[johnhess]

This pattern shows up in a great many industries. And not always in favor of engineers.

Almost always, the divide is right along the profit center/cost center line. In finance, traders are revered and engineers are their support staff. In the Air Force, pilots run the show all the way up the chain of command and engineers -- as critical to mission success as they may be -- are support. That's okay. Those jobs can be even more rewarding than working in "tech".

Remember, the same reason you might choose to work as an engineer in $awesome_field is why your ops/admin/qa team came to your company.

[lxt]

I can't upvote this enough! It's why I find jobs where what I do (engineering) is not the core product less rewarding on the whole.