Will Larson (@Lethain) / X

Pinned

Mar 19, 2020

A lot of folks want a map to Staff Engineer, and just as many Staff Engineers want to better understand their role. Towards that end, I'm working on a small project to collect folks' stories of reaching and operating as staff-plus engineers

staffeng.com

Staff Engineer: Leadership beyond the management track

Will Larson

@Lethain

Jan 2, 2023

"What should I measure when the CEO asks for engineering metrics?" is probably the most frequently recurring eng leadership question, and connects into a larger, somewhat nebulous topic: how should you measure engineering organizations? Some notes! lethain.com/measuring-engi…

Will Larson

@Lethain

Dec 29, 2017

This has been a terrible, staggering year in so many ways. It's also been a disproportionately interesting and meaningful year for me professionally, and I wanted to share some of what I learned in 2017 about engineering and infrastructure management.

Will Larson

@Lethain

Jan 13, 2020

In preparation for starting a new role next week, I had some convos with folks in those roles, did some research and have written up what you should focus on for your first 90 days as a VP Engineering or CTO

lethain.com

Your first 90 days as CTO or VP Engineering.

Whenever I transition to a new opportunity, I think about how to “start well.” How can I ramp up as effectively as possible? How do I balance the urge to “show value” immediately with making the...

Will Larson

@Lethain

Oct 21, 2022

Congrats to @whereistanya for writing this excellent book into existence! Super excited for this book and all the not-yet-written books expanding on the staff+ role

Will Larson

@Lethain

Dec 12, 2022

Pulled together the "work related" books I read over the past four years. With ⭐ next to the ones I still think about somewhat frequently! lethain.com/books-2022/

Will Larson

@Lethain

Jan 29, 2021

Early edition of "Staff Engineer" is available tomorrow. If you didn't buy "An Elegant Puzzle," this is *your* chance to get premium typos, grammatical errors, and diagrams with confusingly reversed arrows, but about Staff-plus engineering instead of mgmt

Staff Engineer: Leadership beyond the management track

From lethain.gumroad.com

Will Larson

@Lethain

Jul 2, 2018

If I had to pick one story had summed up my early career in Silicon Valley, it would have to be the ill-fated launch of Digg v4, sometimes thoughtfully described as the worst relaunch of a product, ever. Now you too can read the story:

lethain.com

Digg's v4 launch: an optimism born of necessity.

Digg was having a rough year. Our CEO left the day before I joined. Senior engineers ghosted out the door, dampening productivity and pulling their remaining friends. We had only one remaining shot...

Will Larson

@Lethain

Feb 18, 2020

What are best resources on becoming/being/operating as staff-plus engineer? Looking for more stuff like (thread):

Will Larson

@Lethain

Jan 30, 2021

Last proof copy arrived and the cover and QR codes are all looking good (made the cover in Omnigraffle, lol)

Will Larson

@Lethain

Feb 20, 2024

First prints have arrived in my hands as of three minutes ago!

Will Larson

@Lethain

Nov 15, 2019

If you were interviewing a bunch of staff/principal/distinguished engineers, what questions would you ask them?

Will Larson

@Lethain

Apr 23, 2023

Starting a new engineering executive role on Monday. What’s your best advice? Stories preferred!

Will Larson

@Lethain

Feb 13, 2023

Once again, I am coming to you with a soup-to-nuts writeup on engineering strategy. Wrote an example eng strat, structuring strat in general, structuring eng strategy in particular, and how to evaluate specific strategy components. It's a lot. lethain.com/eng-strategies/