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The Importance of Effective Communication Skills in Technical Roles

Software engineers and developers often have a lack of balance between their technical and soft skills, such as communication and emotional management. It is important to recognize this as an area for improvement and allocate time to strengthen these skills, just as one would with software development. Leaders should also support their team members in taking charge of conversations. Ultimately, it is an ongoing learning journey to improve soft skills and communication techniques.

Guiding Your Team Through a Data-Driven Transformation

Governing a data environment is different from governing a transactional application, and data scientists need data that is restricted due to personal information. To manage transformations, it is important to communicate with stakeholders and understand their concerns. Amazon and Capital One solved this problem by allowing people to use the programming language they wanted. To help employees keep up with change, it is important to make incremental changes and let people ask questions.

Checking For Values Alignment When Considering a New Role

In this article, the author shares their experience of values misalignment with senior leadership in a previous role. They emphasize the importance of understanding and prioritizing one's values when considering a new role, and suggest asking questions in the interview process to ensure value alignment. They also discuss the difference between intentional and unintentional misalignment, and how to approach each.

The Importance of Culture and Values When Building Teams

This story reflects on the importance of culture and values in a team and organization. It recounts a story of a young team lead and their tech team who faced many challenges while trying to deploy a key update to production. Despite the demolition of the room around them, power outages, and other obstacles, they persevered and succeeded due to their shared values and culture. The story emphasizes the importance of culture and values in a team and organization, and how they can help to navigate difficult times.

10x engineer or 10x impact?

Hiring 10x engineers is difficult and competitive, and many companies fail to retain them. To hire and retain 10x engineers, companies need to create an environment where they can thrive and have a sense of purpose. Companies should also create structures that make it possible to systematically work on high impact projects, and set expectations for senior engineers to identify and deliver such projects. With time, even non-10x engineers can become 5x engineers, and creating a supportive environment can help 10x engineers be successful when they join.

How to Streamline Your Recruitment Process for Quick and Effective Hiring

In the current job market, recruiters need to be quick and effective in their hiring process. This includes having a short recruitment process, asking technical questions that are relevant and realistic, looking for emotional intelligence and passion for the craft, and conducting video interviews at the latest stage. Additionally, recruiters should avoid asking candidates why they quit their job or inquiring about their previous salaries, and explain to them why the recruitment process is structured the way it is. The assessment of a candidate is not over when they are hired, but continues until their last hour on the job.

How to Maximize Employee Retention in Engineering Teams

High churn rates can have a significant impact on product-based companies, so it is important to find ways to retain employees. The author, a CTO, has adopted several management techniques to reduce the churn rate, such as a 4-step interview process, an onboarding process that normalizes knowledge gaps and is generous with adaptation time, and a management approach that gives ownership of the work, explains the reasoning behind goals, conducts regular check-ins, and provides flexible working hours. The key tips for high retention are to not micromanage, lead with empathy, and trust employees.

Hiring a Data Team With a Stubborn Manager

The author had difficulty hiring a data team due to a strict recruitment process and an internal recruitment team that didn't understand data roles. The job description was also unhelpful, and the hiring manager was stubborn. After putting his foot down, the author was able to hire two individuals who had previously been rejected. He learned that to be heard, he had to be assertive and work with recruiters who understand data roles.

The Art of Asking Why: Narrowing the Gap Between Customers and Users

As a product manager, it is essential to understand the split between users and customers and to dig deeper into the root problems to create the best solutions. This involves saying no to good ideas, involving the product trio early in the discovery process, and shadowing users in their own environment. By doing this, product managers can build successful products that meet the needs of both users and customers.

Managing Different Time Zones: Inclusive Collaboration Methods

Synchronous communication tools, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, are great for quickly hashing out problems, but their fleeting nature can lead to a loss of information. When working with a remote team, it is important to use asynchronous platforms for decision-making to ensure everyone is included. Tools such as P2 and Notion are great for this, and it is always better to over-communicate than under-communicate.

Managing Remotely: Balancing Team Cohesion and Focus Time

As a manager, it is important to find a balance between fostering team unity and providing individual focus time. To do this, it is important to eliminate superfluous meetings, create meeting time blocks, request status updates in written form, allow for free-flowing conversation, and encourage one-on-ones among ICs. These steps will help to ensure that meetings are productive and provide value.

Creating a Company Culture That Balances Helpfulness and Productivity

This article discusses the problem of overly helpful teammates who spend too much time helping others and not enough time on their own tasks. It proposes the 30-minute rule, which encourages people to help their colleagues for up to 30 minutes each day, but to then focus on their own tasks. This rule has been successful in creating a culture of helpfulness without disrupting productivity.

Streamlining Product Processes After a Reorganization

As program manager, the author faced the challenge of unifying a newly acquired team of 150 people who had no experience with program management. The author's strategy included unifying the toolset, getting leadership buy-in, informing the teams, and executing the plan. The author was successful in achieving the goal, and the teams began to collaborate and share knowledge. The author learned that it takes time for people to get used to new things, and it can be challenging to change people's opinions.

Navigating Disagreements When It Comes to Priorities

When stakeholders disagree on priorities, it is important to take the time to understand where they are coming from and discuss both points of view. Give team members the chance to test out their suggestions and build a transparent framework or system that invites others into the process. This will help to unify the departments on decision-making and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Growing Through Different Engineering Lead Roles

This article outlines the three steps to becoming a tech lead: gaining the trust of the team through competency and integrity, and being a mentor figure to fellow engineers. It also discusses the challenges of transitioning to a tech lead manager role, such as juggling technical work, project management, and people management. The author suggests that new leads should reach out to notable leaders in their organization for mentorship, and that the best solution for productivity challenges is to find the right technical work to grow their ceiling without bottlenecking their team.

