Episode 54
It’s time for another book review! Since, it’s still January, the month of recaps, let’s recap what I’ve reviewed so far. There were four books:
- Episode 40: Building Microservices
- Episode 25: Software Craftsman: Professionalism, Pragmatism, Pride
- Episode 23: Software Craftsmanship: The New Imperative
- Episode 17: Secrets of the Rock Star Programmers
What they all have in common? Well, they are about software development. Today, we are going to do something seemingly different. I will present you a book written by Olivia Fox Cabane, a person who has pretty much nothing to do with our industry. The book is called The Charisma Myth: How Anyone Can Master the Art and Science of Personal Magnetism. It’s a good book. And damn useful in software development.
What if charisma can be taught?
There are people with magnetic presence, who are influential, inspiring, persuasive, charming and able to harvest the undivided attention of crowds. The common understanding is, that it’s a gift, a talent or an innate ability. You just either have it or not.
The common understanding is wrong. In the book, Olivia explains that charisma is simply a skill. Of course, different people have different degrees of talents toward learning particular skills, but nevertheless – it can be trained. Perhaps not everyone can be a master, but hey, being an expert or even decent at it can make great deal of difference in your life, both private and professional. Maybe you are not a politician, show host or CEO, but you usually deal with people to some degree (please get out of the cave…). And when being development team member or leader, scrum master, manager, product owner, administrator or whoever in IT, you benefit from charisma. If you help new people around, conduct a programming training, give a speech on tech conference or go talk with your boss about pay rise, you benefit from charisma. Let’s see how Read the rest of this entry »
How To Train Your Java 