Once upon a hot take. Nowadays it’s lukewarm at best. But I think every developer should have some level of competency communicating in both written and spoken word.

Also a useful skill for efficiently threatening the clanker.

We’re gonna focus on Vani.

Gonna be frank, I still don’t like public speaking.

But nowadays, I think I’m pretty decent at it.

How?

Same way I got okay at writing.

Granted, that was the easier one to do because note-taking and journaling have been longtime habits. Not to mention, our Freedom-Fueled education system gave an abundance of opportunities to sharpen the axe, albeit with constraints. Too many opinions on pens, paper, keyboards, and screens. Out of scope.

Didn’t mean there were none. Every student group or organization I was in, I ran for election.

In high school, it usually looked like me physically shaking as I delivered my speech.

By the time I got to university, the easily visible discomfort got harder to spot. Didn’t fix the elevated heart-rate and wanting to orally eject the contents of my stomach.

Overall, fun process though. Schedule coffee or chitchats with a bunch of folks and see what they want. Unfortunately not good at being popular. Lost nearly all of them, ohh well, not like being on the board when I did win opened any doors.

Panels and presentations. Two other great ways. Also typically more controlled environments than trying to beat your opponents for a seat. It lets you focus on just conveying the information effectively.

Surprisingly work is where it started getting more comfortable.

In the early arc of my career, I was collaborating closely with the campus recruiting team. Career events and hackathons first required me to understand the company I was working for, and then explain it in a way that is relevant to the student I am talking to.

Interviewing candidates was another great drill. They (in theory) know a lot about who they are and what they’ve done. All I have is a piece of paper to go off of. Required active listening and asking questions.

My favorites are those low-stake events when someone in leadership wanted to have a meeting but didn’t want to say anything. It’s good to have some prepped talks in your back pocket. My go-tos were the minimum knives, pots, and pans you need to stock your home lab and building your own small tools.

So back to the point. The butterflies never go away. But sometimes you’re gonna end up in meetings with your boss’ boss, or higher. And there is only so much awkward silence that is acceptable. Functional communication has paid more dividends to my career than any one technical skill I have.