Preparing For Your First Presentation: The Art of Public Speaking

Public speaking is important for many reasons, including knowledge sharing, networking, and broadening your reputation. Preparing for your first time speaking involves choosing a topic, picking the appropriate community event and level, and rehearsing. It is important to understand your presentation style and to participate in community and international events to gain experience.

A Look Into the Hiring Pipeline: How to Fine Tune the Interviewing Process

When a company operates remotely, it sources a wide pool of candidates from all over the globe, which affects the outcome of talent acquisition. Refining the hiring process is necessary to identify where candidates are being rejected and to take a holistic approach to hiring. It is important to create an interview template, open up the approach to hiring, and continually refine the interviewing process to find the right fit for the company.

Here to Make a Recognizable Difference: How to Develop Teams

This article explores the perspective of an engineer on good management and developing teams. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the need and desired outcome of a problem, avoiding dependencies across members, and empowering teams to take initiative and think critically. It also discusses the challenge of training managers and the need to create effective leaders in order to build successful organizations.

Balancing Technical Debt Innovation: How Roadmaps for Development Help Your Company Succeed

In order to achieve balance between technical debt and technical innovation, it is essential to have a strong foundation, which is your team. Leaders must provide a roadmap for their team's professional growth and development, and invest 20% of their time in these processes. Hiring for good cultural fit is important to ensure employees are happy and fulfilled, and to prevent technical debt from occurring. Completion over perfection is key, and showing your team that you care about their direction will help build a strong foundation.

The Optimization and Organization of Large Scale Demand

When presented with a large-scale project with 5,000 requirements, the challenge of organizing and deducing into a more holistic approach is daunting. To streamline efficiency, the requirements were organized into 350 different groupings and Jira was introduced as a platform for increased support. Respect for everyone's time and communication were key in achieving growth as a company and maintaining and supporting the project.

The Importance of Effective Communication Skills in Technical Roles

Software engineers and developers often have a lack of balance between their technical and soft skills, such as communication and emotional management. It is important to recognize this as an area for improvement and allocate time to strengthen these skills, just as one would with software development. Leaders should also support their team members in taking charge of conversations. Ultimately, it is an ongoing learning journey to improve soft skills and communication techniques.

Guiding Your Team Through a Data-Driven Transformation

Governing a data environment is different from governing a transactional application, and data scientists need data that is restricted due to personal information. To manage transformations, it is important to communicate with stakeholders and understand their concerns. Amazon and Capital One solved this problem by allowing people to use the programming language they wanted. To help employees keep up with change, it is important to make incremental changes and let people ask questions.

Checking For Values Alignment When Considering a New Role

In this article, the author shares their experience of values misalignment with senior leadership in a previous role. They emphasize the importance of understanding and prioritizing one's values when considering a new role, and suggest asking questions in the interview process to ensure value alignment. They also discuss the difference between intentional and unintentional misalignment, and how to approach each.

The Importance of Culture and Values When Building Teams

This story reflects on the importance of culture and values in a team and organization. It recounts a story of a young team lead and their tech team who faced many challenges while trying to deploy a key update to production. Despite the demolition of the room around them, power outages, and other obstacles, they persevered and succeeded due to their shared values and culture. The story emphasizes the importance of culture and values in a team and organization, and how they can help to navigate difficult times.

10x engineer or 10x impact?

Hiring 10x engineers is difficult and competitive, and many companies fail to retain them. To hire and retain 10x engineers, companies need to create an environment where they can thrive and have a sense of purpose. Companies should also create structures that make it possible to systematically work on high impact projects, and set expectations for senior engineers to identify and deliver such projects. With time, even non-10x engineers can become 5x engineers, and creating a supportive environment can help 10x engineers be successful when they join.

How to Streamline Your Recruitment Process for Quick and Effective Hiring

In the current job market, recruiters need to be quick and effective in their hiring process. This includes having a short recruitment process, asking technical questions that are relevant and realistic, looking for emotional intelligence and passion for the craft, and conducting video interviews at the latest stage. Additionally, recruiters should avoid asking candidates why they quit their job or inquiring about their previous salaries, and explain to them why the recruitment process is structured the way it is. The assessment of a candidate is not over when they are hired, but continues until their last hour on the job.

How to Maximize Employee Retention in Engineering Teams

High churn rates can have a significant impact on product-based companies, so it is important to find ways to retain employees. The author, a CTO, has adopted several management techniques to reduce the churn rate, such as a 4-step interview process, an onboarding process that normalizes knowledge gaps and is generous with adaptation time, and a management approach that gives ownership of the work, explains the reasoning behind goals, conducts regular check-ins, and provides flexible working hours. The key tips for high retention are to not micromanage, lead with empathy, and trust employees.

Hiring a Data Team With a Stubborn Manager

The author had difficulty hiring a data team due to a strict recruitment process and an internal recruitment team that didn't understand data roles. The job description was also unhelpful, and the hiring manager was stubborn. After putting his foot down, the author was able to hire two individuals who had previously been rejected. He learned that to be heard, he had to be assertive and work with recruiters who understand data roles.

The Art of Asking Why: Narrowing the Gap Between Customers and Users

As a product manager, it is essential to understand the split between users and customers and to dig deeper into the root problems to create the best solutions. This involves saying no to good ideas, involving the product trio early in the discovery process, and shadowing users in their own environment. By doing this, product managers can build successful products that meet the needs of both users and customers.

Managing Different Time Zones: Inclusive Collaboration Methods

Synchronous communication tools, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, are great for quickly hashing out problems, but their fleeting nature can lead to a loss of information. When working with a remote team, it is important to use asynchronous platforms for decision-making to ensure everyone is included. Tools such as P2 and Notion are great for this, and it is always better to over-communicate than under-communicate.

