Why being a good programmer won't make you the next Bill Gates / Mark Zuckerberg / Elon Musk.

Programming is hard, but business is infinitely harder. That is the the reason being a good programmer alone is not enough to make you a brilliant businessman. That's the end of my article. Thanks....

But not really. Let's break down a few things. Elon Musk built a game at the age of 12 and sold it for $500. At the age of freaking twelve he achieved more than most programmers ever will for their entire careers. Mark Zuckerberg created a home network ZuckNet when he was 12 years old. Seeing a pattern here? Well, Bill Gates created a school scheduling system when he was around 15 years old, when 99.999999999999% of the population did not even know what a computer was. Okay, that's some sort of hyperbole... but you get the gist.

Programming is hard. Really hard. There are a million things that you need to know to become just a decent programmer. Understanding a language is the first of the remaining 999,999 steps on your journey to mastery. And learning the first language alone can be extremely hard for most people, and can take even months or years, due to the frustrations that drive people to stop. But if you stick with it for a few months, you will understand it, and then from there, it becomes increasingly easier once you have mastered the fundamentals. In short, there is an almost sure path that you will be a good developer if you stick with it for a few years... That is almost guaranteed.

Business on the other hand.... Business is just a beautiful process of experiencing a load of dung, after a load of dung, after load of dung, after a load of dung in perpetuity to infinity. Imagine that. Most programmers are very good with logic, but almost always very terrible with emotions. That's why most nerds suck at dating. We don't understand the world of emotions. The world women live in their entire lives... Call me a sexist bigot.... come on... do that please... but that is the truth. And business... business is an emotional sport. You heard me. Business is almost 80% emotion, and 20% logic.

Yeah, I don't have the statistics to back that claim, but the pareto principle operates almost universally. Elon Musk says that you need a very high pain threshold to succeed in business. How is pain related to logic? Not even closely related. Pain is pure emotion. Most entrepreneurs will tell you that the only solution to all business problems is sales. That is true. But sales is all about emotions. Emotional intelligence and emotional resilience. Anyone who has ever tried door-to-door selling, or even cold calling will tell you. The fear of snakes, or any phobia you have, pales in comparison when compared to the FEAR of rejection. And in sales, you eat rejection for breakfast, lunch and dinner, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Imagine that.

You can build the best product in the world, but if you don't have the emotional tolerance to be called an "a-hole" for disturbing a potential customer who hates the fact that you just interrupted their already terrible day trying to sell them something they've never even heard of, you won't make it in business. The emotional component of business is what separates the winners and the losers. I know, because I have lost 4 times so far, and am still hanging on with my dear life to avoid a fifth failure. The reason why most programmers cannot succeed in business is simply because of the emotional toll that business has on people.

Logical problems can be frustrating, but logic is as much as it goes. Having a headache because you cannot figure out what bug is causing your program to crash is not the same as holding on to your dear life because your business is going under, you have ten months in rent arrears, and everyone in your life thinks your an "effing" failure, just because you are having a terrible business year. And you have to sit through this tough business year, or do what I have done in the past four business ventures, and fold and look for a job. And that is just the perseverance part.

Learning a new framework is hard. It might take you as much as month, if the framework you are learning is completely new and you have no prior experience with a framework of the kind or the field. E.g. when shifting from web development to mobile app development. But that pales in comparison to having your partner steal all your business's live savings, having the bank checking in on you every month for the delayed payments you have not made because a client refused to pay you and decided to sue you instead.

In very few words, what I am trying to say is, business is a load of dung, crap, and manure, all rolled into one, and served to you in a taco, that you are supposed to swallow every day until the day your business become sustainably profitable, which could take you years. Do you have the guts to do that, because if you do, then the title of this article is complete bonkers, and makes little sense to you. And you just wasted four minutes that you could have focused on building that empire. So go back and keep building. But if not, now you know why being a programmer won't make you the next tech unicorn CEO. As always, till next time "ciao amici."