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Discussion on: The 10 points that make up real "10x engineers"

 
chadtiffin profile image
Chad Tiffin

The pareto distribution has been observed in more than just economics, it has also been observed in many different workplaces. I doubt if you looked for specific references of it to developer workplaces you probably won't find much, but it is considered to be near-universal across different types of industries, and there is nothing unique about the industry of software dev.

"If 20% of your team are doing 80% of the work then surely there are serious issues with the team..."

Absolutely, which explains why many workplaces are such a mess (particularly large corporate ones where they have enough staff to fit the mean).

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scott_yeatts profile image
Scott Yeatts

I think your point was a little obscured by the way it was made.

Yes, in literally any system there is some sort of distribution curve. There is definitely such a thing as a bad, passable, good, better, best spectrum in any line of work. There is a 20th percentile and an 80th percentile and maybe those in the top 20 percent are "10x" developers according to your definition.

Do they perform ten times the work of anyone else in the shop? Hard to say. If so, then you probably have a mess of a workplace.

This article is focusing on some of the prevalent stereotypes and how they aren't necessarily indicative of whether or not someone is in the top 20 percent, making the argument that instead of pure evaluation of "productivity" (which is nebulous at best... Is that Lines of Code? Completed stories? Impact to team velocity? Speed at solving fizzbuzz?) that there are instead some other non-technical and leadership aspects to the "10x" engineer that pushes the whole team forward rather than being a purely individual contributor divorced from their team...

So I think there's some common ground here for everyone :D