Managing Remotely: Balancing Team Cohesion and Focus Time

As a manager, it is important to find a balance between fostering team unity and providing individual focus time. To do this, it is important to eliminate superfluous meetings, create meeting time blocks, request status updates in written form, allow for free-flowing conversation, and encourage one-on-ones among ICs. These steps will help to ensure that meetings are productive and provide value.

Creating a Company Culture That Balances Helpfulness and Productivity

This article discusses the problem of overly helpful teammates who spend too much time helping others and not enough time on their own tasks. It proposes the 30-minute rule, which encourages people to help their colleagues for up to 30 minutes each day, but to then focus on their own tasks. This rule has been successful in creating a culture of helpfulness without disrupting productivity.

Streamlining Product Processes After a Reorganization

As program manager, the author faced the challenge of unifying a newly acquired team of 150 people who had no experience with program management. The author's strategy included unifying the toolset, getting leadership buy-in, informing the teams, and executing the plan. The author was successful in achieving the goal, and the teams began to collaborate and share knowledge. The author learned that it takes time for people to get used to new things, and it can be challenging to change people's opinions.

Navigating Disagreements When It Comes to Priorities

When stakeholders disagree on priorities, it is important to take the time to understand where they are coming from and discuss both points of view. Give team members the chance to test out their suggestions and build a transparent framework or system that invites others into the process. This will help to unify the departments on decision-making and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Growing Through Different Engineering Lead Roles

This article outlines the three steps to becoming a tech lead: gaining the trust of the team through competency and integrity, and being a mentor figure to fellow engineers. It also discusses the challenges of transitioning to a tech lead manager role, such as juggling technical work, project management, and people management. The author suggests that new leads should reach out to notable leaders in their organization for mentorship, and that the best solution for productivity challenges is to find the right technical work to grow their ceiling without bottlenecking their team.

Preparing For Your First Presentation: The Art of Public Speaking

Public speaking is important for many reasons, including knowledge sharing, networking, and broadening your reputation. Preparing for your first time speaking involves choosing a topic, picking the appropriate community event and level, and rehearsing. It is important to understand your presentation style and to participate in community and international events to gain experience.

A Look Into the Hiring Pipeline: How to Fine Tune the Interviewing Process

When a company operates remotely, it sources a wide pool of candidates from all over the globe, which affects the outcome of talent acquisition. Refining the hiring process is necessary to identify where candidates are being rejected and to take a holistic approach to hiring. It is important to create an interview template, open up the approach to hiring, and continually refine the interviewing process to find the right fit for the company.

Here to Make a Recognizable Difference: How to Develop Teams

This article explores the perspective of an engineer on good management and developing teams. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the need and desired outcome of a problem, avoiding dependencies across members, and empowering teams to take initiative and think critically. It also discusses the challenge of training managers and the need to create effective leaders in order to build successful organizations.

Balancing Technical Debt Innovation: How Roadmaps for Development Help Your Company Succeed

In order to achieve balance between technical debt and technical innovation, it is essential to have a strong foundation, which is your team. Leaders must provide a roadmap for their team's professional growth and development, and invest 20% of their time in these processes. Hiring for good cultural fit is important to ensure employees are happy and fulfilled, and to prevent technical debt from occurring. Completion over perfection is key, and showing your team that you care about their direction will help build a strong foundation.

The Optimization and Organization of Large Scale Demand

When presented with a large-scale project with 5,000 requirements, the challenge of organizing and deducing into a more holistic approach is daunting. To streamline efficiency, the requirements were organized into 350 different groupings and Jira was introduced as a platform for increased support. Respect for everyone's time and communication were key in achieving growth as a company and maintaining and supporting the project.

The Importance of Effective Communication Skills in Technical Roles

Software engineers and developers often have a lack of balance between their technical and soft skills, such as communication and emotional management. It is important to recognize this as an area for improvement and allocate time to strengthen these skills, just as one would with software development. Leaders should also support their team members in taking charge of conversations. Ultimately, it is an ongoing learning journey to improve soft skills and communication techniques.

Guiding Your Team Through a Data-Driven Transformation

Governing a data environment is different from governing a transactional application, and data scientists need data that is restricted due to personal information. To manage transformations, it is important to communicate with stakeholders and understand their concerns. Amazon and Capital One solved this problem by allowing people to use the programming language they wanted. To help employees keep up with change, it is important to make incremental changes and let people ask questions.

Checking For Values Alignment When Considering a New Role

In this article, the author shares their experience of values misalignment with senior leadership in a previous role. They emphasize the importance of understanding and prioritizing one's values when considering a new role, and suggest asking questions in the interview process to ensure value alignment. They also discuss the difference between intentional and unintentional misalignment, and how to approach each.

The Importance of Culture and Values When Building Teams

This story reflects on the importance of culture and values in a team and organization. It recounts a story of a young team lead and their tech team who faced many challenges while trying to deploy a key update to production. Despite the demolition of the room around them, power outages, and other obstacles, they persevered and succeeded due to their shared values and culture. The story emphasizes the importance of culture and values in a team and organization, and how they can help to navigate difficult times.

10x engineer or 10x impact?

Hiring 10x engineers is difficult and competitive, and many companies fail to retain them. To hire and retain 10x engineers, companies need to create an environment where they can thrive and have a sense of purpose. Companies should also create structures that make it possible to systematically work on high impact projects, and set expectations for senior engineers to identify and deliver such projects. With time, even non-10x engineers can become 5x engineers, and creating a supportive environment can help 10x engineers be successful when they join.

