tl;dr:“Many have predicted the death of the “junior engineer” thanks to AI; after all, if AI can do all of the simple tasks, we don’t need to hire people who are only capable of handling those tasks anymore. And indeed, I was at a dinner of director+-level engineering leaders recently where many said they had turned all of their hiring to solely focus on “senior engineers” in lieu of anyone else. Anyone who has thought about this for a moment sees the obvious problems. How do people ever become “senior engineers” if they don’t start out as junior ones?” Camille explores this paradox.
tl;dr:“Many have predicted the death of the “junior engineer” thanks to AI; after all, if AI can do all of the simple tasks, we don’t need to hire people who are only capable of handling those tasks anymore. And indeed, I was at a dinner of director+-level engineering leaders recently where many said they had turned all of their hiring to solely focus on “senior engineers” in lieu of anyone else. Anyone who has thought about this for a moment sees the obvious problems. How do people ever become “senior engineers” if they don’t start out as junior ones?” Camille explores this paradox.
tl;dr:“The only solution to this is to think early and often about the systems of accountability you have to set up. This is much, much harder than micromanaging details, because every system of accountability you set up will eventually be gamed. So in addition to accountability, you need to foster a strong, ethical company culture that encourages transparency while allowing for some mistakes.”
tl;dr:The best engineering managers are often great debuggers. Camille argues that there are overlapping skills between debugging complex systems and managing teams. “Managing teams is a series of complex, black boxes interacting with other complex, black boxes. These black boxes have inputs and outputs that can be observed, but when the outputs aren’t as expected, figuring out why requires trying to open up the black box and see what is going on inside.”
tl;dr:For senior engineers who are looking to step up: “When we are looking to do a larger project than the ones we’ve done before, we need to step out of the context that we normally operate in. When you look one context bigger, you will see immediate new opportunities that you can tackle in adjacent areas… That is where you will find your growth.” Camille highlights this advice with real world examples.
tl;dr:“Year after year, engineers convince themselves and their leadership that a rewrite will solve all their problems. And then they or their leadership get fired, because most rewrites fail to deliver anything at all. Avoid the trap: don’t go into this exercise unless it is the only way forward, and if you absolutely must, plan accordingly.”
tl;dr:"I fear that the culprit is a surprising new factor, one that started before the pandemic but has gotten even more out of hand in the world of remote work: 1:1s." Camille discusses how group discussion topics have turned into 1:1 topics in the remote work era.
tl;dr:"In this post, I decided to write down my definition of what a good OKR looks like. My thinking has evolved from what I first learned long ago in half-remembered talks, blog posts, and books, and is now based on my experience using them to set team goals over the past ten or so years."
tl;dr:"Have you ever been on a team that seemed to work very hard but never move forward? Where you look back quarter after quarter, or perhaps year after year, and you did a lot, but nothing actually seemed to happen? Congratulations, you’re in the middle of Groundhog Day." Camille discusses the symptoms of Groundhog Day and how to get out of it.
tl;dr:"The real difference that companies are looking for is not that you are capable, but that you have demonstrated those capabilities by delivering impact. It’s not enough to have the skills, you have to deploy them to produce something of value to the wider group. In fact, while companies may put language about increasing expertise in their engineering levels, the real lens that they use to evaluate that expertise is through increasing scope of ownership, delivery, and impact."