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The 10x engineer being an enabler is a nice interpretation but the original definition of a 10x engineer is a skilled engineer working unhealthy hours. The ena
by jokethrowaway 6y ago
The 10x engineer being an enabler is a nice interpretation but the original definition of a 10x engineer is a skilled engineer working unhealthy hours.
The enabler 10x engineer may be true - even though I've never found managers so good to multiply their team output dramatically while I've met 10x engineers building incredibly fast and slaving away for a chance to make millions. It could be that's because I found enablers in large companies, where no-one is motivated enough to make millions for rich shareholders somewhere.
- redis_mlc 6y ago> the original definition of a 10x engineer is a skilled engineer working unhealthy hours. No, your narrative is that of "working unhealthy hours." Generally a 10x engineer is just said to get 10x more results. Most successful startups in SV have one.
- pcthrowaway 6y agoI worked on a team with a 10x coder, who was 10x because he improved the rest of the team. Would jump in when people got stuck and unstick them by seeing the yak immediately, where others would just work their way up to it one stack frame at a time. Had a better knowledge of the strengths and weaknesses of everyone on the team than they did, and knew how to nudge them towards the work they would excel at without making them feel incapable of the other work. Would unstick people by finding out how they could help other people who were also stuck and vice versa. He got promoted to manager after basically doing managing the way it should be done, without us ever making us feel like we were being managed. And it really was a golden time for our team. Except he quit not long after. Not sure why, but I suspect management brought along a lot of other responsibilities (interfacing with accounting, HR, higher-level management, etc.) that he didn't really enjoy.