How to Streamline Your Recruitment Process for Quick and Effective Hiring

In the current job market, recruiters need to be quick and effective in their hiring process. This includes having a short recruitment process, asking technical questions that are relevant and realistic, looking for emotional intelligence and passion for the craft, and conducting video interviews at the latest stage. Additionally, recruiters should avoid asking candidates why they quit their job or inquiring about their previous salaries, and explain to them why the recruitment process is structured the way it is. The assessment of a candidate is not over when they are hired, but continues until their last hour on the job.

How to Maximize Employee Retention in Engineering Teams

High churn rates can have a significant impact on product-based companies, so it is important to find ways to retain employees. The author, a CTO, has adopted several management techniques to reduce the churn rate, such as a 4-step interview process, an onboarding process that normalizes knowledge gaps and is generous with adaptation time, and a management approach that gives ownership of the work, explains the reasoning behind goals, conducts regular check-ins, and provides flexible working hours. The key tips for high retention are to not micromanage, lead with empathy, and trust employees.

Hiring a Data Team With a Stubborn Manager

The author had difficulty hiring a data team due to a strict recruitment process and an internal recruitment team that didn't understand data roles. The job description was also unhelpful, and the hiring manager was stubborn. After putting his foot down, the author was able to hire two individuals who had previously been rejected. He learned that to be heard, he had to be assertive and work with recruiters who understand data roles.

The Art of Asking Why: Narrowing the Gap Between Customers and Users

As a product manager, it is essential to understand the split between users and customers and to dig deeper into the root problems to create the best solutions. This involves saying no to good ideas, involving the product trio early in the discovery process, and shadowing users in their own environment. By doing this, product managers can build successful products that meet the needs of both users and customers.

Managing Different Time Zones: Inclusive Collaboration Methods

Synchronous communication tools, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, are great for quickly hashing out problems, but their fleeting nature can lead to a loss of information. When working with a remote team, it is important to use asynchronous platforms for decision-making to ensure everyone is included. Tools such as P2 and Notion are great for this, and it is always better to over-communicate than under-communicate.

Managing Remotely: Balancing Team Cohesion and Focus Time

As a manager, it is important to find a balance between fostering team unity and providing individual focus time. To do this, it is important to eliminate superfluous meetings, create meeting time blocks, request status updates in written form, allow for free-flowing conversation, and encourage one-on-ones among ICs. These steps will help to ensure that meetings are productive and provide value.

Creating a Company Culture That Balances Helpfulness and Productivity

This article discusses the problem of overly helpful teammates who spend too much time helping others and not enough time on their own tasks. It proposes the 30-minute rule, which encourages people to help their colleagues for up to 30 minutes each day, but to then focus on their own tasks. This rule has been successful in creating a culture of helpfulness without disrupting productivity.

Streamlining Product Processes After a Reorganization

As program manager, the author faced the challenge of unifying a newly acquired team of 150 people who had no experience with program management. The author's strategy included unifying the toolset, getting leadership buy-in, informing the teams, and executing the plan. The author was successful in achieving the goal, and the teams began to collaborate and share knowledge. The author learned that it takes time for people to get used to new things, and it can be challenging to change people's opinions.

Navigating Disagreements When It Comes to Priorities

When stakeholders disagree on priorities, it is important to take the time to understand where they are coming from and discuss both points of view. Give team members the chance to test out their suggestions and build a transparent framework or system that invites others into the process. This will help to unify the departments on decision-making and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Growing Through Different Engineering Lead Roles

This article outlines the three steps to becoming a tech lead: gaining the trust of the team through competency and integrity, and being a mentor figure to fellow engineers. It also discusses the challenges of transitioning to a tech lead manager role, such as juggling technical work, project management, and people management. The author suggests that new leads should reach out to notable leaders in their organization for mentorship, and that the best solution for productivity challenges is to find the right technical work to grow their ceiling without bottlenecking their team.

Preparing For Your First Presentation: The Art of Public Speaking

Public speaking is important for many reasons, including knowledge sharing, networking, and broadening your reputation. Preparing for your first time speaking involves choosing a topic, picking the appropriate community event and level, and rehearsing. It is important to understand your presentation style and to participate in community and international events to gain experience.

A Look Into the Hiring Pipeline: How to Fine Tune the Interviewing Process

When a company operates remotely, it sources a wide pool of candidates from all over the globe, which affects the outcome of talent acquisition. Refining the hiring process is necessary to identify where candidates are being rejected and to take a holistic approach to hiring. It is important to create an interview template, open up the approach to hiring, and continually refine the interviewing process to find the right fit for the company.

Here to Make a Recognizable Difference: How to Develop Teams

This article explores the perspective of an engineer on good management and developing teams. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the need and desired outcome of a problem, avoiding dependencies across members, and empowering teams to take initiative and think critically. It also discusses the challenge of training managers and the need to create effective leaders in order to build successful organizations.

Balancing Technical Debt Innovation: How Roadmaps for Development Help Your Company Succeed

In order to achieve balance between technical debt and technical innovation, it is essential to have a strong foundation, which is your team. Leaders must provide a roadmap for their team's professional growth and development, and invest 20% of their time in these processes. Hiring for good cultural fit is important to ensure employees are happy and fulfilled, and to prevent technical debt from occurring. Completion over perfection is key, and showing your team that you care about their direction will help build a strong foundation.

The Optimization and Organization of Large Scale Demand

When presented with a large-scale project with 5,000 requirements, the challenge of organizing and deducing into a more holistic approach is daunting. To streamline efficiency, the requirements were organized into 350 different groupings and Jira was introduced as a platform for increased support. Respect for everyone's time and communication were key in achieving growth as a company and maintaining and supporting the project.

