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<i>The manager’s function is not to make people work, but to make it
possible for people to work.</i><br> — Tom
DeMarco<sup id="intro-quote-ref"><a href="#intro-quote-def">[1]</a></sup>
</p>
<p>A curated <a href="https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome"><img
src="https://awesome.re/badge-flat.svg" alt="Awesome" /></a> list
<strong>for software developers to transition to an engineering
management role</strong>. Compiles advice, anecdotes, knowledge tidbits,
discussions, industry small-talks and rants. A bibliography of sort,
gathered the last few years while <a
href="https://devtomanager.com/interviews/kevin-deldycke/">transitioning
my career from a software engineer to an engineer’s manager</a>. And
later from a manager to a manager’s managers (you all love recursion
right? ʘ‿ʘ).</p>
<ul>
<li>You’re a developer and wonders what it feels like to be a
manager?</li>
<li>You just started your first position as the leader of a team?</li>
<li>You’re stuck into the day-to-day operations of the job?</li>
<li>How can I move up to the next level?</li>
</ul>
<p>You’ll find answers in this guide! It stands out from generic
leadership and management literature, by providing uncompromising
insights and practical advice. It will bootstrap your journey into the
management career track, from a technical background.</p>
<p>This list helps in the transition to management, with a progression
from general to specifics. It starts with an overview of the role, then
describes its requirements, and its position relative to others. Then we
details the day-to-day tools of the trade, both organizational and
behavioral. At last we discuss some of the dark sides of the job.</p>
<h2 id="contents">Contents</h2>
<!-- mdformat-toc start --slug=github --no-anchors --maxlevel=6 --minlevel=2 -->
<ul>
<li><a href="#engineering-to-management-transition">Engineering to
Management Transition</a></li>
<li><a href="#building-teams">Building Teams</a></li>
<li><a href="#roles">Roles</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#executives">Executives</a></li>
<li><a href="#cto--vp-of-engineering">CTO &amp; VP of
Engineering</a></li>
<li><a href="#engineering-managers">Engineering Managers</a></li>
<li><a href="#engineers">Engineers</a></li>
<li><a href="#consultants">Consultants</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#recruitment">Recruitment</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#job-boards">Job Boards</a></li>
<li><a href="#hiring-process">Hiring Process</a></li>
<li><a href="#interview">Interview</a></li>
<li><a href="#coding-challenge">Coding Challenge</a></li>
<li><a href="#negotiation">Negotiation</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#onboarding">Onboarding</a></li>
<li><a href="#motivation">Motivation</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#happiness">Happiness</a></li>
<li><a href="#procrastination">Procrastination</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#culture">Culture</a></li>
<li><a href="#cognitive-tools">Cognitive Tools</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#collections">Collections</a></li>
<li><a href="#explaining">Explaining</a></li>
<li><a href="#problem-solving">Problem Solving</a></li>
<li><a href="#systems">Systems</a></li>
<li><a href="#brainstorming">Brainstorming</a></li>
<li><a href="#behavioral">Behavioral</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#team-dynamics">Team Dynamics</a></li>
<li><a href="#engineering">Engineering</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#the-technical-engineering-manager">The Technical
Engineering Manager</a></li>
<li><a href="#systems-complexity">Systems Complexity</a></li>
<li><a href="#technology">Technology</a></li>
<li><a href="#engineering-practices">Engineering Practices</a></li>
<li><a href="#technical-debt">Technical Debt</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#remote-work">Remote Work</a></li>
<li><a href="#meetings">Meetings</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#1-on-1">1 on 1</a></li>
<li><a href="#standups">Standups</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#facilities">Facilities</a></li>
<li><a href="#product-management">Product Management</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#hiring-pms">Hiring PMs</a></li>
<li><a href="#product-market-fit">Product-Market Fit</a></li>
<li><a href="#product-strategy">Product Strategy</a></li>
<li><a href="#user-centered-design">User-Centered Design</a></li>
<li><a href="#product-marketing">Product Marketing</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#project-management">Project Management</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#specifications">Specifications</a></li>
<li><a href="#estimations">Estimations</a></li>
<li><a href="#tickets">Tickets</a></li>
<li><a href="#delivery">Delivery</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#agile">Agile</a></li>
<li><a href="#key-performance-indicator-kpi">Key Performance Indicator
(KPI)</a></li>
<li><a href="#objectives-and-key-results-okr">Objectives and Key Results
(OKR)</a></li>
<li><a href="#training">Training</a></li>
<li><a href="#communication">Communication</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#knowledge">Knowledge</a></li>
<li><a href="#reading">Reading</a></li>
<li><a href="#documentation">Documentation</a></li>
<li><a href="#writing">Writing</a></li>
<li><a href="#style">Style</a></li>
<li><a href="#presentations">Presentations</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#career">Career</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#promotion">Promotion</a></li>
<li><a href="#performance-reviews">Performance Reviews</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#compensation">Compensation</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#salary">Salary</a></li>
<li><a href="#equity">Equity</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#politics">Politics</a></li>
<li><a href="#re-organizations">Re-organizations</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#team-level">Team-level</a></li>
<li><a href="#company-level">Company-level</a></li>
<li><a href="#acquisition">Acquisition</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#health">Health</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#holidays">Holidays</a></li>
<li><a href="#stress">Stress</a></li>
<li><a href="#burnout">Burnout</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li><a href="#setbacks-and-failures">Setbacks and Failures</a></li>
<li><a href="#exits">Exits</a></li>
</ul>
<!-- mdformat-toc end -->
<h2 id="engineering-to-management-transition">Engineering to Management
Transition</h2>
<p>The first step. The hardest. How to requalify oneself from an
Individual Contributor (IC) to a front-line manager.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>You always been a developer. Being offered <a
href="https://fractio.nl/2014/09/19/not-a-promotion-a-career-change/">a
management position is not a promotion. It is a change in
career</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://charity.wtf/2019/09/08/reasons-not-to-be-a-manager/">17
Reasons not to be a Manager</a> - An article to <a
href="https://youtu.be/b07887ZzKiw?t=40">discourage the faint-hearted
recruits</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://staysaasy.com/engineering/2020/06/09/Don%27t-Joke.html">Advice
to New Managers: Don’t Joke About Firing People</a> - “The second you
became their manager you forfeited the right to joke around in any
capacity about their employment at the company.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://x.com/ValaAfshar/status/966125964861280256">Advice to new
managers</a> - 9 fundamental principles of the behavior required to be a
great manager.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://css-tricks.com/mistakes-ive-made-as-an-engineering-manager/">Mistakes
I’ve Made as an Engineering Manager</a> - Mistakes: “1) Thinking people
give feedback the way they want to receive it; 2) Trying to do
everything yourself; 3) Communicating something one time is enough; 4)
You have to have everything together all the time.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://staysaasy.com/management/2020/07/24/Managing-One-Person.html">Why
It’s Easier to Manage 4 People Than It Is to Manage 1 Person</a> -
“Avoid at all costs the combination of: new manager, 1 report, report is
new-to-industry, manager is not a subject-matter expert.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18823616">Going
from Developer to Manager. What should I know or learn?</a></p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://getweeklyupdate.com/manager-guide">How to be a
Manager – A step-by-step guide to leading a team</a> - A full, detailed
guide on modern management practices.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://ruiper.es/posts/engineer-manager-2017/">On being
an Engineering Manager</a> - Some of these points needs nuance, but
others are a good taste of things to come for first-time
managers.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21892816">Responsibility
vs. accountability</a> - The biggest difference between manager
(accountable) and engineers (responsible): “‘Bad things’ happen for the
person accountable, whereas the person responsible can move on to the
next project.”</p></li>
<li><p>“A computer can never be held accountable. Therefore a computer
must never make a management decision.” - An <a
href="https://x.com/mit_csail/status/1604884273789603842">IBM slide from
1979</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>“It is a job where your goal is to try disappoint people most
slowly.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18222488">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“So the trick is basically to put them (your direct reports) in
charge, not you. You have the supporting role, they can request things
from you. But the goal needs to be very clear.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23973859">source</a>) - A
recipe on how to work with your direct reports, from a section of <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/1982137274?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=5920a3d486de941b37430f948d377bc9&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">7
habits of highly effective people</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0688103804?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=704eff2e2cddae6d97ef082a6f25bafd&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">The
One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey</a> - The author use a parable in
which problems are monkeys. Unexperienced managers let monkeys being
transferred to them, accumulates on their back and compounds. From this,
the book teach you how to change from taking on responsibilities to
delegating them so you don’t become a bottleneck.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="building-teams">Building Teams</h2>
<p>You got the title and the pay grade. Congratulation! This doesn’t
make you a manager yet. Whether you inherit an already existing team or
have to start from scratch, you’ll need to practice the art of building
(and consolidating) them.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="http://www.elidedbranches.com/2016/11/building-and-motivating-engineering.html">Building
and Motivating Engineering Teams</a> - What DO engineers want? Money,
purpose and respect.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250601205421/https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/magazine/what-google-learned-from-its-quest-to-build-the-perfect-team.html">What
Google Learned From Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team</a> - “Google’s
data indicated that psychological safety, more than anything else, was
critical to making a team work. (…) The behaviors that create
psychological safety — conversational turn-taking and empathy — are part
of the same unwritten rules we often turn to, as individuals, when we
need to establish a bond.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/papers-we-love/papers-we-love/tree/master/software_engineering_orgs">Paper
we love: Software Engineering Organizations</a> - “The practice of
software engineering, and its history is, itself, a complex study in
humanity, coordination, and communication.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://tomaytotomato.com/developer-tropes-2/">Developer
Tropes: “Google does it”</a> - It’s <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult">cargo-cultish</a> to
imitate the big names in our industry as a path to success. Instead, the
take home from this article “would be that managers and other leaders
should be like ecologists; who measure, observe and nurture their
ecosystems. Doing so will help build a unique workplace that will yield
great results.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="roles">Roles</h2>
<p>On the profiles, attitude, behaviors, and expectations between
developers, managers and executives.</p>
<h3 id="executives">Executives</h3>
<p>Executives are the senior/highest management layers of a company.
They reports to a board of directors in bigger companies, or directly to
the shareholders in smaller ones. Leadership is expected at this level.
As a manager these are the people you report to.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://apenwarr.ca/log/20190926">What do executives do,
anyway?</a> - Paraphrasing <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0394532341?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=f80a2e0610594cad92d301c587380f0a&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">Andy
Grove’s book, High Output Management</a>, “the job of an executive is:
to define and enforce culture and values for their whole organization,
and to ratify good decisions.” The article also details the failures
modes of a CEO: forcing his own decisions downstream, or various ways of
not resolving conflicts.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18089716">Executives ratify
decisions made on the spot</a> - Tolstoy’s thesis to business.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/adp6_22.pdf">Army
Leadership and the Profession</a> - Establishes and describes what
leaders should be and do.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20190308062113/http://leadership.au.af.mil/sls-skil.htm">US
Air Force’s Strategic Leadership Studies</a> - A reference of
leadership’s competencies and skills.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/CcScN">What Only the CEO Can Do</a> -
“1. Defining and interpreting the meaningful”outside” of the company; 2.
