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Has anyone ever seen a medium-to-large-sized company, in any industry/vertical, that's solved the "[Engineers] often don't get a seat at that table" problem? A

by gen220 6y ago

Has anyone ever seen a medium-to-large-sized company, in any industry/vertical, that's solved the "[Engineers] often don't get a seat at that table" problem? Anecdotally, because I've brought up this issue a lot, I've heard many responses from bother sides. From some engineers, not in the room: "I would never want to be in the room, because then I'd have to work with those people". From other engineers: "They'd never want us there, we're just resources to be used." From the non-engineers who are in the room: "we didn't know you wanted to be there, of course you're welcome", or "we didn't want to interrupt your work for such a high-level meeting". I find that the reason for exclusion is either incompetence (in which case, get out), or a lack of awareness that certain engineers are exceptional sources of opinion, in those rooms. But I've never seen a culture that's pushed engineers into those strategy meetings; it's always been opt-in rather than opt-out. (It's always opt-out for the product org).

ozim 6y ago
In my experience I don't often hear: "They'd never want us there, we're just resources to be used." But: "Damn those stupid meetings again, wasting my time." It is like a lot of developers don't consider meetings part of job. I am currently less and less into actual typing of code and much more into understanding what others are trying to accomplish.
- gen220 6y ago
  As engineers, we are spoiled in that we are accustomed to (1) navigating high signal:noise ratio environments (2) systematically improving the signal:noise ratio in environments where it’s poor. On (1), many corporate meeting rooms have terrible ratios, and so they intuitively feel unproductive. On (2), it’s much easier to improve the ratio in code than it is in words spoken by people. It requires a lot of patience, but in the long game, engineers do improve that ratio in meetings and strategy discussions, and the company benefits from it. My theory is that most engineers are not interested in playing the long game, because (1) it’s not as fun (2) they don’t plan on being at the company on time scales where the investment will have been worth it. While I personally don’t emulate their behavior, I think the developers you describe could conceivably be acting perfectly rational for their career goals.
  - ozim 6y ago
    We all have to start watching SNL Nick Burns as part of CompSci education maybe.

by gen220 6y ago

ozim 6y ago

In my experience I don't often hear: "They'd never want us there, we're just resources to be used." But: "Damn those stupid meetings again, wasting my time." It is like a lot of developers don't consider meetings part of job. I am currently less and less into actual typing of code and much more into understanding what others are trying to accomplish.

gen220 6y ago
As engineers, we are spoiled in that we are accustomed to (1) navigating high signal:noise ratio environments (2) systematically improving the signal:noise ratio in environments where it’s poor. On (1), many corporate meeting rooms have terrible ratios, and so they intuitively feel unproductive. On (2), it’s much easier to improve the ratio in code than it is in words spoken by people. It requires a lot of patience, but in the long game, engineers do improve that ratio in meetings and strategy discussions, and the company benefits from it. My theory is that most engineers are not interested in playing the long game, because (1) it’s not as fun (2) they don’t plan on being at the company on time scales where the investment will have been worth it. While I personally don’t emulate their behavior, I think the developers you describe could conceivably be acting perfectly rational for their career goals.
- ozim 6y ago
  We all have to start watching SNL Nick Burns as part of CompSci education maybe.