I wonder what you should do if you are one of these 0x programmers. Throw away your degree and change career? Or try to close the gap? But what if you really aren't able to become one of the 10x?
I wonder because I feel that this is my situation. The people I started working with are so much above my skill level, it's ridiculous.
Maybe 0.5x? I'm sure I had a negative performance impact on my former team. They would have been faster doing all features by themselves instead of reviewing and correcting my pull requests. New team isn't as good as the other one, but I'm still behind.
I've learned quit a lot in the former team, the new team on the other hand.. I've hardly coded anything this year. I work with code, but I don't build stuff. As a result, my coding skill progression stopped almost completely, while general IT skills improved somewhat. In my former job, I was able to work at my own pace and do everything by myself (SQL dev). I believe I was good there. But now? Working with big systems in Java developed by others in unknown frameworks, done by high skilled people.. I suck.
Do you like software development, in general ? In other words, is there something that you've worked on in the past that you were passionate about, and found yourself thinking about, even when not "working" ?
If the answer to any of the above is "yes", then you may just need to find another job that better suits your interests and needs in terms of career progression. Software development jobs can vary greatly in terms of being interesting/challenging. Being on a big development team is sometimes not the best option for developers that are just starting out. There's simply not enough room to grow and explore because your work environment is so rigid and pre-determined by others.
Your first sentence is exactly what I've asked myself recently. What do I think about once I'm no longer sitting at my desk? What kind of problems does my brain try to solve?
Incongruously, I think mostly about non coding related problems. Still, if I understand the code base and its frameworks, the degree of coding related thinking increases substantially.
But normally, I automatically think more about "How to improve the reviewing process? How to improve onboarding? How to calculate costs? How to organize / improve our customer support?" and similiar problems. Those topics are all more in the project manager department. Maybe I'm better suited for that kind of role, but I can't take myself seriously if I haven't build a strong tecnical skillset.
> I automatically think more about "How to improve the reviewing process? How to improve onboarding? How to calculate costs? How to organize / improve our customer support?" and similiar problems.
FWIW, those interests really should make you a good choice for moving into a less technical role. I don't know if there are career paths that don't start with being someone technical but that's something I would persue, if I were you.
I wonder because I feel that this is my situation. The people I started working with are so much above my skill level, it's ridiculous.