\\n <\/p>\n
\\n<\/ol>\n
\\n\\nWhat is behind these two types of people are their motivations.\\n\\nThose who place a high value on each individual transaction are usually motivated by immediate gain and fairness.\\n\\nThose who place a high value on investing are usually motivated by the principal of the harvest\u2014You reap what you sow.\\n\\n \\n\\nI\u2019m going to diverge for a moment to tell a bit of a story that got me thinking more about this issue.\\n\\nThis weekend I went to a little caf\u00e9 with my wife and daughter.\u00a0 We usually go there on Saturday mornings after my daughter\u2019s play gym class.\u00a0 It is a nice little caf\u00e9, but the food is a bit pricey.<\/em>\\n\\nI don\u2019t mind paying a little more for higher quality food and higher quality service, so I go there despite the price.<\/em>\\n\\nThis little caf\u00e9 has an ongoing promotion where if you turn in 8 receipts you get one of your meals free.\u00a0 (Approximately a $10-12 value.)<\/em>\\n\\nAs I said, my wife, my daughter and I have been going there for quite some time, so we had finally saved up 8 receipts.\u00a0 We ate our meals and went up to pay for our food.\u00a0 The bill was about $25.<\/em>\\n\\nThe owner of the caf\u00e9 carefully looked at the receipts right in front of me.\u00a0 She seemed to scour over every single one, looking for a valid signature and that it was from their caf\u00e9.\u00a0 (Now remember, we are in here quite often, they definitely know who we are.\u00a0 Most of the staff immediately recognizes my daughter.)<\/em>\\n\\nI thought to myself, \u201cok, well this is a bit insulting, but not a big deal.\u00a0 She\u2019s just checking the receipts.\u201d<\/em>\\n\\nThe caf\u00e9 owner pulled one of the receipts from the stack and said \u201cyou already used this one.\u201d<\/em>\\n\\nI looked at the receipt, saw that it had not been used, but it did have a discount on the total from a previous redemption.\u00a0 (The total was still $15.)<\/em>\\n\\nI explained to her that I had 8 receipts which had all represented different visits and each totaling over $15, with the average size around $25-30.\u00a0 I also explained to her that one receipt did have a redemption on it, but it still had a valid meal that was fully paid for on it.<\/em>\\n\\nThe response, I got back was \u201cyou already used this one.\u201d<\/em>\\n\\nWe went back and forth a few times.\u00a0 In the middle of the conversation she answers a phone call and finally hands me off to someone else, saying \u201cI\u2019m done, you deal with this guy.\u201d<\/em>\\n\\nThe new cashier tells me the same thing, and the details from here are not important.\u00a0 I\u2019m not even going to tell you whether or not they gave me the discount, because that is not the point.<\/em>\\n\\n \\n\\nThe owner of that business thought of only this single transaction and not the future transactions that could take place when dealing with this issue.\\n\\nHere I was a paying customer who had brought in 8 receipts.\u00a0 On one of those receipts was a discount that had been applied, because I had previously brought in 8 receipts.\u00a0 So, I had been there and paid for food a minimum of 17 times (including the current visit.)\\n\\nThe business owner was so concerned I was going to rip her off for $10 one time, because one of the receipts wasn\u2019t valid that she was willing to sacrifice all my future business, and potentially upset other customers that were within earshot of her rude comments and handling of the situation.\\n\\nSo what does this have to do with development?\\n\\nWe\u2019ll get to that in a minute, but I want to expound upon this point a bit more, because I think this lesson applies to so much of life in general.\\n\\nThe big point here is that thinking about life\u2019s transactions individually instead of paying attention to the bigger scope of what is going on can have you coming out ahead for the day, but can cost you dearly in the long run.\\n\\n<\/p>\n \u201cYou can shear a sheep many times, but skin him only once.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n \\n\\nNow what should that business owner have done?\u00a0 What would I have done in that exact situation if the tables were turned?\\n\\nFirst of all, I would not have checked the receipts in front of the customer.\u00a0 I would have either briefly scanned the receipts or if we had been experiencing a high volume of fraud and I was so concerned I would have said, \u00a0\u201cPlease wait one moment,\u201d and quickly checked over them out of sight.\\n\\nNext, if I did spot that one receipt did have any kind of problem with it, I would take a look at the average check size of all the receipts\u2014Wait, I\u2019m lying.\u00a0 To be honest, I wouldn\u2019t even do that.\u00a0 If you come to my restaurant with 8 receipts and I said I\u2019d give you a free meal if you turn in 8 receipts, as long as you are not obviously trying to rip me off, heck even if you are, but you did come here and buy something 8 times, I\u2019m going to say \u201cthank you so much for your business, I am glad to give you one of your meals free. \u201c\\n\\nI don\u2019t even mention the issue, I don\u2019t even say one word or give one look to embarrass the customer.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Why do it?\u00a0 Why would you want to ever risk ticking off a paying regular customer and possibly upsetting any other customers nearby? \u00a0I mean, wouldn\u2019t you spend $10 in advertising to get a weekly customer?\u00a0 Wouldn\u2019t you spend $100?\\n\\n<\/p>\n \\n\\nYes, yes.\u00a0 I suppose we ought to.\\n\\nSo there are two very important things to consider.