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What Is a Wildcard Person?

wildcardpeople.com

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Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#221

Post by carapace »

bookofjoe wrote: post #174

>Henry Ford had ordered a dynamo for one of his plants. The dynamo didn’t work, and not even the manufacturers could figure out why. A Ford employee told his boss that von Neumann was “the smartest man in America,” so Ford called von Neumann and asked him to come out and take a look at the dynamo. >Von Neumann came, looked at the schematics, walked around the dynamo, then took out a pencil. He marked a line on the ou…

It was Steinmetz.

> A genius in both mathematics and electronics, he did work that earned him the nicknames "Forger of Thunderbolts"[4] and "The Wizard of Schenectady".[5] Steinmetz's equation,[b][6] Steinmetz solids, Steinmetz curves, and Steinmetz equivalent circuit[7] are all named after him, as are numerous honors and scholarships, including the IEEE Charles Proteus Steinmetz Award, one of the highest technical recognitions given by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers professional society.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Proteus_Steinmetz

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#222

Post by lytefm »

still_grokking wrote: post #169
lytefm wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say INFJ would fit the wildcard description more than INTJ. But that's just my own small-sampled observation and me reading a bit about these personality stereotypes.

INFJ doesn't match with the described "wildcard" in any way, as I see it. (And regarding INTJs it's only the "T"). > Introverted: INFJs are energized by time alone Matching a "wildcard"? Rather no. To have many hats you need to be flexible and open with people. Otherwise this won't work out. Introverts don't like "jumping ship". The "wildcard" on the other hand is good at exactly this, and likes it actually. > iNtuit…

Well, my sample size is small (INFJ: me and a CTO at a different company, INTJ: two colleagues) and my MBTI knowledge based mainly on https://www.16personalities.com. I'd still say it can fit quite well because:

- Introversion: useful for working on the kind of technical tasks outlined in the article instead of preferring to work with other people (apart from the customer success example).

- iNtuitive: coming up with out of the box, ad-hoc ideas to solve whatever new challenge is there.

> When there’s a need for innovation or a different perspective, people with Intuitive personality types can usually step up and provide a new direction. Practicality can sometimes be overrated, especially when a situation calls for serious change and “coloring outside the lines.” [1]

- Feeling: Yeah here I agree that „Thinking” types would suit better according the core theory. But when put in contrast to INTJ, I think that's the dimension which can cause someone to become a wildcard in the first place instead of a specialist: wanting to help everyone else in the company rather than focusing on more clearly confined problems for a long time.

> morale killers for these personalities may include strict rules, formal structures, and routine tasks. They may find it especially dispiriting when they’re asked to redo their work, particularly if it’s for a reason that just doesn’t seem valid to them. [...] At times, efficiency may be less of a priority for Advocates than collaborating with and helping colleagues who need a boost. [2]

- Jugding: I agree that „Prospecting” suits better according to the theory.

So overall, INTP seems to be better suited by theory. But in practice, INFJs are also drawn to the wildcard role and can get quite good at it.

[Edit]: Re-reading the article, especially the „wildcards in summary“ part is a very close match with „infjs at work“ (unknown challenges over routines, importance of impact, creative and independent problem solvers)

[1] https://www.16personalities.com/articles/energy-intuitive-vs...

[2] https://www.16personalities.com/infjs-at-work

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#223

Post by golemotron »

leftbit wrote: post #44
anonyme-honteux wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it's about generalists versus specialists, problem solvers versus maintainers. There is not one category inherently better than the other contrary to the 10x bullshit, they will thrive in different contexts

A wildcard tends to focus on the problem solving and tries to cut on the fluff. So this feels certainly being more productive than dancing the process steps, striving for perfect code coverage by unit tests, nitpicking in code reviews and messing around with "cool" frameworks. (I consider myself a "wilcard". Once joined a project for a sprint with a very elaborate development process. Spent about one hour on things I…

Are some people 10x more wildcard than other people?

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#224

Post by ajkjk »

YurgenJurgensen wrote: post #218
ajkjk wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they're talking about butchering a hog at the skill level of a person who grew up near people who owned hogs, ie, definitely a "I did this with somebody at a barbecue a few times" and not "24 months of training". Giving and taking orders likewise doesn't remotely require army training, it just requires growing up around human beings and being part of anything -- theater, bands, church groups, service groups,…

I notice you ignored all the actually difficult items on the list there. You know, the ones where the Dunning-Kruger brigade are a liability and mistakes mean people die.

