I read (listened to) a book on soft skills for developers[1] years ago. It was a pretty quick and easy read (listen). It might be helpful to call out some areas where you might be lacking, to make you aware, and then give you some ideas how to tackle them.

For me, I ended up in the business school when I went to college. That probably did more for my soft skills than anything else. It forced me to learn out to write things that were more than 2 sentences long… not through a class or direct teaching, but by necessity. I always try to think about my audience when I do anything. Who is a presentation for, who is an email to, what am I trying to convey? In sprint demos to those who will consume things I make, I don’t get technical at all, I focus on the value it will provide to them. How will it save them time and toil? How can they consume it? That’s what they care about. It doesn’t matter how technically impressive something is if people can’t consume it, don’t know how to use it, and it doesn’t help them in some way. Some of my team members didn’t like when I tried to sweep their tech talks under the rug, but our stakeholders said we had some of the best presentations in the company as a result. We didn’t bog them down and lose them in jargon, and instead we focused on what mattered to them. We saved the tech talks for internal presentations with people who would get value from them.

The same goes for your boss. Your job is to make your bosses life easier. Do that and you’re golden. Make their life harder and it will probably be reflected in reviews. Always try to put yourself in the other person’s shoes.

If I need to prep something for a future meeting, I try to do it right when I hear about it and it’s fresh in my mind, before I get distracted and it becomes an item on my backlog. Then I stick it somewhere I know I can find it when it’s time for the meeting (or send it out before the meeting so people have a chance to review it). In terms of image within the company, I think this stuff matters a lot, so I raise it high up on my priority list. Plus, if I’m not prepared for the meeting, it means I’m wasting other people’s time, which isn’t good. Even worse if it means we have to have yet another meeting.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Soft-Skills-software-developers-manua...

Soft Skills: The software developer's life manual is a unique guide, offering techniques and practices for a more satisfying life as a professional software developer. https://www.amazon.com/Soft-Skills-software-developers-manua...

Check out the book SoftSkills by John Sonmez.

https://www.amazon.com/Soft-Skills-software-developers-manua...

John Sonmez's Soft Skills has a decent section on surviving corporate life. http://amzn.to/1zLdIWf