[kwhitefoot]

> onboarding takes forever compared to most industries,

What? If you mean other industries where people are called engineers is used then I'm pretty sure that getting up to speed in another industry and becoming familiar with the unspoken, unwritten, unconscious rules that make the product possible must take at least as long as in any kind of software based company. Not to mention that there are often lots of constraints regarding what may and may not be done with hardware exposed to the public.

[johnnyanmac]

Other engineering professions have standards and licenses to streamline a lot of the technical ins and outs. Even within the same domain of software, the tech stacks and methodologies can different very radically. And you're often not just hiring mid+ level folk just to code.