The article discusses various organizational structures for startup software engineering teams, highlighting the evolution from a single team to squads, chapters, and core teams. It outlines the challenges and trade-offs faced at ...
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Marc G Gauthier is a software engineer, technical leader, and startup advisor. He blogs about writing software, side projects, entrepreneurship, management, and more.
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Evaluating senior tech leadership candidates requires understanding their decision-making styles and adaptability beyond just correct answers in interviews.
The author shares their experience updating iOS apps to the new iOS 26, focusing on the introduction of Liquid Glass, a design feature that enhances the uniqueness of native apps. They express initial excitement about the design b...
The article argues that startups should implement post mortems after incidents to avoid repeating mistakes, despite the perceived costs. It outlines a Minimum Viable Post Mortem process for small engineering teams, emphasizing the...
The post discusses the challenges of managing a highly skilled but abrasive senior engineer who struggles with teamwork and communication. It highlights issues such as overengineering, lack of documentation, resistance to feedback...
The author, a solo developer, decided to build an app to find the best highway stops while on the road. The app is designed to address the author's personal need and is focused on providing information about highway stops and thei...
The author revamped the main screen of their fitness app after receiving feedback about the inconvenience of pausing. The new design was well-received, but the author noticed that many users were tapping the screen to pause instea...
The text discusses the challenges of leadership, particularly for new technical leads and managers. It outlines the 3 types of power - expertise power, relational power, and role power - and how they can be used to influence and l...
0Controlling the Blast Radius
2025-03-11 • management risk management
The text discusses the role of a manager in creating an environment where team members can contribute, learn, and grow. It emphasizes the importance of allowing team members to make mistakes safely and learn from them. The concept...
The text discusses the similarities between technical debt and money debt, highlighting how both involve borrowing something now and paying it back later with interest, and the potential consequences of not addressing them.
The text discusses the misconception of technical projects vs business projects in software development. It argues that all projects in a company have a business purpose, even the ones looking more technical. It emphasizes the imp...
0LLMO: SEO in the Age of AI?
2025-03-11 • seo and website ranking branding llama
The author discusses the increasing traffic to their product from AI-powered apps like ChatGPT and the emergence of a new kind of SEO called Large Language Model Optimization (LLMO). They express the need for brands to understand ...
The text is a cheat sheet of laws, adages, and principles that the author frequently references when building software or leading teams. The author's goal is to share the sayings they mention the most and to build themselves a che...
The text is about 10 Youtube channels that discuss software engineering, including the content of each channel and a recommended video to watch from each. The channels cover a range of topics, from technology and the craft of buil...
The text discusses the difference between having 5 years of experience and 5 times 1 year of experience, emphasizing the importance of growth opportunities and the risk of getting stuck in a comfort zone. It also highlights the ne...
The text discusses the two common responses of new hires when facing problems during their first weeks, and how to set expectations for a new hire's onboarding period. The author suggests creating space for new hires to ask questi...
0Asking for user feedback
2025-03-11 • software development feedback insights
The text discusses the importance of gathering user feedback and shares various methods to do so, including providing a simple way to reach out, using dedicated forms, asking for feedback based on context, making oneself available...
0Levels of Defensiveness
2025-03-11 • defensibility code software testing
The text discusses the importance of being defensive with code to avoid crashes and outages in a production system. It provides examples and strategies for handling potential issues, such as checking for nil values, logging, using...
0Zen refactoring
2025-03-11 • software development code refactoring
The author discusses the process of refactoring their app and addressing small issues and sub-optimizations, despite the lack of clear ROI. They emphasize the importance of paying attention to details and taking pride in one's wor...
The text is about the author's approach to running daily standup meetings, which is different from the traditional Scrum method. The author emphasizes the importance of sharing interesting things relevant to the team and raising b...
The author discusses their experience building a new app in just two weeks, focusing on a workout timer. They detail the challenges, objectives, and features of the app, as well as the monetization and release process. Despite som...
0Remove That Feature
2025-03-11 • development maintenance data removal
The text discusses the challenges of adding new features to a product, including the hidden costs of maintenance and the importance of regularly reviewing and removing features that are no longer valuable. The author shares a real...
The text discusses the concept of Minimum Viable Content, using the example of building a boxing iOS app. The author describes the various iterations and shortcuts taken to provide content to users, ultimately focusing on video co...
The text describes the typical first years of startup engineering leadership, detailing the different phases a VC backed startup goes through until its Series A. It discusses the challenges faced by the CTO and the technical team ...