The only times I've been closed to getting fired weren't because of technical skills. I don't believe I've ever come up against a technical challenge that I couldn't solve by putting enough man hours into it.

But, the one thing that I've gotten a couple of "improvement plans" about were surrounding my lack of emotional intelligence and attitude. Those nine years between 2008-2016 were just as much about improving my emotional intelligence as learning technical skills. I look back in horror about some of things I did during the first 12 years of my career. I can very much see where the article is coming from.