Build

As technologists we want to build software that is friendly, fast, beautiful, reliable, secure, and scalable. And we expect ourselves to deliver it on time and under budget, because our ultimate goal is to have lots of happy customers who can do what they want: cue Daft Punk’s Technologic!

But time and energy are finite, and we simply cannot deliver it all at once. We need to choose our priorities, and this choice is one we should make consciously.

Evaluating our software development priorities while dealing with constraints is known as the tradeoff space.

How can you make wise tradeoffs for your product?

The choice is based on a balance between your technology stack and business model type.

“Move fast and break things!”

While this has become a popular motto, it doesn’t apply to every company.

For example, enterprise software companies that are building system-level software prioritize reliability because customers need to use them. Each change needs to be rigorously tested, and often approved before it can be released.

Meanwhile, consumer internet companies spend time and money on making their UX delightful so that people want to use them. Reliability is something they’re willing to sacrifice. Since many are web-based applications, they can iterate quickly and release changes frequently.

So yes, they can move fast and break things.

The tradeoff space may seem insurmountable, but you too can become confident about your decisions by learning from a true pro!

In the second episode of Femgineer TV, I’ve invited Jocelyn Goldfein, the Former Director of Engineering at Facebook, to talk about:

- What the tradeoff space is

- How to not get overwhelmed by the tradeoff space

- How to make decisions that will help you ship product that your customers will love and help you meet business goals

Jocelyn has led engineering teams at early to growth-stage startups like VMWare and enterprise companies like Trilogy, so she’s definitely had her fair share of dealing with constraints and having to make tradeoffs to ship product and meet business goals.

We also dig into the cost of a mistake, how to take risks, the BIGGEST mistake Jocelyn sees technical folks making over and over again, and how to avoid making it!

Watch the episode to learn how you can make smart tradeoffs when developing software products.

Read Jocelyn's blog: http://www.jocelyngoldfein.com

Follow Jocelyn on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jgoldfein

Join the conversation after listening to the episode at: http://femgineer.com/?p=7004

While a lot of people talk about the financial benefits of a remote team, that’s actually NOT the reason why Ben Congleton and his team decided to build a remote team. You’ve probably also heard over and over again the importance of company culture, but Ben actually breaks down what him and his team at Olark do to build a strong company culture!

During the show we covered the following 3 misconceptions people have about remote working:

1. Employees won’t be as productive and progress will stagnate

2. Communication between employees and teams will break down

3. A remote team will be devoid of culture

In the pilot episode of FemgineerTV Ben and I tackled each of these misconceptions. And Ben shares how he and his co-founders have built an amazing remote team of 30-people, which spans San Francisco to Europe.