What is T-Shaped Developer (And Why You Should Be One)
Today’s we have different types of developers like front-end, back-end, mobile and others. They are more specialists in one field in software engineering. These developers are experts in their fields and are very productive. However , in today’s world of cross-platform teams, this is not enough because they are very focused on only one field of knowledge.
What is “I-Shaped Developers”?
Traditionally, companies favored I-shaped developers: A developer specialists in one of their field , expert and productive, had a problem. Anything outside their stack was no-man’s land.
A backend developer doesn’t understand properly how UI/UX work, anfd the frontend doesn’t know anything related to deployment. Every developer has a very strict skill set.
But then after realising this, companies solved this with the T-Shaped model.
So What is T-Shaped Developers and Why to become?
T-Shaped developer is someone who has a general knowledge of one or more fields of software engineering, deeper knowledge of one or more skills.
In above image: Thick horizontal line shows general knowledge of different fields and Deep vertical line shows deeper knowledge of one or more skills.
These types of developers are comfortable doing jobs outside their areas of expertise.
There are many benefits of T-Shaped Developer :
- Can work everywhere.
- Open minded
- Understanding Other Developers
- Expose yourself to different skills
- Can cover responsibility of other
How to become T-Shaped :
- Learn things outside your expertise
- Involved in SDLC
- Do pair programming with others with more expertise
Conclusion :
Being a T-Shaped developer it is important that you can fit with other roles , better communication with other team members understand their needs and how they work.
After all that you become a well-rounded developer that understands every part of the process of a project.
So What about you? What kind of developer are you?