Last year I saw a talk by Bret Victor titled “Inventing on Principle”. If you have not seen it, I highly recommend it because it poses a question to the viewer: what are your principles? What would you fight for?

Since I saw that talk, I have been searching for my principles. It’s not something I have specifically thought about before, especially as a driving direction for my career. Bret states it may take some time to find your principles, but I am going to go ahead and reflect on my current state as a software engineer after three years of industry experience. What do I strive to achieve? What bothers me? How do the answers to these questions influence my inventions?

I have many thoughts about the design of systems, but I think the dominant idea is that tools should be easy to use for all levels of experience. Thinking deeper about this, tools should ultimately make the lives of their users better. The best tools are the ones where you do not have to question how they work. Going even deeper, I think tools should complement our natural behavior as well. At the end of the day, we are humans experiencing life, and tools or technology should enhance that experience.

Principles can grow over time, but I think this idea of technology enhancing life is something that will always be present in all of my work. It is something so obvious to me that I cannot help but strive for it. I’m sure as I grow in my career more specific principles will emerge and take form. This is just the start!