New year, new links! It has been fairly quiet on the blogs and podcasts recently, and I am focusing on some books at the moment. For some fun, have a look at the Jungle & Tetris posts in the random section. Leadership Productivity Measurement as a Tradeoff - good view from Kent Beck. Questionable Advice: “My boss says we don’t need any engineering managers. Is he right?” - I hope not! It’s a good summary of the purpose of managers. ...
Last year I did have too much time on my hand, and while I spent a lot of time chilling, I did miss using my brain at least a little. So I worked on these two challenges. Excercism #12in23 Screenshot Exercism #12in23 I am a big fan of exercism, which is a site with exercises to learn all kinds of programming languages. The quality of the tracks varies a lot, nonetheless the most popular ones are very useful. There is also a mentoring element, which I haven’t used myself. ...
I was lazy due to the festive season and travels. That means plenty of links for today. Leadership Engineering strategy notes. - I think I posted the articles in a previous edition. Many good resources in this one. Navigators - interesting approach. I guess in some companies these are architects or staff engineers. TBM 257: How to Make the Case for Slowing Down to Speed Up - many strategies, align with the main values and strategies. ...
I liked the story about Backstage from Spotify. The monaspace font is also lovely. Leadership Adam Bryant on how to know if you’re ready to become a leader. [Podcast] - lots of good stuff. A Practical Handbook For Engineering Management- another guide. I have just browsed a bit for now. Team Charters are a trap. - oh, I quite like them, but … “Empowering bottoms up mission-setting in an organization that practices top-down resource allocation is a trap.” ...
If you want to watch something inspiring today, I recommend the video about Germany’s Green City and Pedal to freedom. Overall, a lot of interesting stuff to think about this week. Leadership How Do I More Effectively Build Stakeholder Alignment? [Podcast] - excellent example of coaching, where the thinker is already aware of the answers. Communicating Your Engineering Team’s Impact at Work - Tips for Leaders [Podcast] - obviously pushing LinearB a bit, but still good. ...