What does it mean to be a Dave?

It’s a term that we coined to refer to someone who is incredibly intelligent but disregards good practices because he thinks they don’t apply to him or just thinks they are a waste of time. In our case it is specific to IT or more specifically software engineering.

To understand where the phrase came from one must understand a little background and some of the supporting characters or at least the main character. Dave was a guy we worked with some time ago. He was incredibly intelligent in many ways but lacked formality in software development. He could crank stuff out, but it was very unreadable and undocumented. It was all good if he had to support it, but if anyone else had to touch it – pray for their souls.

All the points or items we mention are real world events. Names have been changed for anonymity, but they were done by real people. Most were committed by Dave, but not all. When appropriate we will take a few sentences to explain the supporting character. In the end the lesson is the same – Don’t Be a Dave!

In other words, a Dave is a nice, friendly, intelligent, hard working and productive co-worker. At the same time his lack of formality and hard headedness make life difficult for the rest of us. So... Don't Be a Dave!