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This might sound like a rant, it probably is but I’m sick and tired of articles that create this perfect personna, meddle in theory but behave like they’re spro

This might sound like a rant, it probably is but I’m sick and tired of articles that create this perfect personna, meddle in theory but behave like they’re sprouting truths. The ninja rockstar developer, the amazing product guy... I could write an article right now about any profession. The reason you need the CPD (Coal/People/Dreaming) focused worker in your coal mine is bacause he will: 1. Understand that coal is an important product. He will give himself to this quest and personal mission to understand how people use coal and just how much society depends on it. This will push him to better himself in its exploitation. 2. Be a dreamer. Most people will just wave their hand and dismiss the possibility that coal extraction is a flatbed for innovation. Your coal focused worker will spend all his time thinking about new ways to work with coal. That will increase the creative output of the whole operation thus raising the bottom line. 3. Be a people person. Coal mines are dreary places that’s why your 10x coal worker will have social skills. He’ll need to keep the people around him entertained and challenged so that he may create friction value. Anyway, turns out I can’t write a proper article in one go but I will end this unsubstantiates comment by saying that most of these articles target the management type that makes ill informed decisions based on blog aricles, and the fact that this kind of feedback loop exists in the world infuriates me. Later edit: just reread the article and got angry again. What’s the value in this? Can we really throw such absolutes right now? I’m sorry if the post author is somehow seeing this comment, it’s not a bad post, it’s a bad post type in my opinion as it brings nothing new to the table. Actually, it might make the reader feel like product developing is this weird arcane science and that unless he has those attributes he’s not this unicorn product engineer, when the reality is that most product engineers can’t become what is described in this article because the work they do is tied to reality, not to the rainbows and clouds world of our imaginations.

