   Upon reading Nurkhon’s Medium article titled “Companies want three types of designers in 2026,” I learned that big tech corporations found a new societal necessity to drain the life out of: entry-level poisitons. Nurkhon details established product companies desire to “rewrite what seniority means,” with hopes of optimizing productivity (shocker) from the design side of product development.
   Now, as a rising junior at my college studying computer science with a concentration in digital systems, I am no stranger to this shift in hiring perspective. Employers now find more value and interest in personal project of incoming prospects. For example, a candidate with a rough draft of an app that synchronizes Spotify data with exercise data from apps like Strava will have 4 times the value of another candidate who only has a 4.0 GPA and a few years of boring experience to offer.Â
   This perspective drew me to Wen’s idea of the “cracked new grad,” a new hire archetype with “a blank slate and is just a really quick learner.” This honey badger-like engineer is what new companies are interested in. A thinker who isn’t intimidated by its small size or lack of experience. One who, in the face of perceived incompetence, doesn’t even consider it and instead just… acts. A young buck with thick skin and an aggressive drive to produce and innovate.Â