I wanted to talk about three posts today that I read in the last week. The first one talks about qualities of a distinguished engineer. The second one is on the topic of the kind of engineers that make up a team. And the last one is more centered around Vishnu’s experience working as a solo founder.
Defining a Distinguished Engineer by Jessie Frazelle
Jessie talks about what sort of qualities can be found in a “distinguished engineer”. I am not exactly sure our industry has agreed on a common definition of what it means to be a distinguished engineer. But I found that the things she had listed would be good to embody for anyone who wishes to grow in their software career. Here are a few qualities that stuck out to me:
Being able to give constructive technical criticism: Quite often I find senior engineers giving out solutions to problems and wishing that their team take their word for it. Thats the sign of a lazy senior engineer. A real leader does not expect this word to be taken like gospel. In fact in a team of smart but less experienced engineers, there should be a good expectations of cross-questioning. A good senior leader will explain their thinking is very approachable ways and welcome questions. They will never try to harshly criticize the solution that someone else might have come up with. They are good about sharing feedback, but also good at making sure its delivered in a way that does not harm the one at the receiving end.
Great communicator and bridge: Senior engineers can understand what is being said in-between the lines. They act as bridges that help move things forward, often between cross-functional teams (product <> engineering) or between separate engineering teams. They help move us past gridlock through their use of empathy and humility. They try to reason from first principles and use their strong technical acumen to ask the right questions, rather then try and come up with answers all the time. Asking the right question is often more important than trying to come up with the right answer.
Value quality, performance, security and maintainability: Senior engineers understand that software is mostly written for other humans to read, rather than for machines to compile. Therefore maintainability is of primary concern. They set a high bar for quality and performance. They know that valuing users privacy and keeping their data secure is also a primary concern of the engineering team.
Have fun: Senior engineers are pretty serious about their responsibilities, but also learn to take themselves not super seriously. They have fun along the way, and make the most of their relationships, at work or outside.
How to Spot and Magnify the Powers of Your Engineering Superheroes, an interview with Lloyd Tabb
Tabb is the founder and CTO of Looker. In this interview Tabb highlights the four superpowers which a team must have and talks about how to best recognize and channel their powers. Also, he describes the profile of the engineering leader, who must corral but not constrain these heroes. Tabb’s take on star programmers and dev team dynamics will inform how you'll work with your team and be able to identify your own strengths. If you think you don’t fit into any of these profiles, please reply to this email and let me know what your superpower profile is like. I would be very curious to know.
Persisting as a solo founder by Vishnu Mohandas
Vishnu gave up a cushy job at Google to build a privacy friendly photos app. He talks about how hard it has been to work as a solo founder and what changes he has had to make to survive in this new pandemic world reality. Though many of us are not entrepreneurs, Vishnu’s lessons are valuable for anyone since we are all working on a startup of you! Some things that I liked from his post:
Patience: Vishnu talks about how meditation helped him deal with negative situations. He talks about how he will take a pause and “sit out” a situation that would otherwise overwhelm him. We don’t talk about this often. On a weekly basis I have found multiple things that have the power to escalate and cause me mental / physical harm. The best thing we can do is remain calm, take a pause and see if we can walk away from that situation temporarily and come back with more resolve later. It takes a lot of patience to do so.
Reducing distractions: Vishnu disabled notifications on his phone, and also works in a “tree of checkpoints”. This is a great insight. Also, have you heard of The Eisenhower Matrix?
Qualities of a senior engineer, spotting powers of engineering superheroes and surviving as a solo founder