
Ask HN: How important is domain expertise for programmers? - ch4s3
Lately I&#x27;ve been finding myself doing a lot of reading about my company&#x27;s vertical&#x2F;domain, healthcare. In fact I&#x27;m reading more about healthcare than software development&#x2F;programming. How important do you think domain expertise is for you career? Am I making good use of my reading time(professionally, I obviously enjoy it)? How do you go about developing domain expertise?
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mindcrime
I'd say it's crucially important, especially if you want to advance over time.
Technical knowledge alone can only get you so far. Especially in highly
specialized domains like health-care (and I saw this as somebody whose dayjob
is in healthcare analytics). Of course you have to strike a balance between
leveling up on hard-core technical skills AND domain knowledge. Unfortunately
I don't know any strictly deterministic and universally optimal way to decide
where that balance is. :-(

 _How do you go about developing domain expertise?_

Other than working "in the business" so to speak, of that domain, I can only
thinking of the regular stuff: read books, read articles, watch videos,
interview people, etc.

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ch4s3
Can you describe how domain knowledge has given you an edge? Are there other
doors it opens?

Do you ever do online courses? I've been working through one on FutureLearn
about antibiotic resistant bacteria, and rather enjoying it.

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mindcrime
_Can you describe how domain knowledge has given you an edge?_

It's somewhat subtle and kind of hard to articulate. And I'm still working on
developing that domain knowledge myself. But from looking at what's going on
here, it's clear that the people who truly understand this system at the
highest levels, are the people who understand how it's actually used by
customers, and what this stuff means to them. As opposed to the folks who know
'just enough' to write code, but are operating in a bit of a vacuum.

 _Are there other doors it opens?_

Based on my experience here, I'd say that the people who become tech leads,
architects, offering managers, etc., are expected to have strong domain
knowledge.

 _Do you ever do online courses?_

I do, but most of the ones I've done have been more on the technology side (a
lot of data science, math, and machine learning stuff).

 _I 've been working through one on FutureLearn about antibiotic resistant
bacteria, and rather enjoying it._

That sounds pretty interesting. I may just check it out.

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joeblow9999
I have worked on software projects across multiple verticles over many years
and I have found pre-existing domain knowledge (or lack thereof) to be utterly
immaterial.

