A lot like how everyone is an Engineer these days.

Software Engineers that just write CRUD apps, Software Architects who just read docs, Systems Engineers who just follow guides, Support Engineers who just answer phone calls and tickets, etc.

Title inflation has been creeping up for many years. It's everywhere.

It's the "just" part that gets me. These jobs are not trivial regardless of the silly titles.

You don't get to call yourself an Engineer because you copy/paste CRUD apps together... or at least you used to not be able to. The engineering has already been done long ago by someone much more talented and knowledgeable.

That is what a programmer or developer does. Engineering implies a lot more than just cobbling together code blocks and libraries. Yet, that's what 99% of Software Engineers spend their days doing.

It would be akin to going out to a construction site and finding people doing rough-ins and roofing with Engineering titles. That is where the software world is currently - "Engineers" in the field doing rough-ins and roofing.

You do get to call yourself that, though. This is a bit like saying "irregardless is not a word" when it's in the dictionary now. Calling yourself a "programmer" will be detrimental to your career, so why do it?

> Calling yourself a "programmer" will be detrimental to your career,

Ah, yes. There is the crux of the issue, isn't it?

People called themselves Engineers to advance their careers artificially (sounds really nice and impressive, etc).

Now, everyone is an Engineer, making the Engineer word have significantly less meaning. Today, a Software Engineer is largely a Software Developer of 10 years ago.

Just like economic inflation - title inflation devalues titles, which causes people to inflate their own titles further to stand out once again - which becomes a negative feedback loop.

People call themselves Engineers because thats their title. Do you expect such people to make up a different one?

Ironically some of the most influential and recognized names have been calling themselves programmers rather than engineers or computer scientists.

No it wouldn't be. It would only be detrimental to your career if you only applied to "programmer"jobs

Just because they’re doing CRUD app puzzles doesn’t mean they’re not engineers. There’s simply much more of that work than actual engineering. And part of engineering is knowing when you do not have to reinvent the wheel.

I really appreciated Hillel Wayne's series on this topic [0].

He actually interviewed a number of people who transitioned from a licensed engineering discipline to software, and asked them how they felt about software as an engineering discipline. His insights are a lot more useful than the arguments between only-ever-software people on HN who have inflated perceptions of what "real" engineers do.

The whole series is worth a read, but here's the short version:

> Instead of asking how they felt about certain engineering topics, I just asked them point blank. “Do you consider software engineering actually engineering?”

> Of the 17 crossovers I talked to, 15 said yes.

> That’s not the answer I expected going in. I assumed we weren’t engineers, that we’re actually very far from being engineers. But then again, I was never a “real” engineer. I don’t know what it’s like to be a “real” engineer, and so can’t compare software engineering to other forms. I don’t have the experience. These people did, and they considered software engineering real engineering.

[0] https://www.hillelwayne.com/post/are-we-really-engineers/

Thank you for sharing this. I’m still reading, but the section about math resonated so much with me.

Just today we looked at a performance problem. CPU/memory usage, DB queries, indexes and joins, size of data, frequency of requests, redundant work, caching, different parts slowing down others...

These things are so ingrained that I don’t think of then as applying math. In my inner eye I see pictures moving around. It’s all familiar and obvious. But thinking about it, there’s always math behind it all in some way. We don’t express it as such but it’s still there.

I’d like to push back on this a bit. I’m a programmer, but I don’t cobble things together. I talk to customers and collaborators, make plans, find solutions and write code.

It’s not engineering but it’s engaging, good work.

I get what you’re trying to say. But it feels wrong to me personally to describe this work as you did.

Grumpy engineers always grouse about this.

I was a consultant at a big engineering organization. They used to huff and puff about the integrity of engineering process etc. but all of the work was done by “engineering technicians“ for 40% of the pay.

Engineering is definitely not a tribe since that would be a contradiction of values. Anyway we all cobble parts together just at different conceptual levels.

I don't understand your rant, but I do agree that the job titles are probably inappropriate. I've had all kinds of titles to describe what I do and don't really care as long as I get paid to enjoy solving problems.

I also think it's absurd to believe only engineers can understand their own work... wouldn't that just be bad engineering?

You underestimate just how mundane and unchallenging a lot of non software professional engineering is. Depending on circumstances, a professional engineer could just be checking and signing off on endless similar drafting details or technicians calcs. A lot of it is also just looking up numbers in tables too.

I'm a cloud architect thank you very much - I take ephemeral balls of vaporware designed by software architects, created by software engineers, documented for software architects to build structure for support engineers who can help bring on clients for my contract holders latest ephemeral ball of vaporware.

What is a software engineer?

Software engineers design and develop computer programs and applications.

