Software Lead Weekly Software Lead Weekly

How Patreon Levels Engineers (Career Ladder)
8 minutes read.

The team at Patreon released their Career Ladder, with their expectations from every level of Individual Contributor (IC): "The guide helps us set consistent expectations around roles, and directly influences hiring and performance evaluation decisions. Current and prospective engineers are held to the same high bar at each level." -- If you're considering having a Career Ladder in your company, this can be very useful as a reference.

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What Would Happen if a Programmer and a Product Manager Had to Cut Down a Tree?
1 minutes read.

My humble effort to help you start the weekend with a smile on your face.

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The Mitochondria in Startups
4 minutes read.

The analogy of Mitochondria (act as the power plants of the cell) is an excellent framing to a different type of leaders inside the organization. Can you recognize yours? Are you doing enough to retain them? Sarah Tavel with an important tip that made me think about my own decisions: "The biggest mistake I’ve seen startups make is using the same comp scale for these two classes of employees. Comp levels are a rational structure to overlay on an irrational commitment and impact. Companies that don’t break bands will undervalue the energy-giving impact the mitochondrial employees have, which will ultimately challenge their ability to motivate and retain them."

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Why Our Engineering Leaders Focus on Product Over Process
7 minutes read.

"We believe that a predictable, reliable engineering team that builds the wrong thing is not a success. The engineering leader (and the engineers themselves) have to feel ownership and responsibility around what they are building, not just how they are building it." -- I strongly relate to this statement by Whitney Sorenson. How do you feel about the way engineering leadership set the tone today in your company? What would you keep? What would you change?

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Startup CTOs, Where Do You Go When You Need Advice About How to Be a Good CTO? (Thread)
2 minutes read.

Chad Fowler started a thread on Twitter that got dozens of ideas, mentors, books, meetups and conferences. We all need this kind of support to lead. What would you add to it?

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Four Things I Wish I Knew When I Became a Tech Lead
6 minutes read.

I'd share the lessons by Emil Sit around "Leadership Style Should Reflect the Team, Not the Leader" and "Lean On People Smarter Than You" with new Engineering Managers who often learn it the hard way. Learning how to amplify people around you should put the focus on them, not you. Did you ask them how you can help? Did you share clear expectations with them? Are you holding them accountable? Start there.

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Why and How to Share Your Manager README (Plus Here’s Mine)
4 minutes read.

Katie Womersley shares an idea that is near and dear to my heart, sharing your managerial philosophy (aka Manager README): "Turns out, "Manager Gameface!" is not super helpful when two humans are trying to figure each other out and build a working relationship... Defining your leadership philosophy means your team has a way to hold you accountable[...,] If they know what you believe and expect as manager, folks will feel more confident that any behaviour of yours that’s not aligned is likely unintended and something you’d be eager to hear about and fix."

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Manager Energy Drain
4 minutes read.

Lara Hogan is such a prolific writer. Just shared it with the managers in my company, and I highly recommend you to do the same. The section about "Delegate messy and unscoped projects" is so good, as it allows people room for growth while providing them enough safety net to experiment and iterate.

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@rands: Leadership == your values demonstrated by your actions.

@tobi: I firmly believe that I learned more about building businesses from playing Starcraft than I've learned from business books