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Software development experience: Is time, depth, or breadth most important?

March 8, 2013, 9:49 AM PST

Takeaway: Answer this one-question poll to let us know what you think is most important when it comes to software development experience: time, depth, or breadth.

I have been hiring folks, and something that sticks out in the process is that there are three major aspects of experience in software development: the amount of time you have been doing something, how deeply you have gone in one skill, and how many different things you have worked with in your career.

I think there is a sweet spot that is unobtainable: too little time in a skill and you do not know it well, too little depth and what you know is not useful, and not enough breadth holds you back from being able to do a lot of things. There just is not enough time in the day to get lots of time, depth, and breadth.

Until the last several years, I had a lot of breadth without depth or time, which was a side effect of being dropped into a lot of projects to clean up issues and then moving on. Now I am a specialist, with a pile of time and depth in one particular tech stack to the detriment of other skills, and I feel like I need to branch out a little more.

Is time, depth, or breadth most important in terms of software development experience?

J.Ja

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About Justin James

Justin James is the Lead Architect for Conigent.

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5 Votes

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Time = Depth * Breadth

dogknees 11th Mar

I think it's a bit like the old Time vs Space trade-off from development.

Agree a bit with Chip. If you learn the fundamentals well and have practice applying them, you can at least get a good start on learning any new system. The individual paradigms or patterns or vernacular in a language or environment do still take time and it helps a lot if you can get talk to someone familiar with the gotcha's that every system has buried somewhere.

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2 Votes

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Tough call

nate.irvin@... 8th Mar

I don't think time really matters - obviously experience and maturity count, but we've all worked with people who've been doing something for years who seem less competent than the average beginner. I had a hard time deciding between breadth and depth but I eventually voted depth. Being well-rounded is important, but I think it's more important to master something. Craftsmanship counts more in my book than mobility. I try in my career to master the skillsets I've chosen/enjoy while still keeping an eye on other technologies and techniques and making sure to dabble in them from time to time.

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2 Votes

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Sometimes I think I'd like to really concentrate on one thing

Tony Hopkinson 8th Mar

but having a bucket full of experience across a broad range of tools and domains has kept me a in bread and jam too often to risk it.

Also knowing more than one way, is just as useful as knowing the "best" way.

Am I scared to going to deep , or are you scared of spreading yourself out?
Who gives a stuff, if you are getting a decent amount of money for doing something you enjoy. happy

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0 Votes

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Software development experience: Is time, depth, or breadth most important?

Manju.L 8th Apr

Software development experience: Is time, depth, or breadth most important?

Overview
There are three major aspects of experience in software development: the amount of time you have been doing something, how deeply you have gone in one skill, and how many different things you have worked with in your career.
Why is time the most important?
With vast array of technology ,it can be very difficult to figure out where to invest the best time .
Problem solving is the core, without problems there wouldnt be a need for software. The importance remains here; in what amount of time can the problem be solved.
Software development is all about describing the metaphysical., that cannot be seen. So how much time does it consume to develop the best software interface counts.
Dealing with users is the next; software isnt developed for alone or oneself, others use it! Unless the software doesnt effectively respond to the users activities and is slow to stimulus is considered troublesome.
The software produced by projects covers a broad application domain, for this reason complexity increases, hence projects consume more time.

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1 Vote

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Contributr

Which goes to show...

Sterling "chip" Camden 16th Mar

... that an optimal balance must be found.

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1 Vote

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It was a book about physics that I got my favourite around the issue

Tony Hopkinson 15th Mar

A philosopher ends up knowing less and less about more and more.
A scientist ends up knowing more and more about less and less.

So the ultimate generalist knows nothing about everything
And the utimate expert knows everything about nothing.

grin

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