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Thank you for articulating something sane. The article is pure "Management/Leadership Speak" nonsense complete with contrived/farfetched analogies and blaming

Thank you for articulating something sane. The article is pure "Management/Leadership Speak" nonsense complete with contrived/farfetched analogies and blaming of Engineering/Engineers for actually delivering something but which may have been "Strategically Wrong" because somebody else made that decision. Engineers are told to "Execute" and not "Strategize" (which means everything and nothing). Given the responsibility, most Engineers are fully capable of Strategizing/Prioritizing/Executing on an Idea/Customer requirements so this insidious idea that Engineers are incapable of "Higher Managerial Functions" needs to die.

MattGaiser 5y ago
> Engineers are told to "Execute" and not "Strategize" Complete these questionably specified tickets and when you are done, come back for more tickets.
- chmorgan 5y ago
  If this is what your job is encouraging then just wow. The engineers that I've seen be most productive are the ones pushing the design approaches and identifying gaps in the approach and tasks etc.
amelius 5y ago
However, most software engineers are bad at creating user-friendly products unless someone with product design skills tells them exactly what the UX should look like, or perhaps unless someone gives the engineers time to think about it.
- rramadass 5y ago
  >However, most software engineers are bad at creating user-friendly products unless someone with product design skills tells them exactly what the UX should look like Absolutely Wrong!
  - amelius 5y ago
    Just look at the user-friendliness of FOSS where there are no managers, versus commercial software. (I still prefer FOSS, but user-friendliness is not where it shines.)
    - Twisol 5y ago
      There are also no deeply invested customers for most FOSS development. It's not really surprising that most FOSS design feels aimless when the developers only need to meet (or aren't funded beyond) their own needs -- the bar is way lower. I don't think the mere existence of "managers" or "designers" is the critical factor. Also, your original statement didn't say anything about FOSS: > [...] most software engineers are bad at creating user-friendly products unless someone with product design skills tells them exactly what the UX should look like, [...] The software engineers I've worked with want to make user-friendly software that meets needs. You know what usually gets in their way? They're not able to work with the end users to understand what the destination should be. They're fed streams (tides!) of loose feature requests with no apparent cohesion. What kind of software do you expect to get out of this process? Garbage in, garbage out.
      - amelius 5y ago
        I think most software engineers are (in a way) glad that they don't have to talk to customers, and that there is someone in the middle. Managers and such are tolerated by developers for this reason.
        Kehvarl 5y ago
        The biggest problem with this stance is that far too often those middle-managers or other customer interfaces understand neither the customer's actual needs nor the programmer's needs. Every successful project I've been part of has required me to meet directly with the customer and understand what isn't working. Asking someone else to ask the customer for a specification just leads to the wrong solutions being solved or an endless stream of feature requests that make no sense in isolation.
hasmanean 5y ago
No, the authors of the article seem to be writing from personal experience and have used an interesting analogy to describe the solution in somewhat geometric terms (a “watershed”). If there were some mathematical way to describe the wiring of the neurons of someone making good decisions maybe they would have used that instead. Absent such a concept they resorted to metaphor instead. Such is the burden of philosophers. More generally I would cast the skill of decision making—while being creative—as this: it’s the ability to navigate a many dimensional design space. Normal engineering has been reduced to a series of unidimensional logical decisions. This is my constraint…these are my material properties (or whatever) and I shall optimize for cost. Easy peasy. A computer could do it. This is the realm of building codes and strict industry standards. But to be creative, you need to navigate a large search space of ideas. Every decision you take opens up new pathways and poses new challenges to solve. What is the best path through such a space? Copy someone else’s design and call yourself an innovator? Stick to first principles? Develop your intuition and then use it to guide your choices? Iterate often and fast? Being creative involves a completely different mindset for working a decision making…and I think it’s different because navigating a large dimensional idea space requires more than mere logic. This is what distinguishes creative people from mere mortals. And decision making in such a space has to be different too. That was why the article was so interesting. One day there might be a mathematical way to define this problem and solution properly. Until then, like philosophers of old, they will have to resort to metaphor to explain what they have grasped with their minds. Some people will get it and some will not. But it’s not nonsense business-speak.
- hasmanean 5y ago
  BTw I think Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem in which he bemoaned the fact that engineers were different from the people who made decisions. He called them the Sons of Martha and the sons of Mary. https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_martha.htm https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_martha.htm
- rramadass 5y ago
  >No, the authors of the article seem to be writing from personal experience and have used an interesting analogy to describe the solution in somewhat geometric terms (a “watershed”). If there were some mathematical way to describe the wiring of the neurons of someone making good decisions maybe they would have used that instead. Absent such a concept they resorted to metaphor instead. Such is the burden of philosophers. The "Watershed Metaphor" doesn't make any sense at all. You can contrive anything and call it "Creativity"/"Philosophizing" etc. but that doesn't make it correct. >the skill of decision making—while being creative—as this: it’s the ability to navigate a many dimensional design space This is just a platitude and can mean anything and everything. >Normal engineering has been reduced to a series of unidimensional logical decisions. This is my constraint…these are my material properties (or whatever) and I shall optimize for cost. Easy peasy. A computer could do it. This is the realm of building codes and strict industry standards. WHAT ??? Nobody who knows the "Scientific Method" and has trained as an "Engineer" will ever agree with you. You are taking "one facet" of a specific Engineering Discipline and generalizing it to the whole Domain of "Engineering". This is a fundamental logical fallacy. >But to be creative, you need to navigate a large search space of ideas. Every decision you take opens up new pathways and poses new challenges to solve. What is the best path through such a space? Copy someone else’s design and call yourself an innovator? Stick to first principles? Develop your intuition and then use it to guide your choices? Iterate often and fast? Being creative involves a completely different mindset for working a decision making…and I think it’s different because navigating a large dimensional idea space requires more than mere logic. This is what distinguishes creative people from mere mortals. And decision making in such a space has to be different too. This is mere verbiage. See Baron's Thinking and Deciding for a detailed study of the relevant subjects. >That was why the article was so interesting. One day there might be a mathematical way to define this problem and solution properly. Until then, like philosophers of old, they will have to resort to metaphor to explain what they have grasped with their minds. Some people will get it and some will not. But it’s not nonsense business-speak You setup your own points and traced a path through it; means Nothing.
roenxi 5y ago
It might be the article struggling to find the perfect frame, but what also stands out is the reason a lot of excellent executors get locked out of strategy decisions is that they don't want to be involved. It isn't a source of regrets. People don't generally sign up for an engineering role because they want to provide strategic direction to others. Such people exist, but are rare. There is a clear bias in Engineering disciplines towards people who really enjoy executing and don't particularly care what they execute. And seconding the manager-speak angle. This article will be nearly useless to someone who doesn't already know how to identify and balance conflicting needs to make a decision. This is a rehash of the usual advice - take a step back, breath deeply and ask if what you are doing is leading to outcomes you value.
- rramadass 5y ago
  Your points are valid and i agree with you. The problem with the article is that it tars the "Engineering Discipline" and practicing Engineers with the brush of implicit incompetence as if they are incapable of "looking at the big picture" and burying their Head in the sand. Nothing could be further from the Truth. The Complexity of the Problem/Solution demands that each of us focus only on our area of Specialized Expertise thus allowing the "Whole System" to be built from "Components". Analyze/Design Top-Down but Build Bottom-Up. Our "Modern World" is dependent on Technology all built by Scientists and Engineers. PS: Take a look at the works of Jacques Ellul for a fascinating study of the relationship between Technology and Modern Society.

