😮‍💨n being "technical"

insert :eyeroll: emoji x1000 here

“i’m not technical why don’t you set it up”

“she’s not technical enough”

its a dividing line between jobs that make lots of money vs those that dont

those jobs with more “built in” respect than ones that dont

people treat technical fluency the same as mathematical fluency - you either have it or you don’t. you can either be a wizard of networking or derive all the things or you’re just a dodo like the rest of us.

I spend a lot of time thinking about this ever-widening gulf between folks who self-select as “technical” vs “non-technical”

Is this due to the “brilliant asshole” phenomenon? Luddites who patently refuse to adapt? or maybe it depends on what age you were when computers and mobile phones came into your life….

Last week I attended a volunteer orientation for CASH Oregon where “technical” was used to describe someone who had the ability to open and download a PDF, fill it out, then scan and submit it back on a web page.

!!!

Clearly context matters when using the term technical!

Over the years I have been a member of or somehow involved in various “women in tech” groups or initiatives. And until recently those groups always meant ENGINEER which is bs. A woman in tech is any woman working in the tech industry - is it helpful to further break down and categorize groups? sure! Of course there are odious toads who regardless of engineering title or level will be disrespectful but when you’re an engineer there’s at least some buffer there. Try being a woman in what others consider “non-technical” at a tech company and see how much respect you get out of the gate.

My view of “technical” is pretty broad - it depends on the situation but mostly I find the word is too vague and used to exclude folks.

maybe this is what builds the wall between Dev and Ops?

Not sure but it is frequently such a barrier to communication and breeds unnecessary complexity. In a world where abstractions leak and developers must know Kubernetes things to configure their applications more than ever we need people to use plain language and concepts when communicating.

Isn’t the definition of mastery the ability to explain complex subjects simply? Do we just have a bunch of overconfident folks who don’t actually know things papering over their ignorance with buzzwords and making others feel bad?

idk! But that’s why I love the Wired series where true experts explain lofty concepts at 5 different levels - like quantum computing!!

some monday morning musings for ya

stay cool this week (literally and vibe-wise)

paigerduty