How I know I'm working with a strong engineer

There are many ways to judge engineers (lines of code written, how smart they sound, choice of IDE, what projects they’ve worked on). I think it’s pretty uncontroversial that the best ways involve working with them on a project, so you’re exposed to the actual details of how they get things done. I realised the other day that I actually have a straightforward heuristic for this. I count the number of times I have this thought:

“Oh nice catch, I didn’t think of that!”

This seems kind of reductive. But it’s a useful way of tracking when engineers are adding value I wouldn’t (or couldn’t) have added to the project. When I’m working with a strong engineer, I have that thought a lot. If I have that thought all the time, I might consider just getting out of their way and letting them make all the key decisions, since clearly I’m outclassed.

Does this mean I’m impressed by low-impact nitpicks? No. I don’t think “nice catch” when I get nitpicked, I think “sure, I guess”. I think “nice catch” when an engineer helps me avoid a bug, or make the user experience nicer, or simplifies the design, and so on. The key is that it’s an insight that I wish I’d had.

If I work with someone, and I never have that thought, it doesn’t mean I don’t think they’re strong. After all, I never have that thought about myself - I always think of the things I think of! There’s a second thought I watch for as well:

“Good, that’ll work.”

I think this when an engineer is coming up with the kind of solution or code I could have come up with. If I have this thought a lot about a person, I tend to think of the person as a reliable engineer who can get stuff done (believe me, that’s high praise).

Obviously, engineers can be good in lots of different ways (for instance, I’m impressed by engineers that are able to defuse inter-org conflict). But in my experience this is a surprisingly reliable gut check.