
Decision-Making: The Most Undervalued Skill in Software Engineering - kiyanwang
https://hackernoon.com/decision-making-the-most-undervalued-skill-in-software-engineering-f9b8e5835ca6
======
Evan_Hellmuth
I agree with the title! But the article itself is fluff & platitude.

Anecdotally, when I make bad decisions on the job it's almost always due to my
emotional state. Whether it's the stress of an impending deadline, lack of
sleep, feeling of inferiority, etc.

Even when I'm aware of a dangerous emotional state, it's difficult to make
good decisions. Proactive prevention (get enough sleep, exercise, meditate if
you're into that) has been the only solution for me. I'd be curious to hear
more preventions and especially _interventions_ that work for others.

~~~
alexpetralia
Completely agreed - I think of these as "decision hyperparameters"[1].

Some of the most important ones I think are: awareness of expertise level,
adequate time, considered alternatives, slept well, not too hungry, aware of
general cognitive biases.

I feel like running through this brief checklist (and checking it twice!) for
important decisions has helped me immensely.

\---

[1]
[https://alexpetralia.github.io/2017/11/27/NL-2017-11-27.html](https://alexpetralia.github.io/2017/11/27/NL-2017-11-27.html)

~~~
jononor
Don't forget social pressure in your list!

~~~
alexpetralia
Good one. I'll update the list, thanks.

------
shawnb576
This article is fluff. However it touches on a base reality:

Writing software isn’t that hard. The hard thing is knowing what software to
write.

This is one thing junior engineers misunderstand about senior people. They’re
not necessarily better coders, they are generally better predictors and
decision makers.

~~~
aw00
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. The reality that many people don't realise
that every software product faces a commercial viability - time and money is
not unlimited.

Agreed that the most senior people have experience than the junior engineers
but that's obvious. Other than previous experience, what about senior people
makes them better predictors and decision makers? According to research
studies by Philip Tetlock, who conducted one of the largest and longest
running studies of the performance of experts at predictions, his results
showed that statistical models outperform "expert judgement".

Btw, this article was just sharing a quick thought and not a "how to", hence
the structure. If you're interested in something more substantial, feel free
to read some of my articles such as how to produce more reliable estimations
([https://hackernoon.com/how-to-do-smarter-
estimations-7d67f27...](https://hackernoon.com/how-to-do-smarter-
estimations-7d67f27910b5) \- I've also added this link to the article for
those who want something more substantial). We use estimations to make
decisions but they're often misleading because the way we produce estimations
lacks discipline.

Also note that I do plan on sharing some preventions and interventions which
can better our decisions.

------
foolrush
Never trust an article that can’t even pick stock photography of a proper
chessboard orientation as the details in the article will hold about as much
weight as the stock photography.

~~~
shawnb576
I think you’re being flip but that is quite the strawman.