MattGaiser 5y ago

> Engineers are told to "Execute" and not "Strategize" Complete these questionably specified tickets and when you are done, come back for more tickets.

chmorgan 5y ago
If this is what your job is encouraging then just wow. The engineers that I've seen be most productive are the ones pushing the design approaches and identifying gaps in the approach and tasks etc.

amelius 5y ago

However, most software engineers are bad at creating user-friendly products unless someone with product design skills tells them exactly what the UX should look like, or perhaps unless someone gives the engineers time to think about it.

rramadass 5y ago
>However, most software engineers are bad at creating user-friendly products unless someone with product design skills tells them exactly what the UX should look like Absolutely Wrong!
- amelius 5y ago
  Just look at the user-friendliness of FOSS where there are no managers, versus commercial software. (I still prefer FOSS, but user-friendliness is not where it shines.)
  - Twisol 5y ago
    There are also no deeply invested customers for most FOSS development. It's not really surprising that most FOSS design feels aimless when the developers only need to meet (or aren't funded beyond) their own needs -- the bar is way lower. I don't think the mere existence of "managers" or "designers" is the critical factor. Also, your original statement didn't say anything about FOSS: > [...] most software engineers are bad at creating user-friendly products unless someone with product design skills tells them exactly what the UX should look like, [...] The software engineers I've worked with want to make user-friendly software that meets needs. You know what usually gets in their way? They're not able to work with the end users to understand what the destination should be. They're fed streams (tides!) of loose feature requests with no apparent cohesion. What kind of software do you expect to get out of this process? Garbage in, garbage out.
    - amelius 5y ago
      I think most software engineers are (in a way) glad that they don't have to talk to customers, and that there is someone in the middle. Managers and such are tolerated by developers for this reason.
      - Kehvarl 5y ago
        The biggest problem with this stance is that far too often those middle-managers or other customer interfaces understand neither the customer's actual needs nor the programmer's needs. Every successful project I've been part of has required me to meet directly with the customer and understand what isn't working. Asking someone else to ask the customer for a specification just leads to the wrong solutions being solved or an endless stream of feature requests that make no sense in isolation.

