If you’ve never read Tina Fey’s book “Bossypants”, it’s worth your time. Tina Fey is a fantastic comedy writer. She also knows something about how to build a team of software engineers.

In one chapter, she talks about managing a team of comedy writers. It’s the same dynamic you see on 30 Rock, and I’m talking about two particular characters on the show – Toofer and Frank. She says that comedy writers come in two basic forms: the type who are very intellectual and academic, whose jokes will make you think (Toofer), and the type who will get up onstage and scream into a microphone until they find something that makes the audience laugh (Frank). She says any good comedy writing team needs both kinds, otherwise it goes wrong.

This same dynamic exists in software engineering. There are two kinds of coders: the type who follow best practices and design patterns, TDD-everything, if-it-ain’t-refactored-it-ain’t-right; then there’s the type who make it work, the real ship-or-die folks, the hackers. Any good software team needs both kinds, otherwise it goes wrong. 

Too much of the first kind and you never get anything done, too much of the second kind and you go bankrupt from technical debt.