stdlib

Find resources to solve your technical leadership challenges

Blog Post

Managers Believe Downsizing Is Effective. Research Says: Nope

According to research, downsizing is not the silver bullet for saving a company. It's more like shooting yourself in the foot. Let's explore.

corporate-rebels.com
Burnout & moraleDecision-makingProcess inefficiencies
Blog Post

Product Manager vs. Product Owner

Find out how the product owner and the product manager roles differ and what they have in common.

romanpichler.com
Decision-makingCross-functional alignment
Article

Dark Patterns: Past, Present, and Future

An article examining how designers use deceptive UI techniques, the growing public awareness of dark patterns, and the responsibilities engineers and leaders have to prevent them.

queue.acm.org
Decision-makingCross-functional alignment
Article

How to Spot Fake Consensus in Leadership Meetings

A LinkedIn post explaining how leaders can recognize and address false consensus in meetings, with practical steps to ensure genuine decision making.

linkedin.com
Decision-makingMeeting effectivenessCommunication
Article

How to Be a Good Boss in Trying Times

An article offering guidance for leaders on supporting teams during challenging periods.

gsb.stanford.edu
CommunicationBurnout & morale
Article

Curiosity and Self-Aware Conflict

The article explores how curiosity can help technical leaders and teams become more self-aware during conflict, offering practical strategies to improve collaboration and decision-making.

infoq.com
Conflict resolutionDecision-making
Blog Post

Better Estimates Are Possible on Agile Teams

Studies have shown how we are - and are not - good at estimation, and what can be done to improve our accuracy.

mountaingoatsoftware.com
Process inefficienciesProject delays
Blog Post

Explain Less, Align More: Explaining tech to non-technical stakeholders

The article shares practical advice on how technical leaders can simplify explanations and align with non-technical stakeholders to improve communication and decision-making.

annajmcdougall.medium.com
CommunicationCross-functional alignment
Article

Perception Vs. Perspective when Hiring

The article examines how hiring decisions can be influenced by the difference between perception and perspective, highlighting the importance of looking beyond surface impressions when evaluating technical candidates.

linkedin.com
HiringDecision-making
Blog Post

My 10 Actionable Tips for New Engineering Managers

New to engineering management? This guide offers 10 actionable leadership tips on 1-on-1s, feedback, and adopting a growth mindset to succeed.

levelup.gitconnected.com
OnboardingFeedbackMeeting effectiveness
Guide

Scaling Through Chaos

The founder's guide to building and leading teams from 0 to 1,000.

indexventures.com
ScalingHiringOnboarding
Blog Post

When The Going Gets Tough

A brief discussion on maintaining resilience and effective leadership when faced with challenging situations.

avivbenyosef.com
Burnout & moraleCommunicationDecision-making
Article

Decision Making: Let Your Team Choose - Lessons from Parenting

A LinkedIn post explains how letting staff make their own decisions boosts learning and motivation, using a parenting analogy and insights from Ackoff and Kohn.

linkedin.com
Decision-makingBurnout & morale
Blog Post

Managing Up: Hot Takes

A concise collection of unconventional advice for technical leaders on how to effectively manage up and influence their managers.

reforge.com
CommunicationDecision-making
Blog Post

The Productivity Paradox: How Our Obsession with Efficiency is Making Us Less Productive

The article examines how the modern focus on productivity tools and AI leads to burnout and paradoxically reduces actual efficiency, highlighting the need for strategic rest and mindful work habits.

daydreamsinruby.com
Burnout & moraleProcess inefficiencies
Blog Post

Sadness: Battling Leadership's Dark Secret

Sadness is leadership's dark secret, illustrated by figures like Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill. The article offers 10 practical ways to manage this weight of caring more than others.

leadershipfreak.blog
Burnout & morale
Blog Post

Measuring Software Engineering

A short guide on how to measure software engineering performance by focusing on system-level outcomes rather than individual output.

fffej.substack.com
Team performanceProcess inefficiencies
Blog Post

Measures of engineering impact

The article discusses how engineering leaders can measure the impact of their teams, contrasting common productivity metrics with business-focused impact measures and providing examples from companies like Amazon, Square, Gusto, and Uber.

lethain.com
InnovationDecision-making
Blog Post

How to Increase Software Developer Productivity

A practical guide offering strategies and habits to boost software developer productivity for technical leaders.

blog.binarymist.net
Team performanceProcess inefficienciesKnowledge sharing
Blog Post

When Challenging Conversations Go Unspoken - A Leader's Nightmares

Be very afraid of the conversations on the tough topics of performance, improvement, and innovation that aren't taking place.

artpetty.com
CommunicationFeedbackInnovation
Blog Post

The Coaching Cookie

A blog post that introduces the Coaching Cookie, a simple framework for technical leaders to structure effective coaching conversations.

stevekeating.me
FeedbackCareer developmentCommunication
Blog Post

Change Management gone very, very wrong

An extremely belated postmortem for a disastrous process.

natashajaffe.substack.com
CommunicationProcess inefficienciesBurnout & moraleKnowledge sharing
Blog Post

How I Build and Run Behavioral Interviews

A practical guide on designing and conducting behavioral interviews, including preparation, rubric creation, and follow-up strategies.

benkuhn.net
Hiring
Blog Post

Dumb Leadership Mistakes I've Made

The author shares personal leadership mistakes such as ignoring intuition, falling into data-driven theater, and overlooking the core responsibilities of a business leader.

lauratacho.com
Decision-makingBurnout & moraleCareer development
Blog Post

(A few) Ops Lessons We All Learn The Hard Way

A curated list of hard-earned operations lessons covering monitoring, incident response, tooling, and cultural insights for technical leaders.

netmeister.org
Process inefficienciesKnowledge sharing
Podcast Episode

RLL - How can I effectively onboard a new hire?

