“What do you do again?”
One complication of being in an industry that is not well understood is explaining to those outside the industry what you do. Meeting new people gets a little complicated when you hear the simple ‘get-to-know-you’ question,
“So what do you do?”
I don’t like to say, “I work in computers.” That answer covers everything from ‘design national networks that millions rely on’ to ‘working IT at a small store’. Vastly different ends to the spectrum.
I have a friend, ‘Smiles’, who works in the search engine optimization business (think ‘Google’ if you don’t know). When she starts to explain her specific job, eyes glaze over as anyone who needs the explanation gets lost fast.
Another friend, ‘Beck’, is a programmer and he just tells his family he’s like a cable repairman. Not even close to what he does but it is a platitude that let’s him not have to try to explain writing software to people who don’t even understand what a computer is.
The best way I’ve found to explain my job is through analogy and I encourage anyone in the industry to create some that work for them. For example when I was working on guidance systems I merely said,
“I help the machine understand what it sees. Like explaining road signs to a new driver.”
not my favorite analogy but it allows for a very general idea of my job without having to explain the history of computers to someone. Here’s the problem with this solution. Since you don’t get very detailed with the analogy it can give the illusion that your job is easy. People tend to forget that it takes years of experience and a lot of knowledge to be able to do even “simple” programs on the computer. Please if you hear anyone in the computer industry describe their job in simple terms or via an analogy do not assume that the job is ACTUALLY simple.
The best advice I can give: if you’d like to understand the computer industry better would be to go to your local library and ask for some intro books to read. Then sit down and read them. Then sit at a computer and use that knowledge a little.
That’s all for now folks!
Take care.