featured in #265
Why Flow Matters More Than Passion
- Sarah Drasner tl;dr: "In flow, obstacles that would cause anxiety are perceived differently, and people have more resolve to push through a task." Managers can help engineers reach flow by: (1) Creating a "clarity of purpose." (2) Set "challenging but not impossible" work. (3) Providing a sense of ownership over work. (4) Provide feedback quickly. (5) Compensate fairly. (6) Believe in their abilities.featured in #264
The Pragmatic Engineer Test: 12 Questions On Engineering Culture
- Gergely Orosz tl;dr: "12 questions to get a sense of what a tech company is like to work at, based on things most job postings do not mention:" (1) Are code reviews and testing both part of the everyday development process? (2) Do you follow an internal open-source model, where any engineer can access and contribute to most other codebases - with appropriate code ownership in place?featured in #261
Nurturing Design In Your Software Engineering Culture
- Nick Tune tl;dr: Tactics to improve the "design mindset in your engineering culture," such as (1) the use of pair programming and mobbing because to vet every and debate small decisions. (2) "A good understanding of the business domains" so engineers and architects can create business-optimized designs, and more.featured in #232
Software Engineering Culture Metrics
- David Xiang tl;dr: David breaks down how to look at engineering culture via questions, characteristics and values, giving examples of each, and 3 interesting metrics - (1) Adoption of frameworks & tools, (2) effectiveness of retrospectives & (3) effectiveness of RFCs.featured in #225
No Meetings, No Deadlines, No Full-Time Employees
- Sahil Lavingia tl;dr: "We got here on accident, not some grand plan." After laying off his employees, Sahil cared more about "freedom" instituting "a no-meeting, no-deadline" culture. He hired contractors who "saved the company." This way of working has grown to 25 contractors and $11 million in annualized revenue.featured in #221
Driving Cultural Change Through Software Choices
- Camille Fournier tl;dr: To change engineering values as a leader, you need to change what you reward and focus on. This can be slow and has negative consequences e.g. some feel their skill are less relevant. As a platform engineer, you can find tools that bake in and support the values you want to be taken seriously.featured in #218
Preserving Culture When Someone Leaves The Team
- Mark Wood tl;dr: It's common to focus on the practical skills lost when someone leaves. Consider cultural implications too. As a manager, identify a common behavior the employee brought, its impact, and how you want to strengthen it going forward - through your own behaviors, asking someone else, or through the a new hire.featured in #215
Diversity, Inclusion, And Belonging For All
tl;dr: LinkedIn's open course to "learn about the challenges and opportunities inherent in working in diverse organizations."featured in #187
The Developer Culture Test: What Defines Places Where Developers Thrive?
- Gergely Orosz tl;dr: The test comprises of 3 areas, with 5 questions each, to help evaluate whether an organization has a healthy culture. Any "decent tech company" should have the 3 basic points nailed, and "cover at least 4 out of the 5 points in each area."featured in #182