At the time I was reading this book I was unemployed, with some sort of crisis in my 20's about what to do and what I am doing with my life, I was feeling down because my previous job was as a software developer, the job that I had dream about and I excesively romanticized, always thinking that I was going to be happy and that my problems would go away if I stick following a clear path, expecting a linear output to say the least.

Why does that matter?, John Sonmez book help me understood the world of career progression better, his book help me realize more the different paths that software development has to offer and some of the reality about career progression and making a living out of this profession. I want you to understand that this review may be vague, it is base in my experiences and I'll only mention what help me.

What is this book about?

The book is about do's and don'ts on your software developer career based on John Sonmez experiences. Who is that guy? his a software developer with some good years of experience, he may not be the best or smartest programmer in the world, but he understood the clasical corporate world and how to make progress there as well as some side hustles.

In this book you will find career paths that you may take as a software developer, advice on how to succeed at them, how to improve your public image, how to improve your well-being and some life advice.

It sounds like guru stuff, he may be some sort of guru, but don't worry he won't really sell you anything at all, just invitations to his other projects or work, but in a moderate frecuency that is not really anoying or pushy.

Is it helpful?

Yes, this book has many chapters that are short and comfortable to read with a reflection about your situation in the end of most of them. My personal experience is that I found some chapters to be topics I knew about to some extension and others were new topics or advice I've never consider. Your experience will probably be similar and it's up to you to take the advice given, forget about it or mixed it up with some other advice and personal experiences.

The advices that I followed

Running and doing more exercise

Oh boy, I always struggle with consistency in my physical well being, not doing much exercise and when I was doing exercise I would drop it after one,two or three months, before I only did calisthenics and never been much into sports, but a simple advice as try running, it's fun and it'll make you feel better, because of runners high seems to change a part of my life that so far in this months I'm really glad about.

Yes, I do encourage you to try running or any form of exercise that stick to you, as developers we may think this will have little impact, but I'll say that I feel better with myself and I feel capable of focus in my task way more often.

Choosing a specific path and focus on that one

This advice can change, I don't mean you should only do one path for the rest of your life, but rather learn what path do you want and which path are you on right now.

The paths are the following: you work for someone (most popular and safe), you open your own company and offer your services (startup), you create your own product and finally you go freelancer.

Choose the one you like the most, try it and let's see if it sticks with you, it's okay to experience all paths in certain points of your career and switch between them, but try to work on a specific one and don't go for all at the same time, save up money to create your startup or make a product, have some savings and learn marketing for your freelance work, everything has it's own time and you don't have to do all at once, it's okay to go for one route and stay with it.

Tips on how to get things done

I really like that the most important tip is to just start doing whatever you want to do, if you want to work on that side project go ahead and do it, don't worry about every single detail, just work slowly and happily, consistency will get things done, you just need to start even if you are not motivated and things don't go as planned or look perfect, it's okay for your app to look ugly, simple, not what you imaging, if you reach that point is because you got something done and can be improve, and that is definitely better than just wonder forever in your mind on how to do X or Y and getting into an eternal loop of "perfect" planning.

Promote yourself

It is really important to promote yourself and sell your services and work, sell yourself to your potential clients and employers, make projects, give some free work to local businesses to get into the radar of your zone. Many developers are already good enough, but they just miss this part (including myself).

I don't want to go deep into many topics, but always look for ways to promote your image even if you don't open a business, product or do any freelancing at all, promoting yourself will always enable you for some opportunities and you'll develop more skill that are important and highly appreciable for any business or company.

Conclusion

Well, this is my very first review of a book, I feel I may deviate in some parts and just straigh up gave my personal opinion and what I understood from the book "Soft Skills: The Software Developer's Life Manual". I do recommend giving it a try, you'll find more information in detail of what I've shown above, it's a book that help me with some of my problems and gave me some ideas on what to do with my career and how to get the best of it, if it work for me I'm sure it'll work for you as well, with your own unique ways of doing things that everyone has of course, but yeah, nice book.