I thought that’s a software developer?

So a programmer

I'd say a programmer is to a software engineer as a handyman is to an architect. Can a handyman do the "dirty work" of most projects? Sure. Can they design a skyscraper to spec, tell you exactly what to expect in terms of resources and timeline, and roll with the punches of logistics and competing priorities? Probably not, unless they were already an architect just doing the job of a handyman.

That being said, as someone with a software engineering degree, I can safely say that most companies don't need engineers and can get by just fine with programmers. Anyway, in this industry there are many architects working as handymen and vice versa.

Can an architect actually put the pieces together? Do they know where to source materials? Do they understand how to order and schedule the construction of a design? Do they "just get" why a particular combination of materials at a specific point in a structure is going to cause problems, because they've seen it over and over? Can they even operate all the tools?

Probably not, unless they used to actually do construction before becoming an architect.

The answer to most of your questions is yes, although obviously most architects are not proficient in operating most tools used in construction because that's not their job.

> Can an architect actually put the pieces together?

Unclear what this means, but architects have plenty of training in doing "manual work". Building models requires a lot more precision than most things in construction.

> Do they know where to source materials?

That's part of their job description.

> Do they understand how to order and schedule the construction of a design?

Definitely part of their job description.

The real truth of the matter is "it depends".

I have about a half-dozen friends as architects in the US, and only 1 of them could do any of the things I mentioned. All have been practising residential and commercial and government architects for > 30 years.

I'd rather be called a handyman than a "Generalist Labor Engineer"

It's a person who applies engineering principles to the design and implementation of software. It's about the "rigidity" of the methods that are used to construct the software. If the software is just cobbled together, it's not "engineered".

There is no such thing as a "software engineer", period.

An "engineer" is someone who works in a technical profession with a governing body (either the State, or an entity that might as well be the State).

An engineer is certified by the governing body, and given a license to practice the profession. An engineer can have their license suspended or rescinded, in the event of professional misconduct or malpractice.

Whether through law, or de facto through insurance company practices, employers face liability if they employ non-licensed engineers. So an engineer is someone who has the leverage to push back against employer pressure to commit malpractice.

Computer programmers / software developers have none of these things. Certifications are a joke, and meaningless beyond the entry level. We are pressured by employers to commit malpractice on a near-daily basis, and call it "tech debt" (recently I've noticed companies moving toward the even more euphemistic "tech opportunity").

Without a governing body and licensing, it is impossible for us to be "engineers" in any real sense of the term. We can only try to emulate an engineering profession as best we best, by pushing back on malpractice pressure where we can.

> There is no such thing as a "software engineer", period.

That's a bold statement.

Would you argue, for instance, that someone graduating from MIT EECS[0] or Stanford Engineering[1] isn't qualified to use the tittle of Engineer?

> An engineer is certified by that governing body, and given a license to practice the profession. An engineer can have their license suspended or rescinded, in the event of professional misconduct or malpractice.

I think you are confused with the PE regulations. [2]

[0] https://www.eecs.mit.edu/

[1] https://engineering.stanford.edu/students-academics/academic...

[2] https://ncees.org/about/

Has a governing body issued you a license, without which one cannot practice your profession? No? Then indeed, you are not an "engineer" in the sense of a profession, as with doctors and lawyers and CPA's, etc. This is wholly orthogonal to the prestige of whichever college you graduated.

Note that even on your own Stanford and MIT links above, they reserve the term "engineering" for programs OTHER THAN "Computer Science" (e.g. "Chemical Engineering", "Electrical Engineering", etc). Show me a "Software Engineering" program at any accredited university.

There's no confusion, I am 100% talking about PE regulations. One requires a license to practice chemical engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, all but the most entry-level roles in aerospace engineering, etc. Employers effectively cannot hire non-licensed workers for those positions.

If that does not apply to your job, then you are an "engineer" only in the sense of LinkedIn puffery.

Mind you, this applies to all us (myself included) in the software development field. I'm not trying to be a gatekeeper. Rather, the complete absence of gatekeeping is the entire point here.

I'm pretty sure ASU [0] is accredited.

0: https://asuonline.asu.edu/online-degree-programs/undergradua...

This is flat out wrong. Many engineering positions do not require a PE certification or state licensure. For example, consumer products are mostly regulated by liability and testing regimes like UL/FCC as opposed to stamping a design to assert that it meets the requirements. Engineers designing consumer products are still engineers.

I agree that the profession of "software engineering" could stand to have much more of the rigor of engineering. For example, it's painfully missing a sense of ethics about large scale surveillance systems. But your argument is biting off way too much.

