[HN Gopher] Short Fat Engineers Are Under Valued
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Short Fat Engineers Are Under Valued
Author : atticusberg
Score : 87 points
Date : 2021-02-12 22:05 UTC (54 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (nested.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (nested.substack.com)
| nullspace wrote:
| In my career, I have met exactly one short fat engineer with
| >5yrs of exp that I was impressed by. That person is now a
| Product Manager at a FAANG company (albeit PM-ing highly
| technical stuff).
|
| I bring this up because I think there is a very good analogy to
| the point that the author is making and the distinction between
| PM and Engineers. Broadly put, PM's are good at figuring out the
| theta, and Engineers are good at the r.
|
| I think that with the perspectives that short fat engineers have,
| they can play enormous roles as "PM" or "Engineering Manager",
| and definitely as ICs during early stages of startups. But they
| clearly don't enjoy depth, and this can be counter-productive for
| that 1% of the time where you really, really want depth.
|
| I don't buy the knowledge vs wisdom thing though, there's plenty
| of wisdom to be gained from going deep into a subject. I'd
| actually claim that wisdom can only come from depth - though what
| depth means is different for different roles.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| I think this article underestimates a risk of the "short fat"
| information spectrum.
|
| People who think they know something are more likely to be wrong
| than people who don't think they know anything on a topic.
| There's a "competence gap" between knowing you know nothing and
| actually having deep knowledge; it's the "just enough to be
| dangerous" zone.
|
| Depending on how tall precisely "short fat" is, that can describe
| an engineer that, more often than not, makes the wrong choice
| because they know enough to have opinions but those opinions are
| raw.
| dangwu wrote:
| The point that "on a long enough time line, wisdom is always more
| valuable than knowledge" is pretty irrelevant to tech companies.
| They hire engineers to get stuff done quickly - not slowly gather
| "wisdom". The average tenure at a tech company continues to be a
| few years.
|
| Also, I've noticed that entry-to-mid level jobs are great for
| "short and fat" engineers, but once you start aiming for senior
| (or higher) level IC positions, job interviews require you to be
| an expert in whatever field the position interviewing for is in.
| If you stay "short and fat", you're setting your career
| trajectory up for failure.
| elil17 wrote:
| Practical question: I have a short, fat resume (e.g. MechE
| degree, work experience in AI, UX, manufacturing, academic
| research, and writing). What industries/companies/roles will
| value this skill set the most? Where can short, fat people find
| opportunities?
| the_only_law wrote:
| I guess I'm relatively fat, but not really. I've done a lot of
| surface level research/ on stuff that no one uses or really cares
| about.
|
| Ive always been amazed by the "tall" devs and have one or twice
| (or more than I'd like to admit) tried to deep dive something
| always eventually giving up because I have no idea where to
| obtain the deeper knowledge. Perhaps more realistically, I just
| have a different type of fat.
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| When I was younger I used to say that I was a jack of all trades,
| master of none. Many years later I feel like a jack of all
| trades, master of many. I no longer fit any of the profiles
| presented here.
| ellisv wrote:
| I feel very funnel/inverse-triangle shaped.
| throwaway856437 wrote:
| That's called being old. Generally considered out of date,
| unable to learn new stuff :-)
| throwaway2245 wrote:
| People who have broad interests with no depth of knowledge have
| not identified (for themselves) where their value lies.
|
| I would imagine that this type of engineer needs to be carefully
| managed to stay on tasks that add business-value.
|
| As such, it's not that they are unfairly seen as juniors. They
| _are_ juniors.
| bluefirebrand wrote:
| "Junior in every department" really struck hard for me.
|
| I know just enough of basically everything to get by or as a
| starting point, but I lack that really deep knowledge that comes
| from using a small group of skills and tools for years. I feel
| that switching languages and frameworks and tools and OSes a
| bunch of times early in my career has really held me back.
|
| I don't mind supporting my team, what I don't like is how
| companies will structure an entire team as support around one or
| two people. I am not a rock star but I am still capable of
| contributing more than "support". I want to build real features.
|
| Especially when I know I'm capable of doing the things those devs
| do, just maybe not at the speed they do.
| pkaye wrote:
| How big a team are you working in? In most places I've worked
| the teams (or company) were small enough that even new hires
| would get a change to work on something big if they have the
| capacity.
| the_only_law wrote:
| I'm in a similar position, albeit mostly because even though my
| professional career has been predominantly one stack, there's
| just no real chance to ever really get to learn the ecosystem.
| Most of the work hasn't called for me learning much of an
| ecosystem, especially since in very bureaucratic environment, a
| lot of it is simply delegated to someone else.
