Amateur field notes in the psychology of software engineers

Having been asked a sufficient number of times, “what my ideal role is” or “what type of engineer I want to be” - it suddenly dawned on me, in boredom, that there are approximately four behavioural axis with which one view a given software engineer. I use the term “wings”, stolen from the personality typing methodology in the Enneagram, to imply that all four functions are possessed by a given engineer; but, in similar manner to the Enneagram, an individual tends to “lean” more heavily on a set of wings compared to others.

The four wings of a software engineer are:

1. Product / Business
2. Design
3. People
4. Technical

Choosing to further solidify my apparent fate towards becoming a management consultant (per my university career assessments), I place the concept on a two by two matrix for rhetorical purposes below in dress rehearsal, surely, for my McKinsey & Company interview.

Figure 1: A two by two matrix containing all four wings in the different quadrants.

The Product/Business Engineer

Motivations

The Product/Business oriented engineer is motivated by building a marketable product and less so the deep technical details of doing so. They are interested in how component features are assembled and packaged to deliver value to end users that are solving customers needs. These individuals want to be abreast of business and product developments in the roadmap as well as contributing to the supportive structure as a whole; often contributing opinions as to how the business can be improved strategically, or how and why a given feature may align or not to the market.

Strengths

• Big picture and holistically oriented contributors
• Process identifiers for opportunities to push the business forward from an engineering and product perspective
• Entrepreneurial and strong collaborators in cross functional teams
• Ask “How does this make the business better?”, “How will this produce more value for customers?”, “What features are missing?”

Weaknesses

• Opinionated and loud with feedback
• Do not fit well into boundaries of engineering alone; they want to provide input on where the business is going, or why the direction its going is smart or stupid
• Limited patience for impediments to shipping product and making progress

Drawn To

• Settings of product ideation or portfolio consolidation
• Product facing work including client or server side (i.e. product APIs) to power underlying product
• Working with product managers to understand the “whole picture” of the product, the business and how their work is contributing to it
• Product metrics and usage analytics, revenue, user growth, user feedback
• Rapid prototyping and experimentation

Repelled By

• Deeper technical needs or service / infrastructure layers for its own sake that do not service customers directly
• Technical perfection or process at the expense of product
• Impediments to shipping product or improving the business in some way

Pre-dispositions To / Found In

• Product Engineering
• Front End / Backend Product / Full Stack
• Sales Engineering
• Product Management / Entrepreneurship

The Design Engineer

Motivations

The design oriented engineer is less interested in the marketability of a product or cohesion of the business as a whole. Instead they are concerned with how to “best package” the experience for maximum usability and simplicity. They are strongly motivated by beauty and ideal presentations of the solution for users.

Strengths

• Strong eye for design and opinionated about the how of design
• Talented in fulfillment of user interfaces
• Ask “How do these features work well together?”, “How can I delight users?”, “What polish is missing here?”

Weaknesses

• Less interested in the whole of the business
• Less interested in the purpose of the product or whether it aligns to the market - purely in its “best” presentation

Drawn To

• Product ideation, mock ups and collaboration with designers
• Client side work, asking what the “best” interface looks like (i.e., mobile, client, CLI, et cetera)
• Building beautiful, slick and clean experiences

Repelled By

• Headless experiences, scripting, or “glue” work.
• Deep technical needs at service / infrastructure layers of the organization

Pre-dispositions / Found In

• Mobile Engineering
• Front End Engineering
• Designer Roles

The Technical Engineer

Motivations

The technical wing of the engineer is the stereotypical “nerd” of software engineering. It is the individual who loves interfacing with “the machine”, intrigued by puzzles and opportunities for debugging to “solve the problem”. They are not as interested in the structure in which they operate and more with the problems faced each day, and that they are logical and interesting to work on

Strengths

• Strong computer science skill set
• Strong problem solvers in technical domains

Weaknesses

• Uninterested in the business or product components of work
• Limited patiences for business or people problems

Drawn To

• Infrastructure and deeply technical work
• The technology and packaging of the technical solution (e.g., software architecture)
• Scalability, performance tuning, metrics regarding the software’s effectiveness
• Asking “how to optimize this”, “how to reuse this”, or “how to platformize this?”

Repelled By

• Which organization and business problems are relevant
• Asks for exact requirements and to be left alone to fulfill them

Pre-dispositions / Found In

• Infrastructure
• DevOps / Sys Admin
• Backend Service / Platform Layers

The People Engineer

Motivations

The people wing of an engineer is similar to the product/business wing but instead of asking how the product can be pushed forward, asks how their team and organization can be pushed forward. These engineers are most probably pre-disposed to entering engineering management, but do not necessarily need to. The people focused engineer wants to mentor and improve the team, up-leveling everyone’s skills and competencies at the expense of product or business outcomes

Strengths

• Process identifiers for opportunities to push the entire organization forward (i.e. recruiting to marketing to business operations)
• Finding ways to “scale themselves” to mentor and teach as many people as possible
• Highly social, personable and empathetic team members
• Asks: “How does this help the team?”, “How can I help this person?”, “What ways can I delight the people in our organization?”

Weaknesses

• Highly social and personable causing them to get “distracted” from concrete engineering work
• Focused on ensuring team moral is or remains high
• Schedules more meetings than might otherwise be seen as productive to do so, so as to gauge team sentiment
• Struggles in remote work context

Drawn To

• Strongly cohesive teams that work well together: “Work hard, play hard”
• Opportunities teach, mentor and provide growth feedback to team mates
• Asking “What initiatives can foster greater connection?”, “How is my work going to influence my team?”

Repelled By

• Lack of team connection or engagement within the organization
• Not feeling connected to and pushing the organization forward on some axis
• Non-empathetic or disconnected environments

Pre-dispositions / Found In

• Engineering Management
• Team Leads