The ship has sailed, and you're fighting with an intense zeal that doesn't match the problem. Why die on this hill - are you reserving the "engineer" title for some purpose in the software field?

Interesting perspective, agreed on some of the points.

I'd like to hear some opinions from people who have worked as both "an engineer" and "a software engineer" (maybe OP is such a person, idk) -- what kind of corner-cutting is there in (non-software) engineering fields? Is it at all comparable to tech debt? What kind of compromises in quality/design are made in the service of profit or career advancement? etc.

I think a lot of people end up with an impression that in e.g. civil engineering, everything is perfect and precise and elegant because it has to be (otherwise crumbling infrastructure, accidents, etc.). But understanding that humans in general are always looking to cut corners and be lazy, I wonder how realistic that impression really is... Wouldn't be surprised to hear about comical inefficiencies and poor practices that have become normalized over decades of designing/building physical stuff.

I have been both. While it may seem weird, my response to “is this software person an engineer?” might be “did they take an engineering economics class?”

I did, as well as other courses on non-obvious adjacent topics. Not everyone knows the breadth of concerns that engineering brings to solving problems. It’s not as simple as a technical design.

Now, I see plenty of software people who use the same broad set of skills in problem solving, but it’s rare. It’s rare to see software people care about economics. Social impact is also a rare concern. As is governability. As is systemic thinking.

But, there are absolutely software engineers, just not as many as there are people with the title IMHO.

You don't happen to work for the Oregon Board of Examiners for Engineering and Land Surveying, do you? :)

https://ij.org/press-release/oregon-engineer-wins-traffic-li...

The full court opinion (https://ij.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Jarlstorm-opinion....) is a pretty good read if you're bored sometime.

I was a software developer at Bank of America for eight years. I had two titles: "Assistant Vice President" and "Systems Engineer". I preferred to use "Systems Engineer" because if I said I was an "Assistant Vice President" at a bank, people would think I one of the people approving loans.

> A lot like how everyone is an Engineer these days.

But did they graduate from Engineering school?

In Canada and parts of the US, Engineer is a protected title.

https://engineerscanada.ca/news-and-events/news/who-can-use-...

In the US, certain fields are protected via licensing boards and required degrees. One cannot just become a Civil Engineer, for example, simply by adding that title to their Email Signature.

I’m pretty sure Woz would have an official looking ID proclaiming him to be “Civilian Enginer”

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34566738

They need the respect to make up for the lower pay and even less affordable housing.

what parts of the US?

I was going to say Oregon. But apparently a judge ruled it unconstitutional. https://www.theregister.com/2019/01/02/oregon_engineer_licen....

Why do you think "engineer" should be a special title?

I come from an engineering family, and "engineers" here are one big legally recognized tribe, or pretty much a social class. In reality that just means that they've finished a specific college where they get "engineer with diploma" title. Same with doctors or lawyers. Everyone else is ona a lower wrung of the ladder and there is nothing they can do about it later.

So "of course" a software engineer is a contradiction is terms (as an electrical engineer said here). How can one be a engineer if you didn't go to an engineering college? It doesn't matter if a engineer's career consisted of selling ice creams, that person is a poor engineer and thats that.

I actually met a "engineer" friend of my parents who designed the major parts of a traffic roundabout near my home. It is the worst designed roundabout I've seen and there is at least one car crash per day there. Every now and then people end up in ER. We chatted for a short bit, and touched on those crash reports. He just said dismissively: "people should just drive better". So that's engineering for you.

Yes, like drugs, inflations everything can be great just as long as you can “adjust” your expectations.

I think next step is to adjust time for some people so they think you have lived 100 years while they actually just lived 30.

inflate all the things! on a related note: to some people a phd has become a sign that that person has something to compensate for. a lot of equally or better skilled/knowledgable people do not have one

I thought it was a sign that a candidate has poor cost-benefit analytical skills.

Only half joking

Hah. The same joke persists in MBA circles, where, as the joke goes, during your time here you learn how to evaluate why MBA degree was not a good idea.

My MBA was free , got me a better job and I still think it was a waste of time.

I want to say that a good chunk of it was a waste for me as well. The network effect, as far as I can tell, was minimal. That said, two classes did make a difference ( fraud in accounting and analytics with R ). Even taking those into account though, I honestly can't say my degree was as valuable as it is sometimes portrayed ( definitely not the asking price ). I sometimes wonder whether it is possible I could have stumbled onto R on my own ( I was already playing with Python at the time ) and would I have the patience to go through sample exercises on my own. It is hard to tell. I can't honestly say it was a complete waste of time.

One of my professors said that half the lack of women in STEM professorships could be explained by female students who are smart enough to earn a PhD instead also being smart enough to earn an MD or DVM instead.

