[nnadams]

> Understand the ins and outs of the problem. Then go down the rabbit hole of getting hands dirty.

Yes, I think this nuance is somewhat lacking from the article. Do not sign up for every on-call shift or only do QA work all day. That's how you can become "that person," and you'll just watch your team expect that from you.

If you're early in your career, my suggestion is do different kinds of dirty work, switch it up as much as possible. Get a feel for as many as different things as possible. Then you'll be better prepared to leverage that knowledge, and you'll know when it's worth going down that rabbit hole.

[scrotiemcboogs]

> If you're early in your career, my suggestion is do different kinds of dirty work, switch it up as much as possible.

Spot on. This is massively important. Not only will you build a better picture of systems as a whole, but you'll also discover what is interesting and not interesting to you. Finding that out early on is invaluable.