The Importance of Effective Communication Skills in Technical Roles

Software engineers and developers often have a lack of balance between their technical and soft skills, such as communication and emotional management. It is important to recognize this as an area for improvement and allocate time to strengthen these skills, just as one would with software development. Leaders should also support their team members in taking charge of conversations. Ultimately, it is an ongoing learning journey to improve soft skills and communication techniques.

Guiding Your Team Through a Data-Driven Transformation

Governing a data environment is different from governing a transactional application, and data scientists need data that is restricted due to personal information. To manage transformations, it is important to communicate with stakeholders and understand their concerns. Amazon and Capital One solved this problem by allowing people to use the programming language they wanted. To help employees keep up with change, it is important to make incremental changes and let people ask questions.

Checking For Values Alignment When Considering a New Role

In this article, the author shares their experience of values misalignment with senior leadership in a previous role. They emphasize the importance of understanding and prioritizing one's values when considering a new role, and suggest asking questions in the interview process to ensure value alignment. They also discuss the difference between intentional and unintentional misalignment, and how to approach each.

The Importance of Culture and Values When Building Teams

This story reflects on the importance of culture and values in a team and organization. It recounts a story of a young team lead and their tech team who faced many challenges while trying to deploy a key update to production. Despite the demolition of the room around them, power outages, and other obstacles, they persevered and succeeded due to their shared values and culture. The story emphasizes the importance of culture and values in a team and organization, and how they can help to navigate difficult times.

10x engineer or 10x impact?

Hiring 10x engineers is difficult and competitive, and many companies fail to retain them. To hire and retain 10x engineers, companies need to create an environment where they can thrive and have a sense of purpose. Companies should also create structures that make it possible to systematically work on high impact projects, and set expectations for senior engineers to identify and deliver such projects. With time, even non-10x engineers can become 5x engineers, and creating a supportive environment can help 10x engineers be successful when they join.

How to Streamline Your Recruitment Process for Quick and Effective Hiring

In the current job market, recruiters need to be quick and effective in their hiring process. This includes having a short recruitment process, asking technical questions that are relevant and realistic, looking for emotional intelligence and passion for the craft, and conducting video interviews at the latest stage. Additionally, recruiters should avoid asking candidates why they quit their job or inquiring about their previous salaries, and explain to them why the recruitment process is structured the way it is. The assessment of a candidate is not over when they are hired, but continues until their last hour on the job.

How to Maximize Employee Retention in Engineering Teams

High churn rates can have a significant impact on product-based companies, so it is important to find ways to retain employees. The author, a CTO, has adopted several management techniques to reduce the churn rate, such as a 4-step interview process, an onboarding process that normalizes knowledge gaps and is generous with adaptation time, and a management approach that gives ownership of the work, explains the reasoning behind goals, conducts regular check-ins, and provides flexible working hours. The key tips for high retention are to not micromanage, lead with empathy, and trust employees.

Hiring a Data Team With a Stubborn Manager

The author had difficulty hiring a data team due to a strict recruitment process and an internal recruitment team that didn't understand data roles. The job description was also unhelpful, and the hiring manager was stubborn. After putting his foot down, the author was able to hire two individuals who had previously been rejected. He learned that to be heard, he had to be assertive and work with recruiters who understand data roles.

The Art of Asking Why: Narrowing the Gap Between Customers and Users

As a product manager, it is essential to understand the split between users and customers and to dig deeper into the root problems to create the best solutions. This involves saying no to good ideas, involving the product trio early in the discovery process, and shadowing users in their own environment. By doing this, product managers can build successful products that meet the needs of both users and customers.

Managing Different Time Zones: Inclusive Collaboration Methods

Synchronous communication tools, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, are great for quickly hashing out problems, but their fleeting nature can lead to a loss of information. When working with a remote team, it is important to use asynchronous platforms for decision-making to ensure everyone is included. Tools such as P2 and Notion are great for this, and it is always better to over-communicate than under-communicate.

Managing Remotely: Balancing Team Cohesion and Focus Time

As a manager, it is important to find a balance between fostering team unity and providing individual focus time. To do this, it is important to eliminate superfluous meetings, create meeting time blocks, request status updates in written form, allow for free-flowing conversation, and encourage one-on-ones among ICs. These steps will help to ensure that meetings are productive and provide value.

Creating a Company Culture That Balances Helpfulness and Productivity

This article discusses the problem of overly helpful teammates who spend too much time helping others and not enough time on their own tasks. It proposes the 30-minute rule, which encourages people to help their colleagues for up to 30 minutes each day, but to then focus on their own tasks. This rule has been successful in creating a culture of helpfulness without disrupting productivity.

Streamlining Product Processes After a Reorganization

As program manager, the author faced the challenge of unifying a newly acquired team of 150 people who had no experience with program management. The author's strategy included unifying the toolset, getting leadership buy-in, informing the teams, and executing the plan. The author was successful in achieving the goal, and the teams began to collaborate and share knowledge. The author learned that it takes time for people to get used to new things, and it can be challenging to change people's opinions.

Navigating Disagreements When It Comes to Priorities

When stakeholders disagree on priorities, it is important to take the time to understand where they are coming from and discuss both points of view. Give team members the chance to test out their suggestions and build a transparent framework or system that invites others into the process. This will help to unify the departments on decision-making and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Growing Through Different Engineering Lead Roles

This article outlines the three steps to becoming a tech lead: gaining the trust of the team through competency and integrity, and being a mentor figure to fellow engineers. It also discusses the challenges of transitioning to a tech lead manager role, such as juggling technical work, project management, and people management. The author suggests that new leads should reach out to notable leaders in their organization for mentorship, and that the best solution for productivity challenges is to find the right technical work to grow their ceiling without bottlenecking their team.