\\n\\n<\/p>\n \\n <\/p>\n \\n<\/ol>\n \\n\\n<\/p>\n \\n\\n<\/p>\n \\n\\n<\/p>\n \\n\\n \\n\\nIf you are writing software, you have customers\u2014period!\\n\\nI don\u2019t care how far removed from them you think you are.\u00a0 Someone is using your software otherwise you wouldn\u2019t be writing it.\\n\\nAt the very least, someone is paying your paycheck and that someone is your customer as well.\\n\\nI\u2019m not going to try and offer any very specific advice in this area, because I think it is sufficient to say that when dealing with your customer, you should just keep in mind the number of paid receipts they have already brought in and how many more you would like to receive from them.\\n\\nI\u2019ll admit sometimes I fall flat here myself.\u00a0 I am often really good dealing with a direct customer, but sometimes I forget that my indirect customers are still my customers.\\n\\nJust because you are getting a paycheck, doesn\u2019t mean you’re not selling a service.\u00a0 You just happen to have a regular customer.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There are two basic kinds of people in this world.\\n\\n \\n Those who live their lives evaluating each individual transaction. \\n Those who live their lives as an investment waiting for dividends to be paid. \\n \\n\\nWhat is behind these two types of people are their motivations.\\n\\nThose who place a high value on each individual…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14560,4909,5895],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-career","category-psychology","category-self-improvement"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"690px-Gnu_meditate_levitate\"](\"https:\/\/simpleprogrammer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/690px-gnu_meditate_levitate.jpg\" "\\"690px-Gnu_meditate_levitate\\"")
<\/a>\\n\\n<\/p>\nA little story<\/h2>\n
<\/a>\\n\\nThere are actually quite a few lessons that could be picked out from this story.\u00a0 Let\u2019s start with the main one.\\n\\n<\/p>\nThinking in single transactions<\/h2>\n
Can we talk about programmers now?<\/h2>\n
\\n <\/p>\n
<\/h2>\n
<\/h2>\n
Investing in yourself<\/h2>\n
<\/a>\\n\\nIt\u2019s really easy to to fall into the trap of analyzing every decision in terms of what will pay me the most today or what will have immediate benefits.\u00a0 It is much more difficult to look beyond the current desert that may be before you and see the oasis that awaits those with patience and integrity.\\n\\nI\u2019ve talked before about buying my own monitors<\/a>.\u00a0 I\u2019ve also bought plenty of other equipment.\u00a0 Sometimes because my employer wouldn\u2019t buy it for me or sometimes just because I know it will make me more effective in the long run and I will look better by not being cheap, but buying it on my own, even though my employer might have bought it for me if I asked.\\n\\nI\u2019ve invested time and money in training\u2014hours on weekend and week nights learning something on my own\u2014plenty of transactions that didn\u2019t benefit me in the short run, but had huge benefits in the long run.\\n\\nThis blog for instance is one of them.\u00a0 I spend a good 2-3 hours, sometimes more writing one post a week.\u00a0 I used to write 3 posts a week, before I started doing Pluralsight videos<\/a>.\u00a0 I don\u2019t make hardly anything from publishing a blog post, but I can\u2019t tell you how much having this blog has paid off in job opportunities, business opportunities and just meeting a lot of interesting people that have something to teach me.\\n\\nI\u2019m never happy to live in today.\u00a0 I always have a plan, an agenda.\u00a0 My career is something I actively manage and the way I do it is by investing in it.\\n\\nNow, I am not perfect, far far from it.\u00a0 I get trapped in that transaction style thinking plenty of times myself.\u00a0 I\u2019ve gone months without reading a book to benefit my career.\u00a0 I\u2019ve wasted away plenty of time or made poor choices that only had immediate benefit rather than long term benefit.\u00a0 I just try to live my life in general like there is a thing called karma, even if I might not totally believe in it.\\n\\nI strongly believe in the principal of the harvest.\u00a0 You reap what you sow.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t matter to me if it works by magic or a practical series of cause and effect steps\u2014It doesn\u2019t matter.\u00a0 What matters is that it works.\\n\\nAs we segue into customers, one other point I want to make about your career as a developer is helping others and being as nice as possible to everyone<\/strong>.\\n\\nThis is so vitally important that you better start doing it now!<\/strong>\\n\\nSeriously, one general tip to get ahead in life is make friends not enemies.\u00a0 You never know what relationships you develop may end up benefiting you the most.\\n\\nWhen someone needs your help or asks for it, help them.\u00a0 You\u2019ll be amazed what you might learn by teaching<\/a> and you\u2019ll be putting serious karma in your bank account.\\n\\nI\u2019ve been in places where people have withheld knowledge, and not helped others because they were afraid that it would make them less important and hurt their job security, but that is just utter foolishness.\\n\\nThe most valuable person in any company is the person who can make those around them more successful!<\/strong>\\n\\nDon\u2019t be penny-wise and pound foolish!\\n\\nTo be honest, I don\u2019t even try to analyze the bigger picture that much anymore, because I know good things are coming if you do good things.\\n\\nMy personal philosophy has evolved to: always do the right thing because it is the right thing, and not because of the rewards you are going to receive from doing it.\\n\\n<\/p>\nInvesting in your customers<\/h2>\n