How can we get better at doing anything?
A lost tourist asks a native New Yorker “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?” to which the local replies “Practice, practice, practice!”
Good advice. But if we want to get better at doing something, what should we practice?
The obvious answer is that we should practice improving what we are doing well. So we get even better at it.
My mentor Jerry Weinberg has a different suggestion.
“What are the basic skills required to be a good programmer?”
When this question came up on Quora.com, lots of good and useful answers were given, but they all seemed to be external answers. For me, with more than 60 years of programming experience, the one thing that made me a better programmer than most was my ability and willingness to examine myself critically and do something about my shortcomings. And, after 60 years, I’m still doing that.”
—Jerry Weinberg, What are the basic skills required to be a good programmer?
Being continually willing and able to notice our shortcomings and concentrate on working on them may be the most effective strategy we can use to get better at doing anything.
Image by Jonathunder (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons