1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:04,720 Leadership is where you start to have not necessarily a large 2 00:00:04,720 --> 00:00:07,640 organization, but I think it's to do with a very wide scope and 3 00:00:07,640 --> 00:00:09,880 a very wide impact and bringing lots of people along with you. 4 00:00:10,080 --> 00:00:12,960 Org charts have got a bit of a stigma attached that there's 5 00:00:12,960 --> 00:00:16,680 some kind of bureaucratic thing, but actually the org chart is an 6 00:00:16,680 --> 00:00:20,560 incredible tool where if you design your teams really well, 7 00:00:21,040 --> 00:00:23,280 you've kind of done 50% of your job already. 8 00:00:23,560 --> 00:00:27,280 But long termism is, is really just always having a very long 9 00:00:27,280 --> 00:00:29,680 term view about what it is that you are doing. 10 00:00:30,240 --> 00:00:33,440 And I think that it's very, very easy, the default mode to get 11 00:00:33,440 --> 00:00:37,320 sucked into the urgent day-to-day things because quite 12 00:00:37,320 --> 00:00:40,640 often the pressure for the short term always wins. 13 00:00:40,960 --> 00:00:44,000 The word meetings comes up a lot, but I really think that you 14 00:00:44,000 --> 00:00:47,840 can be an incredibly effective leader by having minimal 15 00:00:47,840 --> 00:00:50,960 meetings. Like you can be a very written 16 00:00:50,960 --> 00:00:54,520 leader. I've seen many tenured and 17 00:00:54,520 --> 00:00:57,920 experienced leaders kind of fall down in terms of their impact 18 00:00:57,920 --> 00:00:59,680 because their writing just isn't up to scratch. 19 00:00:59,680 --> 00:01:02,480 Rd. maps and projects and plans, they're all necessary, 100% 20 00:01:02,480 --> 00:01:03,760 necessary. But the strategy is one of those 21 00:01:03,760 --> 00:01:05,000 things that sometimes is missing. 22 00:01:05,000 --> 00:01:07,680 Sometimes people sort of present a road map and say that's the 23 00:01:07,680 --> 00:01:09,320 strategy. So no, no, no, that's not the 24 00:01:09,320 --> 00:01:10,800 strategy. That's the plan. 25 00:01:11,080 --> 00:01:13,280 The important thing is that you don't just write it once then 26 00:01:13,280 --> 00:01:15,840 forget about it. You have to talk about it again 27 00:01:15,840 --> 00:01:18,440 and again and again. You have to sort of make 28 00:01:18,440 --> 00:01:21,440 yourself irritated by how much you talk about it, but like, 29 00:01:21,440 --> 00:01:24,120 that's usually the level you have to get to for it to be 30 00:01:24,120 --> 00:01:26,760 enough communication that people actually pay attention. 31 00:01:40,720 --> 00:01:42,760 Hello, guys, Welcome back to another new episode of the Tech 32 00:01:42,760 --> 00:01:45,480 Regional Podcast. I'm very happy Today we have a 33 00:01:45,520 --> 00:01:48,760 history moment. So I have James Stanier coming 34 00:01:48,760 --> 00:01:50,840 back for the third time on the podcast. 35 00:01:51,080 --> 00:01:54,560 So if you know James Stanier, he appeared in the first episode 36 00:01:54,560 --> 00:01:58,200 here talking about becoming a effective engineering manager. 37 00:01:58,600 --> 00:02:00,960 And then we talk about remote work during the pandemic. 38 00:02:01,320 --> 00:02:04,200 And after two years, he's happy to be back here again talking 39 00:02:04,200 --> 00:02:06,840 about his new book, Become a great engineering leader. 40 00:02:06,960 --> 00:02:08,240 So James, welcome back to the show. 41 00:02:08,240 --> 00:02:10,199 I'm really looking forward for this conversation. 42 00:02:11,000 --> 00:02:13,600 Yeah, thank you for having me. And as we were saying before we 43 00:02:13,600 --> 00:02:15,880 started recording, I thank you for reaching out when you saw 44 00:02:15,920 --> 00:02:17,600 that the new book was almost done. 45 00:02:17,600 --> 00:02:19,360 I really appreciate it and it's always good to chat to you. 46 00:02:19,960 --> 00:02:21,440 Right. I feel that this book is kind of 47 00:02:21,440 --> 00:02:24,240 like the next evolution of your previous work, right? 48 00:02:24,240 --> 00:02:27,360 So I can see some reference to the previous books. 49 00:02:27,640 --> 00:02:30,320 So tell me the story why you ended up writing this book? 50 00:02:30,320 --> 00:02:32,600 Is this something that you learn along the way and you just want 51 00:02:32,600 --> 00:02:35,400 to share with the audience? It's a good question because 52 00:02:35,480 --> 00:02:37,680 after I write wrote the first book, I thought I'm never 53 00:02:37,680 --> 00:02:39,680 writing a book again. That was too, too much stress. 54 00:02:40,120 --> 00:02:42,000 And then I wrote a second one and then a third one. 55 00:02:42,400 --> 00:02:44,480 I think it all comes from the same thing. 56 00:02:44,480 --> 00:02:50,360 Like I really enjoy writing as a means to think and anything that 57 00:02:50,360 --> 00:02:53,040 ended up in a book is an evolution of anything that I 58 00:02:53,040 --> 00:02:54,680 wrote on my website, my newsletter. 59 00:02:54,680 --> 00:02:57,280 So everything is kind of like an iterative improvement all the 60 00:02:57,280 --> 00:02:59,880 time. And it's kind of like batch 61 00:02:59,880 --> 00:03:01,640 processing. It's like every couple of years, 62 00:03:01,640 --> 00:03:03,880 like I've done enough writing that kind of can be batched 63 00:03:03,880 --> 00:03:07,440 together in into a book. And I think a lot of people that 64 00:03:07,440 --> 00:03:10,240 I'd sort of met over the years who'd read the first book always 65 00:03:10,240 --> 00:03:11,920 sort of said, oh, hey, like, when's there going to be 66 00:03:11,920 --> 00:03:15,520 something about what it means to be a director or AVP or like a, 67 00:03:15,600 --> 00:03:17,920 you know, a leader in quotes? Like when's that one coming? 68 00:03:17,920 --> 00:03:21,400 And at the time that I always didn't know the answer to that 69 00:03:21,400 --> 00:03:23,960 question. But as the months and the years 70 00:03:23,960 --> 00:03:26,160 went on, like enough material built up, I thought, hang on, 71 00:03:26,160 --> 00:03:27,920 there is actually something here. 72 00:03:28,040 --> 00:03:31,760 That is I think what I wish I had when I first started leading 73 00:03:31,760 --> 00:03:33,960 more than one team. And that's where it came from. 74 00:03:33,960 --> 00:03:37,800 And it's just a chance to really focus my brain, get it all down, 75 00:03:38,400 --> 00:03:40,400 talk to people about it, get lots of people reviewing it. 76 00:03:40,400 --> 00:03:43,320 And yeah, I think it's the book I wish I had in the past, which 77 00:03:43,320 --> 00:03:46,280 is usually the the check box I try to tick when I write 78 00:03:46,280 --> 00:03:48,600 something. Yeah, I think a few years back 79 00:03:48,600 --> 00:03:51,400 your engineering manager book is kind of like one of the rarest 80 00:03:51,400 --> 00:03:52,920 resource about engineering manager. 81 00:03:53,240 --> 00:03:55,760 I guess over the time many people wrote about engineering 82 00:03:55,760 --> 00:03:58,760 manager and engineering leadership, you know, like VPF, 83 00:03:58,760 --> 00:04:01,400 engineering CTO. Those kind of roles are probably 84 00:04:01,400 --> 00:04:04,320 not well covered and I'm really glad to see these resources 85 00:04:04,320 --> 00:04:06,760 coming up as well. I think there are several other 86 00:04:06,760 --> 00:04:09,080 books that are also covering this kind of leadership, you 87 00:04:09,080 --> 00:04:10,320 know, engineering leadership topic. 88 00:04:10,680 --> 00:04:14,200 So I think what makes your book unique is like you consistently 89 00:04:14,200 --> 00:04:17,560 follow the same kind of style that you took when you wrote the 90 00:04:17,560 --> 00:04:20,360 first two books, right? So it's really enjoyable, so to 91 00:04:20,360 --> 00:04:23,240 speak, seeing the same styles. So I think in the 1st place, 92 00:04:23,240 --> 00:04:26,400 maybe let's level set what is engineering leader in your point 93 00:04:26,400 --> 00:04:28,280 of view, right? What is this role all about? 94 00:04:29,080 --> 00:04:31,160 That's a good question. And I think it's changed a lot 95 00:04:31,160 --> 00:04:33,120 over time. I mean, I think leadership now 96 00:04:33,120 --> 00:04:35,680 can mean individual contributor as well as manager. 97 00:04:35,920 --> 00:04:39,920 Obviously, the book does have a primary lens on management, but 98 00:04:39,920 --> 00:04:43,240 really you could have ICS performing a lot of these same 99 00:04:43,240 --> 00:04:46,240 functions as well. And I think what we've seen is 100 00:04:46,720 --> 00:04:51,320 leadership is where you start to have not necessarily a large 101 00:04:51,320 --> 00:04:55,000 organization, but I think it's to do with like increasing scope 102 00:04:55,000 --> 00:04:57,400 and increasing impact to the most important things. 103 00:04:57,600 --> 00:05:01,880 So lots of previous business books like, ah, you know, you're 104 00:05:01,880 --> 00:05:06,160 1000 person org or 5000 person org, the companies are all 105 00:05:06,160 --> 00:05:10,680 different sizes. So really the modern leader is 106 00:05:10,960 --> 00:05:13,360 somebody with a very wide scope and a very wide impact. 107 00:05:13,360 --> 00:05:15,760 And like if we end up touching on career progression, I think 108 00:05:15,760 --> 00:05:18,600 that's the model you use over your career to to see if you're 109 00:05:18,600 --> 00:05:20,400 still growing. And I think that's the narrative 110 00:05:20,800 --> 00:05:23,640 that lets you go from a big company to a small company to a 111 00:05:23,640 --> 00:05:25,760 medium company, but always keep growing. 112 00:05:25,760 --> 00:05:29,160 It's to do with scope and impact being large and bringing lots of 113 00:05:29,160 --> 00:05:31,800 people along with you. Yeah, sometimes talking about 114 00:05:31,840 --> 00:05:34,680 size, right? So I can see from like big 115 00:05:34,680 --> 00:05:37,360 corporate, big enterprise, this kind of title means like you're 116 00:05:37,360 --> 00:05:40,600 at the top heading like, I don't know, hundreds or even thousands 117 00:05:40,600 --> 00:05:42,880 of engineers, right. But I guess these days there are 118 00:05:42,880 --> 00:05:44,520 also so many different start-ups, right? 119 00:05:44,520 --> 00:05:46,960 Sometimes a small start up could also have VP of engineering or 120 00:05:46,960 --> 00:05:49,160 even CTO, right? I think the the way that you 121 00:05:49,160 --> 00:05:51,440 mentioned the scope and impact, I think it's really interesting 122 00:05:51,440 --> 00:05:54,560 so that it can be applied not just on the traditional 123 00:05:54,800 --> 00:05:56,840 enterprises, but also on the start-ups as well. 124 00:05:57,240 --> 00:05:59,880 And I think you mentioned about few different skills for 125 00:05:59,880 --> 00:06:02,040 engineering leader. What are the some of the stark 126 00:06:02,040 --> 00:06:05,400 differences, if you can tell, between engineering leader and 127 00:06:05,400 --> 00:06:07,240 engineering manager? Because you also covered 128 00:06:07,280 --> 00:06:09,120 engineering manager in your past book, right? 129 00:06:10,040 --> 00:06:11,920 Yeah. And just to to sort of finish 130 00:06:11,920 --> 00:06:14,280 your previous thoughts. It was really, really valuable 131 00:06:14,280 --> 00:06:18,240 actually, which is when I put this book together, I was really 132 00:06:18,240 --> 00:06:22,080 careful to make sure that everything that's in it works if 133 00:06:22,080 --> 00:06:27,640 you are AVP of a start up or AVP of an extremely large company. 134 00:06:28,040 --> 00:06:31,120 And I've tried as much as possible to decouple amount of 135 00:06:31,120 --> 00:06:35,840 people as the important thing because it the role is the same 136 00:06:35,840 --> 00:06:38,960 in the different places, but you have to ignore the amount of 137 00:06:38,960 --> 00:06:40,880 people. And to follow on to your 138 00:06:40,880 --> 00:06:43,640 question really getting it right. 139 00:06:43,880 --> 00:06:48,040 A few years ago now, I remember somebody sent me APDF, which was 140 00:06:48,040 --> 00:06:50,960 from the US Air Force. And this was written a very long 141 00:06:50,960 --> 00:06:52,560 time ago. And it had this really great 142 00:06:52,560 --> 00:06:55,560 pyramid diagram of like strategy, operations and 143 00:06:55,560 --> 00:06:57,960 tactics. And that's something that I 144 00:06:57,960 --> 00:07:00,040 feature in one of the first chapters, which is the 145 00:07:00,040 --> 00:07:02,480 orientation of like what, what even does any of this stuff 146 00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:04,960 mean? And I think that one thing that 147 00:07:05,080 --> 00:07:08,640 struck me when somebody sent me that US Air Force PDF was like, 148 00:07:08,640 --> 00:07:11,680 OK, here's an organization that has been doing distributed teams 149 00:07:11,680 --> 00:07:15,160 for, you know, thousands of years, so that they know what 150 00:07:15,160 --> 00:07:17,640 they're doing in terms of organization of people and, and 151 00:07:17,640 --> 00:07:20,320 chain of command and so on. And that sort of strategy 152 00:07:20,320 --> 00:07:23,080 operational tactical pyramid is, is super useful. 153 00:07:23,120 --> 00:07:27,240 So in terms of mapping types of leader, if you think of the 154 00:07:27,240 --> 00:07:30,320 tactical layer, that is very much your frontline engineers 155 00:07:30,320 --> 00:07:33,360 and your engineering managers, you know, who are executing 156 00:07:33,360 --> 00:07:36,120 units of work projects, getting them done shipping. 157 00:07:36,400 --> 00:07:38,680 And then you sort of step up a layer to operational. 158 00:07:38,920 --> 00:07:41,160 And that's where traditionally you're sort of directors of 159 00:07:41,160 --> 00:07:43,560 engineering lie, depending on the size of the company. 160 00:07:44,160 --> 00:07:47,440 And that is groups of sort of interrelated projects. 161 00:07:47,440 --> 00:07:51,160 So ownership of a large application and then you've got 162 00:07:51,160 --> 00:07:53,640 all the teams underneath who are building all the features and 163 00:07:53,640 --> 00:07:56,800 then going up another layer to sort of the CTOVP land. 164 00:07:57,400 --> 00:07:59,640 You know, that's really the long term strategy view. 165 00:07:59,640 --> 00:08:03,240 That's the kind of how much should we be getting into AI? 166 00:08:03,320 --> 00:08:06,240 You know, how much should we be going in this particular 167 00:08:06,240 --> 00:08:07,880 technical direction? Should we be taking the product 168 00:08:07,880 --> 00:08:10,600 in this direction? That's sort of where those roles 169 00:08:10,600 --> 00:08:13,320 should be living. And I think that when somebody 170 00:08:13,320 --> 00:08:16,440 sent me that US Air Force thing, I was like, finally it makes 171 00:08:16,440 --> 00:08:18,600 sense. Not the place I expected to 172 00:08:18,600 --> 00:08:22,080 really see it written down. But I think just to finish my 173 00:08:22,080 --> 00:08:25,080 long winded point, when I wrote the first book, the reason I 174 00:08:25,080 --> 00:08:28,560 wrote it for engineering managers is because often people 175 00:08:28,800 --> 00:08:31,840 got into that role and there was a severe lack of good training 176 00:08:31,840 --> 00:08:33,840 material. And I think coming back to this 177 00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:37,240 book, it's the same thing. So it really showed that even me 178 00:08:37,240 --> 00:08:38,919 you'd been doing this for quite a long time. 179 00:08:39,360 --> 00:08:42,280 We're still getting things that actually went oh, and now I 180 00:08:42,280 --> 00:08:43,840 understand my role is so much better. 181 00:08:44,080 --> 00:08:47,480 So this is me trying to gather with a luck into one place and 182 00:08:47,480 --> 00:08:50,440 and and get it out there. Yeah, I think you in your book 183 00:08:50,440 --> 00:08:53,000 you mentioned about this, right. So the biggest gaps in 184 00:08:53,000 --> 00:08:55,960 engineering career, right is the first gap is like going into 185 00:08:55,960 --> 00:08:58,000 management, which is like kind of like engineering manager. 186 00:08:58,000 --> 00:09:00,880 And the second gap is like managing multiple teams, right 187 00:09:01,040 --> 00:09:03,680 or managing managers. So I think engineering leader is 188 00:09:03,840 --> 00:09:06,520 kind of like the second gap for everyone's career in the 189 00:09:06,520 --> 00:09:09,240 engineering simply because there are not many resources available 190 00:09:09,600 --> 00:09:12,120 and probably you have one or two good mentors, but I think that's 191 00:09:12,120 --> 00:09:13,440 about it. Sometimes you're unlucky, you 192 00:09:13,440 --> 00:09:15,720 don't have mentor and you kind of like have to improvise along 193 00:09:15,720 --> 00:09:17,400 the way. And I think you mentioned about 194 00:09:17,400 --> 00:09:19,560 this tactical, operational and strategic. 195 00:09:19,560 --> 00:09:22,800 I think you refer to this as the three levels of warfare. 196 00:09:23,000 --> 00:09:25,480 I think that's kind of like pretty, I would say appropriate, 197 00:09:25,480 --> 00:09:27,720 right? So looking at the where should 198 00:09:27,720 --> 00:09:30,320 the particular person or particular role focuses on? 199 00:09:30,320 --> 00:09:33,040 So I think it's really good perspective to kind of like 200 00:09:33,040 --> 00:09:36,040 explain each of the different roles and responsibilities. 201 00:09:36,400 --> 00:09:39,000 You mentioned about size and you mentioned about scope impact. 202 00:09:39,000 --> 00:09:41,960 How about tenure, right? Do you think somebody needs to 203 00:09:42,000 --> 00:09:44,640 earn, you know, a number of years before they can become a 204 00:09:44,640 --> 00:09:47,520 good engineering leader? That's a very, very good 205 00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:51,000 question. Obviously at the extremes, it's 206 00:09:51,000 --> 00:09:54,240 obvious you'd hopefully want someone leading A-Team or 207 00:09:54,240 --> 00:09:56,960 leading multiple teams who has some experience. 208 00:09:57,600 --> 00:10:01,280 But I think that tenure is something that can be 209 00:10:01,400 --> 00:10:06,000 overemphasized as important because I can't remember who 210 00:10:06,000 --> 00:10:09,840 originally wrote about this. But that thing about having ten 211 00:10:09,840 --> 00:10:12,120 years of experience where you've just done the same thing for 10 212 00:10:12,120 --> 00:10:15,200 years versus 10 years of experience where you've done 213 00:10:15,200 --> 00:10:17,000 something completely new and challenging. 214 00:10:17,000 --> 00:10:20,000 Every year, those two people end up on a very, very different 215 00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:22,840 trajectory. So yes, I think if you plotted 216 00:10:22,840 --> 00:10:27,000 it as an average, you would hope that the more senior people are 217 00:10:27,000 --> 00:10:30,000 the most experienced, but the certainly there's nothing 218 00:10:30,000 --> 00:10:33,000 stopping like incredibly talented, younger or less 219 00:10:33,000 --> 00:10:35,720 experienced people taking on these roles if they are 220 00:10:35,720 --> 00:10:37,080 naturally very, very good at them. 221 00:10:37,080 --> 00:10:40,600 I mean, it's interesting in the Premier League football in the 222 00:10:40,600 --> 00:10:44,280 UK, the new manager of Brighton, he's like younger than some of 223 00:10:44,280 --> 00:10:47,240 the players on the team and it's just because he's an incredibly 224 00:10:47,240 --> 00:10:49,720 talented manager and we should be looking for those people and 225 00:10:49,720 --> 00:10:50,720 bringing them up through the ranks. 226 00:10:51,400 --> 00:10:53,640 Sorry to mention football, it's a very stereotypical like 227 00:10:53,640 --> 00:10:54,840 English. Things, yeah, that's OK. 228 00:10:54,840 --> 00:10:57,720 I'm a football fan as well, very excited for the new season 229 00:10:58,280 --> 00:10:59,760 anyway. So I think becoming an 230 00:10:59,760 --> 00:11:02,360 engineering leader, let's just focus maybe more on the 231 00:11:02,360 --> 00:11:06,120 operational and strategic view in your 3 levels of warfare, 232 00:11:06,120 --> 00:11:08,160 right? So I've previously also 233 00:11:08,160 --> 00:11:10,480 experienced this kind of a challenges becoming an 234 00:11:10,480 --> 00:11:13,360 engineering leader, not much resources and have to learn on 235 00:11:13,360 --> 00:11:16,080 the go, sometimes making mistakes obviously, and 236 00:11:16,080 --> 00:11:19,000 sometimes also learn from other people that can give us good 237 00:11:19,000 --> 00:11:20,880 guidance. So obviously there are many 238 00:11:20,880 --> 00:11:24,080 things that I struggled back then, but obviously we can't 239 00:11:24,080 --> 00:11:26,080 cover all of them. I'll just pick a few things that 240 00:11:26,080 --> 00:11:28,960 I find interesting from your book, which I think could be a 241 00:11:28,960 --> 00:11:30,560 good learning for listeners here as well. 242 00:11:30,880 --> 00:11:33,840 So maybe let's start from the first one about tools, 243 00:11:33,840 --> 00:11:35,920 techniques and, you know, managing the time, right? 244 00:11:35,920 --> 00:11:39,640 So you actually started from one thing that is maybe not so 245 00:11:39,640 --> 00:11:42,680 obvious for many people, but actually if you have experience 246 00:11:42,680 --> 00:11:45,400 being an engineering manager or engineering leader, this is kind 247 00:11:45,400 --> 00:11:46,800 of like an obvious thing as well. 248 00:11:47,240 --> 00:11:50,400 So you cover about org chart. So maybe tell us the reason why 249 00:11:50,400 --> 00:11:53,080 you cover org chart in the first place? 250 00:11:54,160 --> 00:11:57,560 It's interesting, I find that org charts have got a bit of a 251 00:11:57,560 --> 00:12:01,000 stigma attached that there's some kind of bureaucratic thing 252 00:12:01,000 --> 00:12:04,520 or maybe just an unfortunate necessity that, you know, you 253 00:12:04,520 --> 00:12:07,400 have to have a manager and they have to have a manager and so 254 00:12:07,400 --> 00:12:09,520 on. But I think the one thing that I 255 00:12:09,760 --> 00:12:13,080 learned, especially leading much, much larger teams in the 256 00:12:13,080 --> 00:12:15,920 sort of the hundreds, is that actually the org chart is an 257 00:12:15,920 --> 00:12:19,840 incredible tool where if you design your teams really well 258 00:12:20,280 --> 00:12:23,840 and you give them really clear remits and clear goals and 259 00:12:23,840 --> 00:12:27,560 metrics for success, you've kind of done 50% of your job already. 260 00:12:28,000 --> 00:12:31,520 And likewise, if you design your org chart very badly, you can 261 00:12:31,520 --> 00:12:33,720 actually cause many problems. You know, there's the whole 262 00:12:33,720 --> 00:12:36,280 Conway's Law thing of shipping the org chart and all that kind 263 00:12:36,280 --> 00:12:39,280 of thing. But actually org chart design is 264 00:12:39,280 --> 00:12:43,560 something that is one really great and it should be thought 265 00:12:43,560 --> 00:12:45,640 about carefully. We're not just talking about 266 00:12:45,640 --> 00:12:47,640 like the number of direct reports and things, but like 267 00:12:47,640 --> 00:12:51,640 clear areas that people belong to that fit your organization. 268 00:12:51,640 --> 00:12:54,920 Because fundamentally the code that they produce will probably 269 00:12:54,920 --> 00:12:56,160 look a little bit like the org chart. 270 00:12:56,160 --> 00:12:57,920 So you can sort of get ahead of it by getting people in the 271 00:12:57,920 --> 00:13:00,760 right place. And it's one of those things 272 00:13:00,760 --> 00:13:02,480 where you can't change it every week. 273 00:13:02,880 --> 00:13:07,040 So careful or chart design so that maybe when you do reorg 274 00:13:07,040 --> 00:13:10,160 everybody maybe like once a year, maybe less, maybe more. 275 00:13:10,160 --> 00:13:11,680 I don't know what your organization is like. 276 00:13:12,160 --> 00:13:15,520 You can do it really well. And I've always found that even 277 00:13:15,520 --> 00:13:18,440 though people think that reorgs are terrible, actually if 278 00:13:18,440 --> 00:13:21,080 they're done really carefully, mindfully, they have a really 279 00:13:21,080 --> 00:13:23,880 good reason. And you can really sell the 280 00:13:23,880 --> 00:13:26,560 reason why this is happening in a way that empowers people to 281 00:13:26,560 --> 00:13:29,000 say, hey, like the reason that you're being broken up in this 282 00:13:29,000 --> 00:13:31,400 particular way is so that you can all get on with your work 283 00:13:31,520 --> 00:13:34,560 autonomously with just the ability to be the masters of 284 00:13:34,560 --> 00:13:36,360 your own domain. It's fantastic. 285 00:13:36,360 --> 00:13:40,680 So it's not just the division of labour, it really is the sort of 286 00:13:40,680 --> 00:13:43,640 the blueprint of the strategic aim of the organization. 287 00:13:44,520 --> 00:13:45,880 Yeah. So I think definitely, 288 00:13:45,880 --> 00:13:49,480 especially if you are working in a fast growing startup for 289 00:13:49,480 --> 00:13:52,080 example, right, definitely you will have to design your org 290 00:13:52,080 --> 00:13:54,800 chart simply because now that you have many people, right, you 291 00:13:54,800 --> 00:13:58,120 can't just simply have a flat hierarchy because I don't think 292 00:13:58,120 --> 00:14:01,400 it will be more chaotic by then. So I think designing an org 293 00:14:01,400 --> 00:14:03,760 chart, you mentioned a few things like Conway's Law and 294 00:14:03,760 --> 00:14:06,320 maybe you also cover about the team topologies and few other 295 00:14:06,320 --> 00:14:08,880 best practices, right? You know, like that besides and 296 00:14:08,880 --> 00:14:11,160 all that. So maybe specifically, can you 297 00:14:11,160 --> 00:14:14,000 tell us the guidance, like maybe I don't know, it's a summary of 298 00:14:14,000 --> 00:14:17,200 what are the best practices that engineering leaders should think 299 00:14:17,200 --> 00:14:18,880 about when they design their org chart. 300 00:14:19,640 --> 00:14:22,320 Yeah. So I think really being able to 301 00:14:22,320 --> 00:14:24,880 design your org chart for autonomy is important. 302 00:14:25,120 --> 00:14:29,400 So you really want every single team as much as they can to work 303 00:14:29,400 --> 00:14:32,520 independently with as few outside dependencies as 304 00:14:32,520 --> 00:14:35,760 possible. But also in a kind of dichotomy 305 00:14:35,760 --> 00:14:38,720 way, you have to think that you don't want to silo people away 306 00:14:38,720 --> 00:14:42,440 from others so that the wider view of either your architecture 307 00:14:42,440 --> 00:14:45,640 or your organization or whatever it is that's your wider focus 308 00:14:45,640 --> 00:14:48,360 doesn't break down. So it's, it's quite nuanced. 309 00:14:48,840 --> 00:14:51,640 You know, you certainly need to think about skill sets and 310 00:14:51,640 --> 00:14:53,840 seniorities. You know, what's the right kind 311 00:14:53,840 --> 00:14:57,560 of ratio that you want of junior engineers to senior engineers so 312 00:14:57,560 --> 00:14:59,840 that you can make sure that you've got mentorship in place 313 00:15:00,200 --> 00:15:02,920 and that you haven't got sort of pockets of under experienced or 314 00:15:02,920 --> 00:15:05,600 over experienced people. And then also, as you sort of go 315 00:15:05,600 --> 00:15:08,400 up the org chart, you need to start thinking about, OK, for 316 00:15:08,400 --> 00:15:11,160 your most senior individual contributors who are leaders in 317 00:15:11,160 --> 00:15:13,640 their own right, because they will either lead a technical 318 00:15:13,640 --> 00:15:16,480 area or lead the strategy of some particular piece of 319 00:15:16,480 --> 00:15:19,360 architecture. How do you pair them with the 320 00:15:19,360 --> 00:15:22,640 right managers so that they can almost become like Co processors 321 00:15:22,640 --> 00:15:25,040 at different different levels of the org chart to really drive 322 00:15:25,040 --> 00:15:28,280 the organization forward? So there's a lot to think about. 323 00:15:28,280 --> 00:15:30,520 And I think one of the things that worked out better than I 324 00:15:30,520 --> 00:15:33,240 thought it would in the book is you mentioned team Topologies, 325 00:15:33,240 --> 00:15:37,520 which is fantastic. I tried to design A reorg using 326 00:15:37,520 --> 00:15:40,640 team Topologies where you have a before state and then you have 327 00:15:40,640 --> 00:15:43,960 like a team topologies definition and then you rework 328 00:15:43,960 --> 00:15:46,280 it and do a reorg based off of that and it works out pretty 329 00:15:46,280 --> 00:15:48,720 cleanly. So yeah, have a look at that in 330 00:15:48,720 --> 00:15:50,360 the chapter. I think that's something I've 331 00:15:50,360 --> 00:15:53,120 used as well in a reorg I did not too long ago as well. 332 00:15:53,120 --> 00:15:56,040 It's incredibly useful tool. It's something that is always 333 00:15:56,040 --> 00:15:57,400 mentioned about ORC chat as well. 334 00:15:57,400 --> 00:15:59,120 This thing called Conway's Law, right? 335 00:15:59,120 --> 00:16:01,400 Or the reverse, right, The reverse, Conway's law, Have you 336 00:16:01,400 --> 00:16:04,200 had experience where you have to adopt to this? 337 00:16:04,440 --> 00:16:06,360 Because sometimes you know, software architecture or 338 00:16:06,360 --> 00:16:08,880 software result, right? Actually mimics the kind of like 339 00:16:08,880 --> 00:16:11,560 organization hierarchy or communication pattern actually, 340 00:16:11,560 --> 00:16:13,400 right? Maybe something to share here 341 00:16:13,400 --> 00:16:14,920 about your experience with Conway's Law? 342 00:16:15,880 --> 00:16:17,600 Yeah. I mean there's no hard or fast 343 00:16:17,600 --> 00:16:19,600 answer for every org. But one where it comes up time 344 00:16:19,600 --> 00:16:22,440 and time again is if you are working for a company that has 345 00:16:22,880 --> 00:16:26,240 say a a desktop or a web-based application, but you also have a 346 00:16:26,240 --> 00:16:29,040 mobile application. And then how do you design this? 347 00:16:29,040 --> 00:16:31,240 Do you have like the mobile engineering org? 348 00:16:31,240 --> 00:16:36,000 Is that like separate to the main applications org and then 349 00:16:36,200 --> 00:16:39,480 somehow you have to kind of keep both of the feature sets In Sync 350 00:16:39,480 --> 00:16:42,680 and then have like 2 Rd. maps or actually do you blend the two 351 00:16:42,680 --> 00:16:46,160 together and you have the mobile engineers working in the feature 352 00:16:46,160 --> 00:16:50,120 area teams with the people working on the main app so that 353 00:16:50,120 --> 00:16:53,440 they can make the mobile version of whatever's in the main line. 354 00:16:54,040 --> 00:16:55,600 There's no hard and fast answer here. 355 00:16:55,880 --> 00:16:59,400 And the same is true for like, do you do QA as a separate orgs 356 00:16:59,440 --> 00:17:01,000 or do you blend them within teams? 