Benoit Dion

tldr: I'm hiring! As many of you know, I recently joined Lattice as their SVP of Engineering and I'm excited to announce that I'm hiring for all Engineering levels and more broadly, Lattice has open roles across EPD. If you're wondering, why Lattice? The last few years have seen a step change in how we think about the meaning of work and the employer <> employee relationship - add on the fuel of AI taking our jobs and you could be forgiven for thinking the future of work looks bleak for employees. It doesn't need to be that way - here at Lattice we're building the next generation of talent tools to give employers insights and employees purpose because people matter at work. Among other things, we're using generative AI to securely analyze enormous volumes of data to unlock career insights faster and investing in building equitable feedback, compensation and employer analytics tools - not just for one company but for all companies. If you're interested in making a difference to the future of work then let's chat - all roles are remote eligible and based in the US. We have physical offices in San Francisco and NYC if you prefer the in-office environment.

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Practical explanation of API’s the next time you are in a buzzword salad meeting… https://lnkd.in/e-HSTwC3

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Super interesting (and technical) breakdown on how the folks at ClickHouse are transforming the simple, flexible JSON format into something that can be leveraged at hyperscale. An excellent example of how sometimes scale can make you do crazy things.

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The Missing Readme is a great book to share with your development teams and their mentors. Surprisingly concise and readable, it's a great guide for developing professionalism, craftsmanship and a sense of engineering culture in your teams. https://lnkd.in/ghH8UMHv

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Three things I appreciate about Stripe culture are: 1. Fondness for 20th century computer and technology aesthetics. 2. 99.999+% API success SLOs, and high security targets. 3. _Users first_ as a real living principal not just a slogan, whether it's a one-person microbusiness or Ford. All three are so charmingly displayed in https://bfcm.stripe.com/ So far today, before 8am on the east coast, it's showing our customers and merchants processed a bit over $5 billion, and 5,927 businesses are having their best day ever on Stripe (an all-time sales record.)

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Like many other LinkedIn users, I'm going to dump on Intuit for their layoffs now. But I'm also going to point out that this isn't the first time they've done this exact thing. Intuit, in case you hadn't heard, recently laid off over 1,800 people and cited "poor performance" as the reason for many of those affected. This was announced in a letter that CEO Sasan Goodarzi sent to his employees. He also announced that they would be hiring about 1,800 workers to replace those let go. In 2020, the Intuit CEO announced layoffs of 715 employees and said they would hire approximately 700 more. Here's what he said in 2020—yes, 2020. → In 2018, Intuit "refreshed [its] strategy" to become an AI-driven platform. → In 2020, they faced a "fundamental shift" in the market and believed that "speed matters more than ever" in their pivot to AI. → Sasan Goodarzi saw it as his job to "set Intuit up for success." → He said he was "taking these actions to ... ensure that we're able to deliver for our customers..." Fast forward to 2024, where he said: → "AI is one of the most significant technology shifts of our lifetime" and that "companies that aren't prepared to take advantage of this AI revolution will fall behind..." → Intuit is at a "critical moment" in its history, and they're "in a position of strength," as this is ."the beginning of the AI revolution." → The changes Intuit is making are to "support our customers and drive growth." The main difference between the two letters are the numbers of employees affected and the fact that he threw one thousand and fifty people under the bus in the latter. My takeaway from this: → Intuit's layoffs aren't about poor performers or a shift to AI. They shifted to AI in 2020 but couldn't get their strategy right. → They couldn't figure out what skills to hire for because they couldn't get their strategy right. → They lacked adequate management or culture to support the people they'd hired to upskill them or get them into roles more suited to their skills. → Their management sucks. To let 1,800 people go just to hire another 1,800 when you've already done the same thing less than four years prior just means that you're bad at leading a company. You've created a dysfunctional system that won't ever be successful. Sasan Goodarzi should be laying himself off, not the 1,800 people whose lives he just upended. Obligatory pitch for my services: If you want to avoid the problems of hiring that Intuit faced, I can help you design a hiring process that will match your strategy and ensure you get people with the skills they need to succeed in their roles. DM me for more info.

