I really enjoyed the book Range about late specialization. I've also been using ChatGPT for brainstorming and combining two different topics. I've tried to get it to generate analogies too, with mixed success, but I could see that being very powerful as a tool for thinking.
While reading this a book came to my mind - "Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions". There are thousands of bright people innovating clever solutions in CS but humanity often fails to bring those insights to wider societies. There needs to a bridge that could potentially tackle this problem and convert domain specific knowledge to solve day to day problems.
I've thought of this question a long time ago, but I never really put in the work to find the answer. What totally different domain or topic should I study that would indirectly make me a better programmer? better in general or an aspect of programming.
I'd suggest seeking out industries where IT hasn't really "happened" yet.
I work at Deloitte. Every time I chat with my counterparts in Tax, Audit, Wealth, ... I come up with ideas that may or may not be worth pursuing further. After that, it's just a matter of seeking out vicious rejection of all the bad ideas, till you land on one where the best objection is "well, we just don't do things that way around here".
There's also just being the guy in the right place at the right time, and being open to learning new stuff. I ran into a guy ~20 years ago who'd found a niche in building software emulators for ATMs. He didn't have a coding background, but after asking lots of questions of his buddies who worked in banking and taking a few night classes on Visual Basic coding he'd built a multi-million dollar business on his own to fill a gap that almost nobody knew existed. Thousands of better coders working in banking could've done what he did, but none thought to even look at the opportunity that was staring them in the face
Banking is still a "please help us" area with regard to tech.
I've seen some gigantic players in this space, backed up by death stars like Salesforce who have still failed to penetrate the full depth of the business model and provide a properly-integrated software solution.
Everyone talks fantastical tales in their various ivory towers of decisionmaking, but no one wants to sit down with the actual front line employees and understand the UX challenges around performing a complete IRA rollover front-to-back with a customer base that may not be as financially-literate as hoped.
You will find almost universally that the big players will come in and drop a 95% solution on the table. The remaining 5% is what the business actually needed to see the dream come true. If the back office still needs to visually inspect every form, you have failed in your strategic mission. It is quite easy to sweep that 5% under the rug in a larger org chart.
Even in banking, the people responsible are getting fed up with the lack of delivery. This is why tiny companies like ours are able to get competitive products in place now.
In academia it is commonly accepted that a cross domain research portfolio is the kiss of death for tenure. I have personally seen this happen way too many times.