gregdoesit 7y ago
OP here. I’ve written this based on what qualities I’ve observed several of my engineering colleagues exhibit, who are pretty good at building products and working with PMs. And who consistently get stellar feedback from business stakeholders, certain teams going straight to them, to discuss new ideas. I beg to differ the article is super generic, as it closes with very engineering specific recommendations to build a “product-muscle” for developer [1]. This is the kind of advice and coaching I give to devs around me who would like to make more product/business impact. [1] https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/the-product-minded-engineer/#tips-to-become-a-more-product-minded-engineer https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/the-product-minded-engine...
- ThalesX 7y ago
  Of course I am not going to argue with the person behind the article as the simplest explanation is that I misread, misunderstood, misjudged etc. However, I will ask you three questions to clarify this for me, of course optional: 1 - Do you think it’s possible for one person to do half of the things you listed? 2 - Do you think it’s possible for most product people to do most of the things you talk about outside of companies such as Microsoft, Uber and similar? 3 - Should the product minded engineer be interested in users or the stakeholders?
  - gregdoesit 7y ago
    And I’m also not going to argue with people who have different experiences - I can speak for my own experience, and generalise it, finding others who might think similarly, which is what I’ve done here. This is to say YMMV. But to your questions. 1 - Doing half the things I listed. I hope this is not a loaded question, but I’ve seen people do all of them. It usually starts with people who are both good communicators, are curious about the “why” on things, being interested in how the business works. Then they bring product ideas. The nice you bring product ideas to the table, as an engineer, making pragmatic trade-offs is pretty straightforward (if we build a slightly modified feature, we can get the same business impact, but a lot less eng complexity). The rest is about looking out ways to get early feedback (prototyping, hallway testing etc) and challenging weird edge cases. The first few of these I’m seeing a lot around me. 2 - I don’t fully get the question about product people. Also, I spent a good deal of my career working at Skype/Microsoft and Uber, so I don’t think I can give a definite answer. If it helps, at Skyscanner, a smaller startup, I had even more product say as an engineer, than I did at Uber or Microsoft. I suspect everything I wrote assumes an environment where engineers are empowered and close to the product, and data about the product usage/revenue generated. 3 - I’d say have a lot of curiosity on how the product works and how users use it, and generate value for the company. Then you need good communication skills to build trust with the product stakeholders - to understand more about the business, how they think, and to be able to showcase your ideas, prototypes and accommodate feedback for them.
    - ThalesX 7y ago
pm90 7y ago
Thank you for saying this. I will admit that I did find these kinds of blog posts interesting at first, but the core of the thing just seems to be to have better social skills and listen more. I think one of the reasons I found them pleasing to read is if I personally had some of the qualities mentioned in them... validation I guess. But I agree with you that these articles don’t provide much value.
- ThalesX 7y ago
  Oh, here’s the recipe, I read some more blog articles on how to talk to people, and some more on how to pester people on the hallway to ask about stuff they might not care about, sprinkle some salt and pepper and this is me, the 10x product engineer. I only have about 10 bullet points separating me from the Product Gods! I think you’re right, validation is probably the #1 factor why these type of articles propagate. Like those ads where they tell you only geniuses can solve this: 2 + 2 * 2, and you click because you want to see who the morons are that arent’t a genius like yourself.
naavis 7y ago
I felt more like the post is aimed for engineers looking to improve their game and not for management. The post pointed out several things I recognize from my own working life as valuable skills.
- ThalesX 7y ago
  I’m just going to be nasty now and say that those managers I’m talking about don’t read management blogs, they read <insert other role here> blogs so they can ‘stay on top of things’. The article is exposing some very good traits for anyone to have or to hope for, but let’s keep it realistic if we want it to be valuable. You could do a space ship launch by hand ignoring for example wind resistence. It would be awsome in theory, less fuel, easier to stabilize, but it probably won’t get where you expect.
todayispotato 7y ago
While I see what you're saying, there is a reason why these articles keep popping up, and that's because this "product-minded engineer" IS an actual role that is essential to developing good products. However, it has no name we can agree on so it doesn't exist in an organization. We have software engineers that are supposed to be craftsmen, but everyone who can code uses the function title without any requirement on education or skillset. And then there's a huge gap to project and product managers, who often have no or limited technical experience and skills. Bridging that gap is what all these articles are all about, because they observe either a skilled product manager with technical chops or a developer with soft skills filling it. Regardless, the point is that nobody hires for this role. Someone picks up the slack if you're lucky, or your product crashes and burns. Now these articles do seem to portray this person as a Messiah, but that's because he/she kind of is; an extraordinary person who saves your product, while it wasn't even in the job description! Well no shit Sherlock, if you open a restaurant but didn't hire a cook of course you'd deify the waiter who whips up a mean lasagna. But how about you just hire a damn cook instead. Anyway, now I've started to rant. The point is that we should see these articles as a sign that we (collectively as the software industry) are missing a role in our teams and should hire for it. Sure it's nice if this person is a genius, but hard work can replace a lot of geniuses.
- ThalesX 7y ago
  All the startups I have worked with in the recent years have had a product person. It was a full time job that was mostly focused on the customers and how to deliver value within the constraints given by engineering and business. Product development should be done on process I think, not on superstar product engineers. I think the role is new, misunderstood, but I believe throwing bullet points is maybe not the way. What I’m arguing against mostly is this focus on the person instead of the process and the push that someone can be a master of all those domains of knowledge (as in this article). I wrote some (mean) thoughts as I was going through the article which I will answer now to the OP post where he answers my question if you are curious to check it out.
  - andreigheorghe 7y ago

gregdoesit 7y ago

OP here. I’ve written this based on what qualities I’ve observed several of my engineering colleagues exhibit, who are pretty good at building products and working with PMs. And who consistently get stellar feedback from business stakeholders, certain teams going straight to them, to discuss new ideas. I beg to differ the article is super generic, as it closes with very engineering specific recommendations to build a “product-muscle” for developer [1]. This is the kind of advice and coaching I give to devs around me who would like to make more product/business impact. [1] https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/the-product-minded-engineer/#tips-to-become-a-more-product-minded-engineer https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/the-product-minded-engine...

