/Management

No Forks Allowed: How User-Centric Design Saved Next Edit From Compromise

- Vinay Perneti Arun Chaganty tl;dr: Augment's "Next Edit" feature uses AI to predict code changes needed across a codebase when developers make edits. When initial testing revealed UX and model behavior issues, the team faced a choice: fork VS Code or redesign within its constraints. They chose the harder path of working within VS Code's API, refining their three-model approach to be less intrusive yet helpful. 

featured in #601

How I’ve Run Major Projects

- Ben Kuhn tl;dr: “In a company like Anthropic, excellent project management is an extremely high-leverage skill, and not just during crises: our work has tons of moving parts with complex, non-obvious interdependencies and hard schedule constraints, which means organizing them is a huge job, and can save weeks of delays if done right. Although a lot of the examples here come from crisis projects, most of the principles here are also the way I try to run any project, just more-so.” Ben describes his playbook. 

featured in #601

How I’ve Run Major Projects

- Ben Kuhn tl;dr: “In a company like Anthropic, excellent project management is an extremely high-leverage skill, and not just during crises: our work has tons of moving parts with complex, non-obvious interdependencies and hard schedule constraints, which means organizing them is a huge job, and can save weeks of delays if done right. Although a lot of the examples here come from crisis projects, most of the principles here are also the way I try to run any project, just more-so.” Ben describes his playbook. 

featured in #600

How To Praise

- Péter Szász tl;dr: “Construct your positive feedback the same way as you would a negative one. Ensure the situation where the action you want to comment on was well understood; focus on the actions of the person you’re giving a feedback to; and show the impact these behaviors had on you and others. This approach will help your team members recognize and build on their strengths.” Peter shares his framework for doing so. 

featured in #600

What Is Device Fingerprinting And How Does It Work?

- Zack Proser tl;dr: “Every time a device connects to your server, it broadcasts a wealth of information through its browser. Some of these signals are obvious, while others are subtle technical artifacts of how browsers and hardware work together.” Zack breaks down what servers can see and how to mitigate bad actors. 

featured in #600

Applied "Software Engineering at Google"

- Addy Osmani tl;dr: “Google's software engineering practices have evolved to manage our large scale. However, the underlying principles driving these practices are valuable and transferable to organizations of any size. This isn't about blindly copying Google, but about understanding the why behind their methods and adapting the what to your context.”

featured in #600

Rigorous Thinking: No Lazy Thinking

- Wes Kao tl;dr: “Rigorous thinking is asking critical questions about tactics, and having a systematic way of making decisions. It isn’t a single mental model. It’s an approach to problem solving that allows you to deconstruct ideas, gain clarity, and make decisions that are far more likely to be right.” Wes shares her playbook for leaders here. 

featured in #599

The 10 Biggest Leadership Blindspots Based On 10 Years of Research

- Claire Lew tl;dr: Claire shares blindspots, self-assessment questions and actions to remedy each. Blindspots are:(1) What our team doesn't know doesn't hurt them. (2) Everyone should share my sense of urgency. (3) As long as my team likes me, they trust me. (4) I don't play favorites with my team. (5) I treat everyone the way that I want to be treated. And more. 

featured in #598

How Not To Disagree

- Andrew Bosworth tl;dr: “Imagine a simple scenario. Your manager is proposing changes to your roadmap. Those changes would negate months of work by your team. You lead the team and don’t agree with the new direction. Following a robust discussion your manager makes the change over your objections. How do you proceed?”

featured in #598

The QA Wolf Advantage: Vertical Integration For Superior QA

- Jon Perl tl;dr: Traditional outsourced QA relies on inefficient, costly tech stacks that fall short of QA engineers' needs. QA Wolf took a smarter approach. They built proprietary technology that aligns with customers’ needs, enabling their QA engineers to deliver 80%+ automated test coverage for their clients in just 4 months. In this free webinar, CEO Jon Perl reveals how QA Wolf is redefining QA automation.

featured in #598