D RBlog

One benefit of remote work that I think gets overlooked is the ability to mix physical fitness with work.

When I was younger, I sold a bumper sticker that said “Panic is not an Agile methodology“. I still stand by that statement.

This afternoon was my first time shooting at the far archery targets. Changing one of thing could make for a bad day. Changing four…I made every beginner mistake again!

How do you create effective engineering teams? Google researched the question.

Many people are dealing with things that affect our mental health. Often, co-workers are the only people they have in their life outside of family.

It was ten years ago that Jake Goldman taught me the value of remote work. Way before things shut down in 2020, I was collaborating with people from around the globe at 10up. This way of working can make my job as a manager challenging in some ways too. But I believe the trade-offs and extra effort on my part are worth it.

Take home tests are like knives. They can be used to injure people or prepare a meal. Tests can increase candidate diversity. But most often they filter out all but a specific type of candidate, weeding out the diverse voices of what could be your hardest working, most dedicated team members.

Accountability is not just about firing people. It’s about honesty, directness, and compassion. It’s sitting down face to face with another adult and letting them know you see a problem well before you need to part ways.

I kicked off a Software Engineering Book Club at Grindr yesterday. It’s easy to get focused on the minutae of a single platform and the libraries you use. But the big problems we face are universal.

A direct report’s 1:1 agenda and a parents’ book club at school touched on value of listening and acknoledging someone’s feelings.

The business world is waking up to the fact we can’t simply blame poor diversity statistics on a pipeline problem. The systems we create to filter candidates are just as much to blame—if not more—than the systems that prepare candidates for the workforce. Whether you work in HR, you’re trying to fill a role that will report to you, or you’re a peer taking part in a panel interview, you owe it to every candidate to give them a fair shot.

At the end of the work day, how do you know what you’ve accomplished? Who you spoke to? What decisions were made? I’ve found that keeping a work journal helps me keep perspective while also serving as a vital record of the important conversations I have every day.

It’s nerve-wracking to chat with your boss’s boss, even if you only report to them for a few hours more. But to be asked for your advice? That’s awkward. My advice covered several things, but the last thing was the biggest: roll up your sleeves and do the work your team does.

I’m not a fan of the move fast and break things philosophy that permeated our industry in the last decade. People were moving fast, and things were getting broken a lot. On the other hand, Chidi’s whole character on NBC’s The Good Place was built around his endless decision paralysis and over-analyzing. And I’ve seen first-hand the stagnation and compounding problems that stem from inaction.

I’ve been building the web since almost the beginning — 1996 to be exact. I’m tired of chasing SEO and social media likes. I’m exhausted from shifting design & software trends. This is my personal home on the internet, and I’m going back to the basics.