In this episode of Real Life Leadership we discuss practical strategies for onboarding new hires and making their first days memorable.

devaslead.substack.com
Onboarding
Blog Post

Misunderstanding Measurement Motivations

An exploration of why we measure and how measurement can go wrong.

fffej.substack.com
Team performanceBurnout & moraleDecision-making
Blog Post

Prioritising effectively and getting work done as managers

Losing control of your time? Here is how to break free from the chaos, prioritise and get stuff done.

softwareleads.substack.com
Decision-makingProcess inefficiencies
Blog Post

The Anatomy of a Successful Team Squad

What I learned from my recent experiment with the Spotify Squad Model, describing how to build and run effective product squads.

hybridhacker.email
Team performanceCross-functional alignmentScaling
Blog Post

Self Iterations

An article exploring the practice of self-iterations as a tool for continuous personal and professional improvement.

avivbenyosef.com
Career developmentDecision-makingBurnout & morale
Blog Post

The Developer / Manager Feedback Loop Difference

Developers turned engineering managers often feel unproductive because the feedback loop for managers is much longer and less visible than for developers.

marcgg.com
Career developmentBurnout & moraleFeedback
Blog Post

Charles Dickens - Story Slicer

Explores the benefits of breaking work into small slices, using Charles Dickens as a metaphor to illustrate why incremental progress works better than big leaps.

fffej.substack.com
Team performanceProcess inefficiencies
Blog Post

Common misconceptions of Trunk-based development

When you search Google for trunk-based development, you often see a provocative headline that suggests it is a "complete crock of shit". This post clears up common misconceptions about trunk-based development and explains why it matters for modern software teams.

reflag.com
Team performanceProcess inefficienciesScaling
Blog Post

OKRs and JTBD - context, motivation and success criteria

JTBD helps understand why a behavior takes place. OKRs help provide determine whether or not the product strategy that emerges from that research is correct.

jeffgothelf.com
Decision-makingCross-functional alignment
Blog Post

Writing code was never the bottleneck!

The AI hype train isnt slowing down, but are we still focusing on the wrong parts of the software development life cycle?

leaddev.com
Process inefficienciesTeam performanceCommunication
Article

High-Performance Library: Free Ebooks, Frameworks, Templates, and On-Demand Webinars

A LinkedIn post sharing a curated collection of free Revolut ebooks, frameworks, templates, and on-demand webinar recordings for building high-performing teams.

linkedin.com
Team performanceFeedbackScaling
Blog Post

Why Big Tech layoffs haven't made your tech hiring (much) easier

With Big Tech in retreat, now is when we see what companies really are market leaders.

technical.ly
Hiring
Blog Post

Want an unfair advantage in your tech career? Consume content meant for other roles

Learning about roles you work with can provide a meaningful competitive advantage in the modern tech world.

matthewgrohman.substack.com
Cross-functional alignmentCareer development
Blog Post

The Only Metric That Matters When Everything Else Goes to Hell

A quick guide to heartbeat metrics (and why your dashboards won't save you).

notjustbits.com
Decision-makingProcess inefficiencies
Article

Preparing for Your First SDM Interview: A Behavioral Guide

This guide outlines behavioral interview strategies for first-time Software Development Manager candidates, focusing on how to demonstrate leadership competencies during the interview process.

levelup.gitconnected.com
Career developmentDecision-makingConflict resolution
Blog Post

10 technical strategies to avoid when scaling your startup (and 5 to embrace)

When building your technical strategy, you need to assess each component in relation to what success will look like for your business.

intercom.com
ScalingTechnical debtHiringCross-functional alignment
Blog Post

Actualization Levers

A blog post that introduces the concept of actualization levers and explains how they can be used to enhance personal and professional growth for technical leaders.

avivbenyosef.com
Team performanceDecision-makingCareer development
Article

High-Performing Teams Need Psychological Safety: Here's How to Create It

The article explains why psychological safety is essential for high-performing teams and provides practical steps leaders can take to foster it.

hbr.org
Team performanceCommunicationBurnout & morale
Guide

Eight tips to evaluate if your next role is right for you.

We are relatively cautious about what we buy when the stakes are high. But do we apply the same level of scrutiny to the most important investments of our lives – choosing a partner or a career path? Divorce and turnover rates suggest not.

knowledge.insead.edu
HiringCareer development
Blog Post

Engineers guide to recruiters

If you've worked in tech, you've probably had some experience with recruiters - even in bear markets most of us get messages from recruiters. Let's talk about how to make the most of these experiences.

bjorg.bjornroche.com
Career developmentHiring
Blog Post

Mistakes you shouldn't let your reports make

Common wisdom says managers should let their reports learn from mistakes, but some errors need to be prevented by leaders.

bjorg.bjornroche.com
Decision-makingFeedback
Blog Post

Effective Strategy

Strategy is an important and oft-misunderstood concept. Let's explore how a clear understanding can help you keep your team on track.

bjorg.bjornroche.com
Decision-makingCommunicationCross-functional alignment
Blog Post

Product Brief - How to Write One with Examples

A guide explaining what a product brief is, why it matters, its key components, and how to create one with real-world examples.

productstrategy.co
Cross-functional alignmentCommunication
Showing 289-336 of 1110 resources

Aboutstdlib

The stdlib collection is a community-curated library of practical, immediately useful, battle-tested resources for technical leadership. Each resource is designed to be immediately applicable to your role. New resources are added based on community feedback and emerging best practices.