Personal Quest

I’m a big fan of plans, oh yeah. Even though web design is just a hobby for me at the moment, I’m really pushing to go pro in about 3/4 years time. There are a lot of things to learn, and working full time only allows for evenings and weekends. So planning what you’re going to do and when and how is especially important.

Normally I (like many other people) work out a plan by starting at the beginning. The problem in that approach is that you don’t get a good idea of what is a priority. You just end up with a bunch of things you want to accomplish, but no scale to the problem. Stacking things up like this is really not worthwhile. I tried another way of working it out from the ultimate goal backwards, and was surprised how well this method works.

For example, in the UK to be a front-end developer in most studios you need a good grasp of a few areas. HTML & CSS are a given, but in addition Design Skills, Javascript and a smattering of PHP and MySQL also come in handy and all these are often requested. Some even ask for Flash too, but then you’d be probably looking at a Design orientated job there.

So my plan. The ultimate goal here is to have experience enough in each of the areas to be able to show projects as proof of the areas of expertise. (otherwise why would they employ you on just what you say and not what you’ve done?)

Working backwards, the one that requires more experience in any other area is PHP & MySQL. Then it’s Javascript, and then Design HTML & CSS. Taking it as an order of priority you can see that you work up to more complex topics.

For a while I was a bit confused about how I was going to achieve my goal (without actually stating the goal specifically, but feeling it as force and just moving with it) This, completely solves my problem and confusion by setting it out really neatly.

Look at it like this: For the next year, I will primarily focus my efforts in Design (& general Photoshop Skills) and CSS. Now the CSS part is crucial also, because if you can claim to be a great CSS advocate, then you need to know your way around. Designs themselves have to be put into CSS don’t they? Well yes they do you say. So it stands to reason this is a good place to crack on with. Imagine that, a year focusing on just these things. You can learn a lot in one year, I know because this time last year I was just about becoming able to create sites that looked ok and were standards compliant, and I’m amazed how far I’ve come in my ability. That said, there’s still work to be done and things to learn. So for all the time after this coming year those skills will still be improved even though I move on to focus on Javascript and finally PHP & MySQL.

This isn’t to say I’m not going to touch Javascript or PHP/MySQL, in fact it would be a good thing now and again to break the monotony when it occurs by dipping your hand in something entirely new. The point is with a plan set out like this, you already know what your focus is, and can be relaxed about what other skills you pick up, whilst still focusing hard to achieve a specific goal in the short term. I’m sure you can see the psychological advantage this can give you: Focus on what you need to achieve, and set some other time aside for play.

So I’ll be continuing to deepen my understanding of CSS, whilst at the same time finding out about new things such as Skinning PHP based forums and themeing CMS’s like Wordpress. And I can take that aspect to the learning curve easy, and cut myself some slack finally.

Oh and if you’re wondering, I will be age 30 in 4 years time so when I achieve my goal it will be a great way to celebrate going over that hill.