Scrum has given us a lot, but it’s time for some conscious uncoupling

Engineers hate estimating things.

Want to learn how to foster virtual water cooler moments? Whether your company is new to remote working or has been doing it for some time, the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in employees struggling to find a clear boundary for work-life …

A large part of running an online store requires managing the backend operations including product updates, order management, and shipment management. These tasks can easily overwhelm your staff and potentially disrupt business operations …

There’s probably no other framework that impacted modern software development as much as Scrum. For many organizations, it’s the first step towards a mature product development organization and you will find a bazillion articles explaining …

A no-nonsense guide for product teams. Read time is 6m.

Tony Fadell was instrumental in the development of the iPod and iPhone at Apple and then co-founded Nest Labs, which kicked off the consumer smart home market with its smart thermostat in 2011. Tony sold Nest to Google for $3.2 billion in …

Twenty years ago, I was a platoon commander in a classified unit in the army (that is no longer classified). Back then, making decisions and applying authority was straightforward. Officers were to make most decisions, pushing them down the …

It’s getting late on a Saturday afternoon in Denver when I lean back and take in the full weirdness of what I’m doing. I’m seated at a long plastic folding table against the wall in a windowless room, a Discord server open on my laptop. …

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The review is the primary mechanic by which teams create and maintain

Originally posted internally at Facebook on December 27, 2013

I recently held a question and answer session with a particularly talented

EM = Engineering manager EMs = Engineering managers

8 thoughts on the future of remote work

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I received this note recently from an Evernote user in Japan:

At GitHub, we have a very specific way of working. For one, we use GitHub to build GitHub. Not just for code, but to collaborate on things like Legal, Marketing, and internal policies. But it’s not that the medium defines the workflow …

During recent discussions with friends, one common theme that crops up very frequently is how success has remained rather elusive to recent higher level hires at their companies.

I mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it?

Recently, there has been a lot of debate about engineering levels, whether they are good, bad, or just useless. In this story, I hope to show a positive outcome of a good effort. However, before we get started, let’s take a look at what are …

Welcome to issue #41 of next big thing.

Photo by Valerie Blanchett on Unsplash

Today is my birthday. I turn 70. I’ve learned a few things so far that might be helpful to others. For the past few years, I’ve jotted down bits of unsolicited advice each year and much to my surprise I have more to add this year. So here …

We’ve regularly written about the state of WordPress searches over the years: from the first article analysing a 52% spike in searches in 2020, to an in-depth look at a search lull in the summer of 2021, looking at how search traffic and …

No commute. Flexible schedules. Boosted productivity. There’s a lot that remote work gets right.

If you are the kind of person that claims taking control of your professional growth, changing careers, and moving up the ladder are easy feats, I would love to draw on your experience.

More than 2 years ago, I decided to try to create a brief, digestible manual on the expectations of management for senior engineers at my company who are considering making the shift. At the time, I had about 3 years of management …

Charged with extending their unit’s product lines and boosting top-line growth over the next three years, product managers at one global consumer goods company wanted to identify the most attractive customer segments to target and how best …

Photo by Anotia Wang @anotia

Broadly speaking, my overarching agenda for any 1:1 is as follows:

“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” – Sir Isaac Newton

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When hiring developers, there are many things we are looking for, but over the years I have found that raw coding ability is easily the most important quality to look for. I can quickly train a person to have knowledge in some domain, but …

The following is a transcription of our interview with Paulo André. Paulo is a former VP of Engineering who now coaches CTOs, VPs of Engineering, and Engineering Managers. He also writes a weekly newsletter for technical leaders (sign up …

Most corporations (and their employees) made the shift to remote work during the pandemic. Many of these shifts were to remote-capable workflows (moving offline workflows online), but they never made the maturity leap to fully remote-first, …

After two years of working from home, I don’t have one unified period of getting things done. I have several mini periods. Work isn’t a contiguous landmass of focus; it’s more like an archipelago of productivity amid a sea of chores, meals, …

Software has come a long way over the past 20 years. Not only has the

Eugenia Mello

We all knew the landscape of WordPress themes was shifting with the introduction of Gutenberg.

The Ezra Klein Show

It takes practice to communicate well. Being a great

Most engineering organizations separate engineering and product leadership into distinct roles. This is usually ideal, not only because these roles benefit on distinct skills, but also because they thrive from different perspectives and …

We’re often advised to excel at one thing. But as the future gets harder to predict, preserving optionality allows us to pivot when the road ahead crumbles.

In this blog post, rather than focus just on the technical challenges, I want to share:

I believe both can help us be better people and drive positive change around us – in general, but in software in particular.

My wife recently took a management position for the first time. While my first management role was much different in many ways (I was with a small startup, and she works for a state healthcare system), her mixed feelings reminded me of the …

I recently shared this Tweet:

Jessica is the Founder & CEO of Valux Digital, a nationally recognized full-service marketing and PR firm.

Theory on how and why new ideas spread The diffusion of innovations according to Rogers. With successive groups of consumers adopting the new technology (shown in blue), its market share (yellow) will eventually reach the saturation level. …

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Getting up to speed when you join a large project is not an easy thing to do.

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This week I talked with Jean Hsu, VP of Engineering at Range, a company that helps make teamwork way less work. We spoke about being a first time exec, how she navigated being a mother and exec during a pandemic and what she enjoys about …

TL;DR — Despite the pandemic, we had a great year as a team and as a business. We tripled the size of the team, acquired ACF, shipped and published a ton of awesome stuff that we’re proud of, and had a nice bump in revenue.