📊[POLL] Where does TECHNICAL LEGITIMACY come from?
What makes someone a legitimate technical leader in a company?
Some engineers believe credibility comes almost exclusively from deep, hands-on technical achievements: writing critical code, designing architectures, solving production incidents, improving performance, or making difficult engineering decisions.
Others believe technical impact can also be multiplied through public speaking, BBLs, conferences, meetups, mentoring, and community leadership.
🤔 Where does TECHNICAL LEGITIMACY come from?
POLL OPTIONS
👨🔧 Deep, direct tech work only
Technical legitimacy must primarily be demonstrated through concrete engineering achievements. Communication may be useful, but it does not replace delivery.
👨🎤 Talks, BBLs & community
Sharing knowledge, teaching developers, representing the company, and building technical communities can also create meaningful technical impact.
👨🔧👨🎤Both: build and influence
Credibility begins with genuine expertise, but its impact becomes greater when that knowledge is shared and helps other engineers improve.
It depends 🤷.
The expected impact depends on the role. A developer, Tech Lead, Staff Engineer, and Principal Engineer may contribute in very different ways.
“Software development is an intense exercise in collaboration.”
— Martin Fowler
Can someone be technically legitimate without being the person who writes the most code?
#SoftwareEngineering #TechnicalLeadership #TechLead #PrincipalEngineer #PublicSpeaking #DeveloperCommunity #KnowledgeSharing #EngineeringCulture #JavaCommunity #Leadership
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