A conversation about the role of technical program manager and how it completes the role of the staff engineer — When it comes to technical leadership roles, Staff+ Engineer and Technical Program Management have one thing in common: confusion! Outside big tech, these roles are still new and to be introduced. I wanted to reach out to a veteran TPM who has had the role at big tech and exchange notes.

How to develop and roll out a return to office policy that doesn’t hurt the company and country? — In light of Amazon layoffs this article digs into what is wrong with #RTO (return to office) policies and how to have a hybrid work policy that doesn’t hurt the company and long term economy. Read the full article for free here: The Dangers of Enforcing a Premature RTO Policy Creating a decent return to office policy has many nuances. This page digs into different aspects of layoffs and…blog.alexewerlof.com

Why and how we continuously invested the team bandwidth to pay back tech debt and what were the results? — Anyone who has maