As a software engineer, I've recently found myself in a unique situation – 4 months of downtime at work with hardly any tasks, just fixing broken servers with a few clicks. Instead of letting boredom take over, I'm determined to transform this downtime into a productive and engaging period. So, I'm reaching out to you all for some brilliant suggestions and ideas!<p>Watching cat videos on YouTube used to be my go-to pastime, but I'm ready to take things to the next level. I'm eager to explore different avenues for personal growth, skill development, and creativity – anything that can make my downtime at work more fulfilling.<p>Share your insights, and together, let's unlock the full potential of this downtime and emerge even more skilled and inspired! Thanks in advance for your valuable ideas!
I haven't had such downtime for the last couple of years (working on early-stage startups) but I'd really like them back in the corporate for personal growth as a developer in three ways:<p>1. Create a new side project unrelated to work, such as a tool or library I always wanted to create.<p>2. Learning a new stack/domain by creating a product with it. This way, I got proficient in Go language back then.<p>3. Look around in the corporate and see what I can hack myself for personal growth, AKA intrapreneurship. For example, I went to a CTO office of a sibling organization and asked them if they wanted to do a PoC together with our organization on something new.<p>If I had such time now, I would look around for a problem in my product/life that I can solve with LLM and try to create a PoC of an LLM product (maybe with a creative UI) that will teach me a lot and maybe get some users.<p>On the other hand, if you want as a goal to get a position in a FAANG-style company, this is a great time to do a leetcode learning path and get ready for interviews for such jobs.
I enjoy finding obscure ways of solving common problems with a new programming language just to keep things fresh. Then I don’t feel totally guilty about wasting time bc I still got something done, made my life easier in the long run and didn’t lose my mind to sheer boredom…