Answering the two-part question: What business are we in and what
business are we not in? 3. Balancing sufficient yield in the present
with necessary investment in the future; 4. Shaping the values and
standards of the organization.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/S32wu">How CEOs Manage Time</a> - A
study on what CEO of large companies spent their time on, and how. Opens
a new window into what leadership is all about and into its many
components and dimensions.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/9DkfA">Operations and Internal
Communication Strategies For Effective CEOs</a> - After insisting on the
importance of context and narratives, the author provide an interesting
template (good for inspiration) of ritual and recurring internal
communication devices.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://youtu.be/5Z13NI0SuyA?t=2026">Regis McKenna’s
talk at Silicon Valley Leaders Symposium</a> - “These are the things we
(marketers) used to do with individuals and bodies. They’ve all become
automated. The CIO is the marketing chief now.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/narcissistic-ceos-weaken-collaboration-integrity">Narcissistic
CEOs Weaken Collaboration and Integrity</a> - “The prototypic visionary
leader profile is so similar to that of a narcissist, if boards aren’t
careful, they’re going to end up choosing people who are narcissistic as
CEOs”.</p></li>
<li><p>“Hiring isn’t the challenge. The challenge is finding people who
can be effective while working for executives whose only qualifications
and training are narcissistic levels of self confidence.” (<a
href="https://x.com/kellan/status/1205113384632500224">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“The CEO positions himself as a controlling, micromanaging
individual at the center of everything. This makes it possible for the
CEO to intercept financials and other crucial numbers en route to people
who might catch on.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24519247">source</a>) - Or
how fraud can endure at the top level. That’s generally why you need a
board of directors as an oversight.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="cto-vp-of-engineering">CTO &amp; VP of Engineering</h3>
<p>In tech companies these roles are critical, and the frontier between
the two is often blurry.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.ivyexec.com/career-advice/2015/cto-versus-vp-engineering-whats-the-difference/">CTO
vs VP Engineering: What’s the Difference?</a> - CTO manage a small staff
of hackers. VP of Engineering lead an organization of
engineers.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://bothsidesofthetable.com/want-to-know-the-difference-between-a-cto-and-a-vp-engineering-4fc3750c596b">Want
to Know the Difference Between a CTO and a VP Engineering?</a> - Another
way to look at thing: placing these roles along the “Process
Orientation” and “Technical Capability” quadrants.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://madewithlove.be/one-job-many-roles-the-different-skills-needed-to-be-a-successful-cto/">The
different skills needed to be a successful CTO</a> - The premise is a
little misleading, as what is detailed there is the journey, in a
startup, of the technical founder growing with the company to become a
CTO. At which point the position described in the article is not CTO,
but VP of Engineering.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://review.firstround.com/hiring-a-vp-of-engineering-use-this-framework-from-shopifys-vpe-to-get-it-right/">Hiring
a VP of Engineering? Use This Framework</a> - “<em>How do I hire a VP of
Engineering?</em> After more than 20 years, eight companies, and
thousands of hires, I’m starting to suspect this may be the wrong
question. A better one is, <em>What is a VP of
Engineering?</em>”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19188246">“That’s
usually about the time I nope right out of the interview”</a> - Bad
signs of a CTO trying to recruit an engineering manager, or the perils
of not believing in hierarchies.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="engineering-managers">Engineering Managers</h3>
<p>Managers came in all form and shape, and the title and daily
activities varies a lot depending on companies. When developers directly
reports to you, you’ll find yourself at the first management level: you
are a front-line engineering manager.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20230133">What are
the signs that you have a great manager?</a> - “The irony is that you
don’t really notice a great manager.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://rework.withgoogle.com/en/guides/managers-identify-what-makes-a-great-manager#learn-about-googles-manager-research">Identify
what makes a great manager</a> - Google tried to prove managers don’t
matter. Instead, it discovered <a href="https://archive.ph/1USa4">10
Traits of the Very Best Ones</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20220115172555/https://twitter.com/johncutlefish/status/1124938723093766144">As
a product manager, how do you earn the respect and trust of your
team?</a></p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmBSh1FGQyY">Good Boss,
Bad Boss: A Peek Inside the Minds of the Best (and Worst)</a> - A good
boss: gets rid of rotten apples (no asshole rule) and protects people
from idiocy from on high.</p></li>
<li><p>“One of your roles is to act as an information filter in both
directions” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19187593">source</a>) - Some
tips on how to balance which kind of information needs to be shared or
muted.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250511211605/https://www.intercom.com/blog/great-product-managers-dont-spend-time-on-solutions/">Great
PMs don’t spend their time on solutions</a> - Not on solutions, no. But
on customer’s problems.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://minnenratta.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/things-i-have-learnt-as-the-software-engineering-lead-of-a-multinational/">Things
I have learnt as the software engineering lead of a multinational</a> -
Some interesting points here, some others needs to be
challenged.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/surprising-things-about-working-at-tech-unicorns/">Surprising
Things About Working at Well-Known Tech Unicorns</a> - Echoes my own
experience on differences between expectations and reality in high
growth and visible companies from the point of view of an engineering
manager.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://llis.nasa.gov/lesson/1956">100+ Lessons Learned
for Project Managers</a> - 122 aphorisms providind insights into NASA
project management success. Covers design, decision-making, managing
staff, working with superiors and contractors.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/ryanburgess/engineer-manager">Engineering
Manager Resources</a> - Huge list, but need some curation.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24802483">A vitally
important part of the job: being a crap shield</a> - “A lot of the work
of an EM is wading into the slurry pit with a shovel so your team are
free to get the job done”.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="engineers">Engineers</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://insights.sei.cmu.edu/sei_blog/2020/01/programmer-moneyball-challenging-the-myth-of-individual-programmer-productivity.html">Programmer
Moneyball: Challenging the Myth of Individual Programmer
Productivity</a> - “Since software project managers have limited ability
to evaluate individual developer capability, they should rely on a
productive environment and developing talent.”</p></li>
<li><p>“10x developers (…) rapidly become 1x developers (or worse) if
you don’t let them make their own architectural choices” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5496914">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://monicalent.com/blog/2019/06/03/absolute-truths-unlearned-as-junior-developer/">7
absolute truths I unlearned as junior developer</a> - “1. I’m a senior
developer; 2. Everyone writes tests; 3. We’re so far behind everyone
else (a.k.a. tech FOMO); 4. Code quality matters most; 5. Everything
must be documented; 6. Technical debt is bad; 7. Seniority means being
the best at programming”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.kitchensoap.com/2012/10/25/on-being-a-senior-engineer/">On
Being A Senior Engineer</a> - “I expect a ‘senior’ engineer to be a
<em>mature</em> engineer.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://neilkakkar.com/things-I-learnt-from-a-senior-dev.html">Things
I Learnt from a Senior Software Engineer</a> - “I sat next to a senior
software engineer for a year. Here’s what I learnt.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://daedtech.com/5-things-ive-learned-in-20-years-of-programming/">5
Things I’ve Learned in 20 Years of Programming</a> - “A programmer with
5 years of experienced has more industry tenure than half of the entire
industry.” Also see this follow-up comment of <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21612990">10 things I’ve
learned after 35 years</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://x.com/ScribblingOn/status/1002598672444448768">Devs I
really enjoy pairing with</a> - “Don’t act like know-it-all; Openly
admit if they don’t know something; Try to figure stuff out
together”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/@bellmar/all-the-best-engineering-advice-i-stole-from-non-technical-people-eb7f90ca2f5f">All
the best engineering advice I stole from non-technical people</a> -
“It’s intriguing that the stuff that really seems to make a difference
in the quality of software never seems to be about software.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://faculty.washington.edu/ajko/papers/Li2015GreatEngineers.pdf">What
Makes A Great Software Engineer?</a> - Doesn’t conclude on a definitive
answer to the question, but details a model based on 53 attributes (!).
Still a good source referencing other papers on the topic.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11341567">What
makes a Senior Dev</a> - “Time, man. You gotta do your fucking
time.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24627229">The
different engineering levels at Google</a> - From L3 to L8: a quick
description of what makes an engineer at each level.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://amyunger.com/blog/2020/09/10/staff-engineer-at-heroku.html">How
I operated as a Staff engineer at Heroku</a> - A great window into the
somewhat nebulous title of Staff Engineer, also called Principal
Engineer or Software Architect at times. I.e. a role in which you are a
technical expert, but know how to solve non-obvious engineering issues,
most of the time because they are rooted in social, communications and
hierarchical complexities.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://staffeng.com">StaffEng</a> - Once you’ve reached
the Senior Software Engineer level, you’re at the crossroad. Either you
pursue engineering management or continue down the path of technical
excellence to become a Staff Engineer. This isa collection of guides
about the later position.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://betterprogramming.pub/10-admirable-attributes-of-a-great-technical-lead-251d13a8843b">10
Admirable Attributes of a Great Technical Lead</a> - “They are smart yet
kind. Knowledgeable, yet humble. Busy, yet approachable.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="consultants">Consultants</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>“A consultant is someone 4 pages ahead in the manual” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20786286">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“The value that most orgs get from a consultant (…) is the
political cover to make changes they knew they should make all along,
but didn’t have the social capital or the focus to make those changes”
(<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21714791">source</a>).
And that’s the reason bureaucracies and highly political organizations
are fertile grounds for consultants.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://dabit3.medium.com/the-prosperous-software-consultant-5dc8d705c5dd">The
Prosperous Software Consultant</a> - This article let you understand how
an independent consultant operates.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="recruitment">Recruitment</h2>
<p>You’re in a competitive sector in which talents are in high demand.
Be prepared as a manager to spend a lot of time recruiting people,
either to expand your team or fill-in open positions. The dynamics gets
interesting too, as you are now on both sides of the hiring process: as
a candidate to get a job, and as a recruiter to staff up your team.</p>
<h3 id="job-boards">Job Boards</h3>
<p>By targeting the right place to post your job offer to, you’re
increasing your chances of targeting the right candidates.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://github.com/tramcar/awesome-job-boards">Awesome
Job Boards</a> - Niche job boards by domains, technology, roles and
area.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-whiteboards">Hiring
Without Whiteboards</a> - List of companies without the kind of CS
trivia questions that are associated with bad interview
practices.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="hiring-process">Hiring Process</h3>
<p>High-growth company will all need to industrialize the hiring process
at one point.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Why_I_Never_Hire_Brilliant_Men">Why
I Never Hire Brilliant Men</a> - 5 simple rules for hiring men, from
1924. Things haven’t changed a lot in a century.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://thetechresume.com/A_Good_Tech_Resume.pdf">A Good
Tech Resume</a> - A compilation of advice and example, but containing a
good description of a typical hiring pipeline.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.homerun.co/artofwork/guides/job-interviewing">Job
Interviewing Guide</a> - A detailed description of a hiring process, a
great source of inspiration for when your company gets big enough to
start to formalize things up.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/cockroachlabs/open-sourced-interview-process">Open
Sourced Interview Process</a> - Cockroach Labs published their process
“to create familiarity for candidates and account for bias, resulting in
a better candidate experience and hiring decisions.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.karllhughes.com/posts/rethinking-hiring">Rethinking
the Hiring Process</a> - “Testing programmers at something they aren’t
actually expected to be good at and expecting to learn something about
how they would work at your company is delusional, and I think these
kind of interviews only serve to make the hiring team feel smarter and
ensure better outcomes for engineers with traditional CS
backgrounds.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="interview">Interview</h3>
<p>List of questions that can be used when vetting potential candidates,
and topics to draw inspiration from to be used as conversation
starters.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20221101193146/https://kowsheek.com/the-technical-interview-is-an-ego-trip/">The
Technical Interview is an Ego Trip</a> - Starts with anecdote of
developers using a job interview as a vehicle to demonstrate their
superiority. Then the author details a reasonable interview process that
is trying to not waste anyone’s time.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://staysaasy.com/leadership/2021/04/12/the-intangible-skills-you-cant-interview-for.html">The
Intangible Skills You Can’t Interview For</a> - “1) Cut-Through on
Crappy Tasks; 2) Knowing How to Finish; 3) Knowing How to Start; 4)
Giving (And Receiving) Diagonal Feedback; 5) Harnessing the Value of
Intangibles.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/arialdomartini/Back-End-Developer-Interview-Questions">Back-End
Developer Interview Questions</a> - A great source of
inspiration.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://github.com/kaushikb9/em-interviews">Engineering
Leadership Interviews</a> - An outline on how to recruit for engineering
manager roles.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://github.com/viraptor/reverse-interview">Reverse
interview</a> - Questions to ask the company during your interview. Be
prepared to answer them as a manager.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.keyvalues.com/culture-queries">Culture
Queries</a> - A sample of question to ask in job interviews to try to
understand the values of a company.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/mbreads/book-summary-who-c4a437d8ae3a">Book
Summary of “Who: The A Method for Hiring”</a> - The essential of <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/Who-Geoff-Smart/dp/0345504194?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=1686402298&amp;sr=1-1&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=d4a63bc5d11e6d00d942c293a640e2c1&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl"><em>Who</em>,
a popular book</a> on recruiting executives.</p></li>
<li><p>“It’s true that not all developers make positive contributions,
however, I think that blaming”lowering hiring standards” (…) is a
complete red herring.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13209317">source</a>) -
Examples in which developers that might pass tough job interview just
fine are bringing negative value later.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="coding-challenge">Coding Challenge</h3>
<p>The absence of coding exercise will left the door open to fraud.
OTOH, if elitist challenges decrease the number of false-positive, you
will pass on perfectly capable and great developers. Now it is your job
as manager to find balance between these two extremes, and set the tone
on how to have the candidate demonstrate coding skills.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20230416055512/https://freakingrectangle.com/2022/04/15/how-to-freaking-hire-great-developers/">How
to Freaking Find Great Developers By Having Them Read Code</a> -
“Instead of writing code, consider having the candidate read existing
code and talk about how it works. 1) Reading code is 95% of what a
developer does as part of their job. 2) A candidate can tell you a lot
about their programming skill in the first five minutes of reading. 3)
Stress is your enemy because it raises adrenaline which lowers IQ by
several points, causing you to miss good candidates.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://prog21.dadgum.com/177.html">Organizational
Skills Beat Algorithmic Wizardry</a> - “When it comes to writing code,
the number one most important skill is how to keep a tangle of features
from collapsing under the weight of its own complexity.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20210911031845/https://www.jarednelsen.dev/posts/The-horrifically-dystopian-world-of-software-engineering-interviews">The
Horrifically Dystopian World of Software Engineering Interviews</a> -
The dark side on relying too much on algorithm challenges.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://wiki.c2.com/?FizzBuzzTest">Fizz Buzz Test</a> -
“Designed to help filter out the 99.5% of programming job candidates who
can’t seem to program their way out of a wet paper bag.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20211020130141/https://triplebyte.com/blog/fizzbuzz-2-0-pragmatic-programming-questions-for-software-engineers">FizzBuzz
2.0: Pragmatic Programming Questions for Software Engineers</a> - Five
multiple-choice questions to easily separate the real software engineers
from the rest.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/EnterpriseQualityCoding/FizzBuzzEnterpriseEdition">FizzBuzz
Enterprise Edition</a> - A satire of over-engineering for the sake of
enterprise-grade software.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/MaximAbramchuck/awesome-interview-questions">Awesome
Interviews</a> - A huge database of questions sorted by topic to get
inspiration from.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="negotiation">Negotiation</h3>
<p>A critical step to close up the hiring process.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://haseebq.com/how-not-to-bomb-your-offer-negotiation/">How
Not to Bomb Your Offer Negotiation</a> - “A good negotiator is
empathetic and collaborative. They don’t try to control you or issue
ultimatums. Rather, they try to think creatively about how to fulfill
both your and their needs.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20190228034111/https://42hire.com/how-to-answer-the-whats-your-current-salary-job-interview-question-486254cb59ad?gi=a7f878096392">How
to answer the “What’s your current salary?” job interview question</a> -
This article explain the dynamic of that sneaky question and how to
defuse it.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/">Salary
Negotiation: Make More Money, Be More Valued</a> - “Your salary
negotiation — which routinely takes less than 5 minutes to conclude —
has an outsized influence on what your compensation is.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://haseebq.com/my-ten-rules-for-negotiating-a-job-offer/">Ten
Rules for Negotiating a Job Offer</a> - “First part will be about
conceptualizing the negotiating process, about how to begin the process
and set yourself up for maximal success. The second part will be advice
on the actual back-and-forth portion of negotiating and how to ask for
what you want.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="onboarding">Onboarding</h2>
<p>How to get newcomers up to speed with the rest of the team you
manage. And how to introduce yourself to teams you just joined or
inherited.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://staysaasy.com/startups/2022/04/03/performance-management.html">The
Most Important Performance Management Rule For Software Engineers</a> -
“Merge code every week. That’s what you should be saying to your new
Software Engineering hire.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://staysaasy.com/management/2020/08/28/Optimize-Onboarding.html">Optimize
Onboarding</a> - “Your organization has painfully slow onboarding.
