No Good Engineer is Arrogant
Why humility isn't just a nice trait for engineers—it's a requirement. If you think you've mastered engineering, you're not doing anything challenging.
Here’s something I’ve noticed over 20 years in this profession: whenever I meet an arrogant engineer, I already know they’re not very good.
Not because arrogance is annoying (it is). But because arrogance is incompatible with real engineering.
Engineering is a Humbling Profession
This might sound counterintuitive. You’d think after 20 years, I’d have it figured out. “What could possibly stop me now? I must know everything by this point!”
That’s just not true.
Anyone who has been doing significant challenges for a while knows this. You might have decades of experience, and yet you’ll still find yourself stuck on something that feels embarrassingly basic. You’ll spend hours—sometimes days—on a problem that “should” be simple.
This isn’t a sign of incompetence. It’s a sign that you’re actually doing real work.
The Motorsport Test
In motorcycle racing, there’s a saying: if you’re not falling, you’re not pushing hard enough.
The best riders in the world crash. Regularly. Not because they’re bad—because they’re operating at the edge of what’s possible. They’re constantly testing the limits, and sometimes they find them the hard way.
Engineering is exactly the same.
If you’re not getting stuck, if you’re not making mistakes, if everything feels easy and under control—you’re not doing anything challenging. You’re coasting. You’re doing the same repetitive work you’ve done a hundred times before.
The Comfortable Trap
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: a lot of engineers spend their entire careers doing the same basic, repetitive tasks. They master those tasks. They feel confident. They might even feel superior.
But they’re not pushing any boundaries. They’re providing almost no value that couldn’t be automated. They’re not engineers in any meaningful sense—they’re operators.
Your value as an engineer isn’t in executing the same playbook forever. It’s in expanding the domain of what’s possible. It’s in tackling problems that don’t have established solutions. It’s in the exploration.
And exploration means trial and error. It means failure. Constant failure.
This is also where creativity becomes essential—but that’s a topic for another post. For now, just know that the ability to explore uncharted territory, to try things that might not work, is inseparable from the humility to accept that you’ll often be wrong.
The Arrogance Filter
This is why arrogance is such a reliable red flag.
An engineer who is genuinely pushing boundaries knows what it feels like to be humbled. They know what it’s like to be stuck for days on something that “should” work. They’ve felt the frustration of a problem that makes them question everything they thought they knew.
That experience doesn’t produce arrogance. It produces humility.
When I see an engineer who thinks they’ve figured it all out, who talks down to others, who acts like they’re above making mistakes—I know they’re either:
- Not doing anything challenging, or
- So unaware they don’t even recognize their own failures
Neither option makes for a good engineer.
What Real Confidence Looks Like
Don’t confuse humility with lack of confidence. The best engineers I’ve worked with are deeply confident—but it’s a different kind of confidence.
Think of it like dogs. There’s always that loud dog, barking constantly, trying to prove he’s there. He needs everyone to notice him. But the truly powerful dog? He doesn’t bark. He doesn’t need to. He knows what he is, and that quiet certainty is felt by everyone around him.
Arrogance is the barking dog. Real confidence is the quiet one.
The best engineers are confident in their ability to figure things out. They know they’ll get stuck—that’s a given. But they also know they’ll push through eventually. They’ve done it before, hundreds of times. That track record gives them a quiet certainty that doesn’t need to announce itself.
They’re not confident that they already have all the answers. They’re confident that they’ll find them.
Big difference.
The Bottom Line
After 20+ years, I still get stuck on basic problems. I still make mistakes that make me shake my head. I still encounter situations where everything I thought I knew turns out to be wrong.
And I’ve learned to see that as a good sign.
It means I’m still pushing. Still learning. Still operating at the edge of what I can do.
The day everything feels easy is the day I’ve stopped growing. That’s the day I should worry—not the day I’m struggling.
So if you’re feeling humbled by your work today, congratulations. You’re probably doing something that matters.
And if you’re feeling like you’ve got it all figured out? Maybe it’s time to find a harder problem.
I have a saying: “The day I stop laughing is the day I can die.” A day without laughter is a wasted day.
The same applies here. The day I stop struggling with things is the day I stop learning. It’s the day I’ve given up. The struggle isn’t the obstacle—it’s the whole point.
(And yes, sense of humor in engineering is another topic we’ll get to. Turns out it’s more important than most people think.)