Earlier quoted context omitted.
That sounds very familiar to me... I know of a guy like that, who will rapidly jump on and propose and implement half-baked "tactical" solutions to any production incident. As you say, he is valued by management, because he is very responsive, at all hours, and always has some kind of snake oil "fix" to offer for any problem, and generally maintains a bit of a "mad scientist" vibe. The issue is that, most of his "fix…
Great insight and advice I need to take - your description captures my current situation almost to a tee, better than I’ve been able to understand it for myself, so thank you. In addition to what you described, in my case this engineer quickly recognizes other highly-effective and/or important people, and aggressively tries to build that reputation by privately messaging and even privately demoing work where the reci…
If people think that Y approach is good, and talk amongst themselves about it, but don't actually write it up, pitch it to the powers that be, "sell" it, etc., then people are going to do that for them.
If Flores, Wilson and Smith are overwhelmed with one on one chats and meetings, then they'll probably push back and organize some group meetings and communications that everyone is in on. Conversely, if _nobody_ is doing that, then that leaves things wide open for _someone_ to do that, and that person is actually adding some value in doing so.
The person I work with also has a habit of cornering people when they are leaving. If you him "goodnight, see you tomorrow" at 5:30p, and pick up a bag, he will somehow interpret that as an opportunity to broach a whole new topic, and tie you up for half an hour. He does it with senior people too, it can be interesting to watch... hard to say whether it is not picking up on the social cues, or just not caring...