission because it was very funny.

"You all kill me. You'll basically do whole scale redesign and implementation of the UI, and reading metadata out of a file is 'hard'"

He was talking with me and Josh. To be fair we outsourced a lot of that UI work. But this is the funny bit. Frank would actually probably be faster in straight C or C++ than in Elixir and he moves among kernels and drivers like a goddamn cat where I personally lumber along looking at everything much like an archeologist going "mmm, this file seems very important, must have religious significance". Meanwhile, me and Josh will go off on the web end with no concerns at all. The Web is easy.

For us.

The Linux kernel is easy. For some.

And the person who has an easy time with the Linux kernel will often have a hard time picking just one good color.

And many developers across many verticals or horizontals will have trouble with writing, or speaking, explaining themselves or arguing for their opinion. Some will have a hard time being careful, diligent and rigorous. Some will be chronically unable to move fast even if it is okay to break things.

I have no friction with writing. I have very low friction for impromptu speaking. I have lower friction than most for making video. This has value in a group where that ought to be done but everyone else finds it high friction.

I would still kill for a structured writer that would like to contribute to open source by just writing and improving documentation. I mean if you like Nerves and that sounds like a good time, hit me up. I have stickers and your name will be credited across the interwebs. Because I find that work kind of dull. I can do it but it is not my sweet-spot.

Look at what comes easy to you and bring that to a group. Help the group with that. And make sure you get some exposure and chance to learn the interesting parts you don't know. This is magical in terms of collaboration. The magical component is people and the hard part is of course also people. As long as everyone is willing to collaborate and has some insight into their own weaknesses it is usually possible to play to folks' strengths. And occasionally people can push themselves and do something uncomfortable, build some new brain-muscle.

What is your strength? What do you kind of suck at? If you think you suck at everything you are certainly wrong. If you think you rock at everything I'm sure I could pinpoint your weak spot ;)

You can reach me on the Fediverse where I'm @lawik@fosstodon.org or by responding to this email to lars@underjord.io.

Thank you for reading. I appreciate it.