SWLW #622: Capture less than you create, How to not be a Prioritization Machine, and more.

Like always, sharing my best findings for the week.  

 

This Week's Favorite

Capture Less Than You Create
3 minutes read.

There is a lot of value in adopting David's thinking in everything we do. The value of creation is the generational impact it can lead to. The value of creation is the joy we feel. Is that not enough? Even if nothing of it is tied back to our name or pocket, wouldn't that still matter? This is true for starting a family, building a company that others get value from, or contributing to OSS that helps other businesses thrive: "I want for very little, because I've been blessed sufficiently. That's a special kind of wealth: Enough."

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Culture

Product Manager Preparing to Write a PRD No One Will Read
1 minute read.

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

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Reflections on Palantir
12 minutes read.

There are so many interesting insights by Nabeel S. Qureshi on his time at Palantir in this post. Palantir is a fascinating company, weird in so many (good) ways, and it's clear they were able to attract both intelligent and highly intense individuals and put them on a compelling mission. It might change your thinking about the fundamentals of building great companies, such as talent density, worthy missions, focusing on value for the customer ("forward deployed engineers"), etc. These two are my favorites: "The world needs more companies like SpaceX, and Palantir, that differentiate on execution - achieving the outcome - not on playing political games or building narrow point solutions that don’t hit the goal." and "I’m not sure if they still do this, but at the time when you joined they sent you a copy of Impro, The Looming Tower (9/11 book), Interviewing Users, and Getting Things Done. I also got an early PDF version of what became Ray Dalio’s Principles. This set the tone."

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Unraveling Complexity in Product Development (podcast)
63 minutes read.

John Cutler is one of my favorite product leaders. He's a fantastic thinker and writer, so listening to this interview was a no-brainer, and indeed, the ratio of gems per minute here is incredibly high, especially around org design and leadership models.

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Vertical SaaS: Now With AI Inside
5 minutes read.

This short framing of the type of companies you'll see more and more is essential for builders of all kinds and seniorities. It will both help you understand what's worth exploring to buy in your company (or build), and it can inspire you to start one.

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Peopleware

How to Not Be a Prioritization Machine
4 minutes read.

"Teammates also know when to bring a decision up for a discussion, which is when the guideline doesn’t provide a clear cut answer. I found that once I set this prioritization guideline in place, development velocity increased, I had more time to focus on longer-term strategy, and the team even identified things that should be factored into planning that I wasn’t even aware of." -- This is a great example of how you teach others around you to make better decisions over time with structured guidance (vs. deciding for them).

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Why I’m Skeptical of Rewriting JavaScript Tools in “Faster” Languages
5 minutes read.

This is the gist of why rewrites work in terms of performance improvements yet often fail at almost everything else: "In my career, I’ve often seen a rewrite from A to B resulting in a speed boost, followed by the triumphant claim that B is faster than A. However, as Ryan Carniato points out, a rewrite is often faster just because it’s a rewrite – you know more the second time around, you’re paying more attention to perf, etc."

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This Is Kevin Kelly's Philosophy for Life (Thread)
5 minutes read.

Maybe it's the age (I turned 40 this year), but I find it inspiring to look at how others try to provide value and find meaning in our lives. Wonderful takeaways by Kevin Kelly: "When you die, you take absolutely nothing with you except your reputation." Spread love not hate. Lower your ego. Be humble = happiness. Make others feel special or important. Aim to inspire people with your work." and "Your growth as a mature being is measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations you are willing to have. Adult babies run from hard conversations. They go watch a Marvel Movie. But telling people what they don't want to hear is how you create change."

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And finally, inspiring tweets...

@danmurrayserter: Be who you needed when you were younger.

@craigzLiszt: The worst people to work with are those who shoot down ideas prematurely.



p.s. if you're interested in joining SWLW's Slack channel, simply reply to this email and let me know. If you're leading a team, consider writing your Manager README (it's free) or getting my e-book and interviews Leading Snowflakes: The New Engineering Manager's Handbook. You can also support me by becoming a SWLW Patron. Thank you ❤️




Keep reading, keep learning.
-- Oren Ellenbogen.