Skip to Content

Book Reviews

Functioning Through a Pandemic

Functioning Through a Pandemic
person-washing-hands-3943907

As of the first draft of this post, it's been 6 days since my company transitioned most of its workforce into work-from-home arrangements, which was coincidentally the same day that the NBA suspended its entire season as one…

The Engineering Leaders Hired by Startups

The Engineering Leaders Hired by Startups
office-730681_1920

It started with a tweet: Agreed, particularly in looking for an external hire, it’s to compliment a missing piece within the current team and more often than not it’s the management piece. — Allen Cheung (@allenmhc) January 23, 2020…

Unpacking Conway's Law

Unpacking Conway's Law

I've been thinking a lot recently about organizational structure and design[1]. Eventually, I'm reminded and inevitably return to Conway's Law: Any organization that designs a system (defined broadly) will produce a design whose…

Parenthood :: Management

Parenthood :: Management

Does becoming a parent make for a better manager? I remember vividly when I first brought it up as a possibility. I was interviewing at a few companies after deciding to end my time at Square, and wanted to continue…

Evolving Real-Time Strategy Gaming with DotA Underlords

Evolving Real-Time Strategy Gaming with DotA Underlords

Mods are unique to PC gaming. Unlike their mobile and console counterparts, the open nature of the PC allows for amateur game designers and programmers to take an existing game engine—sometimes along with the art assets—and build something…

Interviewing for Signals

Interviewing for Signals

I've been helping out with interviews for my employers since my first gig out of college, some 15 years ago. In that timeframe, the process to get a job as a software engineer hasn't changed too…