Endless HR videos, slow security processes, a mountain of fragile
technology setup - these all make for a shitty and counterproductive
start at a company. Optimize your onboarding to get people doing what
you hired them to do.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24404676">As a
manager of a new employee I make an absolute point of being a
“helicopter mom” from the moment they hit the area until about week 2 or
3</a> - Navigating a new organization will be hard the first few weeks,
and the presence of a manager can help speed things up.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://boz.com/articles/career-cold-start">A Career
Cold Start Algorithm</a> - The author developed an algorithm to ramp-up
quickly when joining an existing team where he had a massive knowledge
deficit and no pre-existing relationships.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.annashipman.co.uk/jfdi/meeting-everyone.html">Meeting
everyone on a new team</a> - Right after inheriting a position at the
top of an organization of 50 engineers, the author bootstraped the
relationship with that big team by meeting everyone in 30 minutes 1:1s.
It was a huge time investment, and despite fears of being boring, it
allows for recognizing patterns of what change was needed.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="motivation">Motivation</h2>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc">Drive: The
surprising truth about what motivates us</a> - Daniel Pink summarizes it
concisely: people are motivated by autonomy, mastery and
purpose.</p></li>
<li><p>Reflecting on the postulates above, <a
href="https://x.com/bcantrill/status/1216491615264489473?s=20">Bryan
Cantrill defines that the role of management</a> “is in constructing
that environment, not micromanaging it. If engineering performance is
suffering, it’s (likely) a management problem: wrong problem, wrong
mission, or wrong team – or all three.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/what-silicon-valley-gets-right-on-software-engineers/">What
Silicon Valley “Gets” about Software Engineers that Traditional
Companies Do Not</a> - “1. Autonomy for software engineers; 2. Curious
problem solvers, not mindless resources; 3. Internal data, code, and
documentation transparency; 4. Exposure to the business and to business
metrics; 5. Engineer-to-engineer comms over triangle-communication; 6.
Investing in a less frustrating developer experience; 7. Higher leverage
–&gt; higher {autonomy, pay}”.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21231455">Some
reasons why enterprise software is good and maybe even fun</a> - The
majority of us will not build the next unicorn: we statically have a
better chance to build enterprise software. The twist? It might even be
more interesting than you expect.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="happiness">Happiness</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/1595621113?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=cc8ac8de84cb23f23ca5577dcb7af139&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">First,
Break All the Rules: What the World’s Greatest Managers Do
Differently</a> - We learn in this book that employee happiness was not
correlated to company success. A comment on HN details the <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20571219">questions that were
highly correlated to company success</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>“My team tracks life impact as a metric (pages outside business
hours) and works to drive that down to zero.” (<a
href="https://x.com/dwc/status/962179099606200320">source</a>) - Maybe
the best indicator of a happy team is how little it is disturbed outside
office hours.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://unito.io/blog/micromanagement-signs/">6 Signs
You’re a Micromanager (And What to Do Instead)</a> - “You’re more
involved with your employees than ever, yet they seem disgruntled,
unhappy, and less productive than usual. Your check-ins seem to go
unappreciated. And no one seems receptive to all of your great feedback
on their work. What’s going on? Well, we hate to break it to you, but
you might be a micromanager.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="procrastination">Procrastination</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.deprocrastination.co/blog/3-tricks-to-start-working-despite-not-feeling-like-it">3
tricks to start working despite not feeling like it</a> - “‘Screw it,
let’s do it’; Start sloppy; Start small”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200121-why-procrastination-is-about-managing-emotions-not-time">Why
procrastination is about managing emotions, not time</a> - “Research
shows that once the first step is made towards a task, following through
becomes easier”.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="culture">Culture</h2>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://github.com/dwmkerr/hacker-laws">hacker-laws</a>
- Laws, Theories, Principles and Patterns that developers will find
useful.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://sci-hub.st/10.1016/s0303-2647%2801%2900170-8">Adaptation
vs adaptability</a> - There is a spectrum between perfect efficiency and
being completely flexible. This article explores ecosystems and the
flows of material and energy between different organisms within the
ecosystem. (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20963513">hinted by HN
comment</a>)</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://voxeu.org/article/it-revolution-and-southern-europes-two-lost-decades">The
IT revolution and southern Europe’s two lost decades</a> - If you still
doubt management culture could make or break an industry: “inefficient
management practices have kept southern European firms from taking full
advantage of the IT revolution”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20443133">Meaningful
differences that makes Google offices more productive</a> - “The people
are smarter, your manager (and their manager) cares a lot about you and
it’s easy to move.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/RoW6v">It’s Not Enough to Be
Right—You Also Have to Be Kind</a> - “It’s harder to be kind than
clever”, or put another way by Abraham Joshua Heschel: “When I was
young, I used to admire intelligent people; as I grow older, I admire
kind people.”</p></li>
<li><p>“It is not your job to protect people (particularly senior
management) from the consequences of their decisions. Make your
decisions in your own best interest; it is up to the organization to
make sure that your interest aligns with theirs.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7179946">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“If you cannot disrupt a perverted culture by introducing a new
culture, the politics of the perverted culture will work against you
until you break, align, or leave. It is not unwise to leave before you
break and it is easier to leave before you align.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20914779">source</a>) - At
one point, even with the most unselfish of intentions, your attempts to
elevate the culture might stall. It is not fair, but it’s probably the
time to leave.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16126082">You have
only 4 options</a> - “1. Change you; 2. Change the other; 3. Fly; 4.
Stay and suffer.” A more concise way of saying the same thing as
above.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.slideshare.net/reed2001/culture-1798664">Netflix
Culture</a> - “The actual company values, as opposed to the
nice-sounding values, are shown by who gets rewarded, promoted, or let
go.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/pdfernhout/High-Performance-Organizations-Reading-List">High
Performance Organizations Reading List</a> - A list of books, web pages,
and videos about how to design better organizations, divided into 3
categories: organization and motivation, health and wellness, and
software development specific.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=1142065">A
Conversation with Werner Vogels, Learning from the Amazon technology
platform</a> - Scaling systems is not only a technical challenge. It has
to be about teams and culture too. One lesson learned from the early
days of AWS: “Giving developers operational responsibilities has greatly
enhanced the quality of the services, both from a customer and a
technology point of view. (…) You build it, you run it.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.theregister.com/2019/05/14/amazons_away_teams/?page=2">The
principles of Amazon service-oriented collaboration</a> - A compilation
of anonymous sources from AWS which ehoes the interview above: “teams
are ostensibly autonomous and can make any important decision needed to
meet their goals.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="cognitive-tools">Cognitive Tools</h2>
<p>Thinking frameworks and mental models to improve decision making,
understand systems and solve problems.</p>
<h3 id="collections">Collections</h3>
<p>Expansive lists of well-known models and concepts.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.foundingfuel.com/article/gigerenzers-simple-rules/">Gigerenzer’s
simple rules</a> - The reason we often relies on these simple
heuristics: “outside the lab, in real world, we cannot do well with just
with logical rationality, we need ecological rationality - the kind of
thinking that helps us get what we want in an environment that’s
uncertain and dynamic. This means exercising our instincts, using simple
but robust rules of thumb.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://fs.blog/mental-models/#military_and_war">The
Best Way to Make Intelligent Decisions</a> - A collection of 109
models.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/@yegg/mental-models-i-find-repeatedly-useful-936f1cc405d#.qb3gkdmtk">Mental
Models I Find Repeatedly Useful</a> - Huge compiled list of mental
models. Became the basis of book.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://untools.co">Tools for better thinking</a> -
“Collection of thinking tools and frameworks to help you solve problems,
make decisions and understand systems.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.collaborativefund.com/blog/a-few-rules/">A
Few Rules</a> - A formalized list of some wisdom you probably
encountered elsewhere.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/lukasz-madon/awesome-concepts">Awesome
Concepts</a> - Laws, principles, mental models and cognitive
biases.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://keepsimple.io/uxcore">UX Core</a> - 105
cognitive biases with simple descriptions, brief and detailed
examples.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="explaining">Explaining</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor">Hanlon’s
razor</a> - “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately
explained by stupidity.” My favorite flavor of <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor">Occam’s Razor</a>,
and a crucial mantra to defuse rampant paranoia in a highly political
setting.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regression_toward_the_mean">Regression
toward the mean</a> - Or why after a period of intense euphoria and
ambition, things slowly get back to their usual mediocrity.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locus_of_control">Locus of
control</a> - A framework on “the degree to which people believe that
they have control over the outcome of events in their lives, as opposed
to external forces beyond their control.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="problem-solving">Problem Solving</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.theengineeringmanager.com/growth/first-principles-and-asking-why/">First
principles and asking why</a> - “Our ability to think in abstractions
can weaken our judgement, as those abstractions may no longer be as true
as they once were. Also a similarly dangerous evolutionary trait is our
ability to think in analogy, where we make assumptions based on the
comparison of two things that are not actually related.” <a
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NV3sBlRgzTI">Elon Musk explains it
better</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>“People who excel at software design become convinced that they
have a unique ability to understand any kind of system at all, from
first principles, without prior training, thanks to their superior
powers of analysis. Success in the artificially constructed world of
software design promotes a dangerous confidence.” - A reminder of the
needs of humility and recognition of limits in our industry, <a
href="https://idlewords.com/talks/sase_panel.htm">from a panel on the
Moral Economy of Tech</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.betterevaluation.org/sites/default/files/the-art-of-powerful-questions.pdf">The
Art of Powerful Questions - Catalyzing Insight, Innovation, and
Action</a> - “Leaders believe that they are being paid for fixing
problems rather than for fostering breakthrough thinking.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="systems">Systems</h3>
<ul>
<li><a
href="https://commoncog.com/blog/to-get-good-go-after-the-metagame/">To
Get Good, Go After The Metagame</a> - “Every sufficiently interesting
game has a metagame above it. This is the game about the game. It is
often called ‘the meta’. (…) The meta is what you get after you master
boring fundamentals. But observing the state of the current meta often
reveals what boring fundamentals you need to learn.”</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="brainstorming">Brainstorming</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yes,_and...">Yes, and…</a>
- “A rule-of-thumb in improvisational comedy (…). It is also used in
business and other organizations as a principle that improves the
effectiveness of the brainstorming process, fosters effective
communication, and encourages the free sharing of ideas.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/@ameet/strong-opinions-weakly-held-a-framework-for-thinking-6530d417e364">Strong
Opinions, Weakly Held — a framework for thinking</a> - “Allow your
intuition to guide you to a conclusion, no matter how imperfect — this
is the ‘strong opinion’ part. Then – and this is the ‘weakly held’ part
– prove yourself wrong.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="behavioral">Behavioral</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="http://blog.ninlabs.com/2013/01/programmer-interrupted/">Programmer
Interrupted</a> - Research shows the devastating effect of interrupting
developers: 1. 15 min is required to resume work; 2. A programmer get
just one uninterrupted 2-hour session in a day; 3. Worst time to
interrupt: during edits, searches &amp; comprehension.</p></li>
<li><p>“People make bad choices if they’re mad or scared or stressed.” -
<a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250123004447if_/https://i.pinimg.com/originals/b5/17/97/b5179700050b96f91f63e086e053b5ee.jpg">Disney’s
Frozen</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://leowid.com/2019-2">I coached CEOs, founders, VCs
and other executive: These are the biggest takeaways</a> - Excerpt:
“We’re all just big, complicated bags of emotion walking around; Power
comes with the ability to receive a No; Learning to manage your focus,
not your time.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20200526135036/https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53419b80e4b0cccdfc3bbcf8/1579371627532-SANUEQ1REPX09L8NE1XM/ke17ZwdGBToddI8pDm48kI9Q46LYBJG1wKj9b7EvhSB7gQa3H78H3Y0txjaiv_0fDoOvxcdMmMKkDsyUqMSsMWxHk725yiiHCCLfrh8O1z5QHyNOqBUUEtDDsRWrJLTmWp-RWlGnWD_Yv5axNBE_gjfhPXbI2t7MOi3WVleCqN9URFC-c33mY-I6dtTBVWXC/ih-cheat-sheet-v2.jpg">Intellectual
Humility Cheat Sheet</a> - “is about being open and able to change your
mind about important things, and being able to discern when you
should.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://books.google.com/books?id=__CnDwAAQBAJ&amp;lpg=PT21&amp;dq=intellectual%20phase%20lock%20Frank%20Dunnington&amp;pg=PT21#v=onepage&amp;q=intellectual%20phase%20lock%20Frank%20Dunnington&amp;f=false">Avoiding
Intellectual Phase Lock</a> - Anticipating an important result so much,
humans by nature are susceptible to introduce subtle confirmation bias.
