Eugene Yan

His website: https://eugeneyan.com

Some cool articles by him:

  1. When writing documents become as important as writing code
  2. Build a project portfolio
Pages that link here

When writing documents become as important as writing code
By the ever-wise Eugene Yan URL: https://eugeneyan

Build a project portfolio
Eugene Yan writes extensively on the topic of data science careers, and I particularly enjoyed the essay he wrote titled Why Have a Data Science Portfolio and What It Shows

Build a project portfolio

Eugene Yan writes extensively on the topic of data science careers, and I particularly enjoyed the essay he wrote titled Why Have a Data Science Portfolio and What It Shows.

A tl;dr summary of what he has in there:

  • The "why" is more than "getting a job". The process of building the portfolio matters more.
  • The process involves developing qualities: persistence, continual learning, altruism (to help others).
  • The "what it shows" includes both technical skills and those aforementioned qualities.

And a notable quote:

IMHO, traits and skills are a prerequisite to building a great portfolio. And they reinforce each other.

Also:

A portfolio is just an artifact of our skills, traits, and working process. It’s the destination; it’ll take care of itself if we focus on the journey.

Reflects very much the story behind The Score Takes Care Of Itself, by the legendary NFL coach Bill Walsh.

When writing documents become as important as writing code

By the ever-wise Eugene Yan

URL: https://eugeneyan.com/writing/writing-and-coding/

Notable quotes:

At the start of our careers, it’s all about delivery. We contribute by implementing and delivering systems (via writing code)… So as we gain experience and grow our fangs, the way in which we create impact changes. Instead of implementing systems ourselves, it becomes more valuable to guide and serve the team. A great way to do this is via writing documents.

In addition, writing helps with knowledge retention and transfer. Our memory is leaky—we forget as much as 90% of what we read within 7 days. Writing is like saving knowledge to a database. And now, instead of asking us, people can access our knowledge via that database (i.e., writing)—this helps us save time.

Writing documents is like writing code. Code is for machines; documents are for people.

“As you become a tech leader, you need to think about the future. The experienced are those who know what the corners are and how to look around them. They have to parse the business problems, do the (design and code) reviews, and minimize the errors that the team commits.” – David Said

Here’s where writing helps. It scales well—once written, an API spec can be easily distributed without additional effort. It clarifies—the same spec can help achieve alignment and unblock multiple teams at once. Also, by writing about the lessons we’ve learned and the how-tos, we pave the way for those who follow our footsteps: