/Leadership

Layers Of Context

- Will Larson tl;dr: “All interesting problems operate across a number of context layers. For a concrete example, let’s think about a problem I’ve run into twice: what are the layers of context for evaluating a team that wants to introduce a new programming language like Erlang or Elixir to your company’s technology stack?" Will shares some layers of context and how to see across them.

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15 Best Leadership Books

- Dr Milan Milanović tl;dr: “This is a reading guide for you as a leader to navigate and upgrade your leadership skills. It is a curated list of the best books on leadership that you can check and read during the holiday season. But it is not just a numbered list of books to read; it is a guide created by considering my selection from many books I’ve read and talked about with many leaders in the field.”

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Are Your Standards Too Low? In Defense Of Raising The Bar

- Wes Kao tl;dr: Wes discusses why you should consider raising your standards and why this has the potential to dramatically improve your team’s chances of getting what you want: (1) Why every leader should set higher standards. (2) Challenges when raising the bar. (3) How to normalize a culture of excellence. 

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Thinking About Risk: Mitigation

- Jacob Kaplan-Moss tl;dr: Jacob presents a simple framework to help frame discussions about risk mitigation. “It’s intentionally very simple, a basic starting point. I’ll present a more complex framework later in this series, but I want to lay more of a foundation before I get there, so we’ll start here.”

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Tying Engineering Metrics To Business Metrics

- Iccha Sethi tl;dr: “Most engineering organizations I’ve worked in or led have tracked some form of engineering metrics. These range from simple metrics like uptime and incident count to more complex frameworks like DORA. As an engineering leader, you’ve probably been asked, either by someone within or outside of engineering: Why do these metrics matter? or How do they align with our business goals?”

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The 6 Mistakes You’re Going To Make As A New Manager

- Matheus Lima tl;dr: “Reflecting on my first couple of years as an Engineering Manager, I realized that the lessons I learned are not unique to me; many new managers face similar experiences. That’s why I want to share these insights with you. My goal is to support and connect with other new managers who are going through this exciting yet demanding transition.”

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Grifters, Believers, Grinders, And Coasters

- Sean Goedecke tl;dr: “Why do engineers get mad at each other so often? I think a lot of programmer arguments bottom out in a cultural clash between different kinds of engineers: believers vs grifters, or coasters vs grinders. I’m going to argue that good companies actually have a healthy mix of all four types of engineer, so it’s probably sensible to figure out how to work with them.”

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An Introduction To Thinking About Risk

- Jacob Kaplan-Moss tl;dr: “How dangerous is it to launch this new feature if it hasn’t gotten a proper security review yet? How much risk is left after we do that review?” So welcome to a new series about how to think about risk. This series is a crash course, a high-level introduction to the most important concepts and risk frameworks. It’s intended for people who encounter risk from time to time and need some basic tools, but don’t want to make a deep study of it. 

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Grifters, Believers, Grinders, And Coasters

- Sean Goedecke tl;dr: “Why do engineers get mad at each other so often? I think a lot of programmer arguments bottom out in a cultural clash between different kinds of engineers: believers vs grifters, or coasters vs grinders. I’m going to argue that good companies actually have a healthy mix of all four types of engineer, so it’s probably sensible to figure out how to work with them.”

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Being In The Details

- James Stanier tl;dr: “Tech companies are opting to keep their size fixed as they ride out the current economic phase that has higher interest rates and less cheap investment available. As a result, managers are now expected to have more direct reports, less layers, and to be more hands-on with their teams.” What exactly can you do in order to be in the details? And is it possible to do this without micromanaging? James shares techniques. 

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