Be the Worst

For this week’s blog I decided to talk about the pattern from chapter 4 called “Be the Worst”. This pattern describes the situation where you have taken every opportunity to learn and eventually have outgrown your team. In this situation, it is important that you find developers that are better than you. When you take this route you will need to put in a lot of work because your aim is not to stay at the bottom but work your way up. You will be able to use multiple methods like mimicking other developers until you are on the same level and them. 

I agree with the solution for this scenario. I have found that I learn a lot when I am the weakest on a team. I am able to study the code written by the stronger members of my team and get insight on their choices. I found that learning from another person also speeds the process along. During this process, its important to avoid bothering your other team members too much. Although it can be convenient to just ask others, you need to establish a way to learn on your own so you can avoid prohibiting thew progress of others.

As one can guess, this method has risks like dragging the team down and running the risk of being fired because your productivity is not as expected. I have experienced pressure to avoid bringing the team down along with a lack of confidence in my own abilities. The first steps to follow this pattern is to develop confidence in yourself and focus on learning. Second, I think it is important to have open conversations with your team members and speak up when you may be falling behind. As mentioned in my other blogs, I have worked on past teams where I had to learned from other members. During this process, we all kept each other updated on our progress and it was crucial for us to work together to finish by our deadline.

 I think this pattern aligns well with the way I’ve been developing my professional skills and I cant say that I disagree with anything. Following this path will definitely help with self-assessment because the more you know, the more you know what you don’t know.