Ah, that's the missing punchline: you had ambitions to be something else other than an engineer, and you (quite correctly) recognised that you were never going

Ah, that's the missing punchline: you had ambitions to be something else other than an engineer, and you (quite correctly) recognised that you were never going to grow your wider skills at such a place. For someone who had wanted to stay an IC, I don't think the move would have been quite as wise. Being in a niche, engineer-dominated environment, and being paid extremely well for it, is nirvana for many lifelong ICs. It certainly feels very different from the experience of Arthur from the linked article.