To combat IPL, you might introduce random unknowns to suppress any
attempt to game the system toward the object of your desire. I.e. avoid
to cheat yourself to success.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2013/06/robert-cialdini-influence/">The
six ways to influence people</a> - 6 universal principles of influence
that are used to persuade business professionals: reciprocity,
consistency, social proof, getting people to like you, authority and
scarcity.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="http://ruby.fgcu.edu/courses/twimberley/EnviroPhilo/bullshit.pdf">On
Bullshit</a> - This <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23147605">HN comment</a>
perfectly describes the concept. “Unlike lying/fraud, where falsehood is
instrumental, Frankfurt defined bullshit as potentially false speech
where the truth <em>simply wasn’t important</em>. Bullshit is
characterized by giving the <em>surface appearance</em> of confidence,
intelligence, or a convincing argument; whether it’s actually true or
not is besides the point.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="team-dynamics">Team Dynamics</h2>
<p>On the day-to-day dynamics of the team, and its interaction with
other teams.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20190714235605/https://medium.dave-bailey.com/how-to-celebrate-the-small-wins-4a03004a1816?gi=90c401bc3fd1">How
to Celebrate the Small Wins</a> - My takeaway: “Celebrating Slow
Progress; Hunt for Key Milestones”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://larahogan.me/blog/team-leader-venn-diagram/">Team Leader
Venn Diagram</a> - “A tool for gaining a shared understanding of
responsibilities”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://jvns.ca/blog/2020/07/14/when-your-coworker-does-great-work-tell-their-manager/">When
your coworker does great work, tell their manager</a> - Highlighting
unseen work in public allows managers to recognize efforts their reports
are doing. Still, there is some cases in which it might put your
colleague in a tight spot. So always ask if it’s ok first.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://techreflect.net/2020/01/05/eye-candy-qa-2005-2011/">Eye
Candy QA</a> - Retelling of author’s job at Apple: “John Louch was my
boss. (…) John always shared everything with us, even the <em>don’t
share this with your team</em> stuff. We were people he trusted, so it
was as it should be. It made you feel like you were part of something
greater.” Or why sharing some open secret promote strong trust in your
entourage.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.teamtechnology.co.uk/tt/t-articl/apollo.htm">The
Apollo Syndrome</a> - A phenomenon discovered by Dr Meredith Belbin, and
exposed in his 1981 <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/1856178072?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=486a53a41992fa334ccd6de4b3f689e1&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">book
on Management Teams</a>, where teams of highly capable individuals can,
collectively, perform badly.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://youtu.be/cIQ36Kt7UVg?t=203">A conversation with
Elon Musk about Starship</a> - In a team with very talented
contributors, everyone’s is a chief engineer: you are expected to
challenge the status-quo and questions other department’s constraints.
This allow smart engineers to avoid the trap of optimizing for something
that should not exist in the first place. Might be a cure for the Apollo
Syndrome.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20210925184712/https://courses.washington.edu/psii101/Powerpoints/Symptoms%20of%20Groupthink.htm">Symptoms
of Groupthink</a> - Overconfidence, tunnel vision and conformity
pressure can led a group astray.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://shermanonsoftware.com/2019/11/15/its-not-sabotage-theyre-drowning/">It’s
Not Sabotage, They’re Drowning</a> - Some kind of push backs shouldn’t
be interpreted as intentional sabotage, but as drowning people sinking
the lifeboat in an attempt to save themselves.</p></li>
<li><p>“Community already exists, you just create a communication
platform for it” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21828666">source</a>) - Or
why trying to create a community from the ground up might not be the
right way of looking at things: a better and more subtle strategy would
be to empowers the already existing channels and make them
visible.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="engineering">Engineering</h2>
<p>You’re no longer an engineer. Still, your team is responsible for the
systems, technology and all the processes surrounding them. You’d better
know a bit about engineering tenets.</p>
<h3 id="the-technical-engineering-manager">The Technical Engineering
Manager</h3>
<p>You shouldn’t spend your time coding. Leave that to the engineers:
your value lies elsewhere now. But does that means you must forget all
things technical? The answer is an astounding <em>NO</em>. Here are some
arguments:</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://increment.com/teams/do-engineering-managers-need-to-be-technical/">Do
engineering managers need to be technical?</a> - Yes. “Looking forward
to the next 30 years of management trends, only a few things seem
certain: Managers should be technical, and the definition of technical
will continue to change.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/J2vlo#selection-1025.8-1025.64">If
Your Boss Could Do Your Job, You’re More Likely to Be Happy at Work</a>
- “Although we found that many factors can matter for happiness at work
– type of occupation, level of education, tenure, and industry are also
significant, for instance – they don’t even come close to mattering as
much as the boss’ technical competence.”</p></li>
<li><p>“The best managers I met tended to be those that if the
circumstance required it, could do the job of those two levels below.”
(<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23891984">source</a>) -
Another way of putting it: managers needs domain knowledge and to know
the work their reports do.</p></li>
<li><p>“Over the years we have developed the policy that it is important
for the supervisor to thoroughly know and understand the work of his
group.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20683609">source</a>) - This
quote is <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/HP-Way-Hewlett-Built-Company/dp/0887307477?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=1686404404&amp;sr=1-1&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=e6069674f9b0b4ef884b0f8f70eb8f94&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">from
David Packard</a> (HP co-founder), decades before current <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Management_fad">management
fad</a>.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="systems-complexity">Systems Complexity</h3>
<p>Whatever the technical stack, we are building systems first, and have
to manage its complexity.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect">Second-system
effect</a> - “Tendency of small, elegant, and successful systems, to be
succeeded by over-engineered, bloated systems”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.amazon.com/Living-Complexity-Donald-Norman-2010/dp/B00DEKM5GK?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=1686404524&amp;sr=1-1&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=497ae387bbd398624d897bdfbf90f7b6&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">Living
with Complexity, by Donald A. Norman</a> - In which we learn that, based
on <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_conservation_of_complexity">Tesler’s
law of the conservation of complexity</a>, “the total complexity of a
system is a constant: as you make the person’s interaction simpler, the
hidden complexity behind the scenes increases. Make one part of the
system simpler, said Tesler, and the rest of the system gets more
complex.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://flocrivello.com/the-efficiency-destroying-magic-of-tidying-up/">The
Efficiency-Destroying Magic of Tidying Up</a> - “Efficiency tends to
look messy, and good looks tend to be inefficient.” A reminder that
sometimes we should just accept <a
href="https://github.com/kdeldycke/awesome-falsehood">the messiness of
the world</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11042400">I try to
optimize my code around reducing state, coupling, complexity and code,
in that order</a> - An engineer’s perspective on which priorities should
be addressed first to increase robustness of systems.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t705r8ICkRw&amp;t=13m30s">SpaceX’s
5-Step design and manufacturing process</a> - “1. Make requirement less
dumb; 2. Try to delete parts; 3. Simplify or optimize; 4. Accelerate
cycle time; 5. Automate”. See <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28517976">full
transcript</a>.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="technology">Technology</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="http://boringtechnology.club">Choose Boring
Technology</a> - “Boring, in the sense that it’s well
understood.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23445535">Choose
Well-known Technology</a> - A rephrasing of the above advice. “Choose
the technology: 1. You know in and out, and are immediately productive
with; 2. Which is sure to be around in 5-7 years, preferably 10-15; 3.
For which you are comfortable hiring the next 15 engineers.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20220330034214/http://databaseanswers.org/data_models/">Industry
Data Models</a> - A huge list of database templates collected over 25
years by Barry Williams to represent any business process.</p></li>
<li><p>“Lots of people make the mistake of thinking there’s only two
vectors you can go to improve performance, high or wide. High - throw
hardware at the problem, on a single machine. Wide - add more machines.
<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8902739">There’s a third
direction you can go, I call it <em>going deep</em>.</a>”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12509533">You need
to be this tall to use (micro) services</a> - Do not chase the hype.
Yet. Micro-services only brings value past a certain infrastructure and
organization size. This is a list of stuff you should focus on before
bringing micro-services to the mix.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2011/02/03/lego-blocks-and-organ-transplants/">LEGO
blocks and organ transplants</a> - “People have been comparing software
components to LEGO blocks for a couple decades. (…) Integrating two
software systems is usually more like performing a heart transplant than
snapping together LEGO blocks.”</p></li>
<li><p>“Software development is more akin to the product design and
development phase of industrial production than to the manufacturing.”
(<a href="https://accu.org/bookreviews/1998/kloss_1668/">source</a>) -
This quote is from a review of <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0201502089?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=dc65849a678d52afa9f3685159673d6e&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl"><em>Superdistribution
- Objects as Property on the Electronic Frontier</em></a>, in which the
creator of Objective-C was advocating in the 90’s for a new economic
framework that rewards creation of components in proportion to their
use. But software production is not like manufacturing of widgets in a
factory. <a href="https://x.com/kdeldycke/status/1697974273623675254">A
(software) object is not an (hardware) widget</a>.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="engineering-practices">Engineering Practices</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrVtA-ue-x0">Software
Engineering’s Greatest Hits</a> - When scientific method meet the
practice of software development. My takeaways: the best metric is less
lines of code, there is no 10x developers, too much unused configuration
options, pair programing is for transfer of domain-specific knowledge
and hackathon don’t produce long term projects.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/google/eng-practices/blob/master/review/reviewer/speed.md#why-should-code-reviews-be-fast-why">Code
reviews at Google</a> - “Why Should Code Reviews Be Fast? (…) To
optimize for the speed at which a team of developers can produce a
product together, as opposed to optimizing for the speed at which an
individual developer can write code.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://google.github.io/eng-practices/">Google
Engineering Practices</a> - Explains how to perform code reviews and how
to submit them.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://embeddedartistry.com/blog/2018/04/26/embedded-rules-of-thumb/">Embedded
Rules of Thumb</a> - Guidelines and heuristics to provide a reasonable
approximation of the truth while developing embedded devices. Most also
applies to software projects in general.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20180508120159/http://www.testingeducation.org/BBST/foundations/Marick_coverage.pdf">How
to Misuse Code Coverage</a> - “If a part of your test suite is weak in a
way that coverage can detect, it’s likely also weak in a way coverage
can’t detect.” I.e. the great benefit of a coverage report is that it
tells you what you forgot to think about when you wrote the test suite
itself (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28678098">source</a>).</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="technical-debt">Technical Debt</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://decodingvc.gitbooks.io/p9-startup-tech-due-diligence-calculator/content/">Tech
Due Diligence Calculator</a> - A list of questions by topic to help
understand how you are building your tech and engineering team, trying
to highlight red flags.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20190313164624/https://medium.com/@erichiggins/technical-debt-is-like-tetris-168f64d8b700">Technical
Debt Is Like Tetris</a> - Another way to explain technical debt:
“Scenarios like these create technical debt within the product code. A
buried gap in Tetris represents technical debt. (…) Paying down
technical debt keeps you competitive. It keeps you in the
game.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://daverupert.com/2020/11/technical-debt-as-a-lack-of-understanding/">Technical
debt as a lack of understanding</a> - “The problem lies in”never
reorganizing [the code] to reflect your understanding.” (…)
Organizationally, you pay in velocity and turnover; talented people are
going to leave after a few rounds of bullshit.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.amazingcto.com/develop-for-impact-not-for-backlog/">The
Framing of the Developer</a> - Default framing is around the backlog,
which leads to an asymmetry in which failure is blamed on lacks of
developer performance, and success is celebrated as the full realization
of the PM’s vision. But “technology is the bank that gave credit”, and
technical debt should be called product debt “because product took the
credit to get a feature faster and must pay back by investing the time
to clean up.” The alternative? “Companies today need a frame of impact.
In this world-view success is defined by impact.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://overreacted.io/goodbye-clean-code/">Goodbye,
Clean Code</a> - “My boss invited me for a one-on-one chat where they
politely asked me to revert my change. I was aghast. The old code was a
mess, and mine was clean! (…) I see now that my ‘refactoring’ was a
disaster in two ways: I didn’t talk to the person who wrote it; My code
traded the ability to change requirements for reduced
duplication”.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="remote-work">Remote Work</h2>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200827-why-in-person-leaders-may-not-be-the-best-virtual-ones">The
Surprising Traits of Good Remote Leaders</a> - “the confidence,
intelligence and extroversion that have long propelled ambitious workers
into the executive suite are not enough online because they simply don’t
translate into virtual leadership. (…) Instead, workers who are
organized, dependable and productive take the reins of virtual teams.”