Preparing For Your First Presentation: The Art of Public Speaking

Public speaking is important for many reasons, including knowledge sharing, networking, and broadening your reputation. Preparing for your first time speaking involves choosing a topic, picking the appropriate community event and level, and rehearsing. It is important to understand your presentation style and to participate in community and international events to gain experience.

A Look Into the Hiring Pipeline: How to Fine Tune the Interviewing Process

When a company operates remotely, it sources a wide pool of candidates from all over the globe, which affects the outcome of talent acquisition. Refining the hiring process is necessary to identify where candidates are being rejected and to take a holistic approach to hiring. It is important to create an interview template, open up the approach to hiring, and continually refine the interviewing process to find the right fit for the company.

Here to Make a Recognizable Difference: How to Develop Teams

This article explores the perspective of an engineer on good management and developing teams. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the need and desired outcome of a problem, avoiding dependencies across members, and empowering teams to take initiative and think critically. It also discusses the challenge of training managers and the need to create effective leaders in order to build successful organizations.

Balancing Technical Debt Innovation: How Roadmaps for Development Help Your Company Succeed

In order to achieve balance between technical debt and technical innovation, it is essential to have a strong foundation, which is your team. Leaders must provide a roadmap for their team's professional growth and development, and invest 20% of their time in these processes. Hiring for good cultural fit is important to ensure employees are happy and fulfilled, and to prevent technical debt from occurring. Completion over perfection is key, and showing your team that you care about their direction will help build a strong foundation.

The Optimization and Organization of Large Scale Demand

When presented with a large-scale project with 5,000 requirements, the challenge of organizing and deducing into a more holistic approach is daunting. To streamline efficiency, the requirements were organized into 350 different groupings and Jira was introduced as a platform for increased support. Respect for everyone's time and communication were key in achieving growth as a company and maintaining and supporting the project.

The Importance of Effective Communication Skills in Technical Roles

Software engineers and developers often have a lack of balance between their technical and soft skills, such as communication and emotional management. It is important to recognize this as an area for improvement and allocate time to strengthen these skills, just as one would with software development. Leaders should also support their team members in taking charge of conversations. Ultimately, it is an ongoing learning journey to improve soft skills and communication techniques.

Guiding Your Team Through a Data-Driven Transformation

Governing a data environment is different from governing a transactional application, and data scientists need data that is restricted due to personal information. To manage transformations, it is important to communicate with stakeholders and understand their concerns. Amazon and Capital One solved this problem by allowing people to use the programming language they wanted. To help employees keep up with change, it is important to make incremental changes and let people ask questions.

Checking For Values Alignment When Considering a New Role

In this article, the author shares their experience of values misalignment with senior leadership in a previous role. They emphasize the importance of understanding and prioritizing one's values when considering a new role, and suggest asking questions in the interview process to ensure value alignment. They also discuss the difference between intentional and unintentional misalignment, and how to approach each.

The Importance of Culture and Values When Building Teams

This story reflects on the importance of culture and values in a team and organization. It recounts a story of a young team lead and their tech team who faced many challenges while trying to deploy a key update to production. Despite the demolition of the room around them, power outages, and other obstacles, they persevered and succeeded due to their shared values and culture. The story emphasizes the importance of culture and values in a team and organization, and how they can help to navigate difficult times.

10x engineer or 10x impact?

Hiring 10x engineers is difficult and competitive, and many companies fail to retain them. To hire and retain 10x engineers, companies need to create an environment where they can thrive and have a sense of purpose. Companies should also create structures that make it possible to systematically work on high impact projects, and set expectations for senior engineers to identify and deliver such projects. With time, even non-10x engineers can become 5x engineers, and creating a supportive environment can help 10x engineers be successful when they join.

How to Streamline Your Recruitment Process for Quick and Effective Hiring

In the current job market, recruiters need to be quick and effective in their hiring process. This includes having a short recruitment process, asking technical questions that are relevant and realistic, looking for emotional intelligence and passion for the craft, and conducting video interviews at the latest stage. Additionally, recruiters should avoid asking candidates why they quit their job or inquiring about their previous salaries, and explain to them why the recruitment process is structured the way it is. The assessment of a candidate is not over when they are hired, but continues until their last hour on the job.

How to Maximize Employee Retention in Engineering Teams

High churn rates can have a significant impact on product-based companies, so it is important to find ways to retain employees. The author, a CTO, has adopted several management techniques to reduce the churn rate, such as a 4-step interview process, an onboarding process that normalizes knowledge gaps and is generous with adaptation time, and a management approach that gives ownership of the work, explains the reasoning behind goals, conducts regular check-ins, and provides flexible working hours. The key tips for high retention are to not micromanage, lead with empathy, and trust employees.

Hiring a Data Team With a Stubborn Manager

The author had difficulty hiring a data team due to a strict recruitment process and an internal recruitment team that didn't understand data roles. The job description was also unhelpful, and the hiring manager was stubborn. After putting his foot down, the author was able to hire two individuals who had previously been rejected. He learned that to be heard, he had to be assertive and work with recruiters who understand data roles.

The Art of Asking Why: Narrowing the Gap Between Customers and Users

As a product manager, it is essential to understand the split between users and customers and to dig deeper into the root problems to create the best solutions. This involves saying no to good ideas, involving the product trio early in the discovery process, and shadowing users in their own environment. By doing this, product managers can build successful products that meet the needs of both users and customers.

Managing Different Time Zones: Inclusive Collaboration Methods

Synchronous communication tools, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, are great for quickly hashing out problems, but their fleeting nature can lead to a loss of information. When working with a remote team, it is important to use asynchronous platforms for decision-making to ensure everyone is included. Tools such as P2 and Notion are great for this, and it is always better to over-communicate than under-communicate.

