Tag: longform
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An Insider Guide to the Tech Industry
I grew up in a family of technologists in New Jersey, home of Edison’s Labs and the birthplace of the transistor.1 Where most families fought about politics or sports at the dinner table, we debated technology. We received computers before we were 6 and our first programming lessons started in elementary school. When our teenage…
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Four Startup Engineering Killers
In 2016, I gave technical advice to a first-time entrepreneur building a seed-funded food delivery marketplace. In my view, every tech choice the company had made was wrong. Startup engineering is different from any other type of software engineering. It demands short- and medium-term productivity, relative to the “right way” of building systems.
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The Tyranny of Values
We generally think of values as overwhelmingly positive. Instead, values are designed to encourage an outcome in a certain context. To make the best decisions, we need to understand the environments when these values are counterproductive.
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Breaking up with the Yankees
If it is loss that can lead to faith, then victory – a recent Yankees World Series (in 2009) – is the moment where one may question the relationship. Winning can overcome so much, including sky-high salaries, big egos, and a petulant owner, as the Yankees have shown over the last decade, and especially this…