As the <a
href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10869-020-09698-0">source
paper</a> say it best: “virtually, the emphasis shifts from saying to
doing.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17022563">Things to
look for when hiring remote workers</a> - “1. You have to adhere to
employment laws within the country you’re hiring from; 2. To employ
someone full time, many countries require you to have a legally entity
within that country; 3. Prioritize countries where we have the most
interest; 4. Keep a healthy timezone overlap in each of our
teams.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="http://klinger.io/post/180989912140/managing-remote-teams-a-crash-course">Managing
Remote Teams - A Crash Course</a> - Compilation of easy rules and
processes to bootstrap a remote team.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/guide/">GitLab’s
Guide to All-Remote</a> - “GitLab is the world’s largest all-remote
company”. Here is what it means and how it works.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250506052542/https://async.twist.com/asynchronous-communication/">Asynchronous
Communication: The Real Reason Remote Workers Are More Productive</a> -
“Remote workers are more productive than their office-bound
counterparts.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://increment.com/teams/a-guide-to-distributed-teams/">A guide
to distributed teams</a> - A nice wrap up on the numerous dispositions
required to have a highly effective distributed team.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/lukasz-madon/awesome-remote-job">Awesome Remote
Job</a> - Resources on working remotely, including job boards, coworking
spaces, and a list of companies embracing the culture.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="meetings">Meetings</h2>
<p>Two humans + a (virtual) room = a meeting.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/1P4FQ">Dear Manager, You’re Holding
Too Many Meetings</a> - “Employee productivity was 71% higher when
meetings were reduced by 40%. This is largely because employees felt
more empowered and autonomous. Rather than a schedule being the boss,
they owned their to-do lists and held themselves accountable.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://qz.com/work/1713662/how-to-have-great-meetings-according-to-200-scientific-studies/">How
to have great meetings, according to 200 scientific studies</a> - A
roadmap for getting meetings right.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://billwadge.wordpress.com/2019/03/24/laws-of-the-universe-and-teaching/">Wadge’s
Law (of Meetings)</a> - “Before every formal meeting there’s a smaller,
more exclusive, less formal meeting where all the important decisions
are made.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="on-1">1 on 1</h3>
<p>The most important meetings you’ll have are frequent 1:1s with your
direct reports.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>“1on1s are the managers Swiss army knife” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22341739">source</a>) -
Another advice from the source: make them walk’n’talks.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://larahogan.me/blog/first-one-on-one-questions/">Questions
for our first 1:1</a> - A personal list of high-level questions from a
manager.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://github.com/VGraupera/1on1-questions">1 on 1
Meeting Questions</a> - A mega list in which most of them are great
starters for conversation, some others are clearly bad ideas. A great
source of inspiration nonetheless, but choose carefully.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="standups">Standups</h3>
<p>A staple of agile decorum, too often misused.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20200515171636/https://www.cadencework.com/blog/async-standups.html">Your
daily standups should be async. Here’s why</a> - “Daily, real-time
meetings aren’t practical for remote teams” might be the best practical
reason.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://kristoff.it/blog/good-bad-ugly-standup/">The
Good, the Bad and the Ugly Standup</a> - Author experienced 3 formats of
stand-ups before ending with one working for his team, and concludes
that “the details that make up a good meeting are subtle and the pursuit
of an artificial standard of aesthetics will prevent you from doing the
necessary experimentation to improve from an ugly equilibrium”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.usehaystack.io/blog/we-cancelled-standups-and-let-the-team-build-heres-what-happened">We
Cancelled Standups and Let The Team Build. Here’s What Happened…</a> -
Team felt burned out by long, daily status update meetings masquerading
as standups. Eliminating these faux standups got the team back on
track.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="facilities">Facilities</h2>
<p>The environment we work in shapes us. Perks too.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://sci-hub.st/https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.2017.0239">The
impact of the ‘open’ workspace on human collaboration</a> - Open-plan
offices decrease face-to-face collaboration.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://joshuatdean.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/NoiseCognitiveFunctionandWorkerProductivity.pdf">Noise,
Cognitive Function, and Worker Productivity</a> - “An increase of 10 dB
reduces productivity by approximately 5%.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://steveblank.com/2009/12/21/the-elves-leave-middle-earth-%E2%80%93-soda%E2%80%99s-are-no-longer-free/">The
Elves Leave Middle Earth – Sodas Are No Longer Free</a> - Company
stopped providing free soda. The engineers were very upset, but it was
just soda and they could afford it. But really it wasn’t soda. Soda was
the canary in the coal mine, triggering an exodus of its best
engineers.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="product-management">Product Management</h2>
<p>The Product Manager is supposed to be the <em>voice of the
market</em>. Here are more links on the role and its reach.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>“You’re the broker for a lot of unstructured information and have
to fend off all kinds of disruptive influences to land even close to
where you’re trying to go.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19050555">source</a>)</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/dend/awesome-product-management">Awesome
Product Management</a> - A reference. All the missing pieces are found
below.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/tron1991/open-product-management">Open Product
Management</a> - Resources, interviews, case studies, sample products
&amp; projects, communities, open source tools, free &amp; paid services
on product management, for technical people to learn the field.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/vH4D1">Things Many People Find Too
Obvious To Have Told You Already</a> - A set of heuristics on tech
companies and the ecosystem they live in.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.darpa.mil/work-with-us/heilmeier-catechism">The
Heilmeier Catechism</a> - A simple set of question which helped DARPA
evaluates research programs to generate big rewards by taking big
risks.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250528080513/https://spacecraft.ssl.umd.edu/akins_laws.html">Akin’s
Laws of Spacecraft Design</a> - Lots of wisdom about space program
management.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/hakluke/how-to-exit-vim/blob/master/README.md#the-product-manager-way">How
to exit vim, the Product Manager way</a> - A satire with a grain of
truth, especially the comparison between the basic vs experienced
level.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="hiring-pms">Hiring PMs</h3>
<p>On interviewing for a PM position. And how to conduct an interview to
assess a PM’s abilities.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="http://www.venturegrit.com/what-everybody-ought-to-know-about-the-product-manager-case-interview/">What
Everybody Ought To Know About The Product Manager Case
Interview</a></p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.quora.com/What-are-frequently-asked-questions-in-product-manager-interviews">What
are frequently asked questions in product manager
interviews?</a></p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="product-market-fit">Product-Market Fit</h3>
<p>The first step to validate your product: is the market finding
interest in your venture?</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://tjcx.me/posts/i-wasted-40k-on-a-fantastic-startup-idea/">I
wasted $40k on a fantastic startup idea</a> - A tale of building a
product no user want to pay for. “You can’t just create value for the
user: that’s a charity. You also can’t just create value for your
company: that’s a scam. Your goal is to set up some kind of positive-sum
exchange, where everyone benefits, including you. A business plan,
according to this textbook, starts with this simple question: how will
you create value for yourself and the company?”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LNQxT9LvM0">David
Rusenko - How To Find Product Market Fit</a> - “Details the story of how
Weebly developed one of the most popular website creation and hosting
sites on the web today.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.holloway.com/s/rvc-fundamentals-of-product-market-fit">Fundamentals
of Product-Market Fit</a> - A complete overview of the concept: what is
product-market fit and to measuring it.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="product-strategy">Product Strategy</h3>
<p>Where your product lies in the value chain and how to position it in
the market.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.collaborativefund.com/blog/sustainable-sources-of-competitive-advantage/">Sustainable
Sources of Competitive Advantage</a> - “The ability to learn faster than
your competition; to empathize with customers more than your
competition; to communicate more effectively than your competition; The
willingness to fail more than your competition; to wait longer than your
competition”.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.coglode.com">Coglode: bite-size behavioral
research analysis</a> - Mostly applied behaviour insights to help you
build up strategies and tactics on product, design and
planning.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://mobile.x.com/trevmckendrick/status/1218748974321954816">“Why
does the tire company rate restaurants”</a> - A great example on why you
should investigate complementary businesses.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.gwern.net/Complement">Laws of Tech:
Commoditize Your Complement</a> - A step further from the previous
advice, in which is detailed an aggressive strategy to consolidate
monopolies.</p></li>
<li><p>Windows Vista as a prime example of a <a
href="https://x.com/SwiftOnSecurity/status/851861076429991937">sacrificial
lamb product</a>: a massive unpopular re-architecture required to pave
the way for future innovative release. That’s the cautionary tale of why
you should be ready for intense criticism and adversity, if by chance or
fate your wander down the path of monumental changes in a business
software.</p></li>
<li><p>Talking about Vista, Microsoft found out following its
unsuccessful launch that <a
href="https://augustl.com/blog/2019/best_bug_predictor_is_organizational_complexity/">the
#1 bug predictor is not technical, it’s organizational
complexity</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osborne_effect">Osborne
effect</a> - “A social phenomenon of customers canceling or deferring
orders for the current soon-to-be-obsolete product as an unexpected
drawback of a company’s announcing a future product prematurely.” This
is the price to pay for hasty marketing actions.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20230129184848/http://www.toomas.net/2017/07/18/reverse-engineering-a-successful-lifestyle-business-heres-everything-ive-learned-from-reading-indiehackers-com/">Reverse
Engineering A Successful Lifestyle Business</a> - Targets lifestyle
entrepreneur, but still full of fantastic quotes from reference books on
customer relation, pricing and marketing a product.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://x.com/maikzumstrull/status/1309497246946406400">The
Atlassian Syndrome</a> - Your organization will end up with Atlassian
products because “their business model is: 1. Collect requirement lists
from customers and prospective customers; 2. Make sure their product
checks every damn box, no matter how stupid.”</p></li>
<li><p>“Linear roadmaps are misleading” (<a
href="https://x.com/PavelASamsonov/status/1296818042928861184">source</a>).</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="user-centered-design">User-Centered Design</h3>
<p>On how to focus on user’s problem to have your product delivers
value.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/product-managers-at-work/the-product-roadmap-is-dead-welcome-to-the-age-of-problem-roadmaps-7c7745ac8ae0">The
product roadmap is dead: welcome to the age of problem roadmaps</a> -
“Fall in love with your problems and not with your solutions.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20220120220730/https://curatedintelligence.wordpress.com/2017/10/20/kasparovs-law/">Kasparov’s
Law</a> - Weak human + Machine &gt; Machine &gt; Strong Human.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://growth.design/psychology/">The Psychology of
Design</a> - An extensive list of cognitive biases and design principles
with examples and tips to fine-tune your product and UX.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="product-marketing">Product Marketing</h3>
<p>How to find users, grow your customer base and make people talks
about you product.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://github.com/LisaDziuba/Marketing-for-Engineers">Marketing
for Engineers</a> - Lots of resources to help bootstrap your marketing
activities and solve practical tasks.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/DggAq">How the biggest consumer apps
got their first 1,000 users</a> - How the biggest apps out there
started: from going to your user directly (both online and offline),
creating FOMO and word-of-mouth, to build a community first and get
press.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="project-management">Project Management</h2>
<p>If product management is about <em>what</em> is to be developed of
the product, then project management activities answers on <em>how</em>
to deliver that development. It is all about the execution, with a
particular attention to delivery critical path and planning.</p>
<p>But don’t worry too much, every company has its own definition of the
two roles, and sometimes hybrid positions.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/hackernoon/lets-have-no-managers-instead-of-managers-with-no-engineering-experience-e8b7cd29d398">Let’s
have no managers, instead of managers with no engineering experience</a>
- The title is misleading, article’s argument is: we don’t need
<em>project</em> managers if we already have <em>product</em> managers
and scrum masters.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16377523">Best
project management practices in 2018?</a> - There is no silver
bullet.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="http://benbrostoff.github.io/2019/09/28/long-projects.html">Strategies
for long Projects</a> - Relentless, irrational optimism; Daily progress
documentation; Compounding investments; Time budgeting.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://iism.org/article/developers-can-t-fix-bad-management-57">Developers
can’t fix bad management</a> - “Why do so many software projects fail?
Software development is much closer to creating a new factory than
running an existing factory. (…) Software development is made up of many
unknown duration tasks, this fundamentally unpredictable nature makes
traditional management’s predictive planning techniques particularly
unsuited for software projects.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="specifications">Specifications</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>“Walking on water and developing software from a specification
are easy if both are frozen.” Edward V. Berard - <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0132888955?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=559e579e5b00fde12559bbbb91ec1b95&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">Essays
on object-oriented software engineering</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ed94CfxgsCA">The art of
destroying software</a> - Greg Young described a good way to deal with
requirements volatility: optimize from the beginning to be able to
delete your code, and structure your code so that any part of it is no
bigger than 1 week’s worth of coding. So that any part can be re-written
in 1 week.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://stackoverflow.blog/2020/02/20/requirements-volatility-is-the-core-problem-of-software-engineering/">Requirements
volatility is the core problem of software engineering</a> - “Start by
accepting that change is inevitable. (…) As a consequence of this,
software is never finished, only abandoned. (…) This means that no
software product is ever exactly, perfectly satisfactory.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="estimations">Estimations</h3>
<p>Time management and planning starts with estimates, but often
degenerates into deadlines.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.reaktor.com/blog/forecasting-method/">Don’t
(guess)timate your projects, forecast with confidence</a> - “The problem
with spending a lot of time on estimating is that it can feel useful,
but often is so inaccurate that it hardly yields much value to the
business.” The best we can do is measure and forecast.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="http://kyleprifogle.com/dear-startup/">Dear Startup: You
have no idea how much that costs</a> - “We are completely clueless about
how long things should take.” Here is a <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21069178">trick to handle
expectation of unreasonable estimates</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalation_of_commitment">Escalation
of commitment</a> - A.k.a. sunk-cost fallacy, or the rational
explanation of why the hell do we still irrationally keep investing in a
bad project.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/9Hq7N">Who are you trying to impress
with your deadlines?</a> - “There are companies where those deadlines
are set in stone, and a missed deadline is next to fire. That’s when the
problem starts.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://techreflect.net/2019/12/10/aperture-senior-qa-2004-2005/">Apple
Aperture: Senior QA</a> - How not to manage projects approaching
deadlines: “cutting finished features, yelling at people, and working
people to the point of nervous breakdowns. Then they came upon a
brilliant idea: let’s steal over a hundred engineers from other teams
and then the project will magically get done on time.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://youtu.be/LmRl0D-RkPU?t=3202">Robert “Uncle Bob”
Martin talk about professionalism in software development</a> - The only
honest estimate is “I don’t know”. But you can come up with some kind of
probability assessment, that will inform about the shape of the risk.
