In Praise of “Normal” Engineers

A lot of technical people got really attached to our identities as smart kids. The software industry tends to reflect and reinforce this preoccupation at every turn, as seen in Netflix’s claim that “we look for the top 10 percent of global talent” or Coinbase’s desire to “hire the top 0.1 percent.” I would like to challenge us to set that baggage to the side and think about ourselves as normal people.

It can be humbling to think of yourself as a normal person. But most of us are, and there is nothing wrong with that. Even those of us who are certified geniuses on certain criteria are likely quite normal in other ways—kinesthetic, emotional, spatial, musical, linguistic, and so on.

Software engineering both selects for and develops certain types of intelligence, particularly around abstract reasoning, but nobody is born a great software engineer. Great engineers are made, not born.

I read this article twice last night. I haven't come across any article that spoke to my massive professional anxieties/impostor syndrome as well as this one.

One of my biggest pet peeves with being around smart people is when people explain things using big words. It feels like it takes so much more effort to understand tough concepts when they are saddled with jargon and ACT words.

I also enjoyed this point about building teams:

We place too much emphasis on individual agency and characteristics, and not enough on the systems that shape us and inform our behaviors.

I believe a whole slew of issues (candidates self-selecting out of the interview process, diversity of applicants, and more) would be improved simply by shifting the focus of hiring away from this inordinate emphasis on hiring the best people and realigning around the more reasonable and accurate right people.

It’s a competitive advantage to build an environment where people can be hired for their unique strengths, not their lack of weaknesses; where the emphasis is on composing teams; where inclusivity is a given both for ethical reasons and because it raises the bar for performance for everyone. Inclusive culture is what meritocracy depends on.