|
| I often half joke about how I don't know any programming
| languages which is unfortunately kinda of true. I've toyed with
| a lot of languages, including ones that your average developer
| may not have even heard of, but at the end of the day it's just
| toying.
| meheleventyone wrote:
| None of these things exist. A taxonomy of three kinds is entirely
| inadequate to describe the potential of anyone working today.
| These sorts of quick fix mental models are pretty poisonous.
| There are literally recommendations for all three saying how
| useful they are. This is some of the dumbest snake oil to infect
| software development.
| kypro wrote:
| No sources and a lot of assertions here. I'm not sure how true
| this is tbh. Some of the best TAs I've worked with have a very
| broad knowledge of a lot of technologies, without being much of
| an expert in any specific technology.
|
| I'm also personally somewhere between a tall-skinny and t-shaped
| engineer. Admittedly jobs seem to be a little harder to come by,
| but there are some jobs (especially with small startups) that
| really appreciate engineers who have a wide range of skills.
|
| I'd love to see some data, confirming this. I suspect OP is
| right, but I don't think "short and fat" engineers are under
| valued as a rule, it's more that 90% of the time companies are
| looking to hire someone with a very specific skillset to fill a
| very specific role.
| philosopher1234 wrote:
| Wisdom comes from depth and breadth not breadth alone. That
| initial bolder claim was a major turn off for me. The "wisdom"
| you get from breadth is the same kind of "wisdom" you get from
| seeing a lot of faces go by on the street. It's surface level,
| and mostly wrong.
| standardUser wrote:
| And what about us short, skinny engineers? I guess we're just
| happy to be here.
| hprotagonist wrote:
| at this point i'm P-shaped.
| lmilcin wrote:
| (removed)
| Zababa wrote:
| The article is not about physical appearance though.
| pcstl wrote:
| That's not what the article is about, though
| pb7 wrote:
| The article itself isn't about this but one could theorize that
| the headline taken literally is also likely true.
| the_only_law wrote:
| Ngl for a minute before clicking I was slightly curious if this
| was some random study of the literal interpretation.
| pb7 wrote:
| I believe there is ample research showing height and
| attractiveness (one could reasonably consider weight to be
| one determining factor in attractiveness) do play a factor in
| career success, compensation, and selection for leadership.
| christophilus wrote:
| Invader Zim was prescient, it turns out.
| jodrellblank wrote:
| one could devil's advocate speculate the other way as well;
| e.g. If IQ declines with age, and exercise is a way to slow the
| decline[1], fatness could reflect lack of exercise and
| lifestyle which doesn't prioritise exercise, so would you
| expect to see lower value for fatter engineers in a pure
| meritocracy?
|
| If lower IQ correlates with obesity (" _a 10-point decrease in
| IQ was associated with a 1.10-fold increase in the odds for
| obesity._ "[2]) either way - a lower IQ person is more likely
| to get fat, or the metabolic changes of getting fat negatively
| affect cognition as well - over a large group of skilled people
| would you expect thinner people to earn more?
|
| If height and IQ are correlated (" _Taller people tend to be
| smarter. Although the relationship is modest, height and IQ are
| consistently correlated at ~.10-.20_ "[3]), would, etc.
|
| [1]
| https://www.mdedge.com/neurology/article/193699/alzheimers-c...
|
| [2] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/lim2.11
|
| [3]
| https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jo...
| seaman1921 wrote:
| and such is the quality of top comments on HN now-a-days :)
| asmos7 wrote:
| came for hope - walked away disappointed.
| vocram wrote:
| And that's true even more if they are bald and with a beard.
| winter_blue wrote:
| I knew a senior software engineer who was in his 60s, _who
| was short, fat (pot bellied), completely bald (or shaven),
| and had a large white beard_.
|
| He also used to ruffle the feathers of HR. Once, when a woman
| from the talent acquisition team tries to give him generic
| instructions about conducting interviews, he told her "Lady,
| I don't need all this, I've been doing this since before you
| were born". (She was born in the mid-80s.) She reported him
| to HR, and obviously they didn't do anything, since he was
| one of the most valuable engineers at the company.
|
| He had a great breadth of knowledge and experience, and was
| really good at what he did, and he was considered one of the
| most important engineers at the company.
| [deleted]
| peter_l_downs wrote:
| well, yeah, all engineers are under valued
| kristopolous wrote:
| Some clicking on google scholar shows academic literature
| supports the claim at least with regard to height. Maybe
| someone can find similar articles with weight (I couldn't find
| anything)
|
| https://psycnet.apa.org/buy/2004-95165-004
|
| https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00288309
| shaggyfrog wrote:
| Egads. The term is "generalist", and has been for decades.