Managing Remotely: Balancing Team Cohesion and Focus Time

As a manager, it is important to find a balance between fostering team unity and providing individual focus time. To do this, it is important to eliminate superfluous meetings, create meeting time blocks, request status updates in written form, allow for free-flowing conversation, and encourage one-on-ones among ICs. These steps will help to ensure that meetings are productive and provide value.

Creating a Company Culture That Balances Helpfulness and Productivity

This article discusses the problem of overly helpful teammates who spend too much time helping others and not enough time on their own tasks. It proposes the 30-minute rule, which encourages people to help their colleagues for up to 30 minutes each day, but to then focus on their own tasks. This rule has been successful in creating a culture of helpfulness without disrupting productivity.

Streamlining Product Processes After a Reorganization

As program manager, the author faced the challenge of unifying a newly acquired team of 150 people who had no experience with program management. The author's strategy included unifying the toolset, getting leadership buy-in, informing the teams, and executing the plan. The author was successful in achieving the goal, and the teams began to collaborate and share knowledge. The author learned that it takes time for people to get used to new things, and it can be challenging to change people's opinions.

Navigating Disagreements When It Comes to Priorities

When stakeholders disagree on priorities, it is important to take the time to understand where they are coming from and discuss both points of view. Give team members the chance to test out their suggestions and build a transparent framework or system that invites others into the process. This will help to unify the departments on decision-making and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Growing Through Different Engineering Lead Roles

This article outlines the three steps to becoming a tech lead: gaining the trust of the team through competency and integrity, and being a mentor figure to fellow engineers. It also discusses the challenges of transitioning to a tech lead manager role, such as juggling technical work, project management, and people management. The author suggests that new leads should reach out to notable leaders in their organization for mentorship, and that the best solution for productivity challenges is to find the right technical work to grow their ceiling without bottlenecking their team.

Preparing For Your First Presentation: The Art of Public Speaking

Public speaking is important for many reasons, including knowledge sharing, networking, and broadening your reputation. Preparing for your first time speaking involves choosing a topic, picking the appropriate community event and level, and rehearsing. It is important to understand your presentation style and to participate in community and international events to gain experience.

A Look Into the Hiring Pipeline: How to Fine Tune the Interviewing Process

When a company operates remotely, it sources a wide pool of candidates from all over the globe, which affects the outcome of talent acquisition. Refining the hiring process is necessary to identify where candidates are being rejected and to take a holistic approach to hiring. It is important to create an interview template, open up the approach to hiring, and continually refine the interviewing process to find the right fit for the company.

Here to Make a Recognizable Difference: How to Develop Teams

This article explores the perspective of an engineer on good management and developing teams. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the need and desired outcome of a problem, avoiding dependencies across members, and empowering teams to take initiative and think critically. It also discusses the challenge of training managers and the need to create effective leaders in order to build successful organizations.

Balancing Technical Debt Innovation: How Roadmaps for Development Help Your Company Succeed

In order to achieve balance between technical debt and technical innovation, it is essential to have a strong foundation, which is your team. Leaders must provide a roadmap for their team's professional growth and development, and invest 20% of their time in these processes. Hiring for good cultural fit is important to ensure employees are happy and fulfilled, and to prevent technical debt from occurring. Completion over perfection is key, and showing your team that you care about their direction will help build a strong foundation.

The Optimization and Organization of Large Scale Demand

When presented with a large-scale project with 5,000 requirements, the challenge of organizing and deducing into a more holistic approach is daunting. To streamline efficiency, the requirements were organized into 350 different groupings and Jira was introduced as a platform for increased support. Respect for everyone's time and communication were key in achieving growth as a company and maintaining and supporting the project.

The Importance of Effective Communication Skills in Technical Roles

Software engineers and developers often have a lack of balance between their technical and soft skills, such as communication and emotional management. It is important to recognize this as an area for improvement and allocate time to strengthen these skills, just as one would with software development. Leaders should also support their team members in taking charge of conversations. Ultimately, it is an ongoing learning journey to improve soft skills and communication techniques.

Guiding Your Team Through a Data-Driven Transformation

Governing a data environment is different from governing a transactional application, and data scientists need data that is restricted due to personal information. To manage transformations, it is important to communicate with stakeholders and understand their concerns. Amazon and Capital One solved this problem by allowing people to use the programming language they wanted. To help employees keep up with change, it is important to make incremental changes and let people ask questions.

Checking For Values Alignment When Considering a New Role

In this article, the author shares their experience of values misalignment with senior leadership in a previous role. They emphasize the importance of understanding and prioritizing one's values when considering a new role, and suggest asking questions in the interview process to ensure value alignment. They also discuss the difference between intentional and unintentional misalignment, and how to approach each.

The Importance of Culture and Values When Building Teams

This story reflects on the importance of culture and values in a team and organization. It recounts a story of a young team lead and their tech team who faced many challenges while trying to deploy a key update to production. Despite the demolition of the room around them, power outages, and other obstacles, they persevered and succeeded due to their shared values and culture. The story emphasizes the importance of culture and values in a team and organization, and how they can help to navigate difficult times.

10x engineer or 10x impact?

Hiring 10x engineers is difficult and competitive, and many companies fail to retain them. To hire and retain 10x engineers, companies need to create an environment where they can thrive and have a sense of purpose. Companies should also create structures that make it possible to systematically work on high impact projects, and set expectations for senior engineers to identify and deliver such projects. With time, even non-10x engineers can become 5x engineers, and creating a supportive environment can help 10x engineers be successful when they join.