ThalesX 7y ago
Of course I am not going to argue with the person behind the article as the simplest explanation is that I misread, misunderstood, misjudged etc. However, I will ask you three questions to clarify this for me, of course optional: 1 - Do you think it’s possible for one person to do half of the things you listed? 2 - Do you think it’s possible for most product people to do most of the things you talk about outside of companies such as Microsoft, Uber and similar? 3 - Should the product minded engineer be interested in users or the stakeholders?
- gregdoesit 7y ago
  And I’m also not going to argue with people who have different experiences - I can speak for my own experience, and generalise it, finding others who might think similarly, which is what I’ve done here. This is to say YMMV. But to your questions. 1 - Doing half the things I listed. I hope this is not a loaded question, but I’ve seen people do all of them. It usually starts with people who are both good communicators, are curious about the “why” on things, being interested in how the business works. Then they bring product ideas. The nice you bring product ideas to the table, as an engineer, making pragmatic trade-offs is pretty straightforward (if we build a slightly modified feature, we can get the same business impact, but a lot less eng complexity). The rest is about looking out ways to get early feedback (prototyping, hallway testing etc) and challenging weird edge cases. The first few of these I’m seeing a lot around me. 2 - I don’t fully get the question about product people. Also, I spent a good deal of my career working at Skype/Microsoft and Uber, so I don’t think I can give a definite answer. If it helps, at Skyscanner, a smaller startup, I had even more product say as an engineer, than I did at Uber or Microsoft. I suspect everything I wrote assumes an environment where engineers are empowered and close to the product, and data about the product usage/revenue generated. 3 - I’d say have a lot of curiosity on how the product works and how users use it, and generate value for the company. Then you need good communication skills to build trust with the product stakeholders - to understand more about the business, how they think, and to be able to showcase your ideas, prototypes and accommodate feedback for them.
  - ThalesX 7y ago

pm90 7y ago

Thank you for saying this. I will admit that I did find these kinds of blog posts interesting at first, but the core of the thing just seems to be to have better social skills and listen more. I think one of the reasons I found them pleasing to read is if I personally had some of the qualities mentioned in them... validation I guess. But I agree with you that these articles don’t provide much value.

ThalesX 7y ago
Oh, here’s the recipe, I read some more blog articles on how to talk to people, and some more on how to pester people on the hallway to ask about stuff they might not care about, sprinkle some salt and pepper and this is me, the 10x product engineer. I only have about 10 bullet points separating me from the Product Gods! I think you’re right, validation is probably the #1 factor why these type of articles propagate. Like those ads where they tell you only geniuses can solve this: 2 + 2 * 2, and you click because you want to see who the morons are that arent’t a genius like yourself.

naavis 7y ago

I felt more like the post is aimed for engineers looking to improve their game and not for management. The post pointed out several things I recognize from my own working life as valuable skills.

ThalesX 7y ago
I’m just going to be nasty now and say that those managers I’m talking about don’t read management blogs, they read <insert other role here> blogs so they can ‘stay on top of things’. The article is exposing some very good traits for anyone to have or to hope for, but let’s keep it realistic if we want it to be valuable. You could do a space ship launch by hand ignoring for example wind resistence. It would be awsome in theory, less fuel, easier to stabilize, but it probably won’t get where you expect.

todayispotato 7y ago

While I see what you're saying, there is a reason why these articles keep popping up, and that's because this "product-minded engineer" IS an actual role that is essential to developing good products. However, it has no name we can agree on so it doesn't exist in an organization. We have software engineers that are supposed to be craftsmen, but everyone who can code uses the function title without any requirement on education or skillset. And then there's a huge gap to project and product managers, who often have no or limited technical experience and skills. Bridging that gap is what all these articles are all about, because they observe either a skilled product manager with technical chops or a developer with soft skills filling it. Regardless, the point is that nobody hires for this role. Someone picks up the slack if you're lucky, or your product crashes and burns. Now these articles do seem to portray this person as a Messiah, but that's because he/she kind of is; an extraordinary person who saves your product, while it wasn't even in the job description! Well no shit Sherlock, if you open a restaurant but didn't hire a cook of course you'd deify the waiter who whips up a mean lasagna. But how about you just hire a damn cook instead. Anyway, now I've started to rant. The point is that we should see these articles as a sign that we (collectively as the software industry) are missing a role in our teams and should hire for it. Sure it's nice if this person is a genius, but hard work can replace a lot of geniuses.

ThalesX 7y ago
All the startups I have worked with in the recent years have had a product person. It was a full time job that was mostly focused on the customers and how to deliver value within the constraints given by engineering and business. Product development should be done on process I think, not on superstar product engineers. I think the role is new, misunderstood, but I believe throwing bullet points is maybe not the way. What I’m arguing against mostly is this focus on the person instead of the process and the push that someone can be a master of all those domains of knowledge (as in this article). I wrote some (mean) thoughts as I was going through the article which I will answer now to the OP post where he answers my question if you are curious to check it out.
- andreigheorghe 7y ago