Ask HN: I am the smartest person in the room. What should I do?

1) You are not chasing a pipe dream. Being the smartest person in the room is a terribly taxing position to be in, especially if you are not compensated by title or pay. I've been in that position enough times that my current primary qualifier for employment is to work for people who are smarter than me, as well as a few people to work with who are smarter.

You need to turn your interviews in the reverse: demand interviews with your future co-workers/peers, and evaluate their competency (and "culture").

In other industries, it is a smart move to wait for change: wait for a new/better manager (managers, especially CEO's have much higher turnover than anyone else), or wait for a better culture or environment/teammates.

This is not so in computing. You don't need to wait. There are greener pastures.

2) If you are not compensated by title, if you do not have the ability to hire and fire, you will not be able to change culture.

The company you work for is likely to promise everything but follow through with nothing -- they are getting a good deal having an expert perform tech support, saving two or three new hires if you leave. I've been replaced by entirely new business units of 6 or more people after my departure. In retrospect its quite clear why paltry raises and weak promises to provide new hires or changes in the group to string me along as they did.

cut your losses.

A side note: many programmers "retire" into mediocracy, performing undemanding work in undemanding timelines. Pretend you know a great deal less than you really do, and pretend like the simple work that you do is harder than it really is. Spend very little of your day doing any actual work.

I've had many people try to sell me on the idea that such environments can provide you with plenty of time to "work on your own stuff", but I've never seen anybody create something on their free time that I admire while working in such an environment. I don't believe it.

Thanks for taking the time to reply. I am a little troubled by a one thing, though. . .

I am not a programmer - I'm a mechanical engineer. You say in other industries it's smart to wait it out for change. How do I evaluate whether to hunker down or gtfo?

First, recognize that you are only the smartest person in the room according to your own metrics.

Second, decide whether this a problem that you want to do something about. One option is to fix your environment by educating the people you see as "less smart," because teaching is always good for karma. A simpler option is to leave your environment for a new one.

I recommend trying to improve the environment yourself. As a hedge, build your profile for employers and get ready to leave. Once you're in the groove for interviewing, apply to some new companies and see what you can do.

It sounds like the environment may be unfixable, given your references to turnover and de facto demotion to tech support. If the company does not value your skills as an engineer (assuming you have them and are not delusional), then yes, there exist greener pastures elsewhere.

The first thing to do is make sure that you are actually not the dumbest person in the room.

How would I do this?

Sometimes company trajectories stall out, and you'll end up pressing yourself against the roof trying to push that company back up. Physics will beat you. But! Your founders may get things going again.

As far as your actual questions...

1. There are better work environments, in companies with better prospects.

2. You probably can't change the culture unless you're a founder. But fortunately, your founders can change the culture. The question is whether or not they have the political power to do so in your new ownership context.

This is encouraging to hear - I appreciate that you took time to answer.

The sad part of this is that there are no founders. At least, none that are left. The company was stated ~35 years ago by a pair of brothers, and they sold about 10 years ago. We were left to our own devices until about a year ago since we were incredibly profitable. I'm not sure what changed, but someone decided to "bring us into the fold".

1) Absolutely not.

2) Are you in a position to change the culture? Doesn't sound like it. Generally only execs can do that, and generally only the CEO.

Being the smartest person in the room, unless you're a C-level executive, is terrible. (And even if you are a C-level executive it's non-optimal.) You're not learning anything. You need to quit.

This was my take on the situation, also. It's nice to know that I'm not crazy, though.

The only things I would ask myself in your place are: "Am I being objective in thinking I have nothing to learn from these people?" (it's easy to delude yourself) and "Can I change the room without leaving the company?". If the answers are "yes" and "no" respectively you need to cut your losses.

I was in your situation once. Stuck it out a year longer than I should have wanting things to get better. They never did. The day I left was cathartic release. And now I work with a bunch of people much smarter than me and it's great.

Find a different room.