Jalama Road in Santa Barbara County, on the way to Jalama Beach.
This is the weblog I wish I had when I first got into software management.
I have been in the software industry for over ten years. I have worked as an engineer and as a manager. I have worked at small startups and the largest companies in the world. I have a PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience from Dartmouth, which means I spend a lot of time thinking about why people and organizations behave the way they do. Putting it all together, I finally have some experiences that are worthwhile to share.
If you are new here, these five posts will give you a good feel for what I write about and how I think:
Scrutinize advice from the lucky – Before you take any of my advice, read this one first. Survivorship bias is real, luck has shaped my career more than I’d like to admit, and you should think critically about guidance from anyone who has achieved some measure of success. Including me.
Shine bright, but don’t burn out – The most personal thing I have written here. I rode the burnout train and it was miserable. If you manage people, or if you are deep in the weeds yourself, this one matters.
The Punctuated Equilibrium – Career progression isn’t the linear march you think it is. Things are stable until they are not, and dramatic change can happen quickly. The goal is to always be positioned for those moments.
Iterate, iterate, iterate – Pretty much anything great comes from constant iteration. I will take a good-enough plan and fast learning over a perfect plan and slow execution every time.
Don’t lose your humanity in a layoff – The hardest thing I have had to do as a manager. The spreadsheets that accompany a layoff work to depersonalize the decisions. People become a column, a row, a single cell. They are more than that.