Solving problems is a complex, multi-disciplinary art, but as software developers, we tend to jump straight into writing code. While that may be your strength, there are times when you'd be better served by stopping to ask, "What's the real problem here?"

In this talk, I'll use three illustrative stories to drive home the key points: (1) software engineers are hired to solve problems, (2) we are expected to understand those problems, and (3) we don't have to write code to solve them. Along the way, I'll share some tools, tips, and discoveries I've made that might help you become a more productive and effective software developer.

Slides: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ZgGKr7PgNGbMYtpRKKp-nMcTCUzGtFjj

Given At:

- [Chicago JS Camp, 2019](https://www.chicagojscamp.org/schedule) (10 minutes, [Video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aw5B8XDQLT8))
- [Developer First, 2020](https://www.developer-first.com/karl-hughes)
- React Native Meetup, April 15th 2020

Blog Posts:

- [The Bulk of Software Engineering is Just Plumbing](https://www.karllhughes.com/posts/plumbing)
- [Writing Less Software to Accomplish More](https://www.karllhughes.com/posts/less-custom-software)
- [The Age of Cloud Services](https://www.karllhughes.com/posts/cloud-services)