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My advice is to deeply study your personality, proclivities, and weaknesses. Decide if you will move from "specialist to generalist" (eg: management) or "specia

by czbond 10y ago

My advice is to deeply study your personality, proclivities, and weaknesses. Decide if you will move from "specialist to generalist" (eg: management) or "specialist to deep specialist" (deep engineer). Actively plan your career.... Are you idea, information, or people focused? The world rewards each - but you have to find your niche. I like to lead, inspire, plan products, add significant revenue, and mold careers in high risk, time compressed situations. I dislike managing day-to-day. I've learned this. Plan that everything you do will become "the new normal", always pushing the edge. I've found that as I get older my value has increased exponentially, but it's related to my personality type and actions. No matter your thoughts on Myers Briggs, it offers a "starting point". I'm an ENTP - which I used to believe "a curse" in engineering circles, until I've realized it is the best gift I could have ever had. Focus on where your personality excels, and find an area of interest where others are not like you.

Qworg 10y ago
What do you do, if not manage day to day? This definitely sounds like the direction I'm leaning, so it'd be helpful to see what others have done. My email is in my profile if you'd prefer.
- themodelplumber 10y ago
  Not knowing what OP's specific change involves, key ENTP gifts are going to involve 1) ideating quickly over (or identifying relevant) new technologies or patterns in general and 2) constructing novel frameworks or sets of rules, and refining them to be more elegant over time[0]. If an ENTP working for me wanted to be less involved in managing the day-to-day, I'd be pretty happy about that and would highly encourage them to get their head back in the clouds and start proposing new solutions in our problem domain. The ENTP talent for ideation and ability to distill patterns into frameworks could be extremely helpful in creating breakthroughs in any industry. [0] 1: extraverted intuition; 2: introverted thinking, the primary and secondary cognitive functions used by ENTPs, based on the Jungian theory of cognitive functions.
- czbond 10y ago
  I help companies realize new revenue paths, and to execute on new products quickly. Specifically, I figure out the 20% of engineering effort to get to the initial results. I often skip much of the initial "Product Manager-y" tasks, and build quickly with a very small team, to be in a position to sell - often based on intuition. I realized years ago that I couldn't compete in "traditional domains" of engineering - my interests in everything meant I could not become a master, traditional engineer. That career path was out. I can't compete with INTJ or ISTJ (deeply focused personalities) which is what many software engineers classify as - but I can outcompete on innovation and new revenue.
  - elliotec 10y ago
    I'd like to have a chat with you if you're up for it, I don't see any contact info for you in your profile but you can contact me through my website listed in mine if you want.
epalmer 10y ago
In addition to Myers Briggs, I have found StrengthsFinder [1] to be very helpful. I am dyslexic and ADD. Also ENTJ. I would love to be a specialist but all my life I have found out I am better as being a generalist with some lite specialist skills. At 62 years old now, being a generalist that manages a few developers and coaching a scrum team is a perfect fit. I do get to write code but by HN standards, my code is pretty simple. It does work and most of it runs 24x7 without failure. [1] https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com
smoyer 10y ago
I'm an INTJ who had learned to play the extrovert ... I'm over 50 now but still getting (technically) stronger. My ability to pull all-nighters and to participate in protracted death-marches has declined but now I'm smart enough to avoid those situations.
bkjsbkjdnf 10y ago
> I'm an ENTP top bantz

by czbond 10y ago

Qworg 10y ago

What do you do, if not manage day to day? This definitely sounds like the direction I'm leaning, so it'd be helpful to see what others have done. My email is in my profile if you'd prefer.

themodelplumber 10y ago
Not knowing what OP's specific change involves, key ENTP gifts are going to involve 1) ideating quickly over (or identifying relevant) new technologies or patterns in general and 2) constructing novel frameworks or sets of rules, and refining them to be more elegant over time[0]. If an ENTP working for me wanted to be less involved in managing the day-to-day, I'd be pretty happy about that and would highly encourage them to get their head back in the clouds and start proposing new solutions in our problem domain. The ENTP talent for ideation and ability to distill patterns into frameworks could be extremely helpful in creating breakthroughs in any industry. [0] 1: extraverted intuition; 2: introverted thinking, the primary and secondary cognitive functions used by ENTPs, based on the Jungian theory of cognitive functions.
czbond 10y ago
I help companies realize new revenue paths, and to execute on new products quickly. Specifically, I figure out the 20% of engineering effort to get to the initial results. I often skip much of the initial "Product Manager-y" tasks, and build quickly with a very small team, to be in a position to sell - often based on intuition. I realized years ago that I couldn't compete in "traditional domains" of engineering - my interests in everything meant I could not become a master, traditional engineer. That career path was out. I can't compete with INTJ or ISTJ (deeply focused personalities) which is what many software engineers classify as - but I can outcompete on innovation and new revenue.
- elliotec 10y ago
  I'd like to have a chat with you if you're up for it, I don't see any contact info for you in your profile but you can contact me through my website listed in mine if you want.

epalmer 10y ago

In addition to Myers Briggs, I have found StrengthsFinder [1] to be very helpful. I am dyslexic and ADD. Also ENTJ. I would love to be a specialist but all my life I have found out I am better as being a generalist with some lite specialist skills. At 62 years old now, being a generalist that manages a few developers and coaching a scrum team is a perfect fit. I do get to write code but by HN standards, my code is pretty simple. It does work and most of it runs 24x7 without failure. [1] https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com https://www.gallupstrengthscenter.com

smoyer 10y ago

I'm an INTJ who had learned to play the extrovert ... I'm over 50 now but still getting (technically) stronger. My ability to pull all-nighters and to participate in protracted death-marches has declined but now I'm smart enough to avoid those situations.

bkjsbkjdnf 10y ago

> I'm an ENTP top bantz