The RSE hiring and career progression pipelines: Top tips to navigate them efficiently

THE RSE HIRING AND CAREER
PROGRESSION PIPELINES:

TOP TIPS TO NAVIGATE THEM EFFICIENTLY

TANIA ALLARD

RSE SOUTH LONDON - JULY 2023

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TANIA ALLARD
• Director Quansight Labs

• PSF board of directors

• DISC (Diversity in Scientific
Computing) chair

• FOSS, Open Research, Research
Software, MLOps, and accessibility

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https:/
/xkcd.com/
The mission of Quansight Labs is to sustain and
grow community-driven open source projects and
ecosystems, with a focus on the core of the PyData
stack and on tools and digital infrastructure for
data science, ML/AI, and scientific computing.
Tania Allard - trallard.dev | bit.ly/rsx-career

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• Not for profit

• Build and sustain open source
communities and projects

• Grants and other funding
mechanisms
• Consultancy-based operations

• Clients across research, industry,
government
SIMILAR: EMBEDDED RSE SIMILAR: SUPPORT RSE

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WHO IS THIS TALK FOR?
• Hiring managers

• Team leaders

• Interviewers
PEOPLE INVOLVED IN RSX* HIRING
• Individual contributors

• Team or technical leaders

• Across all career levels and
disciplines
RSX* AND FUTURE RSX
*RSX - anyone developing software which plays a significant role in research or research-related activities
(RSE, RSDesigner, RSProject Manager…)

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• Titles, levels, job descriptions… oh my what a mess

• Hiring RSXs

• Career planning and progression for RSXs
WHAT ARE WE TALKING ABOUT?
*RSX - anyone developing software which plays a significant role in research or research-related activities
(RSE, RSDesigner, RSProject Manager…)

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TITLES, LEVELS,
JOB
DESCRIPTIONS
WHAT A MESS

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AS ANY CAUTIONARY TALE..
It all started with a simple but brilliant
request:

We need new career ladders and job
descriptions

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AS ANY CAUTIONARY TALE..
AND A FOOL
It all started with a simple but brilliant
request:

We need new career ladders and job
descriptions

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WHO IS IN OUR TEAM?
DEVELOPERS / SOFTWARE ENGINEERS
PROJECT MANAGERS
DESIGNERS
DEVELOPER RELATIONS / EXPERIENCE ENGINEERS

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WHEN I SAY DEVELOPERS/RSES TEAM
THIS IS NOT WHAT I MEAN

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THIS IS MORE LIKE IT….
DEVOPS
PACKAGING & COMPILERS
OPEN INFRASTRUCTURE
GENERALISTS
NUMERICAL AND OPTIMISATION

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SO WE NEED CAREER
LADDERS AND JOB
DESCRIPTIONS YOU
SAY?

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BUILDING A CAREER LADDER*
01 - CREATE A LIST OF COMPETENCIES
02 - SET LEVELS
03 - MAP LEVELS TO COMPETENCIES
04 - ROLL OUT AND EVALUATE
05 - ETERNAL HAPPINESS
Most advice the world will give you*

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COMPETENCIES
LEADERSHIP COLLABORATION COMMUNICATION & FEEDBACK
STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT & IMPACT CRAFT & QUALITY
DELIVERY
AUTONOMY & OWNERSHIP
KNOWLEDGE SHARING
RSE I RSE II Sr. RSE I Sr. RSE II Staff RSE Principal RSE
LEVELS

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BUILDING A CAREER LADDER THAT PROMOTES GROWTH
01 - CREATE A LIST OF COMPETENCIES
01 BIS - DEFINE AND PROMOTE GROWTH
03 - MAP LEVELS TO COMPETENCIES
03 BIS - WRITE JOB DESCRIPTIONS
05 - ITERATE
Focused on the practice of Engineering at Quansight
0 - ALIGN WITH COMPANY VALUES
02 - SET LEVELS
04 - ROLL OUT AND EVALUATE

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THE MOMENT YOU REALISE…

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SCOPE
OWNERSHIP
Task Feature Domain Organisation
Execution
Process
Solution

discovery
Problem

Discovery
Project /

team
PROGRESSION MINDSET
RSE I
RSE II
Sr. RSE I
Sr. RSE II
Staff RSE
Principal RSE

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HIRING
FOR SCALE AND EXPANSION

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HIRING NOTES FROM THE FOOL HERSELF:
1. Hiring is hard and you will make mistakes (FACT)

2. Use your career ladders

3. Make sure everyone knows your career ladders

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HIRE FOR THE OPPOSITE OF THIS
• Know your team

• Identify:

• Gaps (competencies)

• Gaps (ownership)

• Capacity needs (expand vs scale, new
skills vs more of )

USE YOUR CAREER LADDERS

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IF ANYTHING…. WHEN HIRING
COMMUNICATION & FEEDBACK DELIVERY
Make sure you get indication of these two at least:

• Can they communicate with a set of diverse people?

• Can they get things done?

And then whatever technical skills you need…

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PROGRESSION
WITHOUT FOMO

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GROWING & KEEPING YOURSELF IN DEMAND (MYTH)
WHAT YOU KNOW
FOMO TOPIC
WHAT
YOU DO NOT
KNOW
SHINY
NEW THING
YOU DO NOT
KNOW
WHAT
YOU DO NOT
KNOW
WHAT YOU DO
NOT NEED TO
KNOW

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GROWING & KEEPING YOURSELF IN DEMAND (REALITY)
YOUR NICHE (WHAT YOU KNOW)
WHAT
YOU DON’T
KNOW
WHAT YOU KIND
OF KNOW
WHAT YOU’D
LIKE TO KNOW
MORE OF
WHAT
YOU KIND OF
NEED TO
KNOW
ENOUGH
TO MAKE
YOU
USEFUL
DIRECTION OF
GROWTH

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SCOPE
OWNERSHIP
Task Feature Domain Organisation
Execution
Process
Solution

discovery
Problem

Discovery
Project /

team
RSE I
RSE II
Sr. RSE I
Sr. RSE II
Staff RSE
Principal RSE
ONE OR BOTH DIMENSIONS

OF GROWTH

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WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?
It keeps you focused on what matters:

• Avoid snacking: low effort, low impact

• Avoid preening: low impact, high visibility

• Stop chasing ghosts and instead spend time on what
only you can do

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• Get to know your team

• Signal what matters to your team & organisation

• Hire for scale and expansion

• Use your career ladders
IF ANYTHING TAKE THIS: MANAGERS & TEAM
LEADS

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• Use your career ladders as a compass not as a GPS (i.e. help you set the direction of your
growth)

• Avoid snacking too much 🍪

• Learn smart:

• Know your niche (what only you can do)

• Know your team/domain

• Broaden your scope or ownership (one at a time)

• Focus what matters (technical work, glue work, collaboration)

• Finish things!
IF ANYTHING TAKE THIS: RSX

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www. quansight-labs.org
THANK YOU

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The RSE hiring and career progression pipelines: Top tips to navigate them efficiently

The RSE hiring and career progression pipelines: Top tips to navigate them efficiently

Tania Allard

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