This is not unlike PERT, where an activity is bounded by <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_evaluation_and_review_technique#Time">optimistic,
pessimistic and most-likely time</a>. Now if managers don’t take a range
for an answer, don’t fall in that trap. Tell them you’re already trying
as you possibly can. “And then the manager will have to do something
very foreign: they’ll have to manage. That’s what management is:
managing risk.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://erikbern.com/2019/04/15/why-software-projects-take-longer-than-you-think-a-statistical-model.html">Why
software projects take longer than you think: a statistical model</a> -
“Confirms the hunch that developers estimate the median well, but the
mean ends up being much higher.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://lepiter.io/feenk/developers-spend-most-of-their-time-figuri-9q25taswlbzjc5rsufndeu0py/">Developers
spend most of their time figuring the system out</a> - “A hand drawn
picture about the current system is a belief. Decisions should never be
based on beliefs. Not in engineering. (…) As software is highly
contextual we cannot predict specific problems. We can only predict
classes of problems.” And that’s why it is hard to estimate software
projects: because developer’s main activity is a long process of
deducting the assumptions a system is built on.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://shape-of-code.com/2021/01/17/software-effort-estimation-is-mostly-fake-research/">Software
effort estimation is mostly fake research</a> - “The NASA dataset
contains 93 rows (that is not a typo, there is no power-of-ten missing),
COCOMO 63 rows, Desharnais 81 rows, and (…) the China dataset contains
499 rows.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="tickets">Tickets</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://almad.blog/essays/no-bugs-just-todos/">There Are No
Bugs, Just TODOs</a> - Issue trackers needs to materialize ownership,
queue position, state, task breakdown and aggressive closing. Priority,
ticket type, software version, severity and long-life tickets are
anti-patterns.</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="delivery">Delivery</h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.seangoedecke.com/how-to-ship/">How I ship
projects at big tech companies</a> - “Shipping is a social construct
within a company. Concretely, that means that a project is shipped when
the important people at your company believe it is shipped.” That is the
dark side of delivery, in which you optimize for visibility by
upper-management for the next performance evaluation cycle.</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="agile">Agile</h2>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://safedelusion.com">The SAFe Delusion</a> -
Curated review of facts, evidence, and opinions from relevant sources
without vested interests, to help decision-makers make informed choices
and get better results.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/project-management-in-tech">How
Big Tech Runs Tech Projects and the Curious Absence of Scrum</a> -
There’s an interesting table in this article on the strereotypes of
companies, their funding models, main engineering actors, and their
central methodologies.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/pSUhM">Why do some developers at
Google consider Agile development to be nonsense?</a> - Because the
short-term focused Scrum processes “seem suited to particular types of
development, most notably consulting or contract programming, where the
customer is external to the organizations, runs the show because they
are paying for development, and can change their mind at any time”.
Still, google engineers already practice a culture close to what looks
like the original 10-points Agile manifesto. But that’s it.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250604004212/https://ronjeffries.com/articles/019-01ff/story-points/Index.html">Story
Points Revisited</a> - The alleged inventor of story points says they
are probably a mistake.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250601171312/https://media.defense.gov/2018/Oct/09/2002049591/-1/-1/0/DIB_DETECTING_AGILE_BS_2018.10.05.PDF">Detecting
Agile Bullshit</a> - US Department of Defense guide to detect software
projects that are really using agile development versus those that are
simply waterfall or spiral development in agile clothing
(“agile-scrum-fall”).</p></li>
<li><p>“The fundamental problem that drives most agile failures isn’t in
the team’s execution, it’s in the business’ expectations. One side is
signed up for incremental delivery, and one side is set up for a fixed
scope and deadline and the result is misery.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20326074">source</a>)</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.jeremiahlee.com/posts/failed-squad-goals/">Failed
#SquadGoals - Spotify doesn’t use “the Spotify model” and neither should
you</a> - “Why it didn’t work? 1. Matrix management solved the wrong
problem; 2. It fixated on team autonomy; 3. Collaboration was an assumed
competency; 4. Mythology became difficult to change”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10664-016-9464-2">Recurring
opinions or productive improvements — what agile teams actually discuss
in retrospectives</a> - An 3-years analysis of a team’s retrospectives,
with dire conclusions: people keep forgetting what they already learned,
keep discussing unsolveable problems out of their control, and keep
debating opinions based on biased interpretations or incorrect
understandings.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="key-performance-indicator-kpi">Key Performance Indicator
(KPI)</h2>
<p>KPIs are a set of quantitative measurements at the team or
organizational level, to measure the success of the business.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>“Numerical goals set for other people, without a road map to
reach the goal, have effects opposite to the effects sought.” - <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/Out-Crisis-W-Edwards-Deming/dp/0911379010?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=&amp;sr=&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=ec7a442a2cd5bfcfb5b6c32ea1409f2f&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">W.
Edwards Deming</a></p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://cloudplatform.googleblog.com/2018/07/sre-fundamentals-slis-slas-and-slos.html">SRE
fundamentals: SLIs, SLAs and SLOs</a> - If you are in the business of
cloud services, these metrics are certainly great KPIs.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.gitclear.com/blog/the_4_worst_software_metrics_agitating_developers_in_2019">The
4 Worst Software Metrics Agitating Developers in 2019</a> - The worst
KPIs to track a software team output: Lines of Code, Commit Count,
Issues Resolved (aka “Shipping Velocity”) and Code Churn (aka
“Efficiency”).</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="objectives-and-key-results-okr">Objectives and Key Results
(OKR)</h2>
<p>OKRs are a framework. Extending KPIs, they applies individually to
each members of an organization, down to the IC level. In theory,
everyone is supposed to have its own set of OKRs.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/dmASK">OKRs from a development team’s
perspective</a> - On how OKRs articulates with a backlog.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://svpg.com/team-objectives-overview/">Team
Objectives – Overview</a> - Why OKRs might not work at your company: 1.
You’re still using feature teams instead of product teams; 2. Mixed-up
manager and individual objectives; 3. Leadership opting-out of active
management.</p></li>
<li><p>“One way in which I’ve seen OKRs used effectively is as a defense
against the type of middle or upper manager who is constantly coming up
with new ideas or tasks.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19550614">source</a>) - Or
how OKRs can be weaponized to prevent top managers to mess with the
(already established) schedule.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250218070530/https://hrblog.spotify.com/2016/08/15/our-beliefs">Why
individual OKRs don’t work for us</a> - Spotify decision to stop using
OKRs for individuals.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17492038">Google’s
usage of OKRs</a> - OKR grades are public, but not used for promotion.
It was never taken very seriously there.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://github.com/domenicosolazzo/awesome-okr">Awesome
OKR</a> - There is no shortage of content on how to measure and
communicate objectives.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="training">Training</h2>
<p>On mentoring, education and learning.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/developers-mentoring-other-developers/">Developers
mentoring other developers: practices I’ve seen work well</a> -
Discusses mentorship practices that work well
engineer-to-engineer.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2019/06/07/apprenticeships/">What
Medieval People Got Right About Learning</a> - “Why apprenticeships beat
classrooms”.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://roadmap.sh/roadmaps">Developer Roadmaps</a> -
Very high-level guides and paths to learn different practice and
tools.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="communication">Communication</h2>
<p>It is not only about reading, writing and talking. It encompass all
the social practice and context sharing of the team’s activities.</p>
<p>Especially a software team, which generates a huge amount of
knowledge. All this knowledge is fragile and about to be lost for good.
Unless you materialization it in the form of writing.</p>
<h3 id="knowledge">Knowledge</h3>
<p>On knowledge surrounding a team.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="http://www.mooreds.com/wordpress/archives/3232">What
senior engineers do: fix knowledge holes</a> - “This is the textbook
definition of a senior engineer. You see a problem, you solve it
(thoroughly), you document it and you level up your team.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Chesterton%27s_fence">Chesterton’s
fence</a> - “If you’re considering nominating something for deletion, or
changing a policy, because it doesn’t appear to have any use or purpose,
research its history first.” It’s not we’d like to play conservative
here, but because we need to fix the knowledge hole as described
above.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/coaching-notes/youre-not-managing-a-team-of-software-engineers-you-re-managing-a-team-of-writers-b263d3a10cc7">You’re
Not Managing a Team of Software Engineers, You’re Managing a Team of
Writers</a> - Because writing software is “a creative process which is
by its nature unpredictable and personal, in an environment which craves
certainty, predictability and consistency.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="reading">Reading</h3>
<p>Before you know how to write, you need to know how to read.</p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="http://svr-sk818-web.cl.cam.ac.uk/keshav/papers/07/paper-reading.pdf">How
to Read a Paper</a> - Outlines a practical and efficient three-pass
method for reading research papers.</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="documentation">Documentation</h3>
<p>The various forms of technical writing, their structure and target
audience.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.divio.com/blog/documentation/">What nobody
tells you about documentation</a> - There is four kinds of
documentation: tutorials, how-to guides, explanation and reference. Each
with their own structure and mode of writing.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://flyingcircus.io/doc/reference/security/disaster-recovery.html#disaster-recovery">Flying
Circus Platform - Disaster recovery</a> - Critical infrastructure which
aims to be available 24/7 needs a <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disaster_recovery">Disaster Recovery
Plan</a>. It generally takes the form of a document providing an
overview of the expected severe failures and a set of procedures on how
the system and the team operating it is prepared to deal with. The one
linked here is a great example of such document, and is strong evidence
the team is prepared for the worse.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="writing">Writing</h3>
<p>General advice on how to convey meaning and clarity by mastering the
style. If badly written, your documentation is likely to have poor usage
and utility.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/441f/ac7c2020e1c8f0d32adffca697bbb8a198a1.pdf">How
to Write a Technical Paper</a> - Serves as a guideline on how to write a
good technical paper, in the form of a typical journal
publication.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.cs.tufts.edu/~nr/pubs/learn.pdf">Learning
Technical Writing Using the Engineering Method</a> - An alternative
approach, involving a weekly meeting of a writing group. An interesting
dynamic to gather feedback and experience.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://developers.google.com/tech-writing">Technical
Writing Courses</a> - This collection of courses and learning resources
aims to improve your technical documentation. Learn how to plan and
author technical documents. You can also learn about the role of
technical writers in a company.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://sci-hub.st/https://iubmb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/bmb.20329">Algorithm
for writing a scientific manuscript</a> - A process to guide the
preparation and refinement of manuscripts.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://people.clas.ufl.edu/jlichstein/files/Baldwin_Formula_for_writing_a_scientific_paper_and_reviewing_papers.pdf">The
Baldwin Formula for scientific writing: writing papers and reviews</a> -
“The most efficient way to write scientific papers is to write while you
are still conducting experiments”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/088278v5.full.pdf">Ten
simple rules for structuring papers</a> - “Focusing on how readers
consume information, we present a set of 10 simple rules to help you get
across the main idea of your paper.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://cs.stanford.edu/people/widom/paper-writing.html">Tips for
Writing Technical Papers</a> - Another set of tips, specifically using
the example of a technical paper describing an improvement of an
algorithm.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://speakerdeck.com/pycon2016/a-jesse-jiryu-davis-write-an-excellent-programming-blog">Write
an Excellent Programming Blog</a> - Tips on structure and style to
produce great blog posts.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://mkaz.blog/misc/notes-on-technical-writing/">Notes on
Technical Writing</a> - An effective list of do and don’t when it comes
to writing documentation.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="style">Style</h3>
<p>Once you have the right structure and content thanks to advice above,
you can now copy-edit and fine tune your style with the tools below.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://nohello.net/en/">Please don’t say just hello in
chat</a> - When properly used, interactive written medium allows for
asynchronous communication.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.animalz.co/blog/bottom-line-up-front/">BLUF:
The Military Standard That Can Make Your Writing More Powerful</a> -
“BLUF is a military communications acronym—it stands for “bottom line up
front”—that’s designed to enforce speed and clarity in reports and
emails.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.thepunctuationguide.com">The Punctuation
Guide</a> - Simple reference on how (and why) to use these special
characters.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="presentations">Presentations</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://alexnixon.github.io/2019/12/10/writing.html">It’s time to
start writing</a> - On “Jeff Bezos’s dotcom-era policy of banning
PowerPoint within Amazon”, and how “this is neither about powerpoint nor
about reading - it’s about thinking.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20220720230551/http://www.jilles.net/perma/2020/06/05/presentation-rules.html">Presentation
Rules</a> - A set of 16 rules to avoid boring and ineffective
presentations, and have your message reach your audience.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/the-mission/the-greatest-sales-deck-ive-ever-seen-4f4ef3391ba0">The
Greatest Sales Deck I’ve Ever Seen</a> - “1. Name a big change in the
world; 2. Show there’ll be winners and losers; 3. Tease the promised
land; 4. Introduce features as”Magic Gifts”; 5. Present evidence that
you can make the story come true.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6199544">Some tips
on public speaking</a> - “If you ever find yourself buffering on output,
rather than making hesitation noises, just pause. People will read that
as considered deliberation and intelligence.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="career">Career</h2>
<p>Now that you’ve proven your worth as a front-line manager, what’s the
next step? These articles explore the follow-up roles, from managing
managers, to director, and everything in between.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://larahogan.me/blog/manager-levels/">Work at
different management levels</a> - A great progressive breakup of what it
feels like to work at different levels of management.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://medium.com/@rvprabhu/levels-of-abstraction-in-engineering-management-6bac9410e89a">Levels
of abstraction in engineering management</a> - Another take on the
differences between Manager, Manager of Managers, Head of Org and Head
of Function.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://jacobian.org/2019/apr/23/questions-for-employers-director-vp/">My
questions for prospective employers (Director/VP roles)</a> - Be
prepared to ask them as a recruiter or being asked about them for senior
management roles.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZJZbv4J6FZ8Dnb0JuMhJxTnwl-dwqx5xl0s65DE3wO8/">Founder
to CEO</a> - You can build you own career engine, starting as a
technical founder of a startup, building a great team, then grow with
the company to learn and become a full-fledge CEO.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://x.com/shreyas/status/1268372416427786240">How
title, money and scope affect your fulfillment</a> - “For talented
mid-career folks, when making job changes, how do you rank: 1. Title 2.
