Vercel VP: What Senior Engineers do Differently

<p>What senior engineers do differently has less to do with output than most career ladders suggest, and Lindsey Simon, VP of Engineering at Vercel, has watched the distinction sharpen as everyone in the valley becomes a &quot;member of technical staff.&quot; From why new grads with hackathon years might out-prepare engineers with six years on the job, to what happens when PR throughput stops being your lever, this is a conversation about what earns seniority now.</p><p>In this episode, we cover:</p><ul><li>Why engineering roles are consolidating into &quot;member of technical staff&quot;</li><li>How to ask agents first and frame better questions to humans</li><li>The scope-of-impact ladder and what the best engineers systematize</li><li>Learning how to learn: closing gaps to 100% understanding</li><li>Why writing is the skill that scales</li></ul><p>If you&#39;re wondering whether your years of experience still compound, or you&#39;re early-career and tired of the &quot;woe is the juniors&quot; narrative, this one reframes both.</p><p>This podcast was recorded at TechLead Conference, a conference for engineering leaders on adopting AI.</p><p><br></p><p>TIMESTAMPS<br>00:00:00 - Impact the Business<br>00:00:31 - FOMO all the time: The 2006 Google Interview<br>00:01:52 - Engineering Roles Are Consolidating<br>00:02:52 - The &quot;Member of Technical Staff&quot; trend in SF<br>00:03:33 - Interns Demo to the CTO<br>00:04:33 - How New Grads Out-Prepare Senior Engineers<br>00:06:10 - Ask Your Agent Before You Ask a Human<br>00:08:01 - Digging Backwards Into Fundamental Understanding<br>00:09:22 - &quot;We&#39;re All Junior Engineers Again&quot;<br>00:10:22 - Management Is Not Leadership<br>00:12:04 - Losing PR Throughput as Your #1 Lever<br>00:13:11 - Fulfillment Beyond Shipping Features<br>00:14:32 - Building for Fickle Engineers: Telemetry Beats Opinions<br>00:16:11 - Watching Users Struggle With Your Product<br>00:18:12 - Have Expectations for Seniors Actually Changed?<br>00:19:57 - Claude Says a Month, It Takes Two Hours<br>00:20:33 - What the Best Engineers Do Differently<br>00:21:30 - How Vercel React Skill Came to Be<br>00:22:23 - Why Conference Conversations Hit Different<br>00:23:35 - Learning How to Learn: Close Gaps to 100%<br>00:25:41 - The Case for Liberal Arts in Tech<br>00:27:03 - Get Feedback Early, Don&#39;t Hide in the Cave</p><p><br></p><p>Guest - Lindsey Simon, VP of Engineering at Vercel:</p><p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindseysimon" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindseysimon</a></p><p><a href="#softwareengineering" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">#softwareengineering</a> <a href="#ai" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">#ai</a> <a href="#careergrowth" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">#careergrowth</a></p>