Selling results, not tools - that reminds me a lot of what patio11 has said over the years. And, clearly, it's been effective. Slack is an extremely popular and common tool today. :)
But, it's been hard for me as a nerd to care about results - my specialty and personality is to deeply care about the tools and how they are excellent; results are largely less interesting. I've adapted and learned to care, but it was not natural. I think that's a critical distinction between effective sales and ineffective sales.
As a fellow programmer myself, I care more about the results than the tools, but I have worked with many programmers who, like you, care more about tools than the results.
As humans, aren't we all conditioned to care more about the result? E.g. I eat pasta, without spending time tinkering with pasta-making tools.
Can you help me understand what past experiences made you deeply care about the tools, while finding the results largely less interesting?
Because I want to understand this perspective more, so I can practice better empathy with my co-workers and better put myself in their shoes. Thanks!
Results are contingent on tools. Further, results are so profoundly contingent on tools and the process of the tools, that without deeply understanding tools, often the result is simply misunderstood or mishandled.
This is particularly striking when commenting about business metrics and how they are generated. Not understanding the query and what it doesn't say often leads to misunderstanding.
In a certain sense, while you may be conditioned to care more about the result, I care more about the art and craft, because that defines the result and the backpropagation of information into the tools.
Let me explain more: Slack defines an experience. That is the tool. The result is consequential of the tool. Change the tool, change the result. One compiler produces one output, another produces a different output, more readable. Change the tool, change the result. The locus of interest and control is the tool - although the zoomed out reality is the result is the relevant bit to the user, mostly.
Joel talks about leaky abstractions: tools are abstractions; understanding the tool takes the cover off and lets you create new abstractions and understand without leaks. Understanding tools gives you the ability to recombine and build the new tools - one begins to realize the independent variable is the tool.
And again - lack of understanding produces embarrassment and inability to properly use the tool - understanding gives lucid and clear capability.
With respect to your remark about pasta: I would, frankly, be happier to make my own pasta if I had the time. Same goes for the other food I eat.
I paint for a hobby; I have paintmaking supplies and will, in time, as I use up my tubes, transition over to making the paint that I paint with. I am learning how to make brushes. I often prepare the wood for painting upon. In time I will prepare canvases and likely I will learn the process of pressing and refining flaxseed into linseed oil.
Time and experience have persuaded me not to talk about the tools and so forth to the non-nerd crowd such as, e.g., The Business, because it's not considered useful to them.
Great comment. What you are talking about though is useful levels of abstraction.
When you are talking to 'the business' I find it helpful to remember you are their 'tool'. How you do what you do, or what you use to do it may be an unhelpful abstraction.
To use your painting analogy, it is like talking to the painter about the soil in which trees grow, which produce the wood used for the brushes. While the binding of the brushes, the making of the substrate or the production of paint may be useful, correct mulching may well be a step too far.
> When you are talking to 'the business' I find it helpful to remember you are their 'tool'. How you do what you do, or what you use to do it may be an unhelpful abstraction.
Oh, I am aware. I don't resent it - I've grown past that (I was, once - I was more dogmatic nerd then). It's rather that there's often a mismatch between the technical ground reality and the business reality - focusing on bridging that gap would be helpful for all involved. Part of that is my role, part of that is the role of the business. :)
But even someone who makes pasta for a living and has the time doesn't likely have the skills to make pasta-making tools, which after all are made of steel and not wheat. Software is different because the tools we use are made of bits almost all the way down.
> not to talk about the tools
"Five whys" can help explain the relevance of tools to The Business, especially when cleaning up a delayed or over budget project (not that that ever happens).
> But even someone who makes pasta for a living and has the time doesn't likely have the skills to make pasta-making tools, which after all are made of steel and not wheat. Software is different because the tools we use are made of bits almost all the way down.
The enterprise term for my mentality is vertical integration. It's an incredibly effective system of organization for an enterprise. Apple does it in many aspects with the iPhone; Google does it for software. Organizations that horizontally integrate often have cost duplications and mission sprawl, although they can often be generally effective as well - c.f. chaebol.
I appreciate what you're saying, but the poster I applied to was inquiring about my mentality. I find that my mentality is to vertically integrate in my knowledge and life approach.
On the contrary it gives insight into something I'd always wondered about. How did a chat app get such big mind share - its clear the strategy was deliberate, and that it worked.
But, it's been hard for me as a nerd to care about results - my specialty and personality is to deeply care about the tools and how they are excellent; results are largely less interesting. I've adapted and learned to care, but it was not natural. I think that's a critical distinction between effective sales and ineffective sales.