Developers are biased against designers because of jealousy, and the bias is compounded by gender; but someone who can read and write code and also has great design taste is unstoppable, so the asker is in a strong position.
Scott responds to Birthday Girl's question about credibility bias: engineers undervalue design because of jealousy toward a discipline they haven't learned, and the bias is likely compounded by her being a woman. He affirms the hybrid role's value. ✦ AI generated
Scott · Syntax · 2026-08-05 · original ↗
starts at this moment · 4:57
“are people biased at design because it is not as a technical background?”
on the regard of are people biased against design because it's not seen as technical. Uh I think that this has always been one a bias that I've noticed and I would like to pose that it's out of jealousy. developers look at somebody who's good at design and think they possibly could not be as good of an engineer as me because well I'm not good at design and I would uh was you know that's a whole discipline you've had to learn and I've spent that time in the engineering side of things. So I I've personally seen this to be the case. ... I would also say it is probably also because you're a woman. I I that is also a bias that we see in this industry. So you you have a multiple factors here and I think that's working against you. But I do think that this role in particular is such a huge role in the future now uh of the world that we exist in with AI and all these things and somebody who has design taste and design style is going to be able to create some really amazing stuff.
verbatim transcript · starts at 4:57
4:45like that was the huge thing that everybody fought over as well is like should you be a full stack engineer or should you be backend and front end? That's no longer a question. In most cases, people are are doing both in the web world. Yeah. Wow. You know what I I and and I think one, happy birthday, birthday girl. two, if it is still your birthday, which I would assume it is considering
5:09that's your name. I I would say on the regard of are people biased against design because it's not seen as technical. Uh I think that this has always been one a bias that I've noticed and I would like to pose that it's out of jealousy. developers look at somebody who's good at design and think they possibly could not be as good of an engineer as me because well I'm not good
5:35at design and I would uh was you know that's a whole discipline you've had to learn and I've spent that time in the engineering side of things. So I I've personally seen this to be the case. Some people just have much better design intuition too. I've seen engineers that are are fantastic designers just because they have that really good design intuition. I would also say it is
5:59probably also because you're a woman. I I that is also a bias that we see in this industry. So you you have a multiple factors here and I think that's working against you. But I do think that this role in particular is such a huge role in the future now uh of the world that we exist in with AI and all these things and somebody who has design taste
6:26and design style is going to be able to create some really amazing stuff. So I think you're in a great position if if you can read and write code as well as have a great design sense. To me, this is like this is a role that I have tried to embody my entire career. This is the the this is the skill set that I wish that I had. I've