In this engaging article, Sean Goedecke reveals his personal heuristic for identifying top-notch engineers: he gauges their strength by counting the moments when he thinks, "Oh nice catch, I didn’t think of that!" This simple yet effective metric—that captures when an engineer contributes insights that enhance projects by preventing bugs, streamlining design, or simply improving the user experience—serves as his gut check on value addition. In addition to the "nice catch" moments, he also listens for those reliable instances when he mentally affirms, "Good, that'll work," reflecting confidence in straightforward, solid solutions. By sharing these relatable benchmarks, Sean offers a refreshing, real-world perspective on how to truly recognize engineering talent beyond conventional metrics like lines of code or flashy IDE prowess.

• Sean Goedecke uses the phrase “Oh nice catch, I didn’t think of that!” as his personal gauge for spotting strong engineers.
• The heuristic is based on the frequency of these surprise insights that add significant value to a project, whether by avoiding bugs, enhancing design, or improving the user experience.
• Another important moment he notes is when he thinks, “Good, that’ll work,” signaling reliability in coming up with functional solutions.
• His approach emphasizes hands-on collaboration and real-time problem solving over traditional metrics like lines of code or technical jargon.
• The method is less about minor fixes or nitpicks and more about those game-changing ideas that a peer or collaborator wishes they’d thought of themselves.
• Sean’s perspective encourages managers and team members to appreciate and empower engineers who consistently bring innovative, practical solutions to the table.
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