> Everyone around you is technically strong too
If this is true, you’ve hit the jackpot. Competence is usually rewarded by spreading the competent people thin enough that they rarely get to collaborate.
If this is true, you’ve hit the jackpot. Competence is usually rewarded by spreading the competent people thin enough that they rarely get to collaborate.
So yeah, I’m implying a pretty high bar. I guess an operational definition for me would be, “can adapt to an environment where most of their concrete skills don’t transfer.” A competent person will rise to the challenge, maybe even enjoy it if the reasons for the weird environment aren’t too stupid. The truth is, the rules change on us all the time, and if you don’t get the fundamentals, you’re a technician who needs to retrain from zero wherever that happens.
Excellence is something quite different. I’ve been in the presence of excellence. Excellence makes everybody in the room act smarter and smooths the path to competence. It shows you the way and gives you new ways of understanding the world. It’s truly rare, not 20%, maybe 0.2%.
Obviously, knowing one command is not mastery. It is not even competence for that matter. It is just one piece of information and how you use it determines whether you are considered competent or not.
I work in heavily regulated corporate and I sometimes yearn for a fintech or other startup, but, honestly, after all those years, I am not sure if I even would make it. My mind has not been built for competent. It was built for compliance and CYA.
It's honestly a stretch to say they're software developers as you're probably imagining, but if you walk into a random office, most people with that title won't use version control, won't ever ship, and are generally a bit concussed.
It can be hard to imagine because many times, when we find competent teams, many of the members have never directly experienced a truly average team, as the culture one acquires on those teams makes it hard to ever be accepted on a good team (frequently the weaker developers don't even understand there's anything lacking in their skillset).
I'm more sympathetic now than I was a year ago, but it's also pretty unacceptable when you remember they work at hospitals and the government!