Long-form essays on technology, leadership, and the craft of building
The Six Levels of an Engineering Manager Career — and Why They Matter
July 21, 2024A framework for understanding the fundamentally different jobs at each rung of the engineering leadership ladder — IC, Manager, Director, VP, C-Level, and CEO. Being promoted isn't doing your current job better; it's a new job with new skills, new mindsets, new success criteria, and new failure modes.
An Open Letter on Culture to Product and Engineering Organizations
October 15, 2022Eight cultural guidelines for product and engineering organizations, written during my 18 months as CTO at MongoDB. Topics: balancing non-functional requirements with features, treating tech debt as a choice, pride in your work, trust, Conway's law, Dunbar's number, experimentation, candor and context for accountability, and avoiding unnecessary approvals.
How to Stay Competitive and Flexible in a Multi-Cloud World… and How Not To
August 15, 2022An argument against the false fairy-tale of cloud-agnostic abstractions. Why letting the workload dictate the cloud, taking advantage of best-in-class services where you can, and focusing teams on being great on every environment they deploy to beats commoditizing yourself across the lowest common denominator. From conversations with many CTOs during my time at MongoDB.
Leadership Principles from Various Companies (under construction)
June 22, 2022A curated set of leadership principles from companies I've worked with or admired — with my commentary forthcoming.
A Single Prioritized Backlog
January 17, 2021About 70% Clay Christensen, 30% me. The case against balancing work and home as two separate budgets — and for integrating them into one prioritized list for your whole life. Licensed Apache 2.0 so others can adopt it.