Our recommended five books are:
- Software Engineering at Google: Lessons Learned from Programming Over Time (Titus Winters, Tom Manshreck and Hyrum Wright)
- An Elegant Puzzle: Systems of Engineering Management (Will Larson)
- Scaling People: Tactics for Management and Company Building (Claire Hughes Johnson)
- Build Better Products: A Modern Approach to Building Successful User-Centered Products (Laura Klein)
- Team Topologies: Organizing Business and Technology Teams for Fast Flow (Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais)
Software Engineering at Google: Lessons Learned from Programming Over Time (2020, 575 pages, Titus Winters, Tom Manshreck and Hyrum Wright)
A fascinating insight into software engineering practices and tools used at technology leader Google. I love their definition of software engineering as programming integrated over time. The 25 in-depth chapters are written by Google domain experts and offer a glimpse into how scaling and sustainability are handled and traded against other concerns.
The is a big book full of useful information, but the density of multiple authors limited to a chapter apiecedoes make it challenging to read at times. Definitely recommended, but be prepared to devote a chunk of your time to study the book and get the most out of it.
An Elegant Puzzle: Systems of Engineering Management (2019, 288 pages, Will Larson)
A beautifully presented hardback book containing engineering leader Will Larson’s guidance on engineering management. There is a lot of strong and hard-won advice on organizations, tools, approaches, culture and careers. The content is practical and provides an unusual depth on engineering management in modern software organizations.
The figures are sometimes obtuse and the last 71-page appendix and endnotes are mostly superfluous. I also did not enjoy some of the referencing out either where no information is given other than a single word and Q-code link. Regardless, this is a great book.
Scaling People: Tactics for Management and Company Building (2023, 432 pages, Claire Hughes Johnson)
Author Claire Hughes Johnson is a corporate officer and advisor at Stripe after spending seven years as COO while they rapidly scaled from 200 to over 7000 people. Before this, she spent 10 years at Google leading successful business teams. The book is beautifully presented, full of valuable guidance and provides practical advice of great leadership and pragmatic scaling. The examples are perfectly placed and insightful to demonstrate the advice around them.
Build Better Products: A Modern Approach to Building Successful User-Centered Products (2016, 368 pages, Laura Klein)
I am starting to love the Rosenfeld Media series — high-quality books, presented beautifully, edited expertly and eminently practical. Color is used intelligently throughout as you would expect from design-focused books.
Lean startup expert and “What is Wrong with UX” podcaster Laura Klein writes a great book on how to build new products. This practical guide is organized around exercises with expert advice from experienced practitioners at the end of each chapter. Expect lots of strategy, design, analytics and empathy; heist teams are worth the price of admission on their own.
Team Topologies: Organizing Business and Technology Teams for Fast Flow (2019, 240 pages, Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais)
Pragmatic and informative guide to organization design from IT consultants Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais. Building on their work on
Team Topologies
with real experience, the authors cover teams as a means of delivery, team topologies that work for flow, and evolving team interactions for innovation and rapid delivery. The book is well written with a good level of depth, with valuable illustrations and strong use of color and design throughout. I recommend this book to anyone interested in creating effective teams and high-performance workplaces.
Peter Hyde is surely one of Gartner’s most prolific readers and writers. He is an enterprise agile coach with deep experience in helping global organizations transform product development to achieve higher performance, increased quality, faster delivery and an outstanding customer experience.
