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Comment by 000ooo000 | Hacker News Reader

My theory is that devs like writing these articles because it implicitly means they're toward the better end of whatever made-up spectrum they're pushing. After all, why would anyone care for a weak engineer's thoughts on what makes a strong engineer?

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I don't think that's fair at all. Every engineer should regularly reflect on where they could improve, and that necessitates understanding that you're not good at all things. A weak engineer sharing those thoughts is just as useful as a strong engineer sharing them.

> where they could improve

Or compensate.

I don’t ever expect that my ability to get sidetracked will go away. But I have a system.

And I don’t think I’ll ever get thrilled about algorithms induction proofs. So I just solve other problems.

> I don't think that's fair at all. Every engineer should regularly reflect on where they could improve,

it is fair and you didn't read the article ;)

(b/c: the author isn't offering anything on how to improve. quite the opposite. it sounds like s/he thinks if you're weak you'll stay weak.)

Many engineers feel their work is not seen. Management rarely looks at their output let alone the code. Seeing a (supposedly) weaker engineer beeing promoted instead will make you think about how to succeed next time.

I get this vibe from HN comments that refer to "juniors". Because it's a frequent occurrence, whether they mean it or not, I think they get a small kick out of placing themselves above others.

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