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The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

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Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#101

Post by esafak »

stagger87 wrote: post #64
Xeoncross wrote: post #15

Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…

I work in an EE dominated industry where staff and principal titles are only handed out to 30+ year veterans who know their domains better than anyone else in the world. These are people who specialized in one thing their entire career (mmWave RF amplifiers for instance). These companies are every where big software is at, and then some. They don't pay great, they are not "cool" to work at. Gov is often the biggest c…

Everything about this is why people rightly go into software instead.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#102

Post by coliveira »

Xeoncross wrote: post #15

Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…

> Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live

There is NO such thing as hardcore engineer job position that doesn't involve a lot of management. All the good engineers that get jobs are the ones who do management work as well as coding. If you cannot do this, the industry will just close its doors for you.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#103

Post by esafak »

Meszek wrote: post #42
eatonphil wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One area to find great engineers (and interesting jobs) is at database, infrastructure and devtools companies. Places like Cockroach, PlanetScale, Docker, JetBrains, CodeWeavers, Fastly, etc. And the databases, infrastructure or tooling teams within Meta, Microsoft, etc.

I'm at a point in my career when I need to decide if I want to work for European branch of American Big Tech or try a 20 people database startup (got offers from both). I've got 2 yoe in high performance c++, working on data processing engines. I'm really tempted to go to the startup... But big tech pays more. And I feel like I could actually learn how to use tools properly before I come back to writing them. Any opi…

If you have never worked for a reputable big tech company, I'd do a brief stint for signaling, networking, and mentorship purposes. Then go to a rising startup.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#104

Post by feoren »

brianm wrote: post #79
Xeoncross wrote: post #15

Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…

Most companies, in my experience, don't actually know how to make use of Staff+ engineers. I spent years at a medium sized public "tech" company just trying to help the company change engineering enough to make use of these folks, and we go to a place where we could... mostly. FANG and FANG-model (anyone copying FANG engineering/product model) companies do it well and have the bulk of success cases. Look for engineer…

> Most companies, in my experience, don't actually know how to make use of Staff+ engineers.

Absolutely spot on. Making use of Staff+ engineers requires giving them a hard problem that would catapult your company forward if it were solved, and a ton of autonomy in how they go about it. Give them dedicated time to prepare presentations on what they're doing and what they've learned recently. Give them dedicated time to mentor other staff members. Give them a routine, but not a schedule. Stop asking them for so many fucking estimates. Give them access to support staff. And then get your fucking hands off them and let them veritably radiate value to your company.

All of this is, of course, antithetical to whichever imposter-syndrome micro-managing MBA vice president happens to have landed in the chair that gives them authority over these people in their never-ending game of Management Musical Chairs. No fucking way are they going to let some grunt just work on a hard problem without constantly getting in their way, nagging them about pointless deadlines and bullshit estimates, and showing visual progress via good-looking DOM elements so they can take credit for it and get Business Points before their 2-year tenure in that chair is up and they move to Head of Brand Awareness or wherever. No: doing so would reveal that their entire position is literally pointless. Can't have that.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#105

Post by auntienomen »

My favorite version of Staff Engineer is "Person whose prospects for career advancement are limited by their seniority, who is consequentially incentivized to care about doing the right thing".

Least favorite version is the one who doesn't realize this, and makes a muddle of an already working system to demonstrate their impact.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#106

Post by coliveira »

mywittyname wrote: post #88
onion2k wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Something I learned relatively late in my career was that really impressive work is the result of iterations in tiny steps. When you see something that makes you go "WOW! I could never do that!" you're seeing the final result of a long journey, and you probably could have taken each small step with a bit of effort. There's no need for…

When I worked at mega corps, I'd see a "new" tech emerged that was always very similar to a software that our company had developed to solve similar issues. I remember terraform getting released and seeing that it was just an inferior version of the Cloud Formation Template generator someone at my company had invented years prior. I've seen this happen so many times and every time, I'm surprised that more businesses…

There is a simple reason why megacorps don't spin off projects: they would need someone with vision to search for these projects and with high authority to proceed on the spin off. They don't have this kind of people, for the obvious reason that it is not their main concern. Executives in any megacorp are 100% busy making the core business a success, and investing time in small projects that may come to nothing is just a distraction. This may just explain why big corporations are just a waste of time and resources, in the long term.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#107

Post by trgn »

coliveira wrote: post #102
Xeoncross wrote: post #15

Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…

> Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live There is NO such thing as hardcore engineer job position that doesn't involve a lot of management. All the good engineers that get jobs are the ones who do management work as well as coding. If you cannot do this, the industry will just close its doors for you.

> There is NO such thing as hardcore engineer job position that doesn't involve a lot of management

So bizar. I've been in a few companies with senior "hardcore" engineers heads down in code, without management responsibilities.

> If you cannot do this, the industry will just close its doors for you.

Wait what?

A good engineering company will strive for a mix of seniority within teams of ICs. Some of these seniors may become "staff", which usually means, can talk tech stuff to the brass.

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#108

Post by bippihippi1 »

Xeoncross wrote: post #15

Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…

smaller companies, and new teams in larger orgs. if you work on an existing system there's less 'interesting' work and more iterative improvement. larger orgs can produce hardcore stuff, it's just usually too large to attribute all of the 'interesting' stuff to one person. a microservice is just a library with infrastructure, not that much different from writing a small part of a 'hardcore' project. also you can start your own project and do something amazing

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#109

Post by sibeliuss »

timacles wrote: post #94
onion2k wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Something I learned relatively late in my career was that really impressive work is the result of iterations in tiny steps. When you see something that makes you go "WOW! I could never do that!" you're seeing the final result of a long journey, and you probably could have taken each small step with a bit of effort. There's no need for…

The thing that separates those guys from everyone else is simple. Its stamina. No there isn't some higher level of understanding or deep perception. Every one of the all time great programmers had 1 exact thing in common with no exceptions. Stamina. You will not find a single outlier. They did their craft every day, for many hours, year after year. So sure, any of us could have taken the individual small steps. But w…

This is the answer. There's certainly ridiculous talent (especially with ideas), but in my experience it always comes down to stamina stretched through time. Cool things get built by people that stick it out, and recruit others to do the same. And also know _exactly_ when to exit to pursue something new (but that's a different subject).

Re: The Staff Engineer's Path – Book Review

#110

Post by VirusNewbie »

Xeoncross wrote: post #15

Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…

I've worked at a big telco and now FAANG and I can tell you there is so much non CRUD work it's crazy. There are very very hard technical problems to solve in FAANG.
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