This evening, I was sitting rocking our new daughter, listening to the relaxing, soothing sounds of Metallica. Actually, I was listening to the radio, and a Metallica song came on, but nonetheless it hit me. If I were hiring a developer, who would I want them to emulate better than Lars Ulrich?
So, I guess I should explain. First, like any good developer I’d want to hire, Lars is one of the best. He’s been at his art for a long time (getting his first drum set around 1977). He knows his way around all of the tools (instruments) of his craft. And he can play the heck out of a drum set.
But, despite all this, he knows that there is more to band stuff then just showing up and hitting some drums. Lars is the spokesperson for Metallica, showing he knows the business side too. And even though he can smack a gong and master a djembe, he understands that one doesn’t need to show off all of those skills in every application. In fact, in most of the Metallica songs, Lars is simply setting a very solid backbeat. Nothing fancy, but getting the job done. And when he needs to pull out the stops (16th notes on the bass for One anyone?), he does it with flair, style, and class.
So, someone who is a master at their craft, understands both the business and how to talk to the public, and knows that you don’t always have to pull out all the stops everytime to get the job done. I definately think that’s my ideal of a developer. Now, if I can just convince my wife to let me buy another drum set…
What about Neil Peart of Rush? Much better drummer! Or Mike Portnoy of Dream Theater … makes Lars look like an amateur when it comes to playing “over the top” metal drums!!! But, then again Lars makes a much better analogy.
Exactly my point. They are /incredible/ drummers, but listen to a Rush song, and Neil is way over the top. Compare that to a Metallica song, and generally Lars is just kicking back, playing simple boom-chick-boom-chick.
And let’s not forget Akira Jimbo whose video I literally stood in a drum store and couldn’t take my eye off of for 10 ro 15 minutes.
It’s a good point though. There are some very talented developers out there who can whip out reflection to skip past your security roadblocks, extracting your private methods on the fly into services other dynamic objects can use, in Perl, in less than 5 lines of code. But, finding someone who is half of that, but understands the business side of things, and social aspects? That’s some good stuff.