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There's an oft-cited stat from Pendo that 80% of software features are rarely, if ever, used. While it's impossible to know the accuracy of that, it's not hard to believe. I've been part of multiple feature factories, where emphasis was put on new features to 'claim' rather than taking time to ensure we've actually solved the desired problem before moving onto the next. If you're a Product Manager/Leader in the Indy area, join us on August 14 for a conversation around best practices for measuring product success. We'll have food, drinks, and hopefully some great learnings! (Registration link in the comments)

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I took an hour last night to dive into the 2024 DORA report, and it's a fascinating read. There are tons of insights for anyone in the engineering or software delivery space -- here are some snippets that stood out to me: 1. "𝗥𝗲𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 𝗥𝗮𝘁𝗲" has been added as a fifth key metric for software delivery performance. This emphasizes the importance of effective testing and getting things right the first time. 2. AI's impact is undeniable, but trust remains an issue. 𝟳𝟱.𝟵% 𝗼𝗳 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝗽𝗼𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗶𝗿 𝗱𝗮𝗶𝗹𝘆 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸, most commonly for coding and information summarization. While 88% reported some level of trust, a significant 𝟯𝟵.𝟮% 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘁𝗹𝗲 𝗼𝗿 𝗻𝗼 𝘁𝗿𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝘁 𝗮𝗹𝗹. 3. Interestingly, having a dedicated platform team (IDP) showed a modest 6% productivity gain at the team level, though individual impact was negligible. 4. 𝗨𝘀𝗲𝗿-𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗰 𝗱𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 continues to be absolutely critical. The data strongly suggests that prioritizing users' needs leads to better products, increases productivity, and reduces burnout. 5. I couldn't ignore this note around stable prioritization: "An organization can have strong leaders, good internal documents, and a user-centered approach to software development, but 𝗶𝗳 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘂𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲, 𝗲𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗼𝘆𝗲𝗲𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗲 𝗮𝘁 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸 of experiencing burnout." You can be doing all of the "right things" around the edges of the work, but prioritization and clarity matters. These points really resonate with the practices we've built and refined at WillowTree, but I love that they give everyone room to grow. If you're interested in diving deeper, I highly recommend setting aside some time to read the full report: https://lnkd.in/gwYxS2Nt and I would love to hear your thoughts. Have you noticed any of these trends in your own work? What other insights did you glean from the report?

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Progress = your QA release process growing from 15 minutes to 5 hours. A stat that’s both invigorating & frustrating at the same time. But I think the single best thing you can do to delight your customers is to personally guarantee “it just works”.

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If I were starting over today building a new startup I'd just build as much as possible on Postgres + Extensions, Docker containers, Amazon Web Services (AWS) AppRunner, and RabbitMQ, and I'd use a well supported Web framework with batteries included over a build your own minimal one. I'd avoid serverless functions, other than for very specific, non-core business things, or using in the short term only if using backend as a service with integrated deployment. I'd lean heavily on AWS for deployment and scaling but only use services that have fully compatible Open Source equivalents, less due to vendor lock in and more due to ability to spin up the whole platform using a Docker compose file on local easily. I'd go with a mono-repo and avoid micro-repos but not be open to whatever size deployable services make sense. If my business was the right shape I'd seriously consider Supabase in order to avoid having to create a whole API for data access and then build a separate API that sits on top to do bigger business logic bits.

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In case you missed it while prepping for Flag Day 🇺🇸 Happy State of Engineering Management Report Day happened this week! The annual thought leadership piece from Jellyfish has dropped. Hear from Engineering leaders, managers and frontline ICs .... we cover a range of topics that matter to great R&D leaders. Key Points: 1️⃣ Engineers are now strategic partners! 🙌 2️⃣ Burnout continues to be a challenge 😱 3️⃣ The talent shortage is spiking back up. 4️⃣ Many teams have embraced #AI 🧠 5️⃣ Others have legit concerns about AI ⁉ If #developerproductivity #genAI #engineeringexcellence are important to you .... have a read! (link in the Comments)

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If you're a Director/VP or CTO running an engineering org and will be in NYC Tuesday night (11/19) apply to join us as we discuss personal productivity. Whether it's motivation, organization or optimization, we're going to dig into how we deliver more value, and better value what we deliver :) Should be a great discussion! Link in the comments!