How to Streamline Your Recruitment Process for Quick and Effective Hiring

In the current job market, recruiters need to be quick and effective in their hiring process. This includes having a short recruitment process, asking technical questions that are relevant and realistic, looking for emotional intelligence and passion for the craft, and conducting video interviews at the latest stage. Additionally, recruiters should avoid asking candidates why they quit their job or inquiring about their previous salaries, and explain to them why the recruitment process is structured the way it is. The assessment of a candidate is not over when they are hired, but continues until their last hour on the job.

How to Maximize Employee Retention in Engineering Teams

High churn rates can have a significant impact on product-based companies, so it is important to find ways to retain employees. The author, a CTO, has adopted several management techniques to reduce the churn rate, such as a 4-step interview process, an onboarding process that normalizes knowledge gaps and is generous with adaptation time, and a management approach that gives ownership of the work, explains the reasoning behind goals, conducts regular check-ins, and provides flexible working hours. The key tips for high retention are to not micromanage, lead with empathy, and trust employees.

Hiring a Data Team With a Stubborn Manager

The author had difficulty hiring a data team due to a strict recruitment process and an internal recruitment team that didn't understand data roles. The job description was also unhelpful, and the hiring manager was stubborn. After putting his foot down, the author was able to hire two individuals who had previously been rejected. He learned that to be heard, he had to be assertive and work with recruiters who understand data roles.

The Art of Asking Why: Narrowing the Gap Between Customers and Users

As a product manager, it is essential to understand the split between users and customers and to dig deeper into the root problems to create the best solutions. This involves saying no to good ideas, involving the product trio early in the discovery process, and shadowing users in their own environment. By doing this, product managers can build successful products that meet the needs of both users and customers.

Managing Different Time Zones: Inclusive Collaboration Methods

Synchronous communication tools, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, are great for quickly hashing out problems, but their fleeting nature can lead to a loss of information. When working with a remote team, it is important to use asynchronous platforms for decision-making to ensure everyone is included. Tools such as P2 and Notion are great for this, and it is always better to over-communicate than under-communicate.

Managing Remotely: Balancing Team Cohesion and Focus Time

As a manager, it is important to find a balance between fostering team unity and providing individual focus time. To do this, it is important to eliminate superfluous meetings, create meeting time blocks, request status updates in written form, allow for free-flowing conversation, and encourage one-on-ones among ICs. These steps will help to ensure that meetings are productive and provide value.

Creating a Company Culture That Balances Helpfulness and Productivity

This article discusses the problem of overly helpful teammates who spend too much time helping others and not enough time on their own tasks. It proposes the 30-minute rule, which encourages people to help their colleagues for up to 30 minutes each day, but to then focus on their own tasks. This rule has been successful in creating a culture of helpfulness without disrupting productivity.

Streamlining Product Processes After a Reorganization

As program manager, the author faced the challenge of unifying a newly acquired team of 150 people who had no experience with program management. The author's strategy included unifying the toolset, getting leadership buy-in, informing the teams, and executing the plan. The author was successful in achieving the goal, and the teams began to collaborate and share knowledge. The author learned that it takes time for people to get used to new things, and it can be challenging to change people's opinions.

Navigating Disagreements When It Comes to Priorities

When stakeholders disagree on priorities, it is important to take the time to understand where they are coming from and discuss both points of view. Give team members the chance to test out their suggestions and build a transparent framework or system that invites others into the process. This will help to unify the departments on decision-making and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Growing Through Different Engineering Lead Roles

This article outlines the three steps to becoming a tech lead: gaining the trust of the team through competency and integrity, and being a mentor figure to fellow engineers. It also discusses the challenges of transitioning to a tech lead manager role, such as juggling technical work, project management, and people management. The author suggests that new leads should reach out to notable leaders in their organization for mentorship, and that the best solution for productivity challenges is to find the right technical work to grow their ceiling without bottlenecking their team.

Preparing For Your First Presentation: The Art of Public Speaking

Public speaking is important for many reasons, including knowledge sharing, networking, and broadening your reputation. Preparing for your first time speaking involves choosing a topic, picking the appropriate community event and level, and rehearsing. It is important to understand your presentation style and to participate in community and international events to gain experience.

A Look Into the Hiring Pipeline: How to Fine Tune the Interviewing Process

When a company operates remotely, it sources a wide pool of candidates from all over the globe, which affects the outcome of talent acquisition. Refining the hiring process is necessary to identify where candidates are being rejected and to take a holistic approach to hiring. It is important to create an interview template, open up the approach to hiring, and continually refine the interviewing process to find the right fit for the company.

Here to Make a Recognizable Difference: How to Develop Teams

This article explores the perspective of an engineer on good management and developing teams. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the need and desired outcome of a problem, avoiding dependencies across members, and empowering teams to take initiative and think critically. It also discusses the challenge of training managers and the need to create effective leaders in order to build successful organizations.

Balancing Technical Debt Innovation: How Roadmaps for Development Help Your Company Succeed

In order to achieve balance between technical debt and technical innovation, it is essential to have a strong foundation, which is your team. Leaders must provide a roadmap for their team's professional growth and development, and invest 20% of their time in these processes. Hiring for good cultural fit is important to ensure employees are happy and fulfilled, and to prevent technical debt from occurring. Completion over perfection is key, and showing your team that you care about their direction will help build a strong foundation.

The Optimization and Organization of Large Scale Demand

When presented with a large-scale project with 5,000 requirements, the challenge of organizing and deducing into a more holistic approach is daunting. To streamline efficiency, the requirements were organized into 350 different groupings and Jira was introduced as a platform for increased support. Respect for everyone's time and communication were key in achieving growth as a company and maintaining and supporting the project.