Arrogance in Engineering

When I’m talking about my work, 99% of those I talk to probably walk away thinking I’m an elitist, arrogant jerk-face. Historically, I’ve never looked at this simply because I understand that comprehension of this reality, like anything else, occurs on a bell-curve like distribution, which looks something like this:

As any statistically aware person will note, the vast majority of people will reside somewhere in the center, leaving rather small groups of people at the extremes. In the case of explaining my work, my perspective falls at the rightmost extreme. So mathematically, my comfort with the majority’s lack of understanding is justifiable.

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All that is beside the point, though. While it may be theoretically sound to ignore most people in this sense, I simply cannot do so anymore. Mostly, this is because I’m tired of being ‘typed as an egotistical, elitist, arrogant jerk.

Such ill-conceived opinions form because I make the following comments routinely, and do so completely seriously:

• Most engineers are mass-produced from college — completely replaceable textbook hacks, in every sense of the word, and I have no interest in working with them.
• Engineering, or in a broader sense, making stuff, is an utter waste of time if you’re not going to be the best.
• There’s a tremendous difference between an engineer on paper and an honest-to-the-bone engineer. The great kind are tinkerers. They build things in their spare time and are positively eccentric about it.

Granted, I can understand why someone might take these the wrong way if they’re only briefly thought about. But these aren’t things I briefly thought about. No, I’ve thought a lot about this stuff, and my conclusion is simply that there’s nothing arrogant about any of it.

Arrogance is derived from situations where one feels superior either:

• inappropriately, where they feel superior despite the fact that they aren’t

or

• naturally, where they feel superior because they have an unfair advantage, such as a genetic benefit.

In the case of my conclusions about engineers, neither is true because:

• Great engineers work an order of magnitude harder than ordinary engineers do, and took the time to find what they loved in order to facilitate such eccentric interest.

and

• Great engineers aren’t born that way. Being a great engineer isn’t an “ability.”

Consequently, I’m not elitist because I have high standards and expect those I’m working with (along with myself) to meet them. Naíve perhaps, but elitist — no. Anyone who tells you that such expectations are unrealistic, quite depressingly, doesn’t routinely work with great engineers, and in that sense, I sincerely pity them. What a sad site that must be.

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