Learn how to code

This week they started laying the foundation of our house and I’m terrified. Everything we’ve planned over the last weeks and months suddenly becomes a reality. There are still a lot of problems we’re facing and I am quite exhausted but we will have a house soon and that’s what counts, right? On a side-note I didn’t think we would build or get house so soon in our lives. In a big city renting seems like the obvious choice but a child changes everything for sure. I am really happy (now) that we’ve made the decision also looking at the development of rental prices in Berlin. Buying seems to be a more controllable option.

What I learned last week

I did a little internal workshop for our project managers and designers this week to introduce them to HTML, CSS and Git. Because we all have different and not entirely digital backgrounds, we don’t all know how to code a basic website or how to work with the dev tools in the browser. That’s something I really want to change. Over the years working in different agencies it was frustrating to still see and feel the gap between design and development. And not only between design and development – the gap existed between other disciplines as well. And it still exists- I mean we’re all working on digital products but don’t have any clue how they’re being built? We are talking about interdisciplinary teams but don’t require basic interdisciplinary knowledge from our teams? It think it’s time we must change that.

Not only do designers need to know how to code (a basic website), also project managers, strategists and everyone else working on digital products should know, too. It also is the time of web generators that require minimum to zero knowledge when it comes to coding websites. Speaking of Webflow, Squarespace, Wix and the like. Even working with these tools leads to a better understanding of how digital things work. So, my plan basically is: everyone in our company should have basic knowledge about HTML, CSS and Git. Everyone in our company should have a basic dev setup on their computers installed to start developing things quickly or to download and run tech stacks from other projects. Designers and project managers should be able to commit image and/or text changes throughout the project and learn from developers how to do these things. So the question is, should people who work on digital products learn how to code? The answer is yes, absolutely!

Links of the week

Because we’re facing a climate catastrophe I am researching alternative energy concepts, batteries and cars from time to time. I did not know Sono Motors before but their car and mobility concept sounds interesting. I am currently driving a Volvo and the ability to share your car with others is also already baked into every new Volvo. I am looking forward to go full electric in two and a half years.

Not that long ago I twittered that I prefer paper over a digital product, when it comes to task management. Nonetheless I came back to using Things from Cultured Code again. The task manager is incredibly well done and worth a try. Because I am on the move a lot recently it’s just easier to track my tasks using my iPhone rather then sticking to my notebook.

In case you were wondering what kind of tool I use for my newsletter, here it is. I am using Buttondown, a simple and neat tool that doesn’t com with all the clutter (and powerful but in my case unnecessary features) MailChimp has. Highly recommended!

And that was my week.

Cheers,
Lorenz