357 00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:03,880 Do you do? You can go on and on here, but 358 00:17:03,880 --> 00:17:06,560 certainly thinking about how you design your teams multi 359 00:17:06,560 --> 00:17:09,960 functionally in a way that really helps the products and 360 00:17:09,960 --> 00:17:12,680 you get to sort of exploit Conway's Law is something worth 361 00:17:12,680 --> 00:17:15,520 thinking about. And yeah, mobile QA always comes 362 00:17:15,520 --> 00:17:17,240 up again and again. Yeah. 363 00:17:17,240 --> 00:17:20,200 So I think definitely it's kind of like no hard fast rule here, 364 00:17:20,200 --> 00:17:21,760 right? Sometimes different organization 365 00:17:21,760 --> 00:17:24,599 have different contexts, right? And especially depending on the 366 00:17:24,920 --> 00:17:27,599 kind of leaders that exist in the organization as well, right? 367 00:17:27,599 --> 00:17:31,160 So more teams also mean that you need to have kind of like 368 00:17:31,160 --> 00:17:32,480 managers to run the teams, right? 369 00:17:32,480 --> 00:17:34,320 Otherwise it can be also chaotic. 370 00:17:34,720 --> 00:17:37,600 How about political right? Because sometimes in some 371 00:17:37,600 --> 00:17:40,840 organization, no matter large or small, they are sometimes 372 00:17:40,840 --> 00:17:43,120 politics. So is there any kind of orchard 373 00:17:43,120 --> 00:17:46,440 design that you think would kind of like avoid politics much, 374 00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:48,760 much effectively? It's tricky. 375 00:17:48,760 --> 00:17:50,280 It depends what you mean by politics. 376 00:17:50,320 --> 00:17:53,120 I mean, if you've got people who are naturally inclined to be 377 00:17:53,120 --> 00:17:55,400 that way, it doesn't matter what role they're in, they're going 378 00:17:55,400 --> 00:17:57,680 to be that way. I think what's important though, 379 00:17:57,680 --> 00:18:00,760 is to think about your org design in such a way that 380 00:18:00,760 --> 00:18:04,640 doesn't encourage people to, I've heard the, the term 381 00:18:04,640 --> 00:18:07,280 sandbagging where you sort of like lay out the sandbags around 382 00:18:07,280 --> 00:18:09,160 your team so that nobody can get in kind of thing. 383 00:18:09,560 --> 00:18:11,680 And then you just become like a black hole, just needing more 384 00:18:11,680 --> 00:18:14,720 and more people all the time. And I think that there is a 385 00:18:14,720 --> 00:18:17,360 balance between, you know, do you design your teams based on 386 00:18:17,360 --> 00:18:21,360 slices of your technology or do you design your teams based on 387 00:18:21,360 --> 00:18:25,520 slices of your product strategy? Again, there's a hard and fast 388 00:18:25,520 --> 00:18:27,040 rule. You obviously want for 389 00:18:27,040 --> 00:18:29,760 particular specialist piece of infrastructure for them not to 390 00:18:29,760 --> 00:18:33,320 be at the wing of a of a product road map type decision when it 391 00:18:33,320 --> 00:18:34,800 needs to be a long term piece of work. 392 00:18:34,920 --> 00:18:37,760 But at the same time you want teams that move fast when it's 393 00:18:37,800 --> 00:18:40,320 it's product focused. But back to your point about 394 00:18:40,320 --> 00:18:44,440 politics, I think that I don't have an answer to that question. 395 00:18:44,440 --> 00:18:46,640 The reason I don't have an answer is that if people are 396 00:18:46,640 --> 00:18:50,520 political and challenging, then they will always act in that 397 00:18:50,520 --> 00:18:53,040 way. But I think what you have to do 398 00:18:53,040 --> 00:18:56,120 as a leader is make sure that the people that you promote, 399 00:18:56,120 --> 00:19:00,880 reward, give good performance ratings to are the ones who show 400 00:19:01,480 --> 00:19:05,360 their kind of collaboration, their ability to do things for 401 00:19:05,360 --> 00:19:08,800 the rest of the org chart. Classic example of something 402 00:19:08,800 --> 00:19:10,800 very critical and urgent happens. 403 00:19:11,280 --> 00:19:14,520 You have to de prioritize some things in your org in order to 404 00:19:14,520 --> 00:19:18,280 get this particular thing done. This thing is not in the area of 405 00:19:18,280 --> 00:19:22,960 any of the people in your org seeing which leaders, people are 406 00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:25,320 the ones who say, hey, yeah, let's get this done, I'm going 407 00:19:25,320 --> 00:19:27,160 to help. Those are the people that you 408 00:19:27,160 --> 00:19:29,520 want to really hoist up over time because they're not 409 00:19:29,520 --> 00:19:31,840 necessarily attached to what they are doing. 410 00:19:31,840 --> 00:19:34,240 They're actually aligned with the the whole company 411 00:19:34,240 --> 00:19:37,680 succeeding. The ones who will push back and 412 00:19:37,680 --> 00:19:39,920 push back and say that's not my area, that's not my area, that's 413 00:19:39,920 --> 00:19:43,120 not my area. Actually they are more inclined 414 00:19:43,120 --> 00:19:46,480 to fight for their little Kingdom as opposed to being able 415 00:19:46,480 --> 00:19:50,600 to really see that the longer term company direction is more 416 00:19:50,600 --> 00:19:52,520 important and it's about with time. 417 00:19:52,520 --> 00:19:54,960 Like rewarding the people that give that altruistic behaviour. 418 00:19:56,040 --> 00:19:57,880 Yeah. So I think I can also relate to 419 00:19:57,880 --> 00:19:59,960 that, right? So for me, the characters of the 420 00:19:59,960 --> 00:20:02,840 people, the leaders and also probably the performance 421 00:20:02,840 --> 00:20:05,240 management, right? So something that also you have 422 00:20:05,240 --> 00:20:08,080 to think about, do you encourage political behaviour or do you 423 00:20:08,440 --> 00:20:10,640 actually encourage collaboration and teamwork, right. 424 00:20:11,040 --> 00:20:13,800 So I think definitely org chart is something that everyone as a 425 00:20:13,800 --> 00:20:15,560 leader, right? You have to really think hard 426 00:20:15,560 --> 00:20:18,800 about this, not just randomly move people from one team to 427 00:20:18,800 --> 00:20:21,640 another, but actually there's some kind of a science behind 428 00:20:21,640 --> 00:20:23,200 it. And don't forget some of the 429 00:20:23,200 --> 00:20:26,200 best practice like Conway's law team topologies, you know, done 430 00:20:26,200 --> 00:20:28,200 besides and all that two pizza team. 431 00:20:28,440 --> 00:20:30,560 Those kind of things definitely are good references from the 432 00:20:30,800 --> 00:20:33,720 other industries as well. So I think let's move on. 433 00:20:33,720 --> 00:20:34,600 I've. Had just one more thought. 434 00:20:34,920 --> 00:20:37,080 Yeah, just one tiny thought that came my mind as you were 435 00:20:37,080 --> 00:20:39,200 speaking. There is just going back to 436 00:20:39,200 --> 00:20:42,960 where we began talking where ensuring that your performance 437 00:20:42,960 --> 00:20:47,160 system for leaders is not attached to size of their org. 438 00:20:47,520 --> 00:20:51,240 If you really do reward your highest performers well, 439 00:20:51,240 --> 00:20:53,640 regardless of the size of their team, but actually based on 440 00:20:53,640 --> 00:20:57,400 their impacts, then the kind of behaviors that are political, 441 00:20:57,400 --> 00:21:01,400 which are holding on to people trying to grow the immediate org 442 00:21:01,400 --> 00:21:03,720 underneath them but not thinking about the rest of the org. 443 00:21:04,320 --> 00:21:06,880 If you have the right framework in place to make sure that 444 00:21:06,880 --> 00:21:10,320 regardless if you've got a small team or a big team, that the 445 00:21:10,320 --> 00:21:13,800 person running the small team can either earn more or get more 446 00:21:13,800 --> 00:21:16,320 senior than the person with the big team because of the 447 00:21:16,320 --> 00:21:19,040 behaviour that they exhibit. Then I think that starts to 448 00:21:19,040 --> 00:21:22,400 break that political behaviour down because it doesn't matter 449 00:21:22,400 --> 00:21:24,960 if you've got a big org or a small org or medium org, like 450 00:21:24,960 --> 00:21:26,880 it's about what you actually do and and how you help the 451 00:21:26,880 --> 00:21:28,400 company. Sorry, that was just my 452 00:21:28,400 --> 00:21:30,600 additional thought there. Yeah, Thanks for the addition. 453 00:21:30,600 --> 00:21:32,960 So I think as engineering leaders who are at the highest, 454 00:21:32,960 --> 00:21:36,240 maybe CT or VP, this is kind of like your responsibility, right? 455 00:21:36,240 --> 00:21:39,040 To ensure that, you know, you manage the performance really 456 00:21:39,040 --> 00:21:41,320 well and reward the behaviours that you want. 457 00:21:41,760 --> 00:21:44,800 The other aspect of something that I'm sure like many 458 00:21:44,800 --> 00:21:47,920 engineering leaders struggle are actually time management. 459 00:21:48,320 --> 00:21:51,520 So I think 1, one good signal if you want to see an engineering 460 00:21:51,520 --> 00:21:54,640 leader is someone who is always busy in their calendar. 461 00:21:55,240 --> 00:21:58,120 So tell us a little bit more what kind of thing that they 462 00:21:58,120 --> 00:22:00,360 should, I don't know, improve in terms of time management. 463 00:22:00,360 --> 00:22:03,280 Because engineering leader, by definition, they have multiple 464 00:22:03,280 --> 00:22:06,520 teams under them, multiple responsibilities, maybe multiple 465 00:22:06,520 --> 00:22:09,720 big projects. How can they manage their time 466 00:22:09,720 --> 00:22:12,440 better? Yeah, I think it starts with 467 00:22:12,520 --> 00:22:15,120 really understanding. So sort of stepping back from 468 00:22:15,120 --> 00:22:17,400 the whole thing in abstract and going, what is it on a 469 00:22:17,400 --> 00:22:21,640 day-to-day week to week basis that I or you need as a leader 470 00:22:21,640 --> 00:22:25,000 to really ensure that you are connected to all the teams that 471 00:22:25,000 --> 00:22:27,000 you're steering things in the right way possible. 472 00:22:27,680 --> 00:22:30,240 And this will completely depend on your organization as to what 473 00:22:30,240 --> 00:22:31,920 the norms are here. Like there may be some 474 00:22:31,920 --> 00:22:35,200 organizations where yes, you end up in meetings all day shop if I 475 00:22:35,200 --> 00:22:36,880 where I work at the moment is very interesting. 476 00:22:36,880 --> 00:22:40,440 I probably have the least meetings I've ever had in my 477 00:22:40,440 --> 00:22:44,320 life as a director kind of role, which is interesting. 478 00:22:44,440 --> 00:22:47,080 But that's kind of due to the company culture, which is very 479 00:22:47,080 --> 00:22:49,920 much to do with only essential meetings. 480 00:22:49,920 --> 00:22:53,000 We have a thing on our calendar invites that shows you the 481 00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:56,200 dollar value of everyone who is participating in a meeting. 482 00:22:56,200 --> 00:22:58,800 So if you call like a massive group meeting for an hour, it's 483 00:22:58,800 --> 00:23:00,360 like you're costing the company a lot of money. 484 00:23:00,680 --> 00:23:03,160 But this is a cultural thing. But I think it starts with like 485 00:23:03,160 --> 00:23:05,920 really understanding, like what it is that you need to do your 486 00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:09,360 job effectively every week, penciling in the critical 487 00:23:09,360 --> 00:23:12,280 essential things like doing your one to ones with your direct 488 00:23:12,280 --> 00:23:16,120 reports, any kind of skip levels or group meetings that are 489 00:23:16,360 --> 00:23:18,360 essential. But I'm also going to sort of 490 00:23:18,360 --> 00:23:21,120 stop myself and say that the word meetings comes up a lot. 491 00:23:21,120 --> 00:23:24,680 But I really think that you can be an incredibly effective 492 00:23:24,680 --> 00:23:27,240 leader by having minimal meetings. 493 00:23:27,280 --> 00:23:31,800 Like you can be a very written leader that can work maybe even 494 00:23:31,800 --> 00:23:33,680 better than someone who's in meetings all day. 495 00:23:34,160 --> 00:23:37,800 And I think that at least personally, I know I'm biased 496 00:23:37,800 --> 00:23:41,000 because I've written stuff and I'm, I can write quite fast and, 497 00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:44,320 and, and that kind of thing. But I find that like my most 498 00:23:44,600 --> 00:23:48,400 valuable time in terms of like actually things getting done and 499 00:23:48,400 --> 00:23:52,600 decided comes through writing. And you certainly find that as 500 00:23:52,600 --> 00:23:55,440 you work for bigger companies where maybe the leadership are 501 00:23:55,440 --> 00:23:58,160 just completely unavailable to just hop on a call. 502 00:23:58,560 --> 00:24:00,880 Most of the real action happens in the writing. 503 00:24:00,880 --> 00:24:03,840 You know, it happens in Slack messages or emails. 504 00:24:04,360 --> 00:24:06,720 And there is like a bit later on in the book talking about the 505 00:24:06,720 --> 00:24:10,440 importance of writing. And actually, I've seen many 506 00:24:10,880 --> 00:24:14,960 tenured, inexperienced leaders kind of fall down in terms of 507 00:24:14,960 --> 00:24:16,760 their impact because their writing just isn't up to 508 00:24:16,760 --> 00:24:19,280 scratch. Like being able to craft very 509 00:24:19,280 --> 00:24:25,360 succinct, clear, unambiguous pieces of writing between the 510 00:24:25,360 --> 00:24:29,000 people that matter, that make things happen and also have 511 00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:32,440 clear actions and next steps is just so, so essential. 512 00:24:33,120 --> 00:24:36,680 Interestingly, if sort of listeners and watchers look at 513 00:24:36,680 --> 00:24:39,080 once a season of a little view into sort of some of the tech 514 00:24:39,080 --> 00:24:40,760 companies at the top, there's AI. 515 00:24:40,760 --> 00:24:44,800 Think internal tech emails sub stack where they sort of look 516 00:24:44,800 --> 00:24:48,240 through various different emails that get put into the public 517 00:24:48,240 --> 00:24:51,280 domain as a result of like antitrust lawsuits and things. 518 00:24:51,600 --> 00:24:54,400 And they'll show like threads of emails between like Bill Gates 519 00:24:54,400 --> 00:24:57,520 and Steve Jobs. And you get to see just how many 520 00:24:57,520 --> 00:25:00,200 decisions are made via writing rather than meetings. 521 00:25:00,200 --> 00:25:02,640 Anyway, I've digressed ever so slightly from what you should be 522 00:25:02,640 --> 00:25:05,800 doing in your calendar, but personally get the critical 523 00:25:05,800 --> 00:25:10,240 stuff in. We usually have 1:30 to 45 524 00:25:10,240 --> 00:25:13,360 minute come to us with any problems per group. 525 00:25:13,520 --> 00:25:16,920 So we have like five groups in my org and we have 45 minutes 526 00:25:16,920 --> 00:25:19,520 for each where the leaders of each come to talk about whatever 527 00:25:19,520 --> 00:25:21,000 they want. If they need help with things 528 00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:23,360 being unblocked, if they want to tell us what they're doing, if 529 00:25:23,360 --> 00:25:26,280 they want to demo something, the time is just theirs. 1 to one's 530 00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:29,280 with my staff, skip levels go in there and then I very 531 00:25:29,280 --> 00:25:31,920 proactively block out my calendar to have thinking time 532 00:25:31,920 --> 00:25:33,880 as well. I'm quite lucky that on 533 00:25:33,920 --> 00:25:36,840 Wednesdays at Shopify, it's always no meetings day. 534 00:25:37,040 --> 00:25:39,360 So I by default I'm speaking to you on a Wednesday. 535 00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:44,400 So as you, as you can probably tell now, but that's a day where 536 00:25:44,400 --> 00:25:48,000 I do a lot of my deep work. For example, a few weeks ago I 537 00:25:48,000 --> 00:25:50,680 was updating our engineering strategy and writing like a six 538 00:25:50,680 --> 00:25:53,400 monthly update of everything that we'd shipped and things 539 00:25:53,400 --> 00:25:55,160 that we'd done well and things that we hadn't done well at. 540 00:25:55,160 --> 00:25:58,880 You know, those things generally happen on my Wednesdays and I 541 00:25:58,880 --> 00:26:01,600 try and block out morning time as well, so I can always go 542 00:26:01,640 --> 00:26:04,880 through my messages and my emails very slowly and make sure 543 00:26:04,880 --> 00:26:06,120 I've got time to respond properly. 544 00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:08,400 So always use your calendar to block out time for yourself as 545 00:26:08,400 --> 00:26:10,360 well. Yeah, I think those are some 546 00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:12,880 really great tips, right. And obviously depending on the 547 00:26:12,880 --> 00:26:15,960 culture of the company, but actually sometimes the leader 548 00:26:15,960 --> 00:26:19,560 needs to, you know, stand right, stand up and make the decision. 549 00:26:19,560 --> 00:26:21,600 Do you want to be involved in all these meetings, you know, 550 00:26:21,600 --> 00:26:25,000 get distracted, or do you want to become a writing leader, 551 00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:27,560 those kind of things. Or do you want to be someone who 552 00:26:27,560 --> 00:26:28,840 is thinking strategically, right? 553 00:26:29,040 --> 00:26:31,360 Because I think the biggest gap, just like engineering manager 554 00:26:31,360 --> 00:26:34,520 rights, when they started as an IC, suddenly they have to manage 555 00:26:34,520 --> 00:26:36,200 people, right? For engineering leader, 556 00:26:36,200 --> 00:26:37,840 sometimes it's not prescriptive, right? 557 00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:39,440 The things that you have to take care about. 558 00:26:39,520 --> 00:26:41,560 So yeah, here you go. You have a few teams, you have a 559 00:26:41,560 --> 00:26:44,280 few projects, just run it. So sometimes there's no clear 560 00:26:44,280 --> 00:26:47,880 direction from the top, accept probably some OK objectives from 561 00:26:47,880 --> 00:26:50,960 the company, but largely kind of like the leaders have to, I 562 00:26:50,960 --> 00:26:53,920 don't know, improvise or think about the strategy, the tactics 563 00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:55,840 that they want people to follow on. 564 00:26:56,040 --> 00:26:58,240 So maybe some tips here. How can the new engineering 565 00:26:58,240 --> 00:27:01,440 leader bridge the gap? So before, like maybe they have 566 00:27:01,440 --> 00:27:04,880 to take care of individual teams and projects and manage them 567 00:27:04,880 --> 00:27:08,400 well, but now sitting at one layer above, they actually have 568 00:27:08,400 --> 00:27:10,720 to start doing something different. 569 00:27:10,720 --> 00:27:13,280 So maybe some tips for new engineering leader here. 570 00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:15,520 Yeah. I mean, you obviously can't do 571 00:27:15,520 --> 00:27:19,200 everything, but on the flip side, you don't want to be so 572 00:27:19,200 --> 00:27:21,680 far removed from everything that you don't know what's going on. 573 00:27:22,040 --> 00:27:25,360 I'd say like a pattern that tends to repeat itself in my 574 00:27:25,360 --> 00:27:28,640 work life is sort of AT shape, which is the similar sort of T 575 00:27:28,640 --> 00:27:31,240 shape engineer thing, but it's sort of T shape leadership, 576 00:27:31,720 --> 00:27:35,360 which is where at any given time one of the many, many projects 577 00:27:35,360 --> 00:27:37,920 going on will need a lot of attention. 578 00:27:38,440 --> 00:27:41,080 And I'll find that I will be very, very close to that 579 00:27:41,080 --> 00:27:44,240 particular project closes in, I'll opt into some of their 580 00:27:44,240 --> 00:27:46,120 group meetings. I'll be in all of their Slack 581 00:27:46,120 --> 00:27:49,960 channels, I'll be contributing to discussion, technical review, 582 00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:53,800 and I'll have a very clear focus on that knowing that I'm 583 00:27:53,800 --> 00:27:58,160 delegating the rest and what my sort of T shaped focus is from 584 00:27:58,160 --> 00:28:01,000 month to month changes, there's usually always one thing that's 585 00:28:01,000 --> 00:28:04,800 either a sort of a critical point or maybe a stressful point 586 00:28:04,800 --> 00:28:08,560 or like a early stage designing point that's worth being close 587 00:28:08,560 --> 00:28:11,320 to. So I'd say always be close to 588 00:28:11,320 --> 00:28:14,640 one or two things at any given time and then delegate the rest 589 00:28:14,640 --> 00:28:18,120 out and then decide how to delegate those other things and 590 00:28:18,120 --> 00:28:19,720 then how you get informed about them. 591 00:28:20,240 --> 00:28:24,000 Something that we do at Shopify is kind of a weekly written 592 00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:26,080 update kind of culture, which works really well. 593 00:28:26,080 --> 00:28:29,960 So all teams just do a long form update once a week of how their 594 00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:31,920 projects are going. And it's very, very easy to just 595 00:28:31,920 --> 00:28:33,360 read them so they come through your inbox. 596 00:28:33,360 --> 00:28:35,840 But depending on how you do things in your organization, you 597 00:28:35,840 --> 00:28:37,520 might need to implement something that helps you 598 00:28:37,520 --> 00:28:40,360 understand what's going on. In your book, you also cover 599 00:28:40,360 --> 00:28:42,840 this one thing called long termism, right? 600 00:28:42,840 --> 00:28:45,960 So it's something that I think it's also good as kind of like a 601 00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,480 reference for engineering leader who kind of like stuck or simply 602 00:28:49,480 --> 00:28:51,440 like not knowing what to focus on. 603 00:28:51,640 --> 00:28:53,880 So tell us a little bit more about this long termism. 604 00:28:53,880 --> 00:28:55,920 How should people use it actually in terms of a 605 00:28:55,920 --> 00:28:58,560 day-to-day? Yeah, long termism is is 606 00:28:58,560 --> 00:29:01,520 interesting and I think it's sort of self descriptive. 607 00:29:01,520 --> 00:29:05,600 It's really just always having a very long term view about what 608 00:29:05,600 --> 00:29:08,600 it is that you are doing. And I think that it's very, very 609 00:29:08,600 --> 00:29:12,440 easy, the default mode to get sucked into the urgent 610 00:29:12,440 --> 00:29:14,440 day-to-day things. When you think about the whole 611 00:29:14,440 --> 00:29:17,320 kind of Eisenhower quadrant thing, you're always in this 612 00:29:17,320 --> 00:29:20,880 sort of burning Fire Zone. But it's really important and it 613 00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:24,040 becomes ever more important the more senior you get to be able 614 00:29:24,040 --> 00:29:28,240 to really have a compelling idea of what does the next year, five 615 00:29:28,240 --> 00:29:31,240 years, or maybe even going as far as like, what would it mean 616 00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:34,440 for the company to still be here in 20 years and being able to 617 00:29:34,440 --> 00:29:37,160 spend time thinking about that. Because if you're able to very 618 00:29:37,160 --> 00:29:41,280 clearly articulate what that means, then that can really help 619 00:29:41,280 --> 00:29:45,560 you as a check when you're looking at the design of some 620 00:29:45,560 --> 00:29:48,520 new infrastructure, you can think, OK, if the company is 621 00:29:48,520 --> 00:29:51,400 going to be here in 20 years, how does this contribute? 622 00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:55,080 Or is this really something where we're going down a route 623 00:29:55,080 --> 00:29:57,240 where we're going to have to redo it again in another year? 624 00:29:57,640 --> 00:30:01,840 And you find that certainly I find that the amount of leaders 625 00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:05,560 who really are truly long term is quite few and far between in 626 00:30:05,560 --> 00:30:09,680 my career because quite often the pressure of the short term 627 00:30:09,840 --> 00:30:13,160 always wins. So having leadership that really 628 00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:18,240 do fight for the long term, I think is really healthy and I 629 00:30:18,240 --> 00:30:21,280 think can bring a lot of clarity to what you're doing. 630 00:30:21,640 --> 00:30:24,440 So the classic thing is in engineering is like, you know, 631 00:30:25,040 --> 00:30:29,760 deadlines estimation. If you have a very short term 632 00:30:29,760 --> 00:30:34,120 focused company, then if your engineering team really haven't 633 00:30:34,120 --> 00:30:36,640 finished something properly and they've built something that's 634 00:30:36,640 --> 00:30:40,160 still not quite stable, they're worried about scaling, they're 635 00:30:40,160 --> 00:30:43,360 worried about failover. But you've got a very short term 636 00:30:43,360 --> 00:30:47,040 focus organization with maybe a lack of long term technical 637 00:30:47,040 --> 00:30:50,120 leadership at the top. Then all the pressure will be to 638 00:30:50,120 --> 00:30:53,360 ship it regardless and then potentially it will become a big 639 00:30:53,400 --> 00:30:56,640 dumpster fire afterwards. But if you have a very long term 640 00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:59,080 focus leadership, which is something that you know, you can 641 00:30:59,080 --> 00:31:02,400 also be yourself, then you can be the sort of leadership that 642 00:31:02,400 --> 00:31:05,320 go, well, you know what, let's make sure that we actually build 643 00:31:05,320 --> 00:31:07,920 this properly. Let's move the deadline outlook. 644 00:31:07,920 --> 00:31:10,240 Let's just delay it. You know, we'll eat the short 645 00:31:10,240 --> 00:31:12,920 term pain of delaying it in order to make sure that 646 00:31:12,920 --> 00:31:14,440 something lands properly when it goes out. 647 00:31:14,440 --> 00:31:17,360 And I know that this is very easy to talk about and actually 648 00:31:17,360 --> 00:31:20,000 doing it for real is a lot harder because it involves 649 00:31:20,400 --> 00:31:23,040 dealing with other people. But I think really always having 650 00:31:23,040 --> 00:31:26,320 your head in a place where you're thinking, where are we 651 00:31:26,320 --> 00:31:29,160 going to be in five years? What decision are we making 652 00:31:29,160 --> 00:31:31,240 today that's going to really cause problems. 653 00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:34,800 And this can often be very small things, such As, for example, if 654 00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:39,040 your company typically writes in two primary languages for like 655 00:31:39,040 --> 00:31:41,680 back end and front end. And then a new project comes 656 00:31:41,680 --> 00:31:44,480 along where someone says, OK, well, we're going to introduce a 657 00:31:44,480 --> 00:31:47,720 new language here because this particular thing we think should 658 00:31:47,720 --> 00:31:50,640 be built in this language. And in the short term, you think 659 00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:52,800 that's great, It's cool. The engineers like, I get to 660 00:31:52,800 --> 00:31:55,360 learn this thing. I don't know whether it's Rust 661 00:31:55,360 --> 00:31:58,480 or Go or something new. And it's like, woof, everyone's 662 00:31:58,480 --> 00:32:00,800 very, very involved. Who's doing that? 663 00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:03,280 Thinking of like, OK, well, in five years when most of these 664 00:32:03,280 --> 00:32:06,680 engineers maybe aren't here anymore, who is going to have 665 00:32:06,680 --> 00:32:10,360 this like ability to train people in this new language so 666 00:32:10,360 --> 00:32:12,560 that they can maintain it? And I think it's really healthy 667 00:32:12,560 --> 00:32:14,240 to have that balance. Yeah. 668 00:32:14,240 --> 00:32:16,520 So I think what you said, I can also relate, right? 669 00:32:16,760 --> 00:32:19,560 There are not many leaders who have this kind of long term view 670 00:32:19,800 --> 00:32:22,320 and sometimes it needs a lot of conviction, right, Because it's 671 00:32:22,320 --> 00:32:25,040 kind of long term, right. So instead of doing long term, 672 00:32:25,040 --> 00:32:27,600 sometimes people put more focus on the short term, maybe they 673 00:32:27,600 --> 00:32:31,120 are burning fires all over the places or maybe projects 674 00:32:31,160 --> 00:32:33,440 deadline to meet people issues as well. 675 00:32:33,680 --> 00:32:36,320 But I think a great engineering leader is someone who always put 676 00:32:36,440 --> 00:32:39,680 one eye on the future, right, on the long term view of the 677 00:32:39,680 --> 00:32:42,080 company, the organization, the team, whatever that is, right? 678 00:32:42,400 --> 00:32:45,560 And I think delegating well something that is definitely 679 00:32:45,560 --> 00:32:48,520 very important because in order for you to spend time in the 680 00:32:48,600 --> 00:32:51,760 long term view, you must have people who can run the 681 00:32:51,760 --> 00:32:53,640 day-to-day operations really well. 682 00:32:53,880 --> 00:32:56,200 And something that you cover a lot in your book as well about 683 00:32:56,200 --> 00:32:59,720 delegation, which probably the leaders here can also look at 684 00:32:59,720 --> 00:33:01,800 the book, right, in order to get the best tips. 685 00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:04,360 So you mentioned a lot about writing. 686 00:33:04,560 --> 00:33:06,640 I guess let's go to the next topic, which is about 687 00:33:06,640 --> 00:33:10,040 communication, right? And I know that you like writing 688 00:33:10,240 --> 00:33:13,200 and you have this strong point of view that a leadership is 689 00:33:13,200 --> 00:33:15,760 writing. So tell us a bit more about why 690 00:33:15,760 --> 00:33:17,560 your view that leaders need to write? 691 00:33:17,640 --> 00:33:19,560 And what if the leaders doesn't like to write? 692 00:33:21,040 --> 00:33:22,840 Yeah, it's, it's a good question. 693 00:33:23,080 --> 00:33:25,240 It's something I covered in the remote workbook as well, because 694 00:33:25,240 --> 00:33:28,240 obviously being remote you, you are writing a lot too. 695 00:33:28,680 --> 00:33:32,840 But I think like doing very, very good leadership and 696 00:33:32,840 --> 00:33:37,200 strategic work often requires doing a lot of work inside your 697 00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:39,240 own head. Obviously you will talk to your 698 00:33:39,240 --> 00:33:42,120 peers, you'll talk to your team, talk to your own manager or 699 00:33:42,120 --> 00:33:43,800 whatever. But when it comes down to it, 700 00:33:43,800 --> 00:33:46,960 like if you are needing to write an engineering strategy, if 701 00:33:46,960 --> 00:33:49,480 you're needing to really think about the world, even if you're 702 00:33:49,480 --> 00:33:52,840 just needing to retain information, and obviously the 703 00:33:52,840 --> 00:33:56,120 more information you're exposed to at the higher levels of the 704 00:33:56,120 --> 00:33:57,920 org chart, it can be very overwhelming. 705 00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:02,280 You're getting into a habit where you are continually taking 706 00:34:02,280 --> 00:34:06,760 notes, almost not necessarily journaling, but being able to 707 00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:10,960 commit words to paper or digital paper every single day. 708 00:34:11,280 --> 00:34:13,920 That builds up at sort of a knowledge database and audit 709 00:34:13,920 --> 00:34:16,960 trail of everything that you've seen or thought really allows 710 00:34:16,960 --> 00:34:19,400 you to sort of connect thoughts together in your head. 711 00:34:19,920 --> 00:34:23,440 And also when it comes to producing pieces that require 712 00:34:23,440 --> 00:34:26,880 you to think, you know, writing is the process where the 713 00:34:26,880 --> 00:34:29,800 difficult ideas form. They don't necessarily always 714 00:34:29,800 --> 00:34:31,719 form 1st and then you write them down. 715 00:34:32,320 --> 00:34:34,320 It's while you're writing them that they actually form. 716 00:34:34,719 --> 00:34:37,880 And the same is true for like if you're writing academic papers 717 00:34:37,880 --> 00:34:41,320 or writing a book or a novel or something like you don't have it 718 00:34:41,320 --> 00:34:43,520 all in your head and then you just put it down in the paper. 719 00:34:43,719 --> 00:34:46,560 It's sort of like a back and forth like game of tennis with 720 00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:49,480 the paper. So I think getting into a habit 721 00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:52,239 of even if you're just writing to yourself is really important. 722 00:34:52,679 --> 00:34:55,880 And similarly, more recently over the last couple of years, 723 00:34:55,880 --> 00:34:59,360 those kind of second brain software like Log SEC or 724 00:34:59,360 --> 00:35:02,160 Obsidian, and there's other kind of knowledge graph software out 725 00:35:02,160 --> 00:35:05,920 there where you're encouraged to write notes and then link them 726 00:35:05,920 --> 00:35:08,880 together based on keywords. They're one of those things 727 00:35:08,880 --> 00:35:12,280 where you start using them and on day one you open it up and 728 00:35:12,280 --> 00:35:13,600 just go, OK, there's nothing in here. 729 00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:15,920 Like what's the point of this? And then you start writing some 730 00:35:15,920 --> 00:35:18,280 notes. But then, you know, the months 731 00:35:18,280 --> 00:35:21,960 go by and then maybe the years go by, and then you can look and 732 00:35:21,960 --> 00:35:24,400 see that actually you've built up this entire knowledge base, 733 00:35:24,840 --> 00:35:27,640 which goes all the way back through time that shows all the 734 00:35:27,640 --> 00:35:29,560 things that you were thinking about, the projects that were 735 00:35:29,560 --> 00:35:32,760 important back then, and you can capture particular learnings. 736 00:35:32,760 --> 00:35:34,960 Then you won't repeat it again if you made a mistake. 737 00:35:35,480 --> 00:35:37,840 So just writing all the time is incredibly important. 738 00:35:37,840 --> 00:35:42,000 And I think that the times that I've felt my worst as a leader 739 00:35:42,240 --> 00:35:46,000 is when I haven't had enough time in my week to really put my 740 00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:48,080 thoughts to paper, even if they're to myself. 741 00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:52,800 And going back to your point about meetings, when I was at an 742 00:35:52,800 --> 00:35:56,320 organization that did seem like the purpose was just to be on 743 00:35:56,320 --> 00:35:59,720 video calls all day, I honestly felt like I degraded in my 744 00:35:59,720 --> 00:36:03,080 intelligence with time. Like having enough time in the 745 00:36:03,080 --> 00:36:08,120 calendar to spend with myself in the quiet, Thinking, reflecting, 746 00:36:08,280 --> 00:36:11,720 coming up with ideas is where I've become far, far better at 747 00:36:11,720 --> 00:36:14,640 my job. Yeah, but I think some people, I 748 00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:16,640 mean, who probably don't like writing, right? 749 00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:20,120 Or some people or some organization which has bias for 750 00:36:20,120 --> 00:36:22,160 action, kind of a mentality, right. 751 00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:25,120 So I understand like writing sometimes take time, especially 752 00:36:25,120 --> 00:36:27,720 if you have back and forth thoughts, you have other people 753 00:36:27,720 --> 00:36:31,040 reviewing you brainstorm, put comments in inside the doc, it 754 00:36:31,040 --> 00:36:34,000 could take quite longer, right? So maybe tell us a little bit 755 00:36:34,000 --> 00:36:37,600 more like for those people who are thinking that action is the 756 00:36:37,600 --> 00:36:40,160 best, right? What should they consider in 757 00:36:40,160 --> 00:36:42,680 order for them to switch their mindset, maybe to consider 758 00:36:42,680 --> 00:36:44,800 writing more? Maybe it's like those important 759 00:36:44,800 --> 00:36:47,240 stuffs first, right? Not just everything in writing, 760 00:36:47,240 --> 00:36:49,080 right? Maybe tell us a little bit tips 761 00:36:49,080 --> 00:36:51,240 here for those people. Yeah. 762 00:36:51,240 --> 00:36:55,760 I mean, one is to catch your bias of action sometimes and 763 00:36:55,760 --> 00:36:59,880 just to think that maybe if you just waited a day or two or even 764 00:36:59,880 --> 00:37:04,120 just one sleep before you do something, but that can actually 765 00:37:04,120 --> 00:37:07,280 be very beneficial to no long term detriment. 766 00:37:07,680 --> 00:37:11,320 I think the other thing that I have changed a lot, especially 767 00:37:11,320 --> 00:37:15,440 since working remotely and also like now I'm in the UK and like 768 00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:16,840 a lot of Shopify is on the East Coast. 769 00:37:16,840 --> 00:37:20,160 So I do have a time zone gap. So I do have times in the 770 00:37:20,160 --> 00:37:21,840 morning that are much more quiet than other people. 771 00:37:22,400 --> 00:37:26,080 It's kind of changing my focus to how I was when I was in a 772 00:37:26,080 --> 00:37:29,360 physical office, which was very much like a single thread and I 773 00:37:29,360 --> 00:37:32,000 would just be executing on the single thread all the time until 774 00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:33,760 it was done and then moving on to the next thread. 775 00:37:34,400 --> 00:37:36,360 Now is very much like multi threaded. 776 00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:40,200 So it requires good like To Do List maintenance, but I've 777 00:37:40,200 --> 00:37:43,040 always got like multiple things that are in some stage of 778 00:37:43,040 --> 00:37:46,200 progress at once. So for example, like a few weeks 779 00:37:46,200 --> 00:37:50,320 ago, I was going in iterative back and forth with my 780 00:37:50,320 --> 00:37:52,840 engineering strategy update with different people, you know, 781 00:37:52,880 --> 00:37:56,040 updating it, sending out review, iterating and so on. 782 00:37:56,640 --> 00:37:59,160 At the same time reviewing various technical documents. 783 00:37:59,160 --> 00:38:01,960 And you kind of just you batch process things and you know that 784 00:38:01,960 --> 00:38:05,480 like every single day that you put out a bunch of things and 785 00:38:05,480 --> 00:38:08,360 then you wait for the next batch to come back and then you go 786 00:38:08,360 --> 00:38:09,960 that way. And the way you get around it is 787 00:38:09,960 --> 00:38:12,360 just by doing more at once. And yes, it does require being 788 00:38:12,360 --> 00:38:15,840 more organised, but you can actually get quite a lot done if 789 00:38:15,840 --> 00:38:18,440 you sort of have things at various stages of asynchronous 790 00:38:18,440 --> 00:38:20,600 back and forth any time. Yeah. 791 00:38:20,600 --> 00:38:23,520 So for those people who are into, you know, bias of action, 792 00:38:23,520 --> 00:38:26,240 right, actually in your book, you also cover that writing 793 00:38:26,240 --> 00:38:28,720 actually assists you in decision making, right? 794 00:38:28,840 --> 00:38:31,800 Especially those decisions which are kind of like the one way 795 00:38:31,800 --> 00:38:34,840 door thing, right, Because they're kind of like distill the 796 00:38:34,840 --> 00:38:37,680 kind of insights, the thoughts that you really have to consider 797 00:38:37,680 --> 00:38:40,560 before you take any action. So maybe tell us a little bit 798 00:38:40,560 --> 00:38:43,080 more on this front, especially the concept of one way door and 799 00:38:43,080 --> 00:38:45,960 two way doors. Yeah, it's something that I 800 00:38:45,960 --> 00:38:49,040 think it's always been a concept that I had been aware of, but 801 00:38:49,200 --> 00:38:51,960 since I started at Shopify, it's just the sort of phrases that 802 00:38:51,960 --> 00:38:53,640 get used a lot. You kind of pick up on it. 803 00:38:53,640 --> 00:38:56,840 But certainly being able to identify for anything that you 804 00:38:56,840 --> 00:39:00,600 are doing, whether that is work being done in a particular team 805 00:39:00,600 --> 00:39:03,720 or when it comes to decisions that you're making that are more 806 00:39:03,720 --> 00:39:05,800 strategic. You know, think about whether 807 00:39:05,800 --> 00:39:08,080 it's a one way door or a two day door, two way door, like two way 808 00:39:08,080 --> 00:39:11,920 doors are easy because you can take that decision move forward, 809 00:39:11,920 --> 00:39:13,720 but then you can just go backwards if you need to. 810 00:39:14,400 --> 00:39:17,320 You could probably think of many examples there, but for example, 811 00:39:17,320 --> 00:39:18,600 one way door is where it's scary. 812 00:39:18,640 --> 00:39:21,640 So a one way door is where you know that if I make this 813 00:39:21,640 --> 00:39:24,160 decision, I do not have the chance to roll it back. 814 00:39:24,720 --> 00:39:28,520 And this can be anything from architectural decisions where 815 00:39:28,520 --> 00:39:31,360 you know that you're going to introduce a big breaking change 816 00:39:31,800 --> 00:39:35,040 and that's going to require say everyone that uses your API to 817 00:39:35,040 --> 00:39:36,600 rewrite something that they've done. 818 00:39:36,640 --> 00:39:38,480 That's a one way door. You can't roll that back very 819 00:39:38,480 --> 00:39:43,000 easily down to personnel things like maybe if you're going 820 00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:45,120 through a period and there are some layoffs, that's definitely 821 00:39:45,160 --> 00:39:47,120 a one way door. And you have to do that very, 822 00:39:47,120 --> 00:39:50,160 very carefully. And I think the idea is that if 823 00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:52,520 you can identify whether something is a one way door, 824 00:39:52,920 --> 00:39:55,040 then you know that that's the sort of thing that probably 825 00:39:55,040 --> 00:39:57,600 requires deeper thinking, greater scrutiny. 826 00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:01,360 And maybe if it's something that isn't particularly confidential, 827 00:40:01,360 --> 00:40:04,080 sensitive, getting other people's opinions is really, 828 00:40:04,080 --> 00:40:07,240 really useful there. For example, going back to the 829 00:40:07,240 --> 00:40:09,200 start of this conversation, a reorg. 830 00:40:09,840 --> 00:40:12,920 It isn't necessarily a one way door, like you could reorb again 831 00:40:12,920 --> 00:40:15,360 the next day, but it's incredibly disruptive. 832 00:40:15,720 --> 00:40:18,200 So thinking about that carefully and getting lots of people's 833 00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:21,880 opinions and making sure that when it actually happens it's 834 00:40:21,880 --> 00:40:25,080 the right thing, as much as you can predict ahead of time is 835 00:40:25,080 --> 00:40:27,680 super important. Yeah, So I think the concept of 836 00:40:27,680 --> 00:40:30,600 one way door, two way doors, for people who may have not heard 837 00:40:30,600 --> 00:40:32,200 about this before, go check it out, right? 838 00:40:32,200 --> 00:40:34,560 So I think it's really, really important to differentiate 839 00:40:34,560 --> 00:40:36,760 before you make any decision. Is this one way door or two way 840 00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:38,600 doors? One way door, definitely, you 841 00:40:38,600 --> 00:40:40,960 need to spend a little bit more time and maybe consult more 842 00:40:40,960 --> 00:40:43,680 people before you make the decision so that you don't get 843 00:40:43,680 --> 00:40:45,920 it wrong, right? Because the effect of the result 844 00:40:45,960 --> 00:40:48,600 for changing the decision is kind of like expensive and maybe 845 00:40:48,600 --> 00:40:50,640 disruptive, right? And you also mentioned in your 846 00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:53,520 book, as you go towards more seniority, you should move 847 00:40:53,520 --> 00:40:56,360 towards more asynchronous communication mode, you know, 848 00:40:56,360 --> 00:40:59,880 right, or maybe recording something, right, instead of 849 00:40:59,920 --> 00:41:02,600 synchronous, which is like meetings, calls and things like 850 00:41:02,600 --> 00:41:04,280 that. So definitely something that 851 00:41:04,280 --> 00:41:07,400 worth to consider as you move up the ladder, you know, becoming 852 00:41:07,400 --> 00:41:10,680 more senior engineering leader. And I think 1 aspect that is 853 00:41:10,800 --> 00:41:13,520 also important, not just writing, but I think also 854 00:41:13,520 --> 00:41:15,920 reading other people's writing, right? 855 00:41:15,920 --> 00:41:19,360 So maybe doing, I don't know, document review or whatever that 856 00:41:19,360 --> 00:41:21,800 is a little bit maybe here. Like what should an engineering 857 00:41:21,800 --> 00:41:23,440 leader do in terms of reading? Good. 858 00:41:24,400 --> 00:41:28,240 Question, I mean from personal experience, like the bulk of my 859 00:41:28,240 --> 00:41:32,240 reading comes through design documents, you know, technical 860 00:41:32,240 --> 00:41:36,440 design documents, making sure that where possible you are 861 00:41:36,800 --> 00:41:39,880 receiving this is sounds very abstract, but receiving input 862 00:41:39,920 --> 00:41:43,160 from all the places that matter. And if you've just started at a 863 00:41:43,160 --> 00:41:47,360 new organization or maybe you've changed organization internally 864 00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:50,120 or a different team, just stopping for a second and 865 00:41:50,120 --> 00:41:53,000 thinking like what kind of fire hoses of information would be 866 00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:56,680 really useful to have coming at my inbox so that every day I get 867 00:41:56,680 --> 00:42:01,520 something that really helps me. And that to me comes from either 868 00:42:01,640 --> 00:42:05,440 hanging out in particular Slack channels on adjacent initiatives 869 00:42:05,440 --> 00:42:08,440 or particular like dev tooling projects that are going on. 870 00:42:08,440 --> 00:42:10,440 So I can always just see the latest that's happening. 871 00:42:10,920 --> 00:42:14,480 Internally at Shopify, we have like a project tracking system 872 00:42:14,480 --> 00:42:16,960 that allows you to kind of follow projects as well, so that 873 00:42:16,960 --> 00:42:18,600 whenever people do their updates, you get it in your 874 00:42:18,600 --> 00:42:21,160 inbox. So I very sort of proactively 875 00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:24,440 spend time going around and sort of choosing what's going to come 876 00:42:24,440 --> 00:42:27,920 into my inbox so that I hopefully get smarter the next 877 00:42:27,920 --> 00:42:30,240 day. And, you know, obviously not 878 00:42:30,240 --> 00:42:32,520 just thinking about your company as well, you know, seek 879 00:42:32,680 --> 00:42:34,360 information out there on on the Internet. 880 00:42:34,360 --> 00:42:36,320 You know, I'm sure people who are watching or listening to 881 00:42:36,320 --> 00:42:39,880 this already have done in order to find this podcast, but try 882 00:42:39,880 --> 00:42:42,440 and find other views that conflict with your own. 883 00:42:42,440 --> 00:42:46,440 Try and find people who write things or say things that 884 00:42:46,440 --> 00:42:48,840 actually would, well, you would never do because they're very, 885 00:42:48,840 --> 00:42:51,200 very different. Because you can actually just be 886 00:42:51,320 --> 00:42:53,360 very useful to hear those opinions and strengthen your 887 00:42:53,360 --> 00:42:54,560 own. Yeah. 888 00:42:54,560 --> 00:42:56,960 So something that you mentioned about project updates, right? 889 00:42:56,960 --> 00:43:00,400 So definitely if you have multiple teams under you, so 890 00:43:00,400 --> 00:43:02,920 definitely do check out their status updates, right? 891 00:43:03,240 --> 00:43:05,680 It could be weekly, it could be biweekly, whatever the cadence 892 00:43:05,680 --> 00:43:07,400 is and give inputs to them, right? 893 00:43:07,400 --> 00:43:10,480 It's not just like letting them do the thing and never check 894 00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:11,880 back unless there's an issue, right? 895 00:43:11,880 --> 00:43:13,880 So I think you do want to hear from them as well. 896 00:43:13,880 --> 00:43:17,360 And sometimes you facilitate that through writing and giving 897 00:43:17,360 --> 00:43:20,680 comments and maybe praises sometimes on the docs itself. 898 00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:23,960 So I think that also work. That's a really good point. 899 00:43:23,960 --> 00:43:26,800 Like for example, if you are receiving written updates from 900 00:43:26,800 --> 00:43:29,160 your teams and maybe something comes through at the end of the 901 00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:32,400 week saying all completed this round of scaling, you know, we 902 00:43:32,400 --> 00:43:36,320 think it's production ready. Just taking 30 seconds to reply 903 00:43:36,320 --> 00:43:38,880 to that and go, oh, you know, what's the throughput that we're 904 00:43:38,880 --> 00:43:41,120 after? What are we expecting at the 905 00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:43,760 busiest period of the year? What do we expect next year? 906 00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:47,080 It really helps, not only helps you, you know, build those 907 00:43:47,080 --> 00:43:49,640 connections with your teams because for example, if you are 908 00:43:49,640 --> 00:43:52,600 running a large organization and this was written by a senior 909 00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:54,440 engineer in one of the teams, maybe they don't even have a 910 00:43:54,440 --> 00:43:56,280 chance to talk to you that much. And this gives them a really 911 00:43:56,280 --> 00:43:58,480 great connection with you, but it also shows that you're 912 00:43:58,480 --> 00:44:00,760 interested. And I think also often when 913 00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:03,520 people write updates, they can sort of hide the details like 914 00:44:03,520 --> 00:44:05,520 this if they're not particularly happy with them. 915 00:44:05,520 --> 00:44:08,520 So I'll see most probing questions even though it's 916 00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:10,240 uncomfortable to be on the end of them. 917 00:44:10,240 --> 00:44:12,400 I think it really promotes the kind of culture that you want, 918 00:44:12,400 --> 00:44:15,680 which is like just being always looking for that little bit of 919 00:44:15,680 --> 00:44:18,920 extra on top of everything in like a positive, challenging, 920 00:44:18,920 --> 00:44:21,240 healthy way. Yeah, so also from my 921 00:44:21,240 --> 00:44:24,080 experience, right, because at the position, right, you might 922 00:44:24,080 --> 00:44:26,560 have need to read a lot of documents, right. 923 00:44:26,880 --> 00:44:30,440 So commenting on those documents actually showing also that you 924 00:44:30,440 --> 00:44:33,400 care, right. So like making sure that people 925 00:44:33,400 --> 00:44:36,160 know you are reading the docs and also trying to get to 926 00:44:36,160 --> 00:44:37,960 understand what's the gist in the docs, right? 927 00:44:37,960 --> 00:44:40,640 And giving good feedback and good comments definitely is 928 00:44:40,640 --> 00:44:43,160 something that's showing that you care to the team as well. 929 00:44:43,440 --> 00:44:46,600 So for leaders, do spend time on reading the docs. 930 00:44:46,920 --> 00:44:50,400 So next thing that probably is also quite difficult for someone 931 00:44:50,400 --> 00:44:53,520 new in the engineering leader position is setting up strategy. 932 00:44:54,120 --> 00:44:56,520 So I don't think many people are trained in, you know, thinking 933 00:44:56,520 --> 00:44:58,880 in strategic level. Some people are maybe more 934 00:44:58,880 --> 00:45:02,800 talented, but I think for most people, something this is new to 935 00:45:02,800 --> 00:45:04,720 them, right? So tell us a little bit more 936 00:45:04,720 --> 00:45:07,920 about strategy, because as an engineering leader, it's kind of 937 00:45:07,920 --> 00:45:10,320 like expected that you need to come up with some strategy for 938 00:45:10,320 --> 00:45:13,440 the team to follow and also say no to, right? 939 00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:16,120 Because a good strategy is something that can really define 940 00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:18,600 what should we do and what should we not do. 941 00:45:18,960 --> 00:45:20,840 So maybe tell us a little bit more about this. 942 00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:24,440 Yeah, and it's quite deep. I spend like a whole chapter 943 00:45:24,480 --> 00:45:26,080 going through strategy in the book. 944 00:45:26,520 --> 00:45:29,080 But I think strategy is often, but there's a few things. 945 00:45:29,080 --> 00:45:32,680 One, it's often a word that gets a bad reputation because it 946 00:45:32,680 --> 00:45:36,840 sounds very kind of businessy and like words like synergy and 947 00:45:36,840 --> 00:45:38,840 things like that. People think, oh, that's just 948 00:45:38,840 --> 00:45:41,080 business nonsense. But it is very important and it 949 00:45:41,080 --> 00:45:43,440 is like that top level of the pyramid as to what the most 950 00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:47,200 senior people should be doing. And I think also strategy is 951 00:45:47,200 --> 00:45:50,760 something that should be what Evergreen in the sense that you 952 00:45:50,760 --> 00:45:53,480 should be able to read a strategy, engineering strategy, 953 00:45:53,480 --> 00:45:57,480 for example, at any time and be really clear where you're going. 954 00:45:57,880 --> 00:45:59,880 But it shouldn't always necessarily have an end. 955 00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:02,480 You know, it should, in an ideal world, be kind of like an 956 00:46:02,480 --> 00:46:06,720 infinite game that is going on forever and that's sometimes not 957 00:46:06,720 --> 00:46:09,120 always possible to achieve. But that's the idea. 958 00:46:09,120 --> 00:46:11,920 It's not meant to be a plan. The idea is that the plan comes 959 00:46:11,920 --> 00:46:15,320 after the strategy. So what is it that you read that 960 00:46:15,320 --> 00:46:18,640 then you really get aligned with where we're going, and then from 961 00:46:18,640 --> 00:46:21,120 there the plan develops of what we're going to do and when. 962 00:46:21,120 --> 00:46:23,800 Sometimes people sort of present a road map and say that's the 963 00:46:23,800 --> 00:46:25,440 strategy. So no, no, no, that's not the 964 00:46:25,440 --> 00:46:29,440 strategy, that's the plan. So writing a good strategy is 965 00:46:29,440 --> 00:46:33,200 something that really captures where an engineering 966 00:46:33,200 --> 00:46:35,000 organization is at a particular time. 967 00:46:35,480 --> 00:46:36,960 You know, what is it that they are doing? 968 00:46:36,960 --> 00:46:39,440 What are the critical things that are important through all 969 00:46:39,440 --> 00:46:42,640 the pieces of work. So for example, maybe it's the 970 00:46:42,640 --> 00:46:46,480 case that at the time that you produce a strategy, you're, and 971 00:46:46,480 --> 00:46:48,920 this is the example in the book, like you are going through a 972 00:46:48,920 --> 00:46:52,920 major rewrite of a kind of update of an old piece of 973 00:46:53,120 --> 00:46:55,440 software and you're really bringing it into the future. 974 00:46:55,440 --> 00:46:58,400 So that strategy then captures like what are the technologies 975 00:46:58,400 --> 00:47:01,360 that we're going to be using? What are the kind of metrics 976 00:47:01,360 --> 00:47:03,320 that we aim for when it comes to shipping? 977 00:47:03,480 --> 00:47:05,400 What's the quality bar? What's the throughput? 978 00:47:05,760 --> 00:47:09,440 What's our approach to using third party or paid software? 979 00:47:09,720 --> 00:47:11,400 How should we be focusing our time? 980 00:47:11,680 --> 00:47:13,440 What's our way that we write tests? 981 00:47:13,440 --> 00:47:15,880 What's our way that we ensure that what we do is good? 982 00:47:16,040 --> 00:47:17,720 You know, that's all the kind of stuff that a strategy 983 00:47:17,720 --> 00:47:20,480 encapsulates. And depending on your 984 00:47:20,480 --> 00:47:24,040 organization, maybe you will have a strategy that's in order 985 00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:26,480 to be the most cost efficient as possible. 986 00:47:26,480 --> 00:47:29,000 We will like host everything on our own hardware and that's our 987 00:47:29,000 --> 00:47:30,360 primary way that we go about things. 988 00:47:30,360 --> 00:47:32,160 Or maybe you're the complete opposite. 989 00:47:32,160 --> 00:47:35,720 You know, we favour speed 1st and therefore everything that we 990 00:47:35,720 --> 00:47:39,280 do is either cloud service or some kind of third party 991 00:47:39,280 --> 00:47:43,880 provider and we focus on only writing the unique code to us 992 00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:45,800 rather than needing to build things that are already out 993 00:47:45,800 --> 00:47:47,080 there. So these are all the kind of 994 00:47:47,080 --> 00:47:49,360 things that are strategy captures where, you know, an NGO 995 00:47:49,360 --> 00:47:52,120 should be able to open it up and go, OK, I really understand 996 00:47:52,520 --> 00:47:53,960 this. The narrative that is wrapped 997 00:47:53,960 --> 00:47:57,600 around the work that I'm doing. And if I have to make decisions 998 00:47:57,840 --> 00:48:01,640 on my team or my project, or even on my pull request, then I 999 00:48:01,640 --> 00:48:04,360 can refer to the strategy to see which direction I should be 1000 00:48:04,360 --> 00:48:06,400 turning it. Yeah. 1001 00:48:06,400 --> 00:48:08,760 So you mentioned about this, I think sometimes it's not 1002 00:48:09,000 --> 00:48:10,960 natural, right. So you mentioned that strategy 1003 00:48:10,960 --> 00:48:13,040 is not a plan or road map we mentioned, right. 1004 00:48:13,320 --> 00:48:16,120 But actually some leaders actually work simply by putting 1005 00:48:16,120 --> 00:48:17,720 out Rd. maps. You know, here are the things 1006 00:48:17,720 --> 00:48:20,120 that we plan to do, I don't know, in the next one or two 1007 00:48:20,120 --> 00:48:22,760 years, right. So they think that's a strategy. 1008 00:48:22,760 --> 00:48:27,040 Is it something that is, I mean can also be accepted or do you 1009 00:48:27,040 --> 00:48:30,600 find that some particular thing that is uniquely different about 1010 00:48:30,600 --> 00:48:33,920 strategy that engineering leaders should focus on more 1011 00:48:33,920 --> 00:48:37,440 rather than building Rd. maps and projects and plans, you 1012 00:48:37,440 --> 00:48:39,520 know? I mean, everything that you said 1013 00:48:39,520 --> 00:48:41,320 there like Rd. maps and projects and plans, they're all 1014 00:48:41,320 --> 00:48:43,440 necessary, 100% necessary. They have to happen. 1015 00:48:43,880 --> 00:48:45,640 But the strategy is one of those things that sometimes is 1016 00:48:45,640 --> 00:48:48,120 missing. And I think that if you can do 1017 00:48:48,120 --> 00:48:50,760 that kind of thing as a leader where you can create an 1018 00:48:50,760 --> 00:48:54,680 Evergreen strategy that really summarizes the key ways that you 1019 00:48:54,880 --> 00:48:58,200 build software, then there's a few things that are good. 1020 00:48:58,200 --> 00:49:01,360 I mean, I think 1 is it means that some of those later things 1021 00:49:01,360 --> 00:49:04,080 take care of themselves. They start to solve themselves, 1022 00:49:04,080 --> 00:49:06,480 you know, in terms of what are our priorities, what's our 1023 00:49:06,480 --> 00:49:09,400 quality bar, what are the technologies that we use, what 1024 00:49:09,400 --> 00:49:11,840 are the languages that we use? And that all kind of comes from 1025 00:49:11,840 --> 00:49:13,480 there. Also, you know, how do we 1026 00:49:13,480 --> 00:49:15,560 measure success can come from the strategy as well. 1027 00:49:15,560 --> 00:49:19,320 If you say, you know, everything that we do has to be 999 1028 00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:23,200 reliability and you know, we have a certain SLA or whatever. 1029 00:49:23,600 --> 00:49:25,560 So that can make the latter a lot easier. 1030 00:49:25,960 --> 00:49:30,400 I think also one of the sort of long term views that you have to 1031 00:49:30,400 --> 00:49:33,000 have as a leader, it's like, well, what could you be 1032 00:49:33,000 --> 00:49:36,760 contributing today where if you were not there tomorrow could 1033 00:49:36,760 --> 00:49:39,320 last beyond? And I think that's the thing 1034 00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:41,360 that's tricky. Like with with Rd. maps, they're 1035 00:49:41,360 --> 00:49:45,440 very volatile when it comes to their prioritization. 1036 00:49:45,840 --> 00:49:47,960 A different product leadership or different engineering 1037 00:49:47,960 --> 00:49:49,760 leadership can have different opinions on what's more 1038 00:49:49,760 --> 00:49:52,640 important or not. Market conditions can change, 1039 00:49:52,640 --> 00:49:55,360 competitors can change, and then the whole road map goes in the 1040 00:49:55,360 --> 00:49:58,120 bin and then you start again. The idea with the strategy is it 1041 00:49:58,120 --> 00:50:00,240 should last longer than those things. 