There’s plenty of questions where I feel like I’m having good answers to. Software design, how to prioritize things, how to resolve conflicts, all the essentials of engineering management. The bigger the teams get that I’m responsible for, the more I’m wondering to what degree I should, and to what degree I actually must be […]
How do you reason about how complicated software is? We all strive to build maintainable and, hopefully, simple, yet powerful systems. And in our own ways, probably all the things that we help to create fulfilling our very own definition of that. I don’t think there’s a lot of folks who would build complicated stuff […]
IT is probably fun to work in because you’re working with a bunch of folk that are pretty much successful because they’re good at finding patterns in stuff, and then finding solutions that address problems that look just like that. And that works really well for writing software. And only works so well for running […]
I’ve been on a vacation for a few days and gave myself a somewhat needed break from writing posts at a high frequency. I realized that even with only 500 words, the posts get a little diluted over time. That’s ok, and it’s mostly an observation that doesn’t surprise me. What makes me happy is […]
A key part of my strategy of leading engineering teams is removing complexity and shaping focus, to ensure the important things are clear and can actually be built. I’ve been doing this a lot, and I’m stuck wondering why we’re building so many things that absolutely no one needs. What do I mean by "so […]
Today, enjoying a day off and browsing around Twitter to get upset about nothing, I found something to get slightly excited about. I don’t have the patience to find the tweet now, but it was very much along the lines that being able to do most things as a software developer without touching your mouse […]
I’m a manager, and I’m spending a substantial part of my time writing things down, and hopefully creating clarity in doing so. The reason why I’m doing this is because I want to be the antithesis to a go to person. While I generally appreciate when people come to me for advise, for chatting or […]
I’ve got a bit of Monday advise. Mostly for me, to prepare myself for an interesting week to come (and a short one at that, with Wednesday being a bank holiday here). Since I’ve gotten myself a journal – a red one, just in case – I figured that there has to be something meaningful […]
In negotiations, there’s a term called anchoring. It refers to the concept that whatever first number is dropped in a conversation, is the number that will be the mental anchor for the rest of the negotiation. It’s why you should avoid saying the first number in any negotiation – if you’re too low, you’ve anchored […]
Whenever we talk about actual work, there’s a tendency of trying to understand how long something will take – or any other proxy metric that means the same thing, but in a more indirect way, such as complexity. This can serve a helpful purpose, but I think it’s mostly a distraction. Let’s talk about estimations! […]