Facebook Exec Explains Why Technical Skills Aren't Enough To Be a Great Engineer (geekwire.com)

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Facebook Exec Explains Why Technical Skills Aren't Enough To Be a Great Engineer (geekwire.com)

Posted by msmash on Sunday March 20, 2016 @08:15AM from the beyond-math-and-science dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Facebook's Regina Wallace-Jones, who is in charge of protecting 1.6 billion people on the social network, says math and science skills aren't enough to tackle challenges at a firm. "Don't let anyone tell you that engineering is only about math and science or that engineering expertise is all you have to offer the world. Your experiences and your perspectives can help inspire a company to find a different approach to a problem or encourage someone else to speak up," she said. "The impact of engineers goes well beyond the mobile apps, the gadgets, and the security systems that we build. The quest to engineer meaningful solutions... is not just about math and science, it's about making amazing solutions for real people in the real world. It's about pushing mankind to its outer limits by inspiring the world to imagine bigger solutions than our hands can hold."

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It is all a rat race by ickleberry · 2016-03-20 08:21 · Score: 4, Insightful

Nothing is ever enough for these corporations while there are still dollars in circulation that don't belong to them. Facebook is about making amazing solutions to fill Mark Zuckerberg's pocket, nothing more, nothing less. "Real people in the real world" my bollox
1. Re:It is all a rat race by Aighearach · 2016-03-20 08:31 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Yeah, the crap about "pushing mankind to its outer limits" is hard to read. Is that really what engineering does?
  Obviously, understanding the humans and the use cases is more important to being a great engineer than just math; the math is just a base requirement, not the job of engineering.
2. Re:It is all a rat race by Ol+Olsoc · 2016-03-20 13:30 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Yeah, the crap about "pushing mankind to its outer limits" is hard to read. Is that really what engineering does?
  Well a little. But I don near shit myself when includedn in the quote was "The impact of engineers goes well beyond the mobile apps, the gadgets,
  Because yeh - once upon a time we went to the moon, using simple computers and slide rules. That's pressing the limits.
  Now pressing the limits is writing apps. http://img.memecdn.com/Cutting...
  
  --
  The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
H1b and the will to work 80 hours a week by Joe_Dragon · 2016-03-20 08:22 · Score: 4, Insightful

H1b and the will to work 80 hours a week is what they really want.
Re: "protecting" 1.6 billion people? by Anonymous Coward · 2016-03-20 08:35 · Score: 1, Insightful

and it isn't even SJW friday.
The anti-SJW crowd sure is a more whining attention seaking bunch, at every opportunity relevant or not, than the SJWs they are so angry at.
What the hell ... by Rudisaurus · 2016-03-20 08:41 · Score: 3, Insightful

... would Facebook know about "real solutions for real people"? It's a frickin' social network, fer Chrissake! What exactly do they produce? What particular problems do they address? How is mankind's lot significantly improved by the presence of Facebook?

Signed,
an engineer

--
licet differant, aequabitur
Yes, but... by Raenex · 2016-03-20 08:53 · Score: 4, Insightful

Facebook's Regina Wallace-Jones, who is in charge of protecting 1.6 billion people on the social network
Who's in charge of protecting 1.6 billion people from the social network?
This... by fyngyrz · 2016-03-20 08:53 · Score: 5, Insightful

The quest to engineer meaningful solutions
This... coming from Facebook... is just about the funniest thing I've seen in several days.
"meaningful"
Ah ha.
Ha ha ha ha. :)

--
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
1. Re:This... by AmiMoJo · 2016-03-20 10:16 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  This thread proves them right. Real engineers like us (I include myself) would never have built Facebook. We would have balked at the privacy issues, thought the whole thing was trivial and stupid. We would have avoided the buzzword bullshit that somehow has grown it into a network with a billion users.
  Like it or not, a lot of prior like Facebook and the fact that we can't see the attraction is why we aren't billionaires or front end developers at their company.
  
  --
  const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
  SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
2. Re: This... by fyngyrz · 2016-03-20 10:29 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Billionaire != meaningful.
  
  --
  I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
3. Re: This... by drinkypoo · 2016-03-21 00:25 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Billionaire != meaningful.
  Strongly disagree. If you are a billionaire you will have more influence over the lives of others than someone who is not. How is that not meaningful? It doesn't make the meaning positive.
  
  --
  "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:SJW crapola by Anonymous Coward · 2016-03-20 09:04 · Score: 1, Insightful

Or your a white guy who isn't as good as he thinks he is at his profession. Given the your rant, I suspect this is exactly the case.
Hint, not being an asshole goes a long way towards landing a job. Also a bath.
Well duh ... by Tetch · 2016-03-20 09:27 · Score: 5, Insightful

Regina Wallace-Jones apparently said:

"The impact of engineers goes well beyond the mobile apps, the gadgets, and the security systems that we build. The quest to engineer meaningful solutions... is not just about math and science, it's about making amazing solutions for real people in the real world"
Regina, this is not news. Any software engineer worth their salt (i.e. with a natural aptitude for computer and software engineering and science) knows this. The whole problem with our industry is that management has seen fit to offer jobs to just about anyone who wants to "work with computers". Worse, they employ the ones who *don't* even like the work ... they just want the money (they've heard there's good money in IT), but actually detest the work ... you'll never get inspirational work out of them.
Could it be that you're one of those managers who think they have a monopoly on intelligence and insight ? Some of us have known what you've just said for a decade or two, but management didn't want to listen, because "the numbers". Now that your numbers are looking good, some of you are stumbling on our prior art as if it's new and deep wisdom.

--
If you don't pray in my school, I won't think in your church.
Re:Insightful by Tablizer · 2016-03-20 18:36 · Score: 3, Insightful

And that's why she earns the big bucks. Because she's the one with this insightful knowledge which no one ever though about before.
No, she earns the big bucks because she can make her bosses think it's insightful.
The corporate world is the Art of Bullshitting. In other words, she's a Bullshit Engineer (at least for this article).

--
Table-ized A.I.
Re:Facebook by Cederic · 2016-03-21 00:19 · Score: 2, Insightful

I don't even use Facebook but it's easy to admire their engineering.
To be fair, it's about all I do admire.
But scaling a website to a billion users a day, 8 billion video views a day, however hundreds of billions of ads served per day - and bear in mind they calculate which ad to serve to each user.
That's some pretty solid engineering.