1042 00:50:00,240 --> 00:50:02,720 So it doesn't matter exactly what you're building or when 1043 00:50:02,720 --> 00:50:04,880 you're building it, but the way in which you're building it 1044 00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:06,800 should be informed by the the strategy. 1045 00:50:07,120 --> 00:50:10,120 So for example, like something in your strategy could be that 1046 00:50:10,120 --> 00:50:16,520 you want to run an organization where you have a strong advocacy 1047 00:50:16,520 --> 00:50:18,960 and use of open source software. You know, maybe you want to 1048 00:50:18,960 --> 00:50:21,800 build particular parts of your product in such a way that 1049 00:50:21,800 --> 00:50:24,280 you're open source and because you want to contribute back in 1050 00:50:24,280 --> 00:50:26,680 the same way that you use other open source software, you want 1051 00:50:26,680 --> 00:50:29,640 to put some back out. Maybe you want to build things 1052 00:50:29,640 --> 00:50:33,400 in such a way where for the stage of your growth you only 1053 00:50:33,400 --> 00:50:36,280 focus on particular metrics in one continent. 1054 00:50:36,440 --> 00:50:41,080 I don't know, because certainly going from fast in US East or 1055 00:50:41,080 --> 00:50:43,800 something to fast in the entire world is a very different thing. 1056 00:50:44,200 --> 00:50:47,640 So having all of this out there so that it reduces the amount of 1057 00:50:47,640 --> 00:50:50,400 decisions being made in the teams because they can see 1058 00:50:50,400 --> 00:50:52,560 what's important. I think we just make everything 1059 00:50:52,560 --> 00:50:54,000 more efficient. Yeah. 1060 00:50:54,000 --> 00:50:57,200 So maybe if I'm not mistaken, so strategy is not something just 1061 00:50:57,200 --> 00:50:58,400 the projects, the road maps, right. 1062 00:50:58,400 --> 00:51:01,040 But also there are some guiding principles or maybe it's some 1063 00:51:01,040 --> 00:51:04,480 kind of guard rails, right, that people should follow as like, I 1064 00:51:04,480 --> 00:51:07,600 don't know, like a compass or maybe sometimes before making 1065 00:51:07,600 --> 00:51:10,040 decisions, right, you have to always consult with this 1066 00:51:10,040 --> 00:51:12,560 strategy, right, in order to make sure that you actually 1067 00:51:12,560 --> 00:51:15,000 follow the same direction. So something that is not just 1068 00:51:15,000 --> 00:51:17,520 finishing a milestone or deliverables, right? 1069 00:51:17,520 --> 00:51:19,320 So something beyond that. So you mentioned about 1070 00:51:19,320 --> 00:51:21,520 Evergreen. So probably something that worth 1071 00:51:21,520 --> 00:51:24,800 to consider for ageing leaders who work solely by creating Rd. 1072 00:51:24,800 --> 00:51:28,040 maps and project plans. Yeah, something that might be 1073 00:51:28,040 --> 00:51:31,640 interesting is that's sort of like an extension of strategy. 1074 00:51:31,840 --> 00:51:33,520 At Shopify. We have this internal thing 1075 00:51:33,520 --> 00:51:36,720 called the Codex, which is kind of where important high level 1076 00:51:36,720 --> 00:51:38,920 decisions are captured. For example, like which 1077 00:51:38,920 --> 00:51:42,560 languages we use as our defaults, which messaging 1078 00:51:42,600 --> 00:51:44,680 formats do we use, which kind of. 1079 00:51:45,080 --> 00:51:47,160 Yeah, all these kind of things are captured. 1080 00:51:47,640 --> 00:51:51,200 And the idea is it makes it easier for teams to see what the 1081 00:51:51,200 --> 00:51:53,160 rest of the organization is going to be doing. 1082 00:51:53,480 --> 00:51:56,040 But likewise in your strategy as well, you know, you can make 1083 00:51:56,040 --> 00:51:59,320 very clear declarations depending on the size or the 1084 00:51:59,320 --> 00:52:02,160 maturity of your product or company as to what acceptable 1085 00:52:02,160 --> 00:52:04,720 means. Does something being shipped 1086 00:52:04,720 --> 00:52:08,200 mean that it's like 100% bulletproof failover, multi 1087 00:52:08,200 --> 00:52:11,600 failover 999? Or is it, you know, similar to 1088 00:52:11,640 --> 00:52:13,560 early days of Facebook? Is it the kind of like we don't 1089 00:52:13,560 --> 00:52:17,440 care about stuff breaking sort of done is better than good or 1090 00:52:17,440 --> 00:52:19,240 perfect? Those are the kinds of things 1091 00:52:19,240 --> 00:52:21,360 that the strategy can contain, and I think they can really 1092 00:52:21,360 --> 00:52:22,480 affect the behavior of the teams. 1093 00:52:23,400 --> 00:52:24,560 Yeah. So you mentioned about the 1094 00:52:24,560 --> 00:52:27,200 engineering strategy, right? Sometimes this is also tricky 1095 00:52:27,200 --> 00:52:30,080 because maybe in engineering it's kind of like obvious, but 1096 00:52:30,080 --> 00:52:33,480 how to communicate that also to the other parts of organization? 1097 00:52:33,760 --> 00:52:36,880 Because sometimes engineering strategy could feel a lot more 1098 00:52:36,880 --> 00:52:40,360 technical and a lot of jargons and very complicated. 1099 00:52:40,760 --> 00:52:43,200 So maybe tell us a little bit more, how can you communicate 1100 00:52:43,200 --> 00:52:45,920 your strategy well, not just within engineering team, but 1101 00:52:45,920 --> 00:52:49,280 also maybe with the CEO or maybe the rest of the organization as 1102 00:52:49,280 --> 00:52:51,600 well? Yeah, I mean like the obvious 1103 00:52:51,600 --> 00:52:54,240 stuff up front is like getting consensus and input from all the 1104 00:52:54,240 --> 00:52:57,160 people that that matter. But I think the important thing 1105 00:52:57,160 --> 00:52:59,400 is that you don't just write it once then forget about it. 1106 00:52:59,600 --> 00:53:02,480 What I do with my current strategy for I area is that 1107 00:53:02,480 --> 00:53:04,280 every six months I write an update document. 1108 00:53:04,760 --> 00:53:08,800 So this update process, effectively, I reread the 1109 00:53:08,800 --> 00:53:12,080 strategy, I then prepare an update that basically shows 1110 00:53:12,080 --> 00:53:14,880 everything that we've done in the last, say, six months, 1111 00:53:15,440 --> 00:53:18,640 grouped by the different areas. So that's actually where it 1112 00:53:18,640 --> 00:53:19,960 starts to link with the product strategy. 1113 00:53:19,960 --> 00:53:22,280 It's like, hey, we shipped these particular things that will 1114 00:53:22,280 --> 00:53:24,280 contribute towards this part of the engineering strategy. 1115 00:53:24,280 --> 00:53:27,560 We did this bunch of improvements in stability and 1116 00:53:27,560 --> 00:53:29,320 resiliency, and that fits that part. 1117 00:53:29,920 --> 00:53:33,000 And all those things are linked to like actual projects that the 1118 00:53:33,000 --> 00:53:35,160 teams have done. And I sort of write those and I 1119 00:53:35,160 --> 00:53:37,160 highlight them. I do a sort of a traffic light 1120 00:53:37,160 --> 00:53:40,160 system on the strategy because like the strategy has got kind 1121 00:53:40,160 --> 00:53:43,880 of like 6 or 7 main bits when I do traffic lights next to each a 1122 00:53:43,880 --> 00:53:46,800 group, the bits of progress that are very measurable that you can 1123 00:53:46,800 --> 00:53:49,680 show. And then if needed, I'll either 1124 00:53:49,680 --> 00:53:52,040 update the strategy with deleting something or adding 1125 00:53:52,040 --> 00:53:53,960 something and then I'll write about why. 1126 00:53:54,520 --> 00:53:58,400 And then also in that strategy update, I'll also go and sort of 1127 00:53:58,400 --> 00:54:01,600 show pie chart breakdowns of like where are we investing all 1128 00:54:01,600 --> 00:54:04,760 of our teams and our people? You know, like here's all the 1129 00:54:04,760 --> 00:54:06,840 people mapped to the projects and here's the sort of the pie 1130 00:54:06,840 --> 00:54:10,680 chart breakdown of 30% of our organization is working on this 1131 00:54:10,680 --> 00:54:14,720 particular mission, 20% on this. Just really kind of using it as 1132 00:54:14,720 --> 00:54:19,160 a, using the strategy as a messenger wrapper to show how 1133 00:54:19,160 --> 00:54:22,000 things are changing over time. And then I'll also spend that 1134 00:54:22,000 --> 00:54:24,680 strategy update spending time talking about the stuff that has 1135 00:54:24,920 --> 00:54:26,640 either gone wrong or has been really, really hard. 1136 00:54:26,640 --> 00:54:29,000 You know, either that's particular staffing 1137 00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:31,080 distribution. Maybe we have some areas that 1138 00:54:31,080 --> 00:54:34,080 are severely underfunded as a result of moving people around 1139 00:54:34,080 --> 00:54:37,720 to work on urgent things. Or maybe if there have been any 1140 00:54:38,120 --> 00:54:40,880 regressions in performance or stability that we've noticed 1141 00:54:40,880 --> 00:54:43,560 over time, you know, call that out, talk about any incidents 1142 00:54:43,560 --> 00:54:46,320 that happened. And yeah, just every six months 1143 00:54:46,320 --> 00:54:49,320 you kind of have that beating sort of heartbeat pulse of the 1144 00:54:49,320 --> 00:54:52,040 strategy in action. And then you always refer back 1145 00:54:52,040 --> 00:54:54,000 to the main strategy as well. So you kind of you have to keep 1146 00:54:54,000 --> 00:54:55,920 it alive yourself. It's all well and good. 1147 00:54:55,920 --> 00:54:58,720 Like putting it on a internal wiki page or something and 1148 00:54:58,720 --> 00:55:00,040 saying, oh, it's there, I'm done. 1149 00:55:00,360 --> 00:55:03,320 You know, it kind of updates every six months or so for me or 1150 00:55:03,320 --> 00:55:04,680 it could be even more frequent for you. 1151 00:55:05,520 --> 00:55:07,120 Yeah, I think you mentioned something that is really 1152 00:55:07,120 --> 00:55:09,840 important, right, Because a lot of strategy are written once and 1153 00:55:09,840 --> 00:55:12,600 forget forever. So I think yeah, you do have. 1154 00:55:12,720 --> 00:55:15,520 You have to talk about it again and again and again. 1155 00:55:15,600 --> 00:55:18,880 You have to sort of make yourself irritated by how much 1156 00:55:18,880 --> 00:55:21,200 you talk about it, but like, that's usually the level you 1157 00:55:21,200 --> 00:55:24,120 have to get to for it to be enough communication that people 1158 00:55:24,120 --> 00:55:27,760 actually pay attention. Yeah, so I think that's a really 1159 00:55:27,760 --> 00:55:29,480 good tip, right? Over communicate, right? 1160 00:55:29,680 --> 00:55:32,880 So not just once, but maybe multiple times, different 1161 00:55:32,880 --> 00:55:36,200 forums, different channels, you know, keep mentioning it until 1162 00:55:36,200 --> 00:55:38,760 people actually understand that that is actually an important 1163 00:55:38,760 --> 00:55:40,600 strategy. So the last part of the 1164 00:55:40,600 --> 00:55:42,960 conversation, I want to bring up this topic because I'm sure many 1165 00:55:42,960 --> 00:55:45,800 listeners here aspire to be an engineering leader, becoming 1166 00:55:45,800 --> 00:55:47,760 city of VP of Engineering engineering, whatever that is, 1167 00:55:47,760 --> 00:55:49,440 right? And you close the book with one 1168 00:55:49,440 --> 00:55:51,240 unique chapter. Maybe the title is called 1169 00:55:51,240 --> 00:55:53,920 Tarzan, you know, jumping from vines to vines, right? 1170 00:55:54,360 --> 00:55:57,080 So how can people actually follow a path? 1171 00:55:57,080 --> 00:56:00,080 Or maybe there's no path, you know, so, so that they become a 1172 00:56:00,080 --> 00:56:02,520 good engineering leader, right? So maybe tell us maybe from your 1173 00:56:02,520 --> 00:56:05,400 experience as well, how can you become a engineering leader 1174 00:56:05,400 --> 00:56:07,680 yourself? It's a very good question. 1175 00:56:08,160 --> 00:56:11,240 The reason that that chapter is called Tarzan Swings from Vine 1176 00:56:11,240 --> 00:56:14,840 to Vine is because there's a a really good YouTube video by a 1177 00:56:14,840 --> 00:56:18,440 content critical Casey Neistat who talks about his own career 1178 00:56:18,760 --> 00:56:21,160 as these like Tarzan rope swings. 1179 00:56:21,680 --> 00:56:25,360 And I think that sometimes people earlier on in their 1180 00:56:25,360 --> 00:56:27,160 careers or even in the middle of their careers and later their 1181 00:56:27,160 --> 00:56:30,240 careers whole whole of their career get very frustrated 1182 00:56:30,240 --> 00:56:34,560 because they get very fixated on one particular outcome. 1183 00:56:35,000 --> 00:56:36,640 That is the thing that they want. 1184 00:56:37,160 --> 00:56:41,480 But as you know, especially the longer that you spend in work, 1185 00:56:42,080 --> 00:56:44,720 you know that being able to get some particular role at some 1186 00:56:44,720 --> 00:56:48,680 particular time or work for some particular company isn't 1187 00:56:48,680 --> 00:56:52,640 guaranteed. Like that role may never exist. 1188 00:56:52,640 --> 00:56:56,680 Maybe if you're in your 30s and you're like, one day I'm going 1189 00:56:56,680 --> 00:57:00,520 to be the CTO of my company, maybe the CTO never leaves, 1190 00:57:00,720 --> 00:57:02,280 right? Like you just you can't, you 1191 00:57:02,280 --> 00:57:06,240 can't do anything about that. So I think what it's about is 1192 00:57:06,800 --> 00:57:09,120 going right back to the start of our conversation around scope 1193 00:57:09,120 --> 00:57:14,040 and impact, using that as a kind of narrative of, OK, I have 1194 00:57:14,040 --> 00:57:17,800 maybe some desirable outcome I want to aim towards. 1195 00:57:17,880 --> 00:57:20,960 Let's say you're a director of engineering for the first time. 1196 00:57:20,960 --> 00:57:23,600 You're like, you know, my goal is to be VP engineering of a 1197 00:57:23,600 --> 00:57:25,840 public company. You know, maybe that's what you 1198 00:57:25,840 --> 00:57:27,680 want. Getting there isn't particularly 1199 00:57:27,680 --> 00:57:31,360 obvious because it might be the case that that public company 1200 00:57:31,360 --> 00:57:34,280 doesn't exist yet because it hasn't started. 1201 00:57:34,880 --> 00:57:37,200 You can't always know what's going to happen in the future. 