Being that tech has grown and has constantly grown since the days of the abacus, it’s easily to get lost in the weeds and forget the bigger picture. The higher levels of engineering and software development require the ability to step back and look at what’s truly going on, what is the purpose of our software, why does it work the way it does, and is it helping managing our lives and not overcomplicate it. The point of technology is to make our lives easier not harder, if we lose sight of the bigger picture we end up doing more work than what was expected and efficiency disappears.

Here are some takeaways (questions to ask oneself) learned about keeping this in check and staying focused:

Does it solve the problem that we seeked to solve?

Does build on future needs and future proof itself?

Is it saving us time?

Is it abstracting us out of the meaning of the code in software?

Answering these questions, a technologist can identify if there software or technology is on the right path or not. That feeling of is this really making a difference or we just doing it for feel good feelings. The challenge in software in particular with AI is the code gets verbose and loses it’s meaning, of course there are ways around this, by evening asking AI to explain the code or software, but even then we have to be careful about our confirmation bias.

Be patient, and try not to feel rushed, mistakes happen more when you lose sight of the bigger picture, and it can be uphill climb to navigate back to what the original purpose of the software or technology you are working on. If it helps, create a goal list of the software and double check with yourself if it’s fulfilling that purpose.