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I always read "learn" in this context as "be familiar enough with the basic language properties that I can pick the rest up on the job, get things done, and not

I always read "learn" in this context as "be familiar enough with the basic language properties that I can pick the rest up on the job, get things done, and not be too dangerous, or annoying in code review" and when I read it that way I agree. Some of the best devs I have hired had no prior experience in the stack. I'm not hiring for Python or C#, I am hiring a software engineer and the skills I value are all transferable.

scarface_74 3y ago
What about your tech leads who are looking for top of market salary? By top of market, I mean within your hiring pool not senior staff principal engineer level at a hedge fund
- sirsinsalot 3y ago
  What about them? I'm looking for someone who has lead a team, solved that level of problems, has good soft skills and leadership. The language or stack is irrelevant. A good lead knows the right questions to ask, understands they don't have all the answers and plays to their own and the teams strength. Honestly the last thing I care about, especially here, is if they know the stack.
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    And the other part of “leading the team” is being able to mentor juniors and help them technically. What good is a lead if they can’t answer technical questions and can’t help other developers with technical guidance? What will it do for team morale on your iOS team when they know you bought in a “lead” who couldn’t actually help them with the tough technical problems?
    - sirsinsalot 3y ago
      The team has a culture that knows full well someone is brought in for who they are ... what they know might need some catch up. I'm not saying this is right in all circumstances. I wouldn't do this with, for example, realtime embedded. For what I operate in, fairly bland web applications and stacks. It works fine, exceptions excepted.
      - scarface_74 3y ago
        The team has a culture where the leads know less than they do and they are okay that?
        bluefirebrand 3y ago
        There is a persistent attitude that developers are interchangeable, that the tech matters less than the knowledge of how to apply tech to solve problems. I think that for architecting systems that's probably true, but as technology becomes more specialized and ecosystems become more complex it's harder for individuals to pick up and run with. Consider if someone has written lots of PHP and jQuery Now tell them to write a NodeJS server, React Frontend using NextJS. It's not just "Oh I need to pick up ExpressJS" anymore. It's a whole beast. Yeah the fundamentals stay the same. REST is still REST, SQL is still SQL, but actually writing lines of code is still a key activity of the job which people familiar with the technology will be better at. Personally I run into this any time I try and write C#. There's a massive undercurrent of stuff that I feel I don't understand about C# and I bounce off that ecosystem every time I try
        scarface_74 3y ago
        > SQL is still SQL And you’re going to hit a brick wall at 100 mph thinking SQL is still SQL once you try to treat a columnar database like Redshift or Snowflake like you would a traditional database. That would be an expensive lesson to learn on the job. That’s just one example of trying to pattern match based on what you know when you hit a new to you technology. It’s like the old school operations people who study one course of ACloudGuru, get a certificate, call themselves “consultants” and duplicate an on prem infrastructure and internal process and their poor clients wonder why they are spending twice as much and not moving faster.
        bluefirebrand 3y ago
        I've never actually used Redshift or Snowflake so I can't comment. I will say that even moving from Postgres to MySql has a speed bump or two, so I completely agree. Tech knowledge just isn't as interchangeable as hiring managers sometimes seem to think.
  - janstice 3y ago
    I agree with all of this - and the skill that leaders need isn’t demonstrating (intermediates can do this), but coaching - this will help develop the team to be able to solve the issues themselves.
    - rTX5CMRXIfFG 3y ago
      You can’t coach what you don’t know. And the reality of leading an engineering team is that when your team members actually seek your opinion on a problem, you have to know the specific solution to specific details, not general patterns.
      - notbeuller 3y ago
        But as a leader, if you don't know - then it's an opportunity for you and the team members to learn it together, the real point of which is teaching the team members how to adapt. Half the crap people ask me, I don't know, but I'm happy to find out with them. And maybe next time they'll be able to figure it out on their own.
        scarface_74 3y ago
        And while you are fumbling around trying to learn the technology, the market is leaving you behind, you’re burning through resources and you’re not creating business value by either making the company money or saving the company money.

scarface_74 3y ago

What about your tech leads who are looking for top of market salary? By top of market, I mean within your hiring pool not senior staff principal engineer level at a hedge fund

sirsinsalot 3y ago
What about them? I'm looking for someone who has lead a team, solved that level of problems, has good soft skills and leadership. The language or stack is irrelevant. A good lead knows the right questions to ask, understands they don't have all the answers and plays to their own and the teams strength. Honestly the last thing I care about, especially here, is if they know the stack.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  And the other part of “leading the team” is being able to mentor juniors and help them technically. What good is a lead if they can’t answer technical questions and can’t help other developers with technical guidance? What will it do for team morale on your iOS team when they know you bought in a “lead” who couldn’t actually help them with the tough technical problems?
  - sirsinsalot 3y ago
    The team has a culture that knows full well someone is brought in for who they are ... what they know might need some catch up. I'm not saying this is right in all circumstances. I wouldn't do this with, for example, realtime embedded. For what I operate in, fairly bland web applications and stacks. It works fine, exceptions excepted.
    - scarface_74 3y ago
      The team has a culture where the leads know less than they do and they are okay that?
      - bluefirebrand 3y ago
        There is a persistent attitude that developers are interchangeable, that the tech matters less than the knowledge of how to apply tech to solve problems. I think that for architecting systems that's probably true, but as technology becomes more specialized and ecosystems become more complex it's harder for individuals to pick up and run with. Consider if someone has written lots of PHP and jQuery Now tell them to write a NodeJS server, React Frontend using NextJS. It's not just "Oh I need to pick up ExpressJS" anymore. It's a whole beast. Yeah the fundamentals stay the same. REST is still REST, SQL is still SQL, but actually writing lines of code is still a key activity of the job which people familiar with the technology will be better at. Personally I run into this any time I try and write C#. There's a massive undercurrent of stuff that I feel I don't understand about C# and I bounce off that ecosystem every time I try
        scarface_74 3y ago
        > SQL is still SQL And you’re going to hit a brick wall at 100 mph thinking SQL is still SQL once you try to treat a columnar database like Redshift or Snowflake like you would a traditional database. That would be an expensive lesson to learn on the job. That’s just one example of trying to pattern match based on what you know when you hit a new to you technology. It’s like the old school operations people who study one course of ACloudGuru, get a certificate, call themselves “consultants” and duplicate an on prem infrastructure and internal process and their poor clients wonder why they are spending twice as much and not moving faster.
        bluefirebrand 3y ago
        I've never actually used Redshift or Snowflake so I can't comment. I will say that even moving from Postgres to MySql has a speed bump or two, so I completely agree. Tech knowledge just isn't as interchangeable as hiring managers sometimes seem to think.
- janstice 3y ago
  I agree with all of this - and the skill that leaders need isn’t demonstrating (intermediates can do this), but coaching - this will help develop the team to be able to solve the issues themselves.
  - rTX5CMRXIfFG 3y ago
    You can’t coach what you don’t know. And the reality of leading an engineering team is that when your team members actually seek your opinion on a problem, you have to know the specific solution to specific details, not general patterns.
    - notbeuller 3y ago
      But as a leader, if you don't know - then it's an opportunity for you and the team members to learn it together, the real point of which is teaching the team members how to adapt. Half the crap people ask me, I don't know, but I'm happy to find out with them. And maybe next time they'll be able to figure it out on their own.
      - scarface_74 3y ago
        And while you are fumbling around trying to learn the technology, the market is leaving you behind, you’re burning through resources and you’re not creating business value by either making the company money or saving the company money.