People love to wish this weren’t true, but it is. All engineers have great potential, but some realize it faster than others, and some never fully realize it at

People love to wish this weren’t true, but it is. All engineers have great potential, but some realize it faster than others, and some never fully realize it at all. The difference is significant. Moreover, not all spectacular engineers are worth working with; there’s a lot to be said for someone’s ability to be worked with and to be a leader, in addition to just pure knowledge or capability. Being able to work on teams matters, and being able to lead them (while being respected, respectful, and educating) matters even more. The latter pieces of being a “strong engineer” are the pieces that are the hardest to learn for most engineers, because we spend so much time pretending it’s only the code that counts. Great engineers who realize and understand how to push their colleagues and themselves to grow while pushing the company forward? They are worth their weight in gold.