I didn't ignore all the difficult ones. But fine. Bricklaying is a few days to learn on the job, tops. Conning a ship almost certainly means captaining a boat which takes some experience for sure, probably a few months. Basic first aid, including setting a bone, is a week long course. Etc.

I can't imagine why you went to the trouble of trying to make them all sound like complicated many-year projects, but it's a ridiculous take and I doubt anyone else will read it that way.

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#225

Post by YurgenJurgensen »

ajkjk wrote: post #224
YurgenJurgensen wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I notice you ignored all the actually difficult items on the list there. You know, the ones where the Dunning-Kruger brigade are a liability and mistakes mean people die.

I didn't ignore all the difficult ones. But fine. Bricklaying is a few days to learn on the job, tops. Conning a ship almost certainly means captaining a boat which takes some experience for sure, probably a few months. Basic first aid, including setting a bone, is a week long course. Etc. I can't imagine why you went to the trouble of trying to make them all sound like complicated many-year projects, but it's a ridi…

Are you seriously suggesting that Robert A. Heinlein, former naval officer, wouldn't care about the distinction between a ship and a boat?

And you still ignored the two most difficult ones.

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#226

Post by ajkjk »

YurgenJurgensen wrote: post #225
ajkjk wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't ignore all the difficult ones. But fine. Bricklaying is a few days to learn on the job, tops. Conning a ship almost certainly means captaining a boat which takes some experience for sure, probably a few months. Basic first aid, including setting a bone, is a week long course. Etc. I can't imagine why you went to the trouble of trying to make them all sound like complicated many-year projects, but it's a ridi…

Are you seriously suggesting that Robert A. Heinlein, former naval officer, wouldn't care about the distinction between a ship and a boat? And you still ignored the two most difficult ones.

I think he knows the difference, but surely meant the life skill of captaining something rather than the literal many-years-to-acquire technical skill of doing so, because the former makes sense and the latter doesn't.

Which two? Designing a building I see I skipped. That seems pretty attainable, he obviously didn't mean 'be a trained architect and building engineer' like you interpreted it. People in charge of organizations sometimes have to design buildings (probably much moreso in the past though). So like, 'kitchen goes here' etc level stuff.

I'm not saying I agree with the whole quote. I just don't see the point of misinterpreting it so aggressively.

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#227

Post by uwagar »

rolenthedeep wrote: post #220
uwagar wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

bit biased towards waging war or being a soldier.

Heinlein was an American naval officer just after WWI and right before WWII. At that time it wasn't called "bias" it was simply "being American". That quote was written in a very different world.

is it still being american?

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#228

Post by d0100 »

mclightning wrote: post #134

I was that guy for some 5-6 years in earlier years of my career. It doesn't pay well. Job security is non-existent. You won't get visa sponsorships. Your only way out is to build your own startup/product. It is too far out of the regular career spectrum, and you face even open criticism in interviews for this sometimes. So, I stopped. I am an expert Frontend Engineer now. I get senior roles without even a proper inte…

> I am an expert Frontend Engineer now

I wonder how much you know more than a Fullstack Engineer?

I ask because I am a generalist "fullstack" and want to know what kind of things an "expert" should know in the frontend that would make them unable to do fullstack personal projects

From my POV, unless you are working on very new tech like WebGl, Wasm, etc, everything else frontend is pretty much resolved. Would "expert" mean the breadth of knowledge on frontend frameworks? Writing JS compilers? Ajax?

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#229

Post by mbgerring »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #32

17 years ago, there was a popular essay about this sort of person, and the label at the time was "Free Electron": https://randsinrepose.com/archives/free-electron/ Before that, they were known as "generalists", autodidacts, polymaths, etc. The thing is that pretty much any clever person that's easily invested in novel things can become one of these people, so this label isn't reserved for people who are generalists,…

Get this — if you’re a generalist, you can actually decide to become a specialist in one area for the sake of money and career advancement, the same way you’d pick up any other piece of knowledge to solve a novel problem.

Re: What Is a Wildcard Person?

#230

Post by dinkumthinkum »

Jensson wrote: post #81
neilv wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your argument might be interpreted as encouraging Leetcode interviews, which I'd disagree with.

The algorithms they ask for in interviews are so low level that any programmer could learn them in a couple of months, that is generalist level and not specialist level. Not all developers who pass them are generalists, but the people who don't aren't generalist developers. They could be generalist problems solvers who dabbles a bit in programming, but they aren't generalist developers.

I don’t know. I think this whole discussion is very vague if go by the example in the article, it sounds unlikely the developer described as the wildcard in the article would do very well on LeetCode.
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