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I'll be at #PlatformCon24 in a few weeks to moderate a panel discussion on Architecting the Future: Platform Strategies for API Adoption & Impact. I am eagerly looking forward to learning more about how API leaders from Wayfair, The New York Times and Cox Automotive have led digital transformation with Apollo GraphOS to yield tremendous impact for their users and their business! RSVP if you'd like to join in person! #ApolloFederation #Platformengineering #APIOps #GraphQL

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We're looking for a senior-staff PM now at Honeycomb, who will drive and own a multi-year vision for a net-new, permanent and significant expansion of Honeycomb's product surface area: https://lnkd.in/g2sM_TfC I’ve sat in this role for 3.5 years now, on and off, so you’ll be inheriting a lot of my regretful decisions. But I’m here to help you navigate that! It involves big data (for real), deep OSS involvement, lots of customers who love the product, and a great team to boot. If you like the idea of thinking through how you’ll turn 10M events per second into 100k, without breaking the bank, and making it as semi-automatic as possible, without losing signal on that data, and building a compelling UI that lets people build and monitor this stuff, this might be up your alley! Wanna talk with tons of customers and spicy sales engineers who have to sometimes commit code crimes to make stuff work, and then tell you about it? Wanna make painful prioritization decisions? Wanna find a way to execute on a multi-year vision and not get lost along the way? Click the link above. Wanna eat shit in front of a customer whose exact set of constraints violates every tradeoff decision you made? And then go back to them 4 months later with the good news that you’ve fixed it all? Come say hi! Wanna try to wrap your head around someone's perceived notions of how observability works, and find creative ways to reorient their worldview? Hi hello please apply. Wanna get deeply involved in the #opentelemetry community, become a core contributor, attend lots of community events, and be continuously infused with customer problems and feedback and also overall industry directions? You know what to do. Wanna work with a very product-minded engineering team who will push you to get stuff done? Wanna be a part of a group that is usually fast, usually right on the first go of things, and isn't afraid to try things and maybe pull them back if they're not working? Wanna have fun too? Clicky clicky.

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Join us in this thoughtful episode of the Mob Mentality Show as we explore the world of Lean Software Development with Dave Adsit:   https://lnkd.in/gfDTSA7h https://lnkd.in/gwBj9exx Titled "Crafting Lean Software: Dave Adsit on Small Batches and Short Lead Times," this episode provides valuable insights for those looking to enhance their software development values and practices. Dave Adsit shares his experiences on how to effectively implement lean principles to achieve small batches, short lead times, and frequent releases. ### Key Discussion Points: #### **Lean Software Development** - **Craft vs. Engineering** - **Principles of Flow** - **Waterfall vs. "Agile" vs. Lean** - **Timeboxes vs. Scope-Boxes** - **Resource vs. Flow Efficiency** - **Prioritization, Prototyping, and Lean Investment Bets** - **Single Piece Flow, Feature Flags, Continuous Delivery** - **Maximal Learning through Experimentation and a 50% Product Bet Success Rate** #### **Collaboration** - **Integration with Lean** - **"All Hands on Deck" Mindset** - **Relation to WIP Limits** - **Pair and Mob Programming** - **Failures and Lessons** - **Rules, Why, and Learning Paths** - **Utilization and Person vs. Team vs. System Value** #### **Continuous Improvement** - **Core Value** - **Innovative vs. Inert Practices** - **Deep vs. Shallow Learning** - **Leading Learning Opportunities** - **Knowing Enough to Make Informed Decisions** - **What If Some Do Not Want to Learn?** - **Rock Star vs. Super-Star** Thanks to Allan Stewart for recommending that Dave Adsit come on the show! #LeanThinking #Lean #SoftwareDevelopment #BatchSize #CycleTime #ContinuousDelivery #SoftwareEngineering #Flow #Waterfall #Agile #Agility #Automation #Prioritization #WIP #Experimentation #Failure #Collaboration #Feedback #MobProgramming #ProductDevelopment #PairProgramming #Kanban #Learning #Value #Teaming #Teamwork #ContinuousImprovement #Retrospectives #SystemsThinking #Leadership #OrganizationalChange #Autonomy #RadicalCandor

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In Search and Rescue we have a saying "slow is smooth and smooth is fast". The same mindset can be applied to #SoftwareEngineering. Have urgency and bias towards action, but don't rush. Find the root cause. Fix it once. Fix it right. An extra few cycles now will make you faster in the long run.

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The engineers you're looking for, are right under your nose - they are the people opening all the Github issues. Who are the people who are deliberately engaging with your repo? Who are these strangers that you feel like you know already given their contributions? And if you want a job, this is one way to essentially do an extended, informal interview through your public contributions. The best founders pay attention. First users, make great hires :)

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Markdown to... command line app - wat? That's the topic for today's unsolicited face time. A single Pipedown pipeline can be used in numerous contexts thanks to the way it consistently accepts inputs and produces outputs. I waffled about my love of pipelines a while back: https://lnkd.in/gERrAsvA Though it's much handier to see in action! https://lnkd.in/giR-KVDT Let me know your thoughts 🚀

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