[the_af]

The Bus Factor was indeed an issue before LLMs, and in fact it's a jargon term that has been in use since forever.

What TFA is arguing is that never before we had a trend towards Bus Factor zero. Before, the worst was often 1 (occasionally zero, of course, but now TFA argues we're aiming for zero whether we're aware or not).

[TuringNYC]

True, but when the bus factor is 1, it might as well be zero -- soon you end up with employees (or contractors) who legitimately want more compensation realizing their critical nature. I totally sympathize from the employee's perspective, esp if the 1-factor means they cannot take holiday. Really, it is the company's job to control the bus factor (LLM or human) -- it is good for both the employee and company in the long run.

[the_af]

Agreed, it's the company's job to control the Bus Factor, that's a given. I think TFA's author worries that instead of controlling it, we're now aiming for zero (the worst possible factor).

[scarface_74]

Is there really a large difference between 0 and 1 when the average tenure of a software developer is 3 years or less at any given company?

[the_af]

A Bus Factor of 1 has always been construed as high risk; that's why the term exists after all. Companies sometimes mitigate it, sometimes not, but in general they are vaguely aware it's a risk.

A Bus Factor of 0, especially as an implicit goal, seems doubly worrisome! Now it's a goal rather than a warning sign.

[TuringNYC]

> Is there really a large difference between 0 and 1 when the average tenure of a software developer is 3 years or less at any given company?

Spot on. 1 might as well be zero. Totally unfair to the worker also, who now cannot take time off.

[scarface_74]

When I was an architect for startups between 2016-2020 doing mostly green field development using new to the company AWS technologies, I made damn sure that any knowledge was disseminated so I could both take a vacation without being interrupted and I could “put myself out of a job”.

I considered it a success when I realized a company doesn’t need me anymore and I can move on and talk about what I did at my next interview in STAR format.

[TuringNYC]

Agree, and also, promotion is hard if you are too tied to a specific system. Diagonal cross-department promotion becomes especially hard if you are a single point of failure.

[the_af]

But a Bus Factor of 1 has always been considered high risk. Sometimes companies take the risk, but that's a different issue.

This is precisely why the term "Bus Factor" was invented: to point out when it's 1, because it's both high risk to the company and unfair to the dev that cannot go on vacation or extended time off.