🤺 Better Org Charts, Good Managers, Goal Cascades, Perfectionism vs Productivity, Trunk-Based Development, Brains: TMW #393

Hello there, it's Monday! Welcome to the week

Those of you in the CTO Craft Slack community will have already spotted that we recently relaunched our Mentoring Circles programme. Since our launch in 2017, several hundred leaders all across the world have taken part by joining small, tight-knit groups of peers to chat monthly about current challenges, topics of interest, things they need feedback on or just to get moral support on difficult situations.

Members have fed back to us the benefits of feeling less isolated and rudderless in their roles, having a touch point for reflection, being able to use the combined knowledge and experience of a small, trusted group and knowing that the challenges they face aren't unique to them.

We'll be starting at least one new group before the end of the year - if you'd like to jump on a call and talk through how membership will improve your experience as a technology leader, run through this quick form, and we'll get something in the diary! Look forward to chatting

Andy @ CTO Craft

CTO Craft Events

CTO Craft Bytes: Identifying and Developing Future Engineering Leaders

Join us for a 30 minute virtual Byte to discuss how the best technology leaders identify and nurture future leaders within their teams.

CTO Craft

CTO Craft Con: Berlin | 24th - 25th September 2024

CTO Craft Con will bring together Chief Technology Officers and other senior technology leaders from the most exciting start-ups, scale-ups, unicorns, and big tech companies to elevate their engineering culture.

CTO Craft Con: Berlin 2024

Check out all of our upcoming Mixer events, including events in Warsaw and Copenhagen this month - is there one happening in your city soon?

Reads of the Week

Make an Org Chart You Want to Ship — Advice from Linear on Designing Your Team

Nan Yu, Head of Product at Linear, has advised dozens of startups of all stages and sizes. He unpacks why founders should be suspicious of symmetry in their team structure, and offers a three-part framework on how to optimize for an “heirloom tomato” org chart.

First Round ReviewFirst Round Staff

Is the Scientific Method Valuable in Engineering?

In engineering, fixating on a hypothesis, and working to confirm or falsify it, can lead us astray.

Colin BreckColin Breck

About our Sponsors

A huge thanks to all our sponsors and partners, who make Tech Manager Weekly and the CTO Craft community possible:

AWS, Albany Partners, Code Climate, Coherence, Damilah, DoIT, Google Cloud, Jellyfish, Plandek, Skiller Whale, Softwire, Sema, Uplevel, Vention, YLD

If you're interested in sponsoring TMW or any of our events, drop us a line at partners@ctocraft.com.

Leadership, Strategy & Business

Good managers are hard to find and once you have them, they should be appreciated

Hire the right managers → appreciate them → see your culture blossom!

Engineering LeadershipGregor Ojstersek

Standardizing

What is it good for?

Stay SaaSyStay SaaSy

TBM 305: Stop the (Goal) Cascade Madness

Goal cascades are compelling, but they don’t work nearly as well as we think they do.

The Beautiful MessJohn Cutler

Stop Protecting Start Correcting: 4 Reasons Unnecessary Mistakes Persist - Leadership Freak

Elbert Hubbard was wrong when he wrote, “The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.” The greatest mistake is the persistence of unnecessary mistakes. Read this post to learn how to break destructive patters.

Leadership FreakDan Rockwell

Culture, People & Teams

Perfectionism - one of the biggest productivity killers in the engineering industry

It can cause immense stress and can lead to burnout 🤯 Don’t worry, we’re sharing our mistakes, so hopefully you’ll avoid some!

Engineering LeadershipGregor Ojstersek

Building a technical career path at Spotify

你好世界 (Hello World in Chinese)

It Depends / Nimble AutonomyKevin Goldsmith

Administrivia: Reconsidering the Engineering and Management Tracks

Multiply your best engineers by unburdening them from administrative work.

Colin BreckColin Breck

Stop Team Topologies

Reevaluating Team Topologies: A Critical Perspective on Organizational Strategies

MediumMartijn Oost

Technology, Operations & Delivery

“20% for tech debt” doesn’t work

5 traps will stop your technical vision from happening

Leading DevelopersMirek Stanek

How we do trunk-based development (and why you should too) - PostHog

What do trees, elephants, and successful software all have in common? They rely on their trunks to help them grow big and strong. In the case of…

PostHog

Who’s in charge of your infrastructure? You or the computer?

Don’t ask the computer to change for you. To move quickly and safely, declare your intentions.

Get Good at Delivering Software™️Dave Mangot

Architectural Retrospectives: the Key to Getting Better at Architecting

The purpose of an architectural retrospective is to use experience to help the development team improve their architecting skills and their way of working as they make architectural decisions. This is different than traditional architecture reviews which are focused on improving the architecture.

InfoQPierre Pureur

Stress, Wellbeing & Growth

Improve strategy, influence, and decision-making by understanding your brain | Evan LaPointe (founder of CORE Sciences)

Learn how brain science can improve your collaboration, decision-making, and innovation with Evan LaPointe.

Lenny's NewsletterLenny Rachitsky

The introverts are winning

Technology is enabling us to retreat from the outside world. But we should resist the urge – for ourselves and for each other

New HumanistMarie Le Conte

Why doesn’t advice work?

(or at least work better)

DYNOMIGHT INTERNET NEWSLETTERdynomight

Why Your Big Brain Needs Breathing Room (Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Slack Time)

Discover why strategic thinking is crucial for tech leadership. Learn how to create space for big-picture planning, overcome guilt, and boost productivity by embracing slack time.

Leadership GardenCsaba Okrona

That’s it!

If you’d like to be considered for the free CTO Craft Community, fill in your details here, and we’ll be in touch!

https://ctocraft.com/community

Please do remember to share this link if you know of anyone who’d like to receive TMW:

https://techmanagerweekly.com

Have an amazing week!

Andy