During the past 19 years in software I have had the pleasure of working closely with five different 10x engineers.<p>None of them have been assholes - the opposite actually - once you&#x27;ve gotten to know them. If I were to generalize: most of them are not particularly extroverted, so that may be a cause of misunderstanding.<p>Some of the 3-5x engineers (they also exist!) have a tendency to treat people as &quot;idiots&quot; until they have proven themselves worthy intellectually&#x2F;engineering-wise.