|
| No one would or should say "short & fat".
|
| And yes, generalists are undervalued.
| theodric wrote:
| My wife likes me so
| wwww4all wrote:
| The reality often goes against the premise of the article.
|
| What are accomplishments of tall.skinny vs short.fat engineers?
|
| Linux was driven by Linus T, javascript by Brendan E, Apple by 2
| Steve's, etc.
|
| Innovation and creativity are more highly valued, which are
| byproducts of short.skinny type.
| grahamlee wrote:
| The two Steves are a great example. Well, Steve W was an
| electronic engineer with a deep interest and understanding of
| electronics. But Steve J was the one who took calligraphy
| classes and realised that computers could benefit from multiple
| fonts.
| wombatmobile wrote:
| As usual with these types of articles, the advice in the maxim
| is asserted free of context.
|
| > On a long enough time line, wisdom is always more valuable
| than knowledge.
|
| In practice, context is everything. That's why for every
| expert, there is an equal and opposite expert.
| jfengel wrote:
| Steve J is tall and skinny. Steve W is slightly shorter than
| average and fat. Linus is pretty much dead average, maybe a
| little tall and a little heavy. Brendan's the same height as
| Steve W, and was weight proportionate at the time, though he's
| put on weight since then.
| soneca wrote:
| I am not sure that perspective will be widely shared, I am not
| even sure if I agree myself, but I do appreciate this post as I
| consider myself a short fat engineer.
| [deleted]
| whoisjuan wrote:
| I think the argument of specialist vs generalist is kind of
| futile. They simple fit in different parts of the journey and
| evolution of a software product.
|
| Generalists are highly valuable for many types of orgs and
| projects especially nascent projects. But sometimes you need the
| precise output of a specialist to achieve something.
|
| If my business has a product that is highly dependent of let's
| say OpenGL, then an OpenGL specialist will generate more specific
| output that someone who knows a little of OpenGL and a lot of
| other things.
|
| However, there's always the counter-agrument that generalists can
| compensate with their holistic view and understanding of problems
| throughout the whole stack. I understand this and agree with it
| but I think there's a point in every innovation where the
| generalist contribution declines sharply. And I'm saying this as
| a generalist.
|
| If you are a generalist and you feel undervalued, you're likely
| in the wrong project or too involved in phases of a project where
| your contribution can't move the needle significantly anymore.
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| A friendly suggestion for the OP:
|
| An uppercase theta should be used for "Big Th time complexity"
| regarding algorithms but for angles like in the article, it
| should be the lowercase theta that looks like this: th.
| ironman1478 wrote:
| The valve employee handbook talks about the T shaped engineer
| (page 32)
| https://media.steampowered.com/apps/valve/Valve_Handbook_Low...
| stingraycharles wrote:
| The article of this post also does. I'm unsure what point
| you're trying to make?
| ironman1478 wrote:
| Nothing! Just a cool factoid!
| throwaway_dcnt wrote:
| What about the squares amongst us?
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Do "height on demand". Constant abstract and compress the
| knowledge so you can ramp up in any area as needed.
|
| Really, this is why programming languages are my "home base" of
| expertise. It's the study of formal ideas and their
| communication.
| robertbalent wrote:
| Is it really true?
|
| A lot of companies are focusing on hiring "short fat" engineers.
| Especially companies having "dev ops" engineering model, where
| engineers must be able to work on all stages of the product
| lifecycle - from design, development, testing, to deployment and
| operations.
| harpratap wrote:
| Devops is more of T-shaped role rather than short-fat
| satyrnein wrote:
| "Full stack" (for whatever definition) is valued because it
| cuts down on coordination costs, but you may run into limits of
| what you can expect one person to know. Interestingly, as I've
| had to hire some "skinny" specialists, my Kanban board has
| gotten wider to coordinate between them.
| homeless_engi wrote:
| Not sure I agree. A "short fat" could theoretically be replaced
| by a group of "short skinny", whereas a "tall skinny" could only
| be replaced by another "tall skinny".
|
| As value is largely determined by scarcity (supply and demand),
| this would cause "short fat" to be of lower value.
| pb7 wrote:
| It depends on how depth of knowledge is measured. One is
| considered an expert in a niche because they know it inside and
| out. But in theory, multiple people with a disjoint subset of
| knowledge of the niche could also be a reasonable replacement?
| bagrow wrote:
| A short fat engineer is likely a dilettante.
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