hasmanean 5y ago

No, the authors of the article seem to be writing from personal experience and have used an interesting analogy to describe the solution in somewhat geometric terms (a “watershed”). If there were some mathematical way to describe the wiring of the neurons of someone making good decisions maybe they would have used that instead. Absent such a concept they resorted to metaphor instead. Such is the burden of philosophers. More generally I would cast the skill of decision making—while being creative—as this: it’s the ability to navigate a many dimensional design space. Normal engineering has been reduced to a series of unidimensional logical decisions. This is my constraint…these are my material properties (or whatever) and I shall optimize for cost. Easy peasy. A computer could do it. This is the realm of building codes and strict industry standards. But to be creative, you need to navigate a large search space of ideas. Every decision you take opens up new pathways and poses new challenges to solve. What is the best path through such a space? Copy someone else’s design and call yourself an innovator? Stick to first principles? Develop your intuition and then use it to guide your choices? Iterate often and fast? Being creative involves a completely different mindset for working a decision making…and I think it’s different because navigating a large dimensional idea space requires more than mere logic. This is what distinguishes creative people from mere mortals. And decision making in such a space has to be different too. That was why the article was so interesting. One day there might be a mathematical way to define this problem and solution properly. Until then, like philosophers of old, they will have to resort to metaphor to explain what they have grasped with their minds. Some people will get it and some will not. But it’s not nonsense business-speak.

hasmanean 5y ago
BTw I think Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem in which he bemoaned the fact that engineers were different from the people who made decisions. He called them the Sons of Martha and the sons of Mary. https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_martha.htm https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_martha.htm
rramadass 5y ago
>No, the authors of the article seem to be writing from personal experience and have used an interesting analogy to describe the solution in somewhat geometric terms (a “watershed”). If there were some mathematical way to describe the wiring of the neurons of someone making good decisions maybe they would have used that instead. Absent such a concept they resorted to metaphor instead. Such is the burden of philosophers. The "Watershed Metaphor" doesn't make any sense at all. You can contrive anything and call it "Creativity"/"Philosophizing" etc. but that doesn't make it correct. >the skill of decision making—while being creative—as this: it’s the ability to navigate a many dimensional design space This is just a platitude and can mean anything and everything. >Normal engineering has been reduced to a series of unidimensional logical decisions. This is my constraint…these are my material properties (or whatever) and I shall optimize for cost. Easy peasy. A computer could do it. This is the realm of building codes and strict industry standards. WHAT ??? Nobody who knows the "Scientific Method" and has trained as an "Engineer" will ever agree with you. You are taking "one facet" of a specific Engineering Discipline and generalizing it to the whole Domain of "Engineering". This is a fundamental logical fallacy. >But to be creative, you need to navigate a large search space of ideas. Every decision you take opens up new pathways and poses new challenges to solve. What is the best path through such a space? Copy someone else’s design and call yourself an innovator? Stick to first principles? Develop your intuition and then use it to guide your choices? Iterate often and fast? Being creative involves a completely different mindset for working a decision making…and I think it’s different because navigating a large dimensional idea space requires more than mere logic. This is what distinguishes creative people from mere mortals. And decision making in such a space has to be different too. This is mere verbiage. See Baron's Thinking and Deciding for a detailed study of the relevant subjects. >That was why the article was so interesting. One day there might be a mathematical way to define this problem and solution properly. Until then, like philosophers of old, they will have to resort to metaphor to explain what they have grasped with their minds. Some people will get it and some will not. But it’s not nonsense business-speak You setup your own points and traced a path through it; means Nothing.

roenxi 5y ago

It might be the article struggling to find the perfect frame, but what also stands out is the reason a lot of excellent executors get locked out of strategy decisions is that they don't want to be involved. It isn't a source of regrets. People don't generally sign up for an engineering role because they want to provide strategic direction to others. Such people exist, but are rare. There is a clear bias in Engineering disciplines towards people who really enjoy executing and don't particularly care what they execute. And seconding the manager-speak angle. This article will be nearly useless to someone who doesn't already know how to identify and balance conflicting needs to make a decision. This is a rehash of the usual advice - take a step back, breath deeply and ask if what you are doing is leading to outcomes you value.

rramadass 5y ago
Your points are valid and i agree with you. The problem with the article is that it tars the "Engineering Discipline" and practicing Engineers with the brush of implicit incompetence as if they are incapable of "looking at the big picture" and burying their Head in the sand. Nothing could be further from the Truth. The Complexity of the Problem/Solution demands that each of us focus only on our area of Specialized Expertise thus allowing the "Whole System" to be built from "Components". Analyze/Design Top-Down but Build Bottom-Up. Our "Modern World" is dependent on Technology all built by Scientists and Engineers. PS: Take a look at the works of Jacques Ellul for a fascinating study of the relationship between Technology and Modern Society.