Values Must Filter Hiring Decisions

Engineers deserve to be treated as adults, not coddled from hard problems. This shift in perspective allows them to grow into senior leadership roles and take on meaningful challenges.

Will Larson believes that the tech industry has often treated engineers like children, sheltering them from difficult realities rather than giving them the responsibilities needed to thrive as adults. "We often treat engineers a little bit like children instead of giving them the responsibilities and ability to actually thrive as adults," he explains. This approach has limited engineers' growth and prevented them from taking on truly senior leadership positions.

In the previous era of abundant resources, when hiring and retention were paramount, this coddling became common practice. Engineering managers would avoid holding engineers fully accountable out of fear they might leave. This created a paradox: engineers wanted more senior roles and responsibilities, but organizations were unwilling to hold them to the standards necessary for those positions.

The current market shift has created an opportunity to correct this imbalance. With less emphasis on retention at all costs, organizations can now hold engineers to higher standards, which in turn enables them to place engineers in more senior roles with real accountability. "We can actually treat engineers like our peers and put them into really senior leadership roles and not have this kind of baseline assumption of like 'oh we have to coddle them or hide them from the real problems,'" Will notes.

For engineering leaders, this means:

• Present engineers with real, hard problems rather than shielding them from business realities
• Establish clear accountability frameworks that match the level of responsibility
• Evaluate engineers on their ability to solve complex problems, not just technical execution
• Create paths to senior leadership that include business impact, not just technical depth

For individual contributors, this perspective suggests:

• Embrace accountability as the pathway to greater responsibility and growth
• Recognize that being shielded from business realities is actually limiting your career potential
• Seek out opportunities to tackle difficult problems that impact the business directly
• Understand that being held to high standards is a sign of respect, not mistrust

This approach creates a virtuous cycle where engineers can grow into truly influential roles by demonstrating they can handle difficult problems and accountability, rather than being perpetually treated as specialized resources that need protection from business realities.