I don't know about that. My wife moved from Iran to
America because America offered her greater
opportunities than Iran did. I notice that Silicon
Valley keeps getting more and more crowded. Why? Because
of the career opportunities offered there. Same up here
in Redmond.
Going to the PDC is the same kind of thing. By not being
there, you've decided to turn down some economic
activity. How much, I'm not sure. I spoke at a user
group six years ago and got a new job there and a
$10,000 a year raise. Had I decided not to go, I would
have turned down $60,000 (and growing).
But, I can't guarantee the same thing will happen to
you. We'll never know.
I'm one who ranted - both at (1) those who have (and
still IMHO) overhyped the "need" to
attend the PDC in order to get a sneak peek and
decidedly alpha bits of products that won't be available
for true solution providing for 1-2 more years at best,
and (2) those who speak of
"responsibility" of directing their
own careers like this is some sort of divine revelation
that puts them in some advantageious position.
Each of these points of view are simply untrue.
To the former I say decide for yourself if the PDC is
cost effective, both in money AND time. Decide if
getting the beta releases that will most likely be
offered through MSDN Universal is a better route. Decide
if using alternative resource venues (including the
overwhelming amount of blogging from the PDC) can give
you the edge you need. Decide if formal training using
handson of pre-release software cuts it.
To the latter I say... well, if you already asked the
above questions in a honest and objective manner, you've
already accomplished everything that Eric Sink wrote so
eloquently. And if you have, then nothing he wrote
should strike you as revelatory.
If you haven't asked these questions, then take his
words to heart, and add one more question too: do you
honestly believe YOUR worth to YOUR clients (remember,
as an employee of some company you are really offering
your services to your employer)... do you really believe
you are worth much at all if you haven't been taking
responsibility all along? You aren't! Remember, rule #1
for anyone in their job is to know what value you
provide to your client/customer/employer. If you don't
understand where the value lies and do whatever you MUST
to keep providing that value you WILL eventually LOSE
that value to someone who comes by and yields much
better value.
In my case, I spend maybe 10% of my year learning new
things. This is enough to stay ahead of the curve on
what I need to use. I spend about 60% of my year
developing brand new solutions that are needed to
address needs today. About 30% of my time is spent
working on enhancements and maintenance of existing
solutions. When I add in that we still haven't
eliminated all Win2k clients nor MSSQL7 servers, I
objectively assess that (1) Whidbey is something to
consider but I won't be able to gain from it's unique
benefits for 12 months, (2) Yukon is not going to be in
use until Q4 2005 or Q1 2006 for us and (3) Longhorn is
definitely not going to be on clients until sometime in
2007. For me, the time and money is simply not worth it.
Both are better spent in other ways today. And both will
be spent on these unreleased products in the next few
years - just not now.
The PDC is a great thing for some. It is completely
worthless for me. I have no fear - sorry Robert - of
"losing my job to someone in India".
(Yeah, that comment still rubs me the wrong way. You
made it directly to me Robert. You made it such an
absolute too. No only did you assume to know my career
needs by saying this, you also assumed I didn't do the
thorough assessment I spoke of above. How dare you? PS:
I mean this with all due respect. I just ask that you
pay me the same respect.)
Clearly, Roy, the PDC is not the thing. Doing any of the
things that improve your L, Learning, is the issue.
How many developers do you know who do nothing to
continue learning and growing as developers? I can tell
you that at one client site, there were perhaps half a
dozen developers who did not read *a single development
related book* in the last year.
PDC may not be essential for you in your situation,
however, I am sure there are other things you can do to
add value to what you offer in the employment/consulting
marketplace, and I expect you do. However, there are
lots of folks who do not. And many of these same folks
will be very upset when they find themselves mostly
unemployable because what they learned a decade or so in
school has very little revelance to the work that needs
to be done.
Many readers of my piece saw more PDC hype than I
intended to convey.
I agree with Roy. Attending PDC is just one example of
grabbing the reins of your own career. There are lots
other examples, many of which don't cost so darn much.
Nobody should feel like a slug just because they skip
PDC.
The point was not about PDC. The point was that we need
to grab opportunities to learn new stuff, all kinds of
stuff. If we don't, we've got nobody to blame but
ourselves.
BTW, Roy, thanks for the link, but let's try to move a
little quicker next time, okay? You were the last
blogger on earth who had not linked my article, and I
was just getting ready to send the blog police after
you. :-)
Eric, I'll comment here only because you did. I didn't
take your piece as PDC related at all. The only
connection to it was that the PDC initiated some talk
about how one handles their career throughout their
life. Like you and your piece, I agree that one should
always be proactive. Proactive also includes saying
"no" or having no interest in
something too, just in a conscious thought-out way. Your
piece was only conveying like thoughts in a well-written
way (like alot of what you have to say).
The "about commitment guy" could have
been me 2 years back. Only then saving all the goodies
on a 100 mb zip disk ;)
Roy do yourself a favor, buy (or lend) the book I
recently blogged about.
ps: Great post, was feeling the same about the PDC
horror (for those that aren't going).