Money 3. Scope”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.wired.com/story/amazon-wants-to-win-at-games-so-why-hasnt-it/">Amazon
Wants to ‘Win at Games.’ So Why Hasn’t It?</a> - “Any product manager
can go between any business—from groceries to film to games to Kindle.
The skillset is interchangeable. They just have to learn the particular
market.”</p></li>
<li><p>“Since managers are not tied to a sector (in the way nurses or
musicians are), the good ones tend to go where they are paid good money
and the bad ones end up wreaking havoc where they are paid at least some
money. That, also, is <a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baumol%27s_cost_disease">Baumol</a>
in action.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20448929">source</a>) -
Explains how the pool of professional managers gets distributed into the
various sectors of the economy.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="promotion">Promotion</h3>
<p>Stepping stones advancing a career in a company takes the form of
promotions. They unlock raises, bonuses and more responsibility.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="http://www.elidedbranches.com/2017/09/how-do-managers-get-stuck.html">How
do managers get stuck?</a> - Identify scenario preventing managers to be
promoted at the next level.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3350548">The
Evolution of Management: Transitioning up the ladder</a> - Describe the
path and expectations at each management level.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://charity.wtf/2020/09/06/if-management-isnt-a-promotion-then-engineering-isnt-a-demotion/">If
management isn’t a promotion, then engineering isn’t a demotion</a> -
This essay deconstruct why management ends up being seen as a promotion,
how its new acquired privileges and powers creates an implicit
hierarchy, which in turns creates bad incentives because of loss
aversion. At the end, the only way forwards is to change the
organization’s culture.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20240914135841/https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/145709/how-to-discipline-overeager-engineer">How
to discipline overeager engineer</a> - Over-achieving talent is looking
for a management promotion. Management does not recognize effort.
Engineer become disgruntled and management is looking to discipline him.
A case-study of a bad situation in which both side shows
clumsiness.</p></li>
<li><p>“Most people realize by their 30s that prestige is a sucker’s
game” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11833832">source</a>) - Do
not chase promotion for the title only.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24463676">For all
you future CTOs, consider your incentive schemes carefully</a> - How a
promotion scheme marked the end of Uber’s engineering excellence and the
start of what made the company turn into a bureaucratic mess.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/nlUrG">How to get promoted</a> - The
cynical take: “an opportunist’s career advice is: ignore OKRs, switch
projects well before the consequences of your decisions can be measured,
act happy and easy-going, package bad news as appeals for slow systemic
adjustments, don’t make anyone look bad, perform rituals with
enthusiasm, grow headcount faster than baseline, let work invent itself,
follow management fashions, avoid acute failures, believe this
sincerely.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="performance-reviews">Performance Reviews</h3>
<p>Reviews and performance evaluations are the tool of the trade to
unlock promotions. As a manager, your going to write and instrument them
for your team members to get the raise they deserve. And getting through
them as any other employee to advance your career.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://jvns.ca/blog/brag-documents/">Get your work
recognized: write a brag document</a> - There’s this idea that, if you
do great work at your job, people will (or should!) automatically
recognize that work and reward you for it with promotions / increased
pay. In practice, it’s often more complicated than that.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/03/incentive-pay-considered-harmful/">Incentive
Pay Considered Harmful</a> - “Incentives (or bribes) simply can’t work
in the workplace. (…) Most software managers have no choice but to go
along with performance review systems that are already in place. If
you’re in this position, the only way to prevent teamicide is to simply
give everyone on your team a gushing review”.</p></li>
<li><p>“If anything in your performance review is a surprise, then I
have failed as a manager.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17249767">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“This is what I loved about working at Netflix. We didn’t have
performance reviews. It was assumed that your performance was good to
excellent, otherwise you wouldn’t be working there anymore. You had a
constant feedback loop with your manager on performance, but nothing was
ever formal.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23861960">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“The system a software developer works in shapes their
performance so much more than individual differences.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21972033">source</a>).</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="compensation">Compensation</h2>
<p>It’s not only about the salary, but the whole package: equity,
bonuses, perks, and the dealings around all of these.</p>
<h3 id="salary">Salary</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.levels.fyi">levels.fyi</a> - Compares salary
range and compensation charts across big tech companies.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://benefits.fyi">benefits.fyi</a> - Same as above,
but trying to evaluate the values of benefits across companies.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21823987">L8-L10
salaries at AWS</a> - A reference point to what $M+ compensation
packages looks like.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250415095157/https://bloomberry.com/why-new-hires-often-get-paid-more-than-existing-employees/">Why
new hires often get paid more than existing employees</a> - “and why the
best way to get a bigger pay is to move to a new job.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2439478">Salaries
never stay secrets forever. Hiding them only delays the
inevitable.</a></p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="equity">Equity</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>“Never accept a lower salary in exchange for equity.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21868845">source</a>)</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17448035">On VC
funding and huge growth</a> - “Startups need an exit strategy. (…) The
idea is to raise money fast, hire experienced people for ancillary
services and develop the application in a way so that it is able to hold
up till IPO. Defer all costs for post IPO.” So from this angle, the only
reason to join a startup is for future money windfall.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.holloway.com/g/equity-compensation">Equity
Compensation</a> - Stock options, RSUs, job offers, and taxes—a detailed
reference, including hundreds of resources, explained from the ground up
and made to be improved over time.</p></li>
<li><p>“Public RSUs for stock you can sell immediately on the open
market are fantastic.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22386728">source</a>).</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="politics">Politics</h2>
<p>Here we are, at the intersection of power and influence lies the
political game. If its nature and intensity is sourced from the
company’s core culture and history, you’re unfortunately unlikely to
avoid it past a certain hierarchical level. Be prepared.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28336658">About
corporate middle management</a> - “As a manager in a large corporation
you are expected to be an aligner. (…) You have to manage frictions and
strive to make the people above you look good.”</p></li>
<li><p>“Politics is how a middle manager runs interference and creates
distractions to make sure you can’t see over, around, or through them,
and that the people behind them closer to the money can’t see you.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22808280">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://exp-platform.com/hippo/">HiPPO FAQ</a> - HiPPO
stands for “Highest Paid Person’s Opinion”, a trait of dysfunctional
culture, in which power politics trumps data.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prince">The Prince</a>
- Machiavelli’s ideas on how to accrue honor and power as a leader.
Resorting to that level of politics in a company is a sure way to render
the culture highly toxic, as well as corrupting and demoralizing the
organization at all levels.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/">The
Gervais Principle</a> - A cynical, bleak, but still fascinating take on
the management ladder, based on <em>The Office</em>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0140280197?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=bf129d7f7a3495a445cf2bf667d3d3c6&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">The
48 Laws of Power</a> - By Robert Greene. Can teach you how to cover your
ass and be effective in a highly political org.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.amazon.com/Rules-Power-Surprising-but-True-Advice-Advance/dp/1637741227?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=&amp;sr=&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=1a2a7107ccffa7b19e03cdb88e616daf&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl">7
Rules of Power</a> - By Jeffery Pfeffer. Tells you <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39084979">how to play office
politics if success in the workplace is the only thing you care
about</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selectorate_theory">Selectorate
theory</a> - “In selectorate theory, three groups of people affect
leaders. These groups are the nominal selectorate, the real selectorate,
and the winning coalition. (…) To remain in power, leaders must maintain
their winning coalition.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circulation_of_elite">Circulation of
elite</a> - “Changes of regime, revolutions, and so on occur not when
rulers are overthrown from below, but when one elite replaces
another.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs">The Rules
for Rulers</a> - “Smart key supporters will always watch the balance of
power, ready to change allegiance if the ruler look to be the loser in a
shifting web of alliances. (…) Buy all the loyalty you can, because
loyalty, in dictatorial organizations of all kinds, is
everything.”</p></li>
<li><p>“Playing the game well is now front and center” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21925738">source</a>), or why
the <a
href="https://nodramadevops.com/2019/12/key-practices-for-achieving-large-professional-goals/">key
practices for achieving large professional goals</a> is missing the
parts about office politics.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22285123">“Company
I’ve worked for had manager who tried to ship features over the weekend
with a ragtag team of developers who don’t understand why that’s a bad
idea.”</a> - Tactics of hustling managers, and how the company reacting
to that kind of manager makes or break a good place to work.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.sci-hub.st/doi/10.1111/peps.12424">Making
Nice or Faking Nice? Exploring Supervisors’ Two-Faced Response to their
Past Abusive Behavior</a> - “It behooves organizations that want to
develop highly authentic supervisors or organizational climates to seek
to hire supervisors that are lower (or at least not higher) on
symbolized moral identity.”</p></li>
<li><p>“The actual power wielded by a high level executive is usually
inversely proportional to the size of the organization they manage.”
(source: <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20260498">comment</a> on <a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20260114">Why large companies
are so difficult to rescue</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“Cutting costs gets you a raise. Delivering a big project is a
path to promotion.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21230771">source</a>)</p></li>
<li><p>“You know your game fails when you read in the news about the
feature you are supposed to have.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20220484">source</a>). A team
learning about its roadmap at the same time of the general public is a
sure sign something is wrong.</p></li>
<li><p>“In a highly political environment there are two ways to create
change, one is through overt manipulation, which is to collect political
power to yourself and then exert it to enact change, and the other is
covert manipulation, which is to enact change subtly enough that the
political organism doesn’t react. (sometimes called”triggering the
antibodies”).” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5541517">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://honkathon.com/2019-08-18-power-bends-light/">Power Bends
Light</a> - “Most things at most startups are perpetually on fire, but
if you can accept that, there is a lot to like. One well-known one: at a
fast-growing startup, a hard-working, talented person who has some
support from company leadership can often acquire an impressive title
(or at least a lot of de facto power) very quickly.”</p></li>
<li><p>“It’s common to promote someone to just get rid of that person :)
Sometimes promoting is just easier that firing.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21767734">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://qz.com/work/1717297/how-to-cope-with-a-toxic-boss-according-to-a-us-spy-manual-from-wwii/">US
spy manual has tips for coping with toxic bosses</a> - Derived from
WWII-era <a
href="https://archive.org/details/SimpleSabotageFieldManual">Simple
Sabotage Field Manual</a>, a classic read to spot harassing and
demoralizing behaviors.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.tilt365.com/the-tilted-edge/blog/post/toxic-leadership-destructive-characteristics-examples">4
Clues to Identify a Destructive Leader</a> - “1. I’m kind of a big deal!
2. None of this is my fault! 3. Just do what I say! 4. Trust me; I’m
never wrong.”</p></li>
<li><p>“The president of MIT told me that tenure was not about research,
productivity, or merit. It was about office politics &amp; being liked
by your department.” (<a
href="https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1494369809538195456.html">source</a>)
- Contemplating to switch from the industry? The grass is not greener in
academia. Given a significant size, any organization comes with its
political game.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="re-organizations">Re-organizations</h2>
<p>As a manager, you have direct responsibility of the structure of the
team. Past a certain size (around 8 to 12 depending on sources), you no
longer have time to work with direct ICs, so you need to re-organize the
team.</p>
<p>At a company level, re-orgs are mostly strategic and your influence
on them depends on your political acumen.</p>
<h3 id="team-level">Team-level</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://jchyip.medium.com/why-its-difficult-to-build-teams-in-high-growth-organisations-e1aee8446337">Why
it’s difficult to build teams in high growth organisations</a> -
Describes 3 different approach a manager can take to accommodate new
people in the team: 1. Sink or Swim; 2. Split and Absorb; 3. Absorb and
Split.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://blog.jessitron.com/2019/06/15/teams-are-like-bread/">Teams
are like bread</a> - Resonates with the <em>Absorb and Split</em>
strategy discussed above: “if you have one team where the magic is
flourishing, don’t kill it. Feed it, grow it, and let it be a source of
further strong teams. No rushing.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://erikbern.com/2021/07/07/the-data-team-a-short-story.html">Building
a data team at a mid-stage startup: a short story</a> - Story of a
manager trying to distill the concepts of a data-driven company while
growing a tiny team of 3 people. Each step covers the evolution of the
technical pipeline and interactions with existing stakeholders.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17329028">If I
Close My Data Centers, What About the People/Jobs Lost?</a> - F50’s data
centers being migrated to commercial cloud provider. But what about the
people currently doing legacy stuff? The answer: retrain.</p></li>
<li><p>“This is the managerialist dream. To replace employees’ judgement
and competence with a process and management methodology. (…) It never
works.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20881308">source</a>). And
why the retraining answer above is the best one.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://conversionxl.com/blog/dont-build-growth-teams/">I’ve Built
Multiple Growth Teams. Here’s Why I Won’t Do It Again.</a> - “Few folks
understand probability, and most executives don’t care about the data,
regardless of what it says.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="company-level">Company-level</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/vOuLQ">The SaaS Org Chart</a> -
Blueprints of an organization at each stage of its
50/125/400/1000-employees stages, with typical ratios and ARR.</p></li>
<li><p>“If you have dealt with large, completely incompetent
organizations and wondered how the hell they actually keep going -
theres your answer. If built correctly it’s genuinely difficult to mess
things up.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20533922">source</a>). I.e.
