LeadDev's PriorityZero

Allison Malloy, Director of Engineering at Shopify, joins the show to chat about her journey from aspiring astronaut to a successful career in software engineering. We talked about her unintentional path to management, the challenges of running a remote team, and her Priority Zero of unifying services across Shopify.

08:40 Transitioning to management: The unintentional leader

14:00 Managing managers and the importance of letting go

17:30 What makes a great technical manager

19:50 Working fully remote from Canada

24:00 Unification of teams and features at Shopify and expanding future capabilities

33:00 Setting the right goals for major projects and launches

Allison's recommendation: The Acquired podcast and The Art of Storytelling by John D. Walsh.

Author of The Manager's Path, Camille Fournier, joins the podcast to talk about her varied career in software engineering, the evolution of management practices in tech, Founder mode vs Manager mode, and her recent interest in platform engineering.

Anil Dash, VP of developer experience at Fastly, joins the show to talk about the decline of community in software circles, the value of following your passions as a developer, what he learned working with Joel Spolsky on Stack Overflow and Glitch, and the evolution of developer tools.

6:00 Going from hobbyist to professional developer

11:00 The decline of software communities

18:00 The importance of following your passion as a developer

29:00 Working with Joel Spolsky

47:00 Adapting to a more corporate role and the pitfalls of 'founder mode'

53:00 Anil's Priority Zero: Making Fastly tools more accessible to developers by focusing on the experience

Anil's recommendation: Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin by David Ritz

Melissa DePuydt, Director of Engineering at Medium, joins the show to talk about making the switch from journalism to software engineering, her experiences with imposter syndrome, and a Scrappy vs. Scale framework for adapting your management approach to different contexts.

Melissa's recommendation: Horseback riding (yes, horseback riding)

Matt Boyle, an engineering manager at Cloudflare, joins the show to talk about joining the tech giant during the pandemic, how that influences his management style, and the vital importance of regular retrospectives.

06:00 The difference between working at big and small companies

09:00 The terrifying transition from IC to manager

15:00 The vital importance of retrospectives

18:00 Managing distributed teams and the importance of asynchronous work

21:00 Matt's Priority Zero: Ensuring high availability

24:00 The importance of continuous improvement after incidents

Matt's recommendation: Acquired podcast

Dan Blundell, Engineering Director at Gymshark, joins the show to talk about his journey from an aspiring musician to self-taught developer.

He reflects on his experiences in the public sector, including working on the UK's Covid-19 test and trace application, and his transition to the fast-growing retailer Gymshark, where he has learned the importance of understanding business needs, hiring for culture, and the significance of maintaining leadership capacity during periods of rapid change.

00:00 The MySpace years and discovering the spark

09:00 Becoming an accidental manager

12:00 Lessons learned from the public sector

15:00 The fear of joining Gymshark and navigating leadership challenges

21:00 The importance of understanding business needs

24:00 Dan's Priority Zero: Scaling at Gymshark

27:00 Hiring for culture and values

Dan's recommendation: The Engineering Leader by Cate Huston

Director of Engineering at Trainline, Gary Stevens, joins the show to talk about the role of machine learning in the travel booking experience, the importance of engagement as an engineering leader, and mentoring vs coaching.

00:00 Gary's journey to director of engineering and learning from great managers

09:00 Coaching vs. mentoring

13:00 The importance of engagement in engineering and the importance of celebrating good work

21:00 Machine learning and the future of travel user experiences

Gary's recommendation: The Hard Fork podcast

Alicia Collymore, a Senior Engineering Manager at Incident.io joins the show to chat about entering the industry without a formal computer science degree, transitioning from tech lead to management, setting goals for people who don't want them, and her priority zero of a big Microsoft Teams integration.

03:10 From self-learning to getting her big break

06:00 Transitioning from Tech Lead to Engineering Manager

12:00 The key to good hiring

15:00 Setting goals for engineers

17:30 Delivering a big MS Teams integration project

Alicia's recommendation: Medusa by Rosie Hewlett

Rafe Colburn, Chief Product and Technology Officer at Depop joins the show to talk about his journey from a computer-loving kid to a seasoned engineering leader. We talked about the biggest lessons he learned from his time at Etsy, management by instinct, the dynamics between product and engineering teams, and his biggest priorities right now at Depop.

Rafe's recommendation: beliapp.com

The James Stanier blog post we talked about: https://theengineeringmanager.substack.com/p/the-disappointment-frontier

Rob Zuber, CTO of CircleCI, joins the show to talk about his unique leadership journey, going from solving real manufacturing problems, to building software for other developers.

00:00 Rob's unconventional path to CTO

13:30 The importance of being scrappy

22:40 The Future of CircleCI

23:33 From analysis to execution: The shift in leadership roles

26:00 Running an Engineering Organization: Learning, reading, and seeking feedback

31:30 Improving developer experience iteratively

Rob's recommended: 'Greatness' by David Marquet