Maybe you’ve heard the quote:

“The top software developers are more productive than average software developers not by a factor of 10x or 100x or even 1000x but by 10,000x.”

This is by Nathan Myhrvold, former Chief Technology Officer at Microsoft.

While 10,000x is a stretch IMO, and has a lot of variables regarding the complexity of the software being built, a few suggestions on getting 2, 5, 10x better based on a few articles I’ve read that reference this quote:

– Better planning, focus and foresight

– Do not jump write into coding, trying one fix after another, which causes stress and mistakes, rather analyze the issue at hand 

– Do not skimp on analysis and design up front

– Using existing versus writing from scratch

– Consistently hitting your “groove” without distractions

– Leveraging what you know, who you know, and where to find what you don’t know

Any others?