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What is your greatest strength and how do you know?
I work very, very hard. It is important to me that while at work, I am actually working. I am not a person who likes to peruse around the office to gossip or to pass time doing something unproductive. In the past I have been promoted quickly within companies that I worked for. I believe most of my promotions were a result of my strong work ethic.
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How do you work best?
I need to keep busy because it keeps me focused. I strongly dislike being micro managed. While working, I am doing so to the best of my ability and having someone looking over my shoulder regarding everything I do, every step I take, is counter productive. It makes me nervous and less likely to succeed because my focus switches from hard work to people pleasing. I also need to know that there is upward growth in my future. There needs to be some type of reward to keep me pushing forward, as a financial incentive is only worth so much.
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What is your greatest area of improvement?
Due to my dislike of being bored or stagnant I can sometimes get myself in over my head. I will hoard work. I will take on other co workers work regardless of how much time I actually have to complete it to avoid having nothing to do. I need to make sure that everything that I commit to I get done. I also tend to be introverted. This can limit my ability to grow my skill set and prevent me from contributing because I can be timid.
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How do you hope to maximize your strengths for your new career in software development?
I have a never give up personality. I believe that coding can sometimes be tedious, often spending time looking for a simple mistake or solution. It is that perseverance that can carry me through the long hours and complicated issues that come with the development industry. I strive at taking on responsibility with putting the load of the work on myself and expecting others to rarely complete my projects. It is clear that the answers will most likely not be laid out clearly for me and I hope my ability to research translates into a great strength in my future career.
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How might knowing about your strengths and working preferences benefit you as a software developer?
The Pairin survey suggested that I am highly analytical which seems to be a very important characteristic for software developers. It also suggests that I value structure and rules which makes me compatible with the very basics of the industry. Everything that I have encountered thus far has a process for how to create and maintain projects. For example, there are very rigid rules regarding how to word your commits. By following those rules you are not only setting yourself up for success but also the success of others on your team.
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What efforts do you make to manage your learning process? Are those efforts successful? What challenges have inhibited your ability to manage your working process effectively?
As a kinetic learner I try to recreate material so that I can retain information more clearly. I also make sure that my learning environment is peaceful. I prefer to work in a quiet, undisturbed location, even foregoing music. These contiditions tend to help me learn the most effectively. I have also learned that when you fall behind in, for example, homework that it affects your ability to learn and to keep up as new information is constantly being thrown at you.
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How do Sierra's and Coate's material relate to your current process for learning?
Sierra explains that there are really three areas that we place bits of knowledge into. A place where we know virtual nothing, an area where we know things but are not fully fluent in them and a final category where we have mastered the subject. She suggests that we move through, or remove, that middle process as quickly as possible. Currently, I have many things in the middle, pending area, and need to retain my cognitive resources as I grow to a level of mastering skills. Coate's suggests that there are many highs and low in the fluency process. I have felt those lows, spending hours fixing one problem, however, when I have actually conquered what I was struggling with it feels amazing! Coates encourages us to hold onto those highs as they come few and far between.
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What role does your emotional state of mind play in your learning? How do your successes and failures at learning affect your emotional state?
Your emotional state is extremely important when it comes to learning. This is why it is important that when working on something for a long time that you remove yourself and take a break as it will help to keep you in a good headspace. It is easy to become hard on yourself when you believe that concepts are not coming to you as quickly as you would like. I find that often with patience and repetition the concepts become more solid and every time I encounter something that was once foreign, but now is less intimidating, my emotional health improves. It is also more difficult to learn when an outside source of emotion preoccpies the mind, often taking much needed space mentally for the things you would really like to accomplish.
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How will you prepare yourself to be at your best with your learning process while at Turing?
Mod 0 has been a real shock to the system and extremely valuable. I believe that this mini Mod helps to prepare you physically, mentally and emotionally for what to expect during your time at Turing. I am starting to form a routine that will undoubtably morph when the program actually starts. It is extemely important that all of my ducks are in a row before I step into that classroom so that I can be successful in learning. I believe that after Mod 0 ends continuing to work on skills daily is imperitive. So many concepts have been thrown my direction in a short period of time that I know if I do not continue to cultivate them that I will lose them.