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I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

benjiweber.co.uk

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Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#61

Post by qikInNdOutReply »

My dream was always to be hired into obscure government bureaucracy and automate the data entry job away, while hiding it. After that, you basically exist in a free incubator.

Imagine the software you can write, if freed from societies expectations of sweat, tears and busy work. Not to be rich, just to be technical excellent, productive and at peace.

I wonder why this has not yet happened with open source. If a sufficient enough part of the public uses your software, the state offers you a maintainer role. Nothing big, but enough to life on and do work.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#62

Post by ColonelPhantom »

kqr wrote: post #48
hoosieree wrote: post #8

I just pair programmed with a student to help them get their code working. The first thing I did was delete unused variables and non-critical code that was distracting from the core algorithm. After removing most of their print statements, it was obvious what the program was doing at run-time. It's much harder to delete your own code than someone else's, especially when you're unsure of what's important.

Deleting stuff, compiling often, and proper indentation -- things beginners don't think they should waste time on, but which actually would solve most of their problems.

Especially as compiling often and proper indentation are often taken care of by running a linter and an autoformatter.

I'll add "learning how to use a debugger", though.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#64

Post by trashtester »

> “the top tier of engineers that are 10x more productive than the average”

10x engineers are not 10x the average, they're 10x the median. And they probably know the difference.

I would guess that 1-5% of engineers are 10x the median, while less than 0.1% or so are 10x the average.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#65

Post by carlmr »

zarzavat wrote: post #38
eloff wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you guys work on the same industry as me? There's easily a 10x difference between the best guy on the team and the worst guy who's about to be on the performance plan. It's a real thing. A lot of programmers really suck. I interview them and wonder why they're in this industry to begin with. I'm easily 10x those guys, they struggle with for loops. Then there are some superstars like Evan Wallace who created esbuil…

That’s not what 10x means to me. It means 10x the median productivity, i.e. 10x a competent programmer. I don’t think anybody can dispute that 10x programmers exist , Bellard, DJB and Carmack being uncontroversial examples. What’s controversial is the distribution. Are 10x programmers bound to become famous through their outsized contributions, such that their number is very few? Or are there a large enough number of…

>10x the median productivity, i.e. 10x a competent programmer.

You assume the median is competent.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#66

Post by froddd »

trashtester wrote: post #64

> “the top tier of engineers that are 10x more productive than the average” 10x engineers are not 10x the average, they're 10x the median. And they probably know the difference. I would guess that 1-5% of engineers are 10x the median, while less than 0.1% or so are 10x the average.

Given the rather arbitrary nature of ‘10x’ I’m not sure this kind of precision is relevant here

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#67

Post by schnitzelstoat »

eloff wrote: post #30
soganess wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software folk taking the 10x thing seriously is akin to PC gamers unironically calling themselves the "PC master race". I have a hard time taking that conversation seriously.

Do you guys work on the same industry as me? There's easily a 10x difference between the best guy on the team and the worst guy who's about to be on the performance plan. It's a real thing. A lot of programmers really suck. I interview them and wonder why they're in this industry to begin with. I'm easily 10x those guys, they struggle with for loops. Then there are some superstars like Evan Wallace who created esbuil…

Is this real?

I mean I work in Data Science and do quite a lot of programming but I'd assumed my abilities would be far below that of any Software Engineer.

I can't believe anyone would get hired who couldn't do fizzbuzz etc.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#68

Post by Jensson »

schnitzelstoat wrote: post #67
eloff wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you guys work on the same industry as me? There's easily a 10x difference between the best guy on the team and the worst guy who's about to be on the performance plan. It's a real thing. A lot of programmers really suck. I interview them and wonder why they're in this industry to begin with. I'm easily 10x those guys, they struggle with for loops. Then there are some superstars like Evan Wallace who created esbuil…

Is this real? I mean I work in Data Science and do quite a lot of programming but I'd assumed my abilities would be far below that of any Software Engineer. I can't believe anyone would get hired who couldn't do fizzbuzz etc.

The worst programmers mostly work in very low paying jobs. You wont find that many of them in higher paying jobs since they are so easy to weed out in interviews, only desperate companies hires them.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#69

Post by enriquto »

qikInNdOutReply wrote: post #61

My dream was always to be hired into obscure government bureaucracy and automate the data entry job away, while hiding it. After that, you basically exist in a free incubator. Imagine the software you can write, if freed from societies expectations of sweat, tears and busy work. Not to be rich, just to be technical excellent, productive and at peace. I wonder why this has not yet happened with open source. If a suffi…

Have you ever heard about the entire concept of academia? It is more or less like that.

Re: I strive to be a 0.1x Engineer (2016)

#70

Post by juped »

bheadmaster wrote: post #54
devmor wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately even the most prolific and very successful CEOs and management in our industry often fail to understand this. A couple years ago I was rejected from a 3rd round interview for a very large company that should have known better for the primary reason that my "coding challenge" exercise didn't meet an arbitrary lines of code minimum, despite meeting all of their requirements. And of course we have the rece…

> And of course we have the recent example of a certain chief Twit firing engineers based on LoC. Is there any evidence of this claim that isn't yellow press and random gossip on Twitter?

No.
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