What's with Who Moved My Cheese?

Who Moved My Cheese?


Johnson, Spencer






Who Moved My Cheese? was a "required" book to read for new employees at my current company. Although the story is very short, the message is very straightforward: Don't get stuck in a rut. That's it. It took about 40 minutes to read through it.

I must admit I wasn't a fan of this book. It seems to have been written for a career path where getting into a rut was easy and relatively safe, but the world of software development is certainly not like that. Now that it's 2012, fewer and fewer people are still programming in COBOL, FORTRAN, BASIC, or even C for that matter. We are frequently given opportunities to learn new technologies that are more powerful and make our lives easier.

Having graduated from university recently, the message was somewhat lost on me. As students take different college courses every semester, they are frequently thrown for a loop and forced to "find cheese" for each new class in its own way.


Don't get me wrong. I don't think Cheese? is completely useless. I think a great demographic for this book would be the recently laid-off employee who may need some motivation to get back out in the work force. However, I don't think this book is a must-read for everyone. In particular, there was a line included in my version of the book which said that anyone who disregards the story is a know-it-all. I take offense to that statement; it has yet to be proven whether or not I actually "know it all."

If your coworkers have all read this book, read it because it only takes about an hour to read and no one wants to feel left out. If you need some motivation to get out of a rut, you don't need to read a book to tell you to get off your rump and do something about it; just do it.

Link: Researcher reveals how “Computer Geeks” replaced “Computer Girls”

Below is a link to an interesting article on what are called the first programmers (link courtesy r/programming). Unfortunately, women were booted out of the programming sector once the world realized how complex the job was. Now, 50 years later, we no longer tell women they can't be intellectuals and yet software development is still a male-dominated career path. Maybe the "Computer Girls" will make a comeback. Maybe Cosmo will have articles about software aimed at visionary young women. Just imagine the right answers to the sex quizzes leading you away from the brawny athlete and instead to the programming dreamboat!

Researcher reveals how “Computer Geeks” replaced “Computer Girls”

Having Read The Passionate Programmer

	The Passionate Programmer (2nd edition): Creating a Remarkable Career in Software Development
	Chad Fowler

The Passionate Programmer is essentially a book about self-motivation. It is neatly wrapped up into several sections about marketability and rekindling the passion for software development, and these sections are broken up into delightfully bite-sized chapters which make the book a breeze to go through.

This book preaches that we should be happy with our jobs but not complacent. The author, Chad Fowler, believes that, at all times, we should be looking for ways to better ourselves as professionals and as individuals. This is certainly a tall task. I've been having trouble finding time to do very many extracurricular activities lately, what with moving to a new city, starting my career, buying a car, and planning a wedding, but what this book really makes me want to do is search the internet for some new software technology I don't understand and learn everything I can about it. It's all about branching out from the norm and doing things one may be uncomfortable doing. I'm fortunate to have started a job at a company where I have the opportunity to frequently switch projects and do things that are completely different fairly regularly.

I also see it as a good thing that I was thrown into technologies I'd never had to deal with before during my first day on the job (Windows programming, .NET, WPF, TestStand, CruiseControl...).  All jobs should be like this. Companies hiring people for their potential to do anything instead of their potential to do a specific task.

Fowler also mentions being social as an important step in a passionate career. Managers, programmers from other companies, managers of managers, developers at conferences, managers of managers of managers, and even folks in online forums or blogs may be the link to an opportunity. I normally just live under the thought chain of "If I write it, it's good, and I'm efficient, I'll get noticed." But Fowler insists this is not true! Talking to these kinds of people and letting them know what you've been up to is beneficial in that it gives managers a sense of how the project's going, it may give other developers ideas or inspiration to solve problems, and it can help you feel more accomplished. It's a good mindset to be in, and it simply involves climbing out of the cubicle every once in a while and finding the right people to talk to.

This book provides good motivation to continue pushing oneself and it provides inspiration for how to better manage one's non-working life.