Supply, Demand, & the Developer Who Speaks Human

…or why my career isn’t just about code

There’s a joke about developers:
Q: What’s the difference between an introverted developer and an extroverted one?
A: The introvert looks at his shoes when he talks to you; the extrovert looks at your shoes.
I love that joke because it sets up the point of this whole piece: I didn’t build a self-starting tech career by being the smartest coder in the room. I can write code, read code, and I’m passionate about it, but what actually created value for me, what moved the market, was leaning into my ability to talk to people. Especially talking to non-technical people about technical things, without their eyes glazing over like a Krispy Kreme donut.

Econ 101 (no graphs, promise)

  • Low demand + oversupply = surplus → prices drop, value feels replaceable.
  • High demand + low supply = scarcity → prices rise, value gets respect.

Jobs obey the same rules. When everyone can do the thing, your value diminishes and you become just another person in line. When few people can do the thing – and the thing matters – you gain leverage.

Most devs optimize for “write better code.” Great! Keep doing that. But the market is crowded there, and the landscape is shifting fast with AI (promise I won’t say that word again). The underserved corner is translation making sense across business, product, and engineering so projects actually ship, get adopted, and stick.

TL;DR: Scarcity at the intersection beats excellence in a crowded lane.

Map the Market: Find Real Demand

Demand doesn’t live on the org chart; it hides in pain points:

  • Projects that stall at “we’ll circle back.”
  • Stories that enter as poetry and exit as defects.
  • Meetings where tech and business speak at each other like two podcasts playing at once.

Think of the times you’ve seen “lost in translation” slow everything down, or send progress into over-customization. That’s demand with a neon sign.

Engineer Your Scarcity: Shape Your Supply

You don’t have to be the best coder or the slickest product owner. Be the rare combo that unlocks progress.

  • Pick your combo: ServiceNow + SecOps storytelling. Integrations + customer outcomes. Scripting + exec-friendly roadmaps.
  • Build a T-shape: deep in one lane, fluent enough in adjacent lanes to translate.
  • Practice out loud: explain the same feature three ways: engineer, manager, CFO. If the CFO version mentions risk reduction or revenue protection, you’re already rarer than you think.

Package the Value: Create Demand on Purpose

Don’t just be valuable; show it. Don’t wait for “word of mouth” to wander into your inbox like a lost kitten on a telephone pole.
Positioning one-liner:
I help [who] solve [pain point] so they get [measurable outcome].

Artifacts:

  • Case studies (Problem → Approach → Outcome → Proof). Keep them handy.
  • Content: short LinkedIn posts → monthly blog → quick demos; results stakeholders can share and developers can glean from.
  • Teach: volunteer a “Lunch & Learn.” Real understanding shows up as teachability (and snackability).
  • Community: participate, help, and share. The helpers get remembered.

Social proof: screenshots of “this unblocked us, thank you,” adoption charts, MTTR drops, fewer escalations. (Blur names. Lawyers like that.)

From the “currently unemployed” department: a mistake I’ve made is not packaging my value soon enough. In the heat of delivery, it’s easy to focus only on finishing. Make small notes, track simple metrics, and turn wins into tangible proof you can share.

Common Traps

  • Hype-chasing: the shiny without a problem attached.
  • Certificate hoarding: impressive wall; whose shoes are you looking at?
  • Language lock-in: fluent in only tech or business. Be bilingual.
  • “It was easy, so it’s cheap:” It’s easy because you’re scarce. Price accordingly.

My Case Study: The Translator Advantage

I said I’m not the best coder in any room, and I sleep great knowing that. My edge is turning chaos into clarity:

  • Moment 1: A stakeholder dumps a paragraph that reads like slam poetry or pseudo-code because their calendar looks like a Chick-fil-A drive-thru. Translate it into a crisp spec with acceptance criteria everyone can read, understand, and agree on.
  • Moment 2: Rally the team around the objective and align on best practices and realistic expectations. We devs are prone to customization overload; once the objective is clear, out-of-the-box solutions often appear.
  • Moment 3: Measure and celebrate: less thrash, faster handoffs, fewer escalations. Funny thing is when you start measuring, value starts measuring itself. Create a team-friendly dashboard so everyone knows where they stand (bragging rights included).

Same person, same code literacy; different market position. That’s supply and demand at work.

Tools & Templates (steal these)

Positioning One-Liner:
I help [role/team] fix [pain point] so they get [metric/outcome].

Case Study Skeleton:

  • Problem: what was costly/slow/risky?
  • Approach: what you did and why it worked.
  • Outcome: numbers that matter (time, cost, risk, adoption).
  • Proof: quote or screenshot.

Meeting Translation Checklist:

  • Who’s the decision-maker?
  • What business risk/opportunity is on the table?
  • What does “done” mean in one sentence?
  • What’s the next irreversible step?

Metrics Menu: cycle time, MTTR, adoption %, defects escaped, rework rate, escalations, revenue protected, SLA attainment.

Closing Thoughts

Supply and demand isn’t just a chart from high school econ. It’s a career strategy! You don’t need to outperform everyone. You need to solve important problems in a way few people can. That’s the scarcity the market rewards.