Developer Or Consultant: Who am I ???

Well, it’s been a question to which earlier I didn’t paid much attention.

But recently, while reviewing my “About Me” section on the some profile portal, the content caught my attention with the inconsistencies, categorizing myself as Consultant at some instances (or) Developer at others.

So who am I ???

Hmmm…

So I thought to dig in a little deeper in the terminology to better describe my role, skills and work I do, and I came across an interesting article which gave me good insight of the differences of the topic.

How to be a Consultant, by David Pallmann

Its a great read, and not to re-write the article content in this post.

I would try to summarize certain points of the article in this post, as quick pointers to identify the best that applies to your profile

I am a developer, when

• I am tasked, with technical objectives and specifications to achieve the desired technical result
• I have sufficient (or more) information, to begin my work
• I have to pay attention to my work, and keenly re-view my work for quality
• I have to document

I am a consultant, when

• I am tasked, with a business challenge to provide an optimal solution
• I have an overview of the task at hand, with little (or high level expectations of the project)
• I have to understand the business, dig a little deeper and elicit requirements for the solution, bring the necessary parties together for the solution build out
• I have to liaise with business, with good listening, paying attention, communicating (verbal/written) and presentation skills
• I have to attend lots of meetings, tying together many loose ends and complete the picture
• I have to document, and present (whether it’s a problem, or solution)
• I have to propose ideas
• I have to build couple of POC’s (Proof of Concepts), as demo to communicate the idea in action
• I have to coordinate the development activities, across different teams
• I have to be professional at job, and respect client team demands and support them
• I have to develop code
• I have to pay attention to my work, and keenly re-view my work for quality
• I have to keep business engaged with my work and deliverables to keep expectations in check

And it continues…

Well this post is just a small brief to the readers about the distinction between consultant and developer, off the experience and blogs.

And an answer to the confusion I was carrying with me.

But by no means has the article belittled either, each role is great and I feel at time either is applicable to an individual.

It’s just you grow to be a consultant, being a good developer pushing yourself hard to satiate your curiosity each day for bigger challenges

Have a great day!!!