If you have two great engineers in a kitchen, discussing a relevant problem, you want there to be synergy. That synergy is broken when one of the engineers has to Google how to reverse a binary tree.
It is also a safe place to work for the really exceptional engineers. They can talk freely about complex computer science, without getting blank stares or having to dumb it down. Otherwise it gets frustrating fast.
CS is way too big for any individual to know it all in depth. If it really is a “safe place” because the employees can talk about complex topics without ever losing anyone, that would imply that they’re all specialized in roughly the same topics and severely lack organizational breadth. I kind of doubt that’s really true.
You can have organizational breath with smaller teams. You pair a great programmer with an exceptional programmer and it helps if they are specialized in roughly the same topics.
