Posts
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A Portfolio of Work
At any level of engineering, you are responsible for some work. Early in your career, it’s a ticket, a task. The work is narrow but likely deep. As you grow in your engineering leadership career, your purview becomes broader. And at some point, you’re no longer responsible for one thing. You become responsible for a collection of work. We call this a portfolio of work. Your portfolio of work and how you manage it constitute the impact you can make. And the further along you get in your career, the more nuance exists in how you can manage it.
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Stop Repeating Yourself with the Rule of Three
It’s Monday. You organize your day, and you double-check your calendar. You go to your first 1:1. Your team member asks why the team is changing your product’s strategy. You share your thoughts. Now it’s Tuesday. You have a 1:1 with your designer who asks the same question. You share your thoughts. Now it’s Wednesday, you meet with your TL who asks about the changes in product strategy. Congrats! You’ve just hit the Rule of Three.
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As We Know It
The value of software is largely driven be two factors: productivity gained and distribution. These can be considered as depth and reach. Over the years, distribution has shifted from on site to box to over the wire. And each has led to incentive shifts as the benefits of software became democratized through these increasingly pervasive distribution channels
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As We Know It
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Taking Notes in In-Person One-on-Ones
As conditions improve in the US, I’m preparing to return to work from an office. If you’re also in the US, you might already be a stalwart of the office and a few months or weeks ahead of me. Maybe you and your company are waiting it out a bit longer, and that’s fine. A lot of us are remembering old practices in different ways. I am preparing for what in-person one-on-ones will be like after being fully remote for almost 18 months. I had previously built up principles for my one-on-ones that I have applied in my remote setup, and I’m starting to think about how I can combine lessons learned remotely to evolve my in-person one-on-ones.