Management Debt

Teams naturally start to incur management debt as they grow and become more complex, just as codebases incur tech debt. The combined weight of past decisions creates a web of precedents and exceptions that can cause problems of varying size over time.

Don’t build a CSV importer (sponsor)

OneSchema is a ready-made CSV importer for developers which automatically corrects customer data. (Also: edge case handling, simple UI, bulk editing). Engineering teams use OneSchema to save months of development time building a CSV importer. With a large library of prebuilt validations and robust SDKs, OneSchema only takes 30 minutes to get running in your app. See how OneSchema works.

Debugging Architects

The importance of the architect’s role appears unhampered by the lack of a precise definition. Failing an all-encompassing depiction, we resort to individual aspects, skill sets, or tasks. However, even those are much debated and opined upon. Take the perennial question: should architects code? And if so, how much?

Velocity defeats itself. Get acceleration instead

I remember velocity from back in my development days. Velocity is the rate of change of position, so: how fast something is moving. Like this spherical cow in a frictionless field: from when it leaves the rubber band, how long until it reaches the gate? Depends on its starting velocity. If the field is 120m wide and the cow has a velocity of 30m/s, it’ll reach the gate after 4 seconds.

How Roadmaps Accidentally Make Teams Powerless

Roadmaps that are too restrictive limit the scope of creativity that your team has to solve problems. Look to build roadmaps that support creative outcomes. Let me walk you through four common reasons roadmaps trap teams and how you could improve them. I hope you get some actionable insights by the end of this read.

You Want Modules, Not Microservices

Architecture is hard sometimes--people keep offering up some new idea that quickly becomes the mainstream "way to do it" without any context or nuance, and the industry, desperate to find ways to improve their architecture, snaps it up without hesitation. Microservices was the latest in the trend, and it's time we dissected the idea and got to the real root of what's going on.

Which Meetings Should You Kill?

Meetings, ugh. Even those of us who like a good meeting have plenty of experience sitting through painful, boring, poorly-run meetings that seem to exist only to waste our time.

The Pendulum Swings: How To Respond To Tech’s Downturn

The macro environment is changing in ways that are creating a more employer-advantaged workspace and demanding results of businesses. Use this as an opportunity to refrain from being an asshole and drive major results for your business.