Level-up Engineering

Building trust across the board and becoming familiar with the whole context of a company is a common challenge for engineering leaders and managers as they transition to a new workplace. Nadia Alramli explains HubSpot's process to set up newly hired managers for their role. In this interview we're covering: The challenges of transitioning to a new company as an engineering leader HubSpot's engine...

Learn how to build an engineering team that not only survives under pressure, but consistently gets better. Adam Wolff explains the key ideas you need to know to make your team antifragile, and shows you how they've worked out through his personal experience from Robinhood and Facebook. In this interview we're covering: Concepts of antifragility Internal and external sources of stress for engineer...

Learn the basics of engineering leadership from seasoned veteran and praised writer of the leadership world: Michael Lopp a. k. a. "Rands". Everything you need to know is in this interview, so you won't have to learn the hard way, like Michael did. In this interview we're covering: The biggest challenge in leadership Mastering the finer points of leadership The biggest takeaway from decades of lea...

Do you want access to the best talent out there in the tech world? Obviously. This is why you need to build your engineering employer brand. You aren't Google or Netflix, you may not even become them, but you can make yourself visible in the right way to the right people, and you can get them into your organization. Learn pro tips from Sarah Wells, Technical Director at Financial Times! In this in...

Learn the top time management and productivity tips, tricks, hacks and practices engineering managers use to get on top of their endless mountain of work. Profit from the hard-earned experience of Matt Martin, CEO of Clockwise to become the best manager you can be! In this interview we're covering: Time management 101 for managers How to do a calendar audit How to use time dedicated to proactive m...

Learn the steps of creating a culture document for an engineering company! In this interview Rob Volk reveals why Foxbox Digital needed a culture document, and what impact it had on their day-to-day work. In this interview we're covering: What's Included and excluded in the Foxbox culture document Why do you need a company culture document? The steps of creating a culture document The impact of a...

Master these 3 leadership styles to build an amazing engineering team and maximize your own potential as well. In this interview with Shawn Fair, you'll learn how, when, and why to use the democratic, autocratic, and free rein leadership styles for optimal results. In this interview we're covering: The 3 base leadership styles Determine the best leadership style for your developer team How to trai...

Utilize social engineering tactics to make your developer team stronger and more productive than ever before. In this interview, Olivia Liddell from Amazon Web Services shows you how to use social engineering for good. In this interview we're covering: How to measure the strength of an engineering team The definition of social engineering The process of using social engineering to build your team...

Leading vs managing comparison, true stories of failures, shortcomings, struggles and solutions that lead to success in an executive leadership position. András Fincza, VP of Engineering, Emarsys shares his invaluable experience to tell you what you've never heard about leadership before. In this interview we're covering: The difference between managing developers and leading engineering mana...

Clean code is the most essential part of building great software with your team. In this interview Uncle Bob shares half a century worth of experience and practical tips about measuring code quality, leading your team, having them write clean code, and selling clean code standards to impatient clients. In this interview we're covering: Definition of clean code Metrics of clean code Consequences of...

You've just become a manager, and don't know where to start? You're close to a promotion, and want to be ready? It's unclear what you should focus on, how to get accepted, and how to streamline your ocean of tasks? Jeff Perry has faced all these problems, and he'll help you find the way to success in this new role. In this interview we're covering: Challenges of becoming an engineering manager Mis...

Download the full State of Software Development 2020 report here! Discussion about the latest trends in the software industry, including the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic with Camille Fournier (Managing Director at Two Sigma) and Juan Pablo Buriticá (taking a break, running his consultant company, ex-VPE at Splice) based on the State of Software Development 2020 report. In this panel discussion...

In this interview Steven McCord, Senior Vice President of Technology explains the ins and out of entering the role of a tech leader. This is how you win at your first 100 days. In this interview we're covering: Challenges of becoming a tech leader Early priorities when becoming a tech leader Focus areas for a tech leader Things you'd do differently Common mistakes for tech leaders How can a compan...

Interview with Sally Lait, Senior Engineering Manager at Monzo. Their engineering culture is well-known in the industry for being one of the best. In this podcast you'll learn how to improve your engineering culture and what red flags to look for. In this interview we're covering: Key elements of a great engineering culture Monzo's engineering culture Cultural on-boarding Engineering culture metri...

Interview with Greg Sabo, Engineering Manager at Asana. Learn how Asana is overcoming the lack of developers on the workforce market, and get your recruitment process to the next level! In this interview we're covering:   How to build your employer brand?   Asana's steps to recruiting engineers   How to make the final decision?   Key elements to recruiting e...

Handling conflicts and giving feedback are two of the most important things a manager needs to do. It has to be a given to lead a productive developer team. So we interviewed Tom Bartel, Engineering Team Leader at trivago to share some of the tips he picked up over the years he spent as a manager. In this interview we're covering:   Common conflicts in an engineering team   How...

In software development when capacity is the problem, most managers think they need to hire more developers. But you can push engineering productivity higher by creating the right context for your existing developers. We interviewed Camille Fournier on the topic of productivity, to learn what she's been doing as a tech leader to keep it high in her developer teams. In this interview we're covering...

Scaling is a massive challenge for an engineering manager to overcome, let alone scaling in a distributed environment. Juan Pablo Buriticá had done it, and in this interview he shares how he managed to pull it off. You'll get his insights and actionable tips to overcome all the issues a tech leader will face when scaling distributed engineering teams. In this interview we're covering: Challenges o...

In software development it's more likely now than ever, that as a manager, you'll face the challenge of leading a fully or at least partially distributed developer team. It's a brand new thing for everyone, but Tim Olshansky, current VP of Engineering at Zenput has faced this already. In this interview he shares what he learned on managing distributed developer teams over the years, and gives you...

Training engineering managers doesn't get the attention it deserves. It's extremely valuable to keep and grow your own talent, rather than get all your tech leaders from a competitive workforce market. We interviewed Matt Greenberg, who has gained years of experience training new engineering managers. In this episode, we're covering: How to make sure an engineering manager prospect is ready? Chall...

How do you build psychological safety in your team? Why is it important? We sat down for an interview with Dan Rummel. He is currently the Senior Director of Engineering at One Medical, and he’s held engineering and leadership positions at various Bay Area startups. He shares this invaluable insight with you on creating a workplace with psychological safety, so you get to understand his...

Working with a remote team has many upsides, but managing a remote developer team is one tough job to have. There are loads of challenges you wouldn’t have to worry about in an office, like possible time zone differences or making sure people feel part of the company. It requires a lot of attention to keep everything on track. We sat down with Katie Womersley, the VP of Engineering at Bu...

Mentoring is underutilized in the software development industry today. So, we did an interview with Gergely Orosz, currently an engineering manager at Uber, who has gained a lot of experience with mentoring over his years as a developer/manager. In this episode, we're covering: Mentoring in tech today His approach to mentoring Challenges in mentoring How to build a mentoring program...

Software companies often grow quickly, which means developer teams often suffer to manage scaling at the pace of growth and necessary workload. We sat down with Rich Archbold to pick his brain on how they scaled developer teams at Amazon, Facebook and Intercom. In this episode we’ll be covering: Biggest challenges when scaling a developer team How he overcame these challenges First steps...