Your orchestra will consist of hardware, platform software, programming, architecture, UX, design, images, sound and the general idea of the product.
Don't isolate those aspects. Instead, let them influence, supplement and fertilize each other.
Concentrate on the product as a whole, and it can become a masterpiece.
Yes, you will need to aqcuire a deep enough understanding and practice in each of these aspects. Don't believe management people who think you can achieve the same result without it.
There is no composer I know of who didn't play at least one instrument at a very high level, and the others at least at entry level, knowing their strengths and limitations very well.
The limit to this metaphor is of course that due to practical reasons, composers did not play all 100 instruments of their opus themselves :)
But I do think a lot of the boundaries created in the software industry are artificial to a large degree (I'm looking at you, software architects).
Overcome these boundaries in your thinking, and you will become more valuable to your customers and/or to your boss. You can still ask specialists to do an extremely sophisticated job if required.
Even if you are a specialist: If you think a little bit more like a composer, you will become even better in your speciality, because you will avoid mistakes that happen in isolation.
A typical example for isolation:
My boss (who has no idea of programming) hired a designer to refreshen an old product of ours. At the time I came into play (as software engineer), he had already proposed a lot of major changes to the UX. Too bad: The product was embedded in SharePoint and used the SharePoint-Ribbon (not that that was a good idea, but thats the way it was), which couldn't be changed easily. And of course, layout changes in the extremly degenerated HTML would lead to massive programming effort (which my boss didn't want to pay). So I had to tell the poor designer that all his nice ideas couldn't be done. At least we could change some of the colors :)
An example for over-the-boundaries thinking:
I don't recall which device that was, since I'm not the mobile/tablet type of guy, but I saw a presentation of some tablet, where the presenter plugged in a USB device, and the screen showed the device at exactly the place where it had been plugged in. So natural. Think of this: Would you as UX designer who typically designs web pages have thought of that when working in Photoshop?
Your orchestra will consist of hardware, platform software, programming, architecture, UX, design, images, sound and the general idea of the product. Don't isolate those aspects. Instead, let them influence, supplement and fertilize each other. Concentrate on the product as a whole, and it can become a masterpiece.
Yes, you will need to aqcuire a deep enough understanding and practice in each of these aspects. Don't believe management people who think you can achieve the same result without it. There is no composer I know of who didn't play at least one instrument at a very high level, and the others at least at entry level, knowing their strengths and limitations very well.
The limit to this metaphor is of course that due to practical reasons, composers did not play all 100 instruments of their opus themselves :)
But I do think a lot of the boundaries created in the software industry are artificial to a large degree (I'm looking at you, software architects). Overcome these boundaries in your thinking, and you will become more valuable to your customers and/or to your boss. You can still ask specialists to do an extremely sophisticated job if required. Even if you are a specialist: If you think a little bit more like a composer, you will become even better in your speciality, because you will avoid mistakes that happen in isolation.
A typical example for isolation: My boss (who has no idea of programming) hired a designer to refreshen an old product of ours. At the time I came into play (as software engineer), he had already proposed a lot of major changes to the UX. Too bad: The product was embedded in SharePoint and used the SharePoint-Ribbon (not that that was a good idea, but thats the way it was), which couldn't be changed easily. And of course, layout changes in the extremly degenerated HTML would lead to massive programming effort (which my boss didn't want to pay). So I had to tell the poor designer that all his nice ideas couldn't be done. At least we could change some of the colors :)
An example for over-the-boundaries thinking: I don't recall which device that was, since I'm not the mobile/tablet type of guy, but I saw a presentation of some tablet, where the presenter plugged in a USB device, and the screen showed the device at exactly the place where it had been plugged in. So natural. Think of this: Would you as UX designer who typically designs web pages have thought of that when working in Photoshop?