1202 00:57:37,600 --> 00:57:40,480 So you kind of have where you are and then where you want to 1203 00:57:40,480 --> 00:57:42,200 go, and you can kind of draw a straight line. 1204 00:57:42,680 --> 00:57:46,760 But the power that you take to get there is kind of like Tarzan 1205 00:57:46,760 --> 00:57:50,440 in the tree in the jungle knows where the end is, but the root 1206 00:57:50,440 --> 00:57:52,520 in the tree isn't very clear. So you have to just keep 1207 00:57:52,520 --> 00:57:55,800 swinging from tree to tree. So if at every step of your 1208 00:57:55,800 --> 00:57:59,000 career you're making a decision to do something new that feels 1209 00:57:59,000 --> 00:58:02,960 oriented towards your final goal is an increase in your scope and 1210 00:58:02,960 --> 00:58:05,000 your impact. So you know, you could go to a 1211 00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:06,280 smaller company and a bigger job. 1212 00:58:06,280 --> 00:58:08,840 You could go to a bigger company and a smaller job, but the scope 1213 00:58:08,840 --> 00:58:11,480 and the impact is bigger. Then what will also naturally 1214 00:58:11,480 --> 00:58:14,000 happen is that you will just stumble across things that you 1215 00:58:14,000 --> 00:58:17,160 didn't know before. Like I mean, you said for for my 1216 00:58:17,160 --> 00:58:20,600 own career, you know, when I was at university, I really wanted 1217 00:58:20,600 --> 00:58:23,400 to be a professor. That was my main goal. 1218 00:58:23,560 --> 00:58:28,960 That was my fixed goal. And I did a PhD and I did a PhD 1219 00:58:28,960 --> 00:58:31,600 in compilers, which was really good fun and I learned a lot. 1220 00:58:31,640 --> 00:58:34,680 And it was, it was great. But the reality was that when I 1221 00:58:34,680 --> 00:58:38,640 came out the other end of it, in the UK at least, it was the 1222 00:58:38,640 --> 00:58:42,640 recession and the funding for academic projects was just 1223 00:58:42,720 --> 00:58:45,960 disappearing everywhere. So getting that next step, which 1224 00:58:45,960 --> 00:58:49,440 was like a postdoctoral position to begin my research career for 1225 00:58:49,440 --> 00:58:52,600 real, there were no jobs, like there were literally no jobs 1226 00:58:52,600 --> 00:58:54,880 that didn't involve like relocating to the other side of 1227 00:58:54,880 --> 00:58:58,720 the country. So that forced me to do 1228 00:58:58,720 --> 00:59:01,280 something different. And I remember I joined a 1229 00:59:01,400 --> 00:59:03,680 startup at the time, which was in the, the town that I was 1230 00:59:03,680 --> 00:59:06,040 living in, and I didn't want to do that. 1231 00:59:06,040 --> 00:59:08,080 Like honestly didn't want to do that. 1232 00:59:08,080 --> 00:59:12,440 I almost felt like I failed because I'd done my PhD and like 1233 00:59:12,440 --> 00:59:15,040 this next step to me was so obvious at the time, but I just 1234 00:59:15,040 --> 00:59:16,720 couldn't do it. So I joined the startup and I 1235 00:59:16,720 --> 00:59:19,000 thought, well, that was a waste of time. 1236 00:59:19,360 --> 00:59:21,280 I could have just not bothered with the PhD. 1237 00:59:21,920 --> 00:59:26,360 But joining that startup and working hard at it, you also get 1238 00:59:26,360 --> 00:59:28,120 a little bit of luck. Like we had lots of funding and 1239 00:59:28,120 --> 00:59:29,800 we grew lots. And then I ended up to move into 1240 00:59:29,800 --> 00:59:32,320 these managerial positions for the first time. 1241 00:59:32,320 --> 00:59:36,600 And, and then that led to going to VPN's position and growing 1242 00:59:36,600 --> 00:59:38,280 the company to many hundreds of people. 1243 00:59:38,280 --> 00:59:41,200 And then we were required. And you know, I'm in Shopify now 1244 00:59:41,200 --> 00:59:43,440 and like, I couldn't predict any of these things, right? 1245 00:59:43,440 --> 00:59:45,400 The whole point is that I couldn't predict this stuff. 1246 00:59:45,880 --> 00:59:50,000 And if you'd have asked me when I was doing my PhD that I would 1247 00:59:50,000 --> 00:59:54,080 be living in the part of the country where I am doing this 1248 00:59:54,080 --> 00:59:56,880 particular job remotely, I couldn't have predicted it. 1249 00:59:57,320 --> 01:00:01,920 It unfolds as you go. So yes, have an overall goal, 1250 01:00:02,280 --> 01:00:05,360 but don't ever be afraid of doing something that's very 1251 01:00:05,360 --> 01:00:08,080 different or new because actually there's so much that it 1252 01:00:08,080 --> 01:00:11,080 can introduce to you, you know, different types of, if you're 1253 01:00:11,080 --> 01:00:14,280 thinking about just software, you know, you might not have any 1254 01:00:14,280 --> 01:00:17,720 exposure to a particular industry in software until you 1255 01:00:17,720 --> 01:00:18,960 have a go. And then you're like, oh, 1256 01:00:19,000 --> 01:00:21,040 actually this is amazing. I really enjoy doing this. 1257 01:00:21,040 --> 01:00:23,120 I want to do more. Or maybe you do it and go, I 1258 01:00:23,120 --> 01:00:24,560 hate this, I want to do something different. 1259 01:00:24,560 --> 01:00:26,760 And then it forces you to take a swing somewhere else. 1260 01:00:27,200 --> 01:00:30,920 And I think it's to do with being very open to new 1261 01:00:30,920 --> 01:00:35,640 experiences because you can't control what's going on in the 1262 01:00:35,640 --> 01:00:38,280 external world. You can only control what you're 1263 01:00:38,280 --> 01:00:40,560 doing in the present moment and what you apply yourself to. 1264 01:00:40,640 --> 01:00:45,240 And if you are talented and if you work hard and if you get a 1265 01:00:45,240 --> 01:00:48,120 little bit of luck, I'm pretty sure in 20 years you'll find 1266 01:00:48,120 --> 01:00:50,240 yourself somewhere really good. It just will happen. 1267 01:00:51,200 --> 01:00:52,920 Yeah, So I think those are some good tips, right? 1268 01:00:53,160 --> 01:00:56,040 Always look at the scope and impact that you're doing, right? 1269 01:00:56,200 --> 01:00:57,440 For sure. It has to grow, right? 1270 01:00:57,440 --> 01:01:00,760 Otherwise, I mean, you are not exposed enough to actually have 1271 01:01:00,760 --> 01:01:03,320 a good amount of experience to become an A leader itself, 1272 01:01:03,320 --> 01:01:04,640 right? And also I think you also 1273 01:01:04,640 --> 01:01:06,440 mentioned in your book this thing called earning or 1274 01:01:06,440 --> 01:01:09,080 learning, right? So when you move from job to 1275 01:01:09,080 --> 01:01:11,640 job, always think the learning aspect, right? 1276 01:01:11,640 --> 01:01:13,040 So what can you learn in the new role? 1277 01:01:13,040 --> 01:01:16,000 It could be new tech stack, it could be new domain, new 1278 01:01:16,000 --> 01:01:17,480 industry, whatever that is, right? 1279 01:01:17,480 --> 01:01:20,600 So the aim is actually for you to always learning and grow the 1280 01:01:20,600 --> 01:01:22,360 scope and the impact at the same time, right? 1281 01:01:22,640 --> 01:01:25,200 So I think, yeah, sometimes we can't predict the career and 1282 01:01:25,200 --> 01:01:27,240 sometimes you also cannot predict the time because the 1283 01:01:27,240 --> 01:01:29,760 opportunity may come at the wrong moment. 1284 01:01:30,080 --> 01:01:33,040 So that happened to me as well during the pandemic. 1285 01:01:33,200 --> 01:01:35,800 So I think there's something that also everyone has to think 1286 01:01:35,800 --> 01:01:37,360 about in terms of your career plan. 1287 01:01:37,920 --> 01:01:41,040 Maybe don't fix it on one route. Do check out other things 1288 01:01:41,040 --> 01:01:44,040 sometimes also do maybe other stuff that beyond your work, 1289 01:01:44,040 --> 01:01:46,040 right? Could be volunteering, writing 1290 01:01:46,040 --> 01:01:47,760 blogs, right? I'm sure it opens up a lot of 1291 01:01:47,760 --> 01:01:49,680 doors as well, just like in your case. 1292 01:01:49,960 --> 01:01:52,400 So I think this is really a good tips and thanks for sharing your 1293 01:01:52,400 --> 01:01:54,640 story as well. I think people might get 1294 01:01:54,640 --> 01:01:58,320 inspired from your experience. So we reached the end of our 1295 01:01:58,320 --> 01:02:00,520 conversation. So I think I ask you all the 1296 01:02:00,520 --> 01:02:03,280 time about this question. So I want to probably spin it a 1297 01:02:03,280 --> 01:02:05,840 little bit different. So I will call this a tree 1298 01:02:05,840 --> 01:02:09,520 engineering leader wisdom. So maybe if you have a different 1299 01:02:09,520 --> 01:02:12,120 version of the wisdom talking about engineering leadership, is 1300 01:02:12,120 --> 01:02:14,240 there anything that you want to share with us here, James? 1301 01:02:15,280 --> 01:02:17,320 Good question. So I'm I haven't prepared this, 1302 01:02:17,320 --> 01:02:18,680 I'm coming up with this on the spot. 1303 01:02:18,680 --> 01:02:22,880 So I think the first piece of wisdom, if you could call it 1304 01:02:22,880 --> 01:02:26,680 wisdom, is the quite often in any leadership position, there's 1305 01:02:26,680 --> 01:02:30,560 never a right answer. If you ever feel that you have 1306 01:02:30,560 --> 01:02:33,040 the definitive correct answer for anything, you're probably 1307 01:02:33,040 --> 01:02:35,240 wrong. So use that as your sort of 1308 01:02:35,240 --> 01:02:38,560 yardstick of like, if you're so sure about something, talk to 1309 01:02:38,560 --> 01:02:41,040 more people, seek more opinions, get people to challenge you 1310 01:02:41,040 --> 01:02:42,960 because you probably have missed something. 1311 01:02:43,120 --> 01:02:45,160 Nothing is ever very easy or straightforward. 1312 01:02:45,640 --> 01:02:48,640 The next one I would say is a bit related to the career 1313 01:02:48,640 --> 01:02:52,000 progression thing. Like it's very easy to say, 1314 01:02:52,000 --> 01:02:55,960 don't be completely fixated on one goal that you're aiming 1315 01:02:55,960 --> 01:02:59,560 towards in your career and let there be some spontaneity and 1316 01:02:59,920 --> 01:03:03,360 open yourself up to different experiences that maybe aren't 1317 01:03:03,360 --> 01:03:04,680 quite where you think you want to go. 1318 01:03:04,680 --> 01:03:06,760 But that's actually where the interesting stuff is. 1319 01:03:07,080 --> 01:03:09,800 You know, I think I've learnt that from my own career journey 1320 01:03:09,800 --> 01:03:14,480 is that if I'd have stayed 100% focused on and moving towards 1321 01:03:14,640 --> 01:03:17,640 being a professor in the future, then I would have missed out on 1322 01:03:17,640 --> 01:03:21,080 like all the cool stuff that we've built different companies. 1323 01:03:21,080 --> 01:03:23,680 I would have missed out on working for Shopify, I would 1324 01:03:23,680 --> 01:03:25,160 have missed out writing these books. 1325 01:03:25,160 --> 01:03:27,920 You know, I wouldn't have been able to work remotely. 1326 01:03:27,920 --> 01:03:30,000 So like there's all this stuff that wouldn't have been possible 1327 01:03:30,000 --> 01:03:32,200 if I'd have been like super fixated on that one goal. 1328 01:03:32,200 --> 01:03:35,480 So being flexible there is good for you and it's sometimes 1329 01:03:35,480 --> 01:03:36,720 uncomfortable, but it is worth it. 1330 01:03:36,720 --> 01:03:38,040 You know, you only, you only live once, right? 1331 01:03:38,040 --> 01:03:39,560 So you've got to make sure that you're doing something you're 1332 01:03:39,560 --> 01:03:43,800 interested in. And then I would say that the 1333 01:03:43,800 --> 01:03:47,400 last one is, and this is obviously difficult to say 1334 01:03:47,400 --> 01:03:50,120 because it depends on your situation and where you are in 1335 01:03:50,120 --> 01:03:51,960 your career, in your finances and so on. 1336 01:03:51,960 --> 01:03:58,560 But don't see money as the ultimate goal of your career or 1337 01:03:58,560 --> 01:04:00,800 wanting to be a leader of some kind. 1338 01:04:01,200 --> 01:04:06,000 I think the reason that I say that is that you've often got to 1339 01:04:06,000 --> 01:04:09,880 think about the earning or learning thing and when you are 1340 01:04:09,880 --> 01:04:13,440 hyper optimised on I want to earn the most money possible at 1341 01:04:13,440 --> 01:04:16,880 any given moment in time. I think you can end up with a 1342 01:04:16,880 --> 01:04:21,800 very short term dead end where either you work somewhere where 1343 01:04:21,920 --> 01:04:24,960 you become hyper specialised and then you end up with skills that 1344 01:04:24,960 --> 01:04:27,080 aren't super transferable to other places. 1345 01:04:27,600 --> 01:04:30,880 Or you miss out on taking that role at a company that's growing 1346 01:04:30,880 --> 01:04:33,280 very, very quickly where they can't afford to pay you a huge 1347 01:04:33,280 --> 01:04:36,280 amount of money, so you have to take a big pay cut if it in the 1348 01:04:36,280 --> 01:04:38,600 future, you have an insane amount of experience. 1349 01:04:38,720 --> 01:04:42,000 And maybe if you get offered a whole bunch of stock options 1350 01:04:42,000 --> 01:04:45,160 that mean nothing when you join, maybe they'll be worth something 1351 01:04:45,160 --> 01:04:46,440 in the future. Like who knows? 1352 01:04:46,440 --> 01:04:49,560 Like if you don't, if you get away from money, if you make 1353 01:04:49,560 --> 01:04:51,760 sure you're earning enough to live the lifestyle that you want 1354 01:04:52,160 --> 01:04:55,320 and to have a financially sensible future in some way, 1355 01:04:55,920 --> 01:04:58,520 don't sweat the rest of it. Like go towards the things that 1356 01:04:58,520 --> 01:05:01,640 really, really interest you and I guarantee that you will be 1357 01:05:01,880 --> 01:05:06,480 much more fulfilled and probably one more in the future anyway if 1358 01:05:06,480 --> 01:05:09,440 you go down that route. Wow, that's really a golden tip. 1359 01:05:09,440 --> 01:05:11,360 The last one. So I think as an engineering 1360 01:05:11,360 --> 01:05:15,200 leader, you should not be fixated or incentivized on, you 1361 01:05:15,200 --> 01:05:17,440 know, the money, the rewards, compensation, whatever that is, 1362 01:05:17,440 --> 01:05:19,440 right? So I think also think about the 1363 01:05:19,440 --> 01:05:22,000 aspect of your growing, your learning and also serving 1364 01:05:22,000 --> 01:05:24,080 others, right? So as a leader, also some parts 1365 01:05:24,080 --> 01:05:25,920 of it is about mentorship and coaching, right? 1366 01:05:25,920 --> 01:05:27,120 Which you also cover in your book. 1367 01:05:27,440 --> 01:05:30,680 So definitely one aspect of the job that is I feel is very 1368 01:05:30,680 --> 01:05:33,520 fulfilling, right? So money is not the only thing. 1369 01:05:34,040 --> 01:05:36,560 So thank you so much for this. If people want to check out your 1370 01:05:36,560 --> 01:05:39,800 resources the book is there any place they can find you online? 1371 01:05:40,680 --> 01:05:43,320 Yep, you can go to the Engineering Manager, 1372 01:05:43,400 --> 01:05:46,360 oneword.com, that's my blog, the newsletter. 1373 01:05:46,360 --> 01:05:50,480 You can find the link at the top there, and there's a book page 1374 01:05:50,480 --> 01:05:52,080 at the top where you can see the books too. 1375 01:05:52,080 --> 01:05:55,320 They're all over on the Pragprog website, Pragmatic Programmers 1376 01:05:55,360 --> 01:05:58,560 if you want to get the ebooks or whatever kind of bookstore that 1377 01:05:58,560 --> 01:06:00,320 does print books and will be your friend as well. 1378 01:06:00,880 --> 01:06:03,920 Maybe you should also create an alias the engineeringleader.com 1379 01:06:04,240 --> 01:06:09,200 so that people are not confused. Yeah, I mean, I'm bad enough at 1380 01:06:09,200 --> 01:06:12,400 remembering to renew the domain name as it is, so I don't want 1381 01:06:12,400 --> 01:06:13,320 anymore. Right. 1382 01:06:13,600 --> 01:06:15,400 So I think the book is really good. 1383 01:06:15,400 --> 01:06:18,280 So for people who would like to check out a good resource about 1384 01:06:18,280 --> 01:06:21,040 becoming a great engineering leader, definitely this is one 1385 01:06:21,120 --> 01:06:24,000 book that I highly recommend. Not just the things that we 1386 01:06:24,000 --> 01:06:26,240 discussed today, there are so many other topics. 1387 01:06:26,240 --> 01:06:27,920 And it's not just high level stuff, right? 1388 01:06:27,920 --> 01:06:30,760 It's also like super tactical, practical, right? 1389 01:06:30,760 --> 01:06:33,360 That you can also try straight away in your day-to-day job. 1390 01:06:33,600 --> 01:06:35,720 So thanks again for this time, James. 1391 01:06:35,720 --> 01:06:37,880 This is the third time I'm looking forward for your next 1392 01:06:37,880 --> 01:06:39,840 book so that I can invite you for the 4th time. 1393 01:06:39,840 --> 01:06:41,360 No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. 1394 01:06:41,360 --> 01:06:42,240 I'm done now. I'm done.