
Catching up with top class engineers - askaquestion
I work in a well known company in a team full of top class engineers. While I am happy to learn and improve, I also find myself constantly getting &quot;left behind&quot;. The company rewards initiative takers, so I frequently find myself getting work that is either too simple or something nobody wants  to do. I have tried to bring this up with my team lead. He seems to not worry about this too much as long as work is getting done, he isn&#x27;t particular on who is building the expertise. Although I hate bringing up the gender angle to this - I am wondering if that is a factor here. I do not ask questions without first digging deep, I do my due diligence. I believe I am sincere in my efforts and eager to learn. How can I work around this problem? Without complaining to X or Y, what can I do at my level to get better and be considered for significant work tasks.
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tgflynn
I don't know the specifics of your situation so my suggestion may or may not
be applicable.

That said I would suggest you spend your own time trying to solve some
difficult problem that your team faces or designing or prototyping a solution
for some complex software component your team needs. If you succeed that
should earn you more respect for your technical abilities.

This has worked for me in the past. Once you get to a more senior role though
I'd be careful of making a habit of it or you may get taken advantage of.

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askaquestion
That's a great suggestion. Thank you for taking the time to reply. So far I
haven't been successful in picking projects that I could meaningfully
contribute to. Also worth noting that most low hanging fruits are solved so
the open problems are either really hairy or undiscovered.

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mpweiher
> The company rewards initiative takers

...

> and be considered for significant work tasks.

Hmmm...it looks like you need to take the initiative instead of waiting to be
considered.

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askaquestion
I was alluding to the fact that because it is okay to not respect "boundaries"
in some way. Very often, folks will grab work without any care about stepping
on another person's toes. It becomes a sort of race to the bottom because very
frequently, folks won't report a bug until they have a fix for it and then
they open a PR and open a ticket.

