I spent last week in Boston visiting one of our Amazon Robotics locations, and it got me thinking about something I heard last year at a Robotics conference that really stuck with me: “Not everyone in robotics is a roboticist.” To me, that meant, “You can be valuable here.”

Jumping into this new domain last year, I was impressed by the depth in each field that it takes to make robotics work. As Software Engineers, we generally learn a domain to apply our craft to. For example, in the past I’ve learned about how hotel reservation and travel systems work, how trains work, etc. Robotics is not a single domain. I quickly realized just how interdisciplinary it is, and that it’s probably the most diverse field I’ve worked in so far. Every day, I team up with people from all sorts of backgrounds: hardware and mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, network engineering, systems engineering, research and applied sciences, computer vision and AI domains, industrial design, and, of course, software engineering (my own background).

Once early on in my career, I realized I was considered an “expert” on a topic when someone referred me back to myself for more information!

I was researching how to build a web application that would serve as a reference implementation for my company. I wanted to be thorough, so I sought out experts who could help me with the gaps I had. Near the end of the day, someone told me, “I’m not sure, but I’ve heard so-and-so is the expert on that topic for our organization.” They were unknowingly referring to me.

Do you ever focus so much on what could go wrong that you overlook all the signs things are actually going well? In tech, our jobs often require us to anticipate failure. But we also need the ability to see where things could succeed — it’s key to thinking big and achieving great things.

If you’ve recently been promoted and taken on a larger scope, it’s common to suddenly feel like you’re not doing a good job. The reality is: you may be doing just fine - your brain just hasn’t caught up yet.

Let’s take the example here of becoming a Sr. Software Development Engineer - a clear step change in scope and responsibility. Your work isn’t just about the hands-on tasks anymore; you’re probably still coding, but you’re also scaling through other engineers on your team.