I think you absolutely are cheating yourself if you cheat on something you're supposed to be learning. On the other hand, I have a tendency to be brutally honest about my own knowledge and capabilities, and it has bitten me multiple times.
I've gotten negative performance review feedback from management that was word for word from the 'things I think I can improve'. I've gotten passed over for jobs and promotions because I don't do a good enough job of 'selling' my experience.
Basically, the most successful software engineers I've met also have the ability to bullshit with the best used car salesmen, and it's hard to argue my unwillingness to do so hasn't held me back.
>brutally honest about my own knowledge and capabilities
Is this a lack of confidence?
> I've gotten passed over for jobs and promotions because I don't do a good enough job of 'selling' my experience.
Selling your experience IS an important skill. Other factors may have played a part too.
> successful software engineers I've met also have the ability to bullshit
Is it their bullshit that gets them to be successful? Or is it that they're more friendly, tactful, and and positive?
To be clear, I don't doubt that you're telling it as you see it. I'm just wondering if your perceptions match the reality.
If someone is always talking about how bad they are at something, then I'll interpret that as the person being negative, lacking confidence, and pessimistic. That's not the kind of person I'd want to be around in general, let alone hire.
I was always raised that you don't brag about yourself, you don't take credit for things you didn't really do, and you don't over promise and under deliver.
As I've gained experience, I've learned that people can take self deprecating things as gospel and as a worker it's your job to talk up your abilities and invitations to identify 'things you can improve' have to be spun in a positive way. As much as I hate to admit it, salesmanship, presentation, and ones ability to 'smooth talk' seems to get you further than raw technical ability. I don't hold it against devs that are able to do that, it's just been an adjustment for me.
Those who make the hiring/firing/promoting decisions rarely have the technical chops to determine which of the engineers is good and which isn't. So it's the engineers that are the most convincing that get the benefits, rather than the highest performers.
There are those who constantly put in overtime to put out fires that they created. To management, these seem like hard-working, dedicated folks. Meanwhile those who design things well, don't have fires to put out, and leave on-time every day seem lazy. All too often the first group is given praise instead of the second group.
This is a point of unfairness that is rampant in the industry. I don't know of any way to solve it, besides each person being their own promoter, hype man, sales man.
> If someone is always talking about how bad they are at something, then I'll interpret that as the person being negative, lacking confidence, and pessimistic. That's not the kind of person I'd want to be around in general, let alone hire.
That sounds more like bad management than anything you did. I'm the same way, I try to be honest about my own knowledge and abilities. I hope you don't change that because there are assholes out there, supportive managers definitely exist
Everyone seems to have come out of the pandemic convinced that they need to tighten whatever screws they have to get theirs. And that triggers other people to do the same thing. Cheating enters the realm of possibility because people (correctly and incorrectly) believe others are doing the same thing.
It's gross and feeds on itself. I'm not sure what will help it get better.
It's pretty simple. There are few incentives for integrity and few disincentives for lack thereof. This shows up in all kind of contexts - from business leaders, to social media "influencers", to athletes, to politicians.
I'm not sure why anyone would expect "the average Joe" to maintain some semblance of integrity when very few successful individuals do the same. The overall message is pretty clear - if you want to succeed, you will need to cheat.
People that don’t cheat much think that cheating is easy. Often times I see cheaters put in almost the same amount of effort as non cheaters the cheaters just get a higher probability of success.
But the long term success for cheating is actually much lower, those who actually learned things will do better in the long term even if they have a lower probability of short term success
> the long term success for cheating is actually much lower, those who actually learned things will do better in the long term even if they have a lower probability of short term success
I want to believe this, but I'm not sure it's always true. Timing of opportunities matters a lot. Someone who is not as skilled in programming probably cheated their way into a FAANG job during the height of the pandemic and made absolute bank, perhaps being able to sock away $200k-$300k since then. That money could then be invested and start compounding, leading to a materially different outcome from someone else who played it by the rules and was better.
The long-term for the cheater might be to simply find a less demanding job and continue riding the prestige hike they got when they snuck into the FAANG job.
The cheaters learn to cheat better that can be a better or equivalent level skill. Human lifetime are sort and human opportunity windows are even shorter. Not cheating put you at the mercy of variance as many now dead great people died in poverty
That said, Falcon 9 actually flies and is a very reliable rocket; SpaceX does not seem to be "cheating" in the classical sense of the word, but making money due to genuine innovative capability.
"Fake it till you make it" has been a thing for a long time -- hence the catchy phrase.
When did this wonderful meritocracy exist? Where?
I think back to Jobs and Woz, and how he got him to hack a project to win a contest, and then didn't tell Woz and kept the money. It's been here since day 1.
Meritocracy doesn't exist for the poor. Before getting my job at The Atlantic through a random personal connection, I experienced job discrimination on the basis of not having graduated from a "prestigious" institution. Obviously this is coded language for being poor. To add insult to injury, I had actually aced a couple engineering courses that University of Michigan had provided to my high school class. You don't get to put that on your resume though. Even though I've always been honest to fault, I would never judge a poor person for skirting the rules of society. At the end of the day, if hiring managers can't tell whether candidates have fake credentials, all that does is prove that credentialism is not about merit.
Actually its over 70% of kids in USA grow up with two parents still. 50 years ago it was 85%, but that would have been with a lot of unhappy and abusive marriages that now with no-fault divorce are able to be dissolved.
Also child sexual and physical abuse has reduced during this same time frame. "According to David Finkelhor who tracked Child Maltreatment Report (NCANDS) data from 1990 to 2010, sexual abuse had declined 62% from 1992 to 2009 and the long-term trend for physical abuse was also down by 56% since 1992." from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_abuse
We have a lot of problems, but your understand of the issues are poor.
Twice as many children are raised by single mothers today compared to 50 years ago. Maybe that’s the more relevant statistic? (Yes there are hero stories where one could argue this doesn’t matter…)
Abusers are at their most dangerous when you try to leave them. They will be even more dangerous if you have to damage their public reputation with the ugly truth to try to escape.
No fault divorce makes it vastly easier to divorce for a lot of reasons and making it unnecessarily hard to leave can foster situations where it becomes abusive because they don't get along that well and can't just up and leave because they want to.
How I can be a good example to my child is what I’m most worried about. I’m not even convinced myself that having the highest levels of integrity is beneficial in current society, let alone when they’re of age.
Man, you crushed it here, so true.