[yallpendantools]

I think the myth/claim of a 10x developer is true but only relative to said rockstar engineer's immediate environment.

Put simply, the 10x developer is a 10x because they've spent ~10x more time immersed in the problem domain than the average developer.

What they do is more sleight-of-hand than Tony Stark engineering his way out of a terrorist cell. If 10x engineer takes a weekend to solve a problem that has stumped the team for a month, it's because he's collected the necessary context to solve the problem over the course of their long career; doesn't mean the answer didn't need to be synthesized, but they already had the raw materials in their cupboard. They have a giants' shoulder to stand on because they bothered climbing. They didn't derive anything from first principles; no one prototyped an Iron Man suit from scrap contraband.

The implication being anyone can be a 10x engineer in the right environment.

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Allow me to carry my own throne with an anecdote, believe what you will: once upon a time, Engineering Manager had the brilliant idea to create a modular system for our main product, the pitch being that we can outsource feature development to contractors while keeping team costs down as we only need to maintain a lean modular system. They tested the idea on a couple of easy scope projects which were successful.

Then came the big test. Three projects outsourced to a team of four contractors. These projects were far more complex than the first two: lots of state management and integration with other systems. In due time deadline neared and the contractors had a very pretty UI that just needed to be wired in. I got pulled in to see the projects home. It was supposed to be easy if not for the Pareto Principle. Relationship with the contractors soon soured as they bailed, showing us that they've technically already accomplished the project on their billable hours spreadsheet. We, the regular team, just needed to deploy the code they turned in but the deployment is none of their concern apparently.

That's when I had to roll-up my sleeves, got dirty with their spaghetti code. The way I see it, the contractors fell on the part where they had to integrate with other systems because said systems were legacy, i.e., created before the idea of the Lean Modular Main System. Honestly, even I didn't know exactly how to work with them but, crucially, I knew how to get answers when the going got tough. I knew how to quickly figure out what I didn't know because as a regular employee I knew things beyond first principles.

In the end, two out of the three projects deployed. They were only a couple weeks late. IIRC the third one only failed because it really ran out of time budget. Upper Management was not happy but Engineering Manager stuck out his neck for me, for which I am genuinely grateful. I didn't get exactly the coveted 10x wording out of him but he pointed out that I released 2/3 whereas a team of four couldn't even release one.

That's not entirely accurate of course. I could code you up a decent web frontend but I could not, for the life of me, get all those pretty UI animations to work even if it's my only way out of a terrorist cell.

[godelski]

  > the 10x developer is a 10x because they've spent ~10x more time immersed in the problem domain than the average developer.

Your ratio is off. This doesn't grow linearly, it grows exponentially. It probably takes more than 10x the experience/time to get to 2x in performance.

  > If 10x engineer takes a weekend to solve a problem that has stumped the team for a month

This is very rare in the real world. There are also alternative explanations you're ignoring:

  1. Luck. Seriously, do not underestimate luck, it plays a major role in your life[0]
  2. Fresh eyes: You're not burdened with all the noise of the past engineering[1]
  3. Getting to leverage the existing work. You have a new prior, you know to not think through the problem like the rest of the team has been.

Those are two obvious explanations but there are more. The reality is that it is going to be some combination along with the experience that you suggested.

  > I didn't get exactly the coveted 10x wording out of him

I do not want to imply in the least that you shouldn't be proud of your accomplishments. You absolutely should! But is this "10x" or actually smaller? A few weeks late you said, so how long do you think it would have taken had you not been so skilled? 20 weeks? More? If it really would have taken 20 weeks then yes, you are a 10xer and call me wildly impressed.

But mind you, I'm also saying that being a "2xer" is wildly impressive. I'm even saying that being a 1.1xer is impressive (because it is!). So I'm really not trying to diminish your accomplishments. The feeling of pride you should have for your accomplishments shouldn't be diminished because you aren't calling yourself a "10xer". That's not what's being said here.

Plus, my whole point is about sustained output. 10x and even 100x certainly exist in short tasks. I mean I can certainly produce a hello world program in python 100x faster than someone that doesn't know how to program. But over longer periods of time this gets to be much harder. Again, I don't want to diminish your pride, the story you explained is not a short task.

[0] That isn't to say that skill doesn't matter, it very much does. But luck is pretty far up there. It is behind skill in importance, but there's not a single (or even 2) factor that controls your life.

[1] This isn't luck, you can control this too. Stuck on a problem? Walk away. Go for a walk. But come back.