This seems a bit of a broad brush. You can hardly fault someone for getting a PhD because of something like graduating into a recession, because they actually wanted to into academia but changed their mind, or so that they could immigrate.

I hit “staff engineer” about four years into my career, and kept it when switching jobs. Kinda ridiculous. I was even offered a director level job months later.

I’m good but I’m nowhere near that good. Title inflation is silly and ten years in, I’m done paying attention to them at all. They tell me nothing.

You should have taken the director job, you probably would have handled it as well as anyone else. I was a "Director" of Test at one company. I didn't even have a budget. Even in interviews I'll tell folks that I was a test manager with a glorified title (though with no budget, was I even a "test manager"?).

I’ve learned after a number of years that I don’t want any job where there’s an expectation that I’m reachable after 5pm. That was definitely one of them.

I expect that, if given the title Director, the candidate has a P&L and makes a significant part of her income through making the P&L. Director should be "Manager of Managers" -- close to "Vice President"

I would say your expectations are reasonable. The anecdote was more to point out the some of the ridiculousness of title inflation (and now that I reread, I did a poor job of getting that point across). I was no where near director-level in job responsibility, nor did I really want an actual director job to begin with.

But now imagine I'm full of myself with my new "Director" title, and go out to interview for real director-level jobs. Man, the previous company would have done me no favors as I go out there and get absolutely slaughtered in interviews.

FWIW, at my non-tech company, our compensation is far far below tech compensation. HR is extremely resistant to increasing salaries for SWEs. It’s comparatively easy to argue that, if an individual has a competing offer for 300k they’re clearly very valuable and we should give them a title that fits that.

Essentially, it’s easier to make tons of exceptions than to fix the root cause.

It's still happening today. I just discussed a role with a recruiter hiring for the same kind of thing: https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/3443314062/?refId=xpvVYRn...

(Staff) titling with a 4+ years of experience ask is incredibly confusing to me.

Its even weirder on the interview side. We had someone apply as a Principle who I could only describe as "solidly mid level"

I wasn't a jerk about it in the interview, but I said something to the effect of "I know titles are different at all other companies, but here the expectations for PEs is that they're tasked on the most critical technical initiatives and are held to high standards for execution. You're also going to be expected to mentor not just Junior technical staff, but also mid and senior level engineers. Does this sound like a role you're interested in? It's fairly demanding."

Guy didn't flinch and said "Yeah, that's exactly what I'm looking for!" :|

(We did not hire)

Why did you even bother asking a question like that instead of telling the candidate directly that the role you're hiring for is beyond their level/expertise/experience/etc?

From the candidate side, the only way to differentiate between "senior" "staff" "principle" "lead" or whatever between companies is the required years of experience on the job listing. Which is a terrible metric, but it's more informative than the title or job duties.

The way our interview guidelines work the interviewer is not permitted say such things to a candidate.I was also trying to stress, at our org at least, this wasn't a titled based on seniority but by responsibility. I had no say in setting the interview guidelines or defining the job role, I was simply the messenger.

Was he "solidly mid level" in terms of years-of-experience or ability? I find myself conflating the 2 frequently, and have to remind myself not to. I like to periodically remind myself that Zuckerbeg as a 22-year old was a successful founder-CEO for a business over a hundred employees and a $1B acquisition offer.

Sure, he is not the norm. But I'm sure there are plenty of people equally as talented as him who didn't take the entrepreneurship route and are now languishing in the corporate ladder. Any company can achieve wild success if they are able to identify such talents and place them immediately in high-impact roles.

As a candidate, I’d be curious about why I was being lectured about why I didn’t meet the “high standards of execution” of some dude who can’t spell “principal”.

It would be a matter of principle to point that out.

And I hit "Senior" 4 years into my career, and have struggled to get a "Staff" title for the last 18 years. I would love some of this title inflation, but haven't been blessed by it. I think there's some amount of luck involved just choosing the correct jobs.

Most people who are capable of doing so have hit the skill cap for programming after 6-8 years. The biggest part of being a Staff engineer is correctly identifying and gravitating to the projects that are going to be important and successful.

My last "staff+" job involved way too many meetings for my taste. If I wanted to be a professional meeting attender, I'd have chosen another line of work.

Where I see this mostly is in non-tech companies that don't have IC tracks. Often these companies have pay-bands that necessitate this.

If you have a SWE that you're worried about losing you can't just keep them in the same job title and give them a big raise. You have to give them a manager, senior manager, or director title in order to get them into the pay-band you need them to be in. So it really isn't about making the employee feel good about the title they have. It's about getting them into the right pay band.