[Python Mastery] The secret to "ethical self-promotion"?

Hey there,

Here's some food for thought:

There's a difference between *doing* a great job as a Python developer, and *to be seen doing* a great job.

Being a skilled developer among peers—and being noticed as a skilled developer involves different skill sets.

I know the term "marketing" has a bitter aftertaste among our crowd. But for lack of a better word this is what I'm talking about here:

Marketing yourself as a developer.

Signaling to your peers and your bosses that you know what you're doing. That you're dependable, and so on.

Now one (bad) way to do that would be to become "that guy" we all worked with at some point: a shameless self-promoter, a brown-noser.

The egotistical braggart, always clawing his way up the career ladder and constantly tooting his own horn…

Another (better) way to do it would be to improve your programming skills so you can produce "better" code.

Code that catches the attention of your peers.

What if you started sprinkling some of Python's advanced features in your code?

A nice and clean generator expression here, an elegant use of the "with"-statement there…

With some practice you can do this tastefully—only where these features make sense and help make the code more expressive.

And trust me, your colleagues will pick up on this after a while. If they ask you questions, be generous and helpful.

Pull everyone around you UP and help them learn what you know.

Maybe you can give a little presentation on "writing clean Python" for your coworkers a few weeks down the road, after carefully gauging their interest.

There's nothing unethical or egocentric about that kind of "marketing."

It benefits everyone involved, including you.

Happy Pythoning!

— Dan Bader

P.S. My new book can help you pick up those advanced Python skills. It's currently available for early access at a reduced price: Python Tricks—A Buffet of Awesome Python Features