the structure of the organization is quintessential to its
longevity.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://jessitron.com/2021/05/26/a-high-resilience-org-chart/">A
high-resilience org chart</a> - “If you know what problem you’re solving
and you know how to solve it, a bureaucratic organization will do. Stick
with what you know. If you’re writing software, that’s a generative
activity. You need a high-resilience org chart. Fewer boxes, more
flexibility.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://caseyaccidental.com/alternative-approach-re-orgs/">An
Alternative Approach to Re-Orgs At Your Company</a> - “Trying not to
repeat re-org mistakes, we started working on a structure that would
make the re-org act like a feedback-fueled progress driven by the teams
instead of by people above them.” This is an attempt to extract from the
ground up signals pointing to inadequate structure. My cautionary tale:
this might only work up to a point depending on the company’s
culture.</p></li>
<li><p>“When everything is great success, people behind that success
shadow the people who could make success in the future. (…) Netflix is
great example of how to do big transition right. Netflix was in renting
DVDs by mail business. When the decision to move to streaming was made,
Netflix CEO did not allow managers who responsible for DVD renting
business into meetings where the future was planned.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21395557">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://onezero.medium.com/speaking-truth-to-power-reflections-on-a-career-at-microsoft-90f80a449e36">Speaking
Truth to Power: Reflections on My Career at Microsoft</a> - After 3
decades in a deeply flawed company, the author comes to a humble
conclusion: leaders should embodies the value of their employees. Not
the other way around. “Changes at the top — not speeches, training or
hashtags — make the most cultural impact. If you want real and lasting
cultural change, sweep away the made-men who succeeded under the
previous culture and promote the people who look, act, and think more
like their employees than their managers.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="acquisition">Acquisition</h3>
<p>A special case of re-org, that might take the form of inclusion,
absorption or dissolution of the acquired company.</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://lethain.com/digg-acquihire/">How the Digg team was
acquihired</a> - Acqui-hire of a whole team can be seen as a type of
reorg. In which managers will have to negotiate the new employment
contracts in bulk in one or two days: “Because acquihires are “star”
oriented, if you’re a senior leaders who doesn’t explicitly refuse to
move forward, pressure will converge on you from all sides”.</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="health">Health</h2>
<ul>
<li><a
href="https://supermemo.guru/wiki/Good_sleep,_good_learning,_good_life">Good
sleep, good learning, good life</a> - An e-book-sized synthesis on sleep
research “with a view to practical applications, esp. in people who need
top-quality sleep for their learning or creative achievements.”</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="holidays">Holidays</h3>
<ul>
<li><a
href="http://timharford.com/2019/09/should-we-take-a-few-long-holidays-or-lots-of-short-ones/">Should
we take a few long holidays, or lots of short ones?</a> - Short ones.
“Reason one: holiday memories tend to depend not on how long the holiday
was, but on the intensity of the experiences. Reason two: a change of
activity can be a spur to creativity. Reason three for taking a short
break: if we need rest to prevent exhaustion, a single, long vacation
won’t do the trick.”</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="stress">Stress</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.companiesalive.com/toxichandlers-healthandhealing-lifecoaching-miami-leadershiptraining.htm">The
Toxic Handler: Organizational Hero — and Casualty</a> - “toxic handler,
a manager who voluntarily shoulders the sadness, frustration,
bitterness, and anger that are endemic to organizational life. Although
toxic handlers may be found at every level in organizations, many work
near the top”.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://larahogan.me/blog/manager-energy-drain/">Manager
Energy Drain</a> - “How do I handle how tired I am as a manager? 1.
Defrag your calendar; 2. Delegate messy and unscoped projects; 3. Say
no.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.silasreinagel.com/blog/2019/08/12/how-slack-harms-projects/">How
Slack Harms Projects</a> - “Promote a false sense of urgency, destroy
focus, allow for bypassing project prioritization, strip away essential
business context, encourage poorly thought-out communication”. To
remediate this, see <a
href="https://pspdfkit.com/blog/2018/how-to-use-slack-and-not-go-crazy/">How
to Use Slack and Not Go Crazy</a> article.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21856352">Examples
of harassments</a> - How a jealous boss, who felt either betrayed or
ridiculed, bullied a capable employee to force him out. Don’t be that
kind of asshole boss.</p></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="burnout">Burnout</h3>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7789438">How shitty
job crush your soul, then lead to burnout</a> - “Burnout is a very
serious situation. If you burn yourself out hard, it will be difficult
to be effective at any future job you go to, even if it is ostensibly a
wonderful job. Treat burnout like a physical injury.”</p></li>
<li><p>“Burnout is caused by resentment. (…) No. Burnout is caused when
you repeatedly make large amounts of sacrifice and or effort into
high-risk problems that fail. It’s the result of a negative prediction
error in the nucleus accumbens. You effectively condition your brain to
associate work with failure.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5630618">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/78aEf">If You’re So Successful, Why
Are You Still Working 70 Hours a Week?</a> - “Our tendency to overwork
and burn out is framed by a complex combination of factors involving our
profession, our organization, and ourselves. At the heart of it is
insecurity.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/yqPAD">What Happens When Your Career
Becomes Your Whole Identity</a> - “A particular confluence of high
achievement, intense competitiveness, and culture of overwork has caught
many in a perfect storm of career enmeshment and burnout.”</p></li>
<li><p>“In my experience extreme workaholism can often be a way to avoid
or defer major life decisions that someone doesn’t want to make or even
consciously recognize. (…) Eventually the debt comes due but sometimes
not until many decades later.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21900054">source</a>)</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://ssir.org/articles/entry/burnout_from_an_organizational_perspective">Burnout
From an Organizational Perspective</a> - “Extensive research by the
military on sustainable performance in stressful conditions teaches that
leaders should become champions of health, rather than taskmasters.”
Describe the symptoms of toxic organizations and how managers can
protect their teams from systemic burnout.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://stackoverflow.blog/2020/01/13/avoiding-burnout-as-an-ambitious-developer/">Avoiding
burnout as an ambitious developer</a> - “Be willing to say no; Know what
you don’t want; Use your energy level realistically; Be kind to your
future self”.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/dear-life-please-improve/202008/how-does-your-tech-job-burn-you-out">Psychology
Today: How Programmers Can Avoid Burnout</a> - “Veteran software
developers often recommend to: 1. Work at a place where you can grow; 2.
Build transferable skills; 3. Have creative outlets and create a space
to focus on yourself, switch off, and relax; 4. Of course, there’s
always the nuclear option: make your money and get out.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/average-tenure-of-a-ciso-is-just-26-months-due-to-high-stress-and-burnout/">Average
tenure of a CISO is just 26 months due to high stress and burnout</a> -
“Today, CISO jobs come with low budgets, long working hours, a lack of
power on executive boards, a diminishing pool of trained professionals
they can hire, but also a constant stress of not having done enough to
secure the company’s infrastructure against cyber-attacks, continuous
pressure due to newly arising threats, and little thanks for the good
work done, but all the blame if everything goes wrong.”</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="setbacks-and-failures">Setbacks and Failures</h2>
<ul>
<li><p>“What does not kill me makes me stronger”, Friedrich Nietzsche -
Brutal, but with a grain of truth.</p></li>
<li><p>“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the
most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to
change.” Charles Darwin - <a
href="https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/05/04/adapt/">A quote</a> to
tame the one above.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-12189-3">Early-career
setback and future career impact</a> - “Despite an early setback,
individuals with near misses systematically outperform those with narrow
wins in the longer run.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://theconversation.com/huge-success-in-business-is-largely-based-on-luck-new-research-130843">Huge
success in business is largely based on luck</a> - “Management research
and education should focus on prescriptive theories that can help
business practitioners move from ‘incompetent to OK’, rather than
focusing on those that address how to move from ‘good to
great’.”</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://stuff.mit.edu/afs/athena/course/2/2.75/resources/random/How%20Complex%20Systems%20Fail.pdf">How
Complex Systems Fail</a> - “Short treatise on the nature of failure; how
failure is evaluated; how failure is attributed to proximate cause; and
the resulting new understanding of patient safety”.</p></li>
</ul>
<!--lint disable double-link-->
<ul>
<li><a href="https://danluu.com/wat/">Normalization of deviance</a> -
Explores how the factors accounting for disasters accumulates unnoticed
until it’s too late. This has been studied on other fields, but not in
software engineering.</li>
</ul>
<!--lint enable double-link-->
<ul>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-fAinNDbQU&amp;t=6s">Steve Jobs
explains - Why companies fail?</a> - On how sales and marketing takes
over product focused companies.</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/h07CR">The failure of Scaling
Etsy</a> - When a company lacks technical leadership: developers waste
time in costly refactors, over-engineered systems, and ends up detached
from the business and product.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="exits">Exits</h2>
<p>Sometimes, you just have to call it quits.</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://archive.ph/NxLVP">Why I Rejected My Manager</a>
- “I understand now why the saying is: people leave managers, not
companies.”</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20786755">Colleague
is leaving. How to investigate what went wrong?</a> - “Most of the time
people leave bosses, not the job or the company.” And why you’re
unlikely to get any substantial insights from exit interviews. (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20787874">source</a>)</p></li>
<li><p>“<em>People do get pissed off in clusters</em> is the best
description of a team/company meltdown that I’ve ever seen.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19755001">source</a>)</p></li>
</ul>
<!--lint disable double-link-->
<ul>
<li>“Something I’ve seen multiple times is that, when a VP leaves, a
company will become a substantially worse place to work, and it will
slowly dawn on people that the VP was doing an amazing job at supporting
not only their direct reports, but making sure that everyone under them
was having a good time.” (<a
href="https://danluu.com/wat/#fn:P">source</a>)</li>
</ul>
<!--lint enable double-link-->
<ul>
<li><p>“Next time your favorite manager and tech lead quit the company,
ask them why.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21767843">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p>“<a href="https://archive.ph/9Osm2">Good business mafias form</a>
when there’s a group of people who all have to quit their job for
reasons that are exogenous to their performance. In the case of Paypal,
it was an acquisition; at Tiger Management, a few years of
underperformance; at Drexel Burnham Lambert, an indictment. In
Reliance’s case, the core group of early employees fled the port of Aden
due to unrest and the withdrawal of the British.” (<a
href="https://archive.ph/WCxsu">source</a>) - And why mass exodus might
be an opportunity for great new ventures.</p></li>
<li><p>“It was my experience that no single departure had any effect.
Mass departures did, trends did, but one person never did, even when
that person was a founder.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4324615">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://nelson.cloud/as-an-employee-you-are-disposable/">As an
Employee, You Are Disposable</a> - “It’s okay to like your job and
employer. Just understand that, as an employee, you are disposable.”
Also: “This is not news. If you are loyal to your employer and do not
own a significant part of the organization, then you should take a good
hard look at why you’re loyal – and whether or not your employer is
loyal to you in return.” (<a
href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40943681">source</a>).</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yr4RvdREwl8">P.T.’s
Hidden Meaning</a> - How Hideo Kojima creatively used a playable teaser
as a way to bypass NDA and to tell the story about the turmoil at Konami
leading to his leaving of the company. But that only works if you’re an
influential and popular game designer.</p></li>
<li><p><a
href="https://www.thecompleteleader.org/sites/default/files/imce/Managing%20Oneself_Drucker_HBR.pdf">Management
Challenges for the 21st Century - Managing Oneself</a> - “There is a
great deal of talk today about the”mid-life crisis” of the executive. It
is mostly boredom. At age forty-five most executives have reached the
peak of their business career and know it.” In paragraph Ⅴ, you’ll find
why knowledge workers needs to manage themselves, and plan for the
second half of their life.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2 id="contributing">Contributing</h2>
<p>Your contributions are always welcome! Please take a look at the <a
href=".github/contributing.md">contribution guidelines</a> first.</p>
<h2 id="footnotes">Footnotes</h2>
<p>The <a
href="https://github.com/kdeldycke/awesome-engineering-team-management/blob/main/assets/awesome-management-header.png">header
image</a> is based on a modified <a
href="https://unsplash.com/photos/6dDHofabCQ8">photo taken in November
2017</a> by <a href="https://unsplash.com/@werner01">Werner Du
plessis</a>.</p>
<!--lint disable no-undefined-references-->
<p><a name="intro-quote-def">[1]</a>: <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0321934113?&amp;linkCode=ll1&amp;tag=kevideld-20&amp;linkId=9a6c692819b070f38feb70816e6635ab&amp;language=en_US&amp;ref_=as_li_ss_tl"><em>Peopleware:
Productive Projects and Teams, 1987</em>, page 34</a> (Addison-Wesley
Professional, 3rd edition, 2013). <a href="#intro-quote-ref">[↑]</a></p>
<p><a
href="https://github.com/kdeldycke/awesome-engineering-team-management">engineeringteammanagement.md
Github</a></p>