3 ms·

100% true. You don't get to replace a pile of shit or even to call it a pile of shit before you demonstrate that you can navigate the pile of shit and teach it

by yosefk 7y ago

100% true. You don't get to replace a pile of shit or even to call it a pile of shit before you demonstrate that you can navigate the pile of shit and teach it new tricks, otherwise you have no credibility. This of course means, at least theoretically, that a sufficiently big pile of shit never gets replaced (since nobody can (or wants to) be sufficiently productive with it to gain the necessary credibility) and might sink the company which made it. But there's no other way. There are always 10 people telling that the code is shit and the only reliable way to tell that some of them are trustworthy is by observing their ability to get things done in the existing code base.

dnh44 7y ago
I think you make a great point but the argument depends on the unstated assumption that master shit navigator == master architect, and I'm not sure how often that's true. They are different skills (maybe?) and while I'm sure there are loads of people with both skills I don't think it's universal. I personally know one engineer that after a decade of being the 10x rockstar shit navigator finally got the opportunity to create a codebase from scratch. They'd been dreaming of doing such a thing for years and had the design all planned out. It was to be the shiny new product for the company. One day the people upstairs finally gave their blessing. The ninja worked alone, making all the decisions, with full support of upper management. The result was a great big steaming pile of shit that nearly sunk the company. After a short period of mental health problems the ninja was promoted to shogun and the company hired a new shit navigator. In football (soccer) it's easy to observe that good players can be good in totally different ways and/or situations. And it's also easy to observe players who were once thought of as good or bad can totally change either way when they change teams. It's a shame engineering performance can't be as easily observed.

by yosefk 7y ago

dnh44 7y ago

I think you make a great point but the argument depends on the unstated assumption that master shit navigator == master architect, and I'm not sure how often that's true. They are different skills (maybe?) and while I'm sure there are loads of people with both skills I don't think it's universal. I personally know one engineer that after a decade of being the 10x rockstar shit navigator finally got the opportunity to create a codebase from scratch. They'd been dreaming of doing such a thing for years and had the design all planned out. It was to be the shiny new product for the company. One day the people upstairs finally gave their blessing. The ninja worked alone, making all the decisions, with full support of upper management. The result was a great big steaming pile of shit that nearly sunk the company. After a short period of mental health problems the ninja was promoted to shogun and the company hired a new shit navigator. In football (soccer) it's easy to observe that good players can be good in totally different ways and/or situations. And it's also easy to observe players who were once thought of as good or bad can totally change either way when they change teams. It's a shame engineering performance can't be as easily observed.