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Four Wings of a Software Engineer

#psychology #software development #engineering-management #people

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.

A two by two matrix with the y axis labeled business affinity and x axis labeled abstraction. The bottom left quadrant of the plot is labeled with People. The bottom right is labeled technical. The upper left quadrant is labeled product and the upper right quadrant is labeled design.

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

Weaknesses

Drawn To

Repelled By

Pre-dispositions To / Found In

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

Weaknesses

Drawn To

Repelled By

Pre-dispositions / Found In

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

Weaknesses

Drawn To

Repelled By

Pre-dispositions / Found In

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

Weaknesses

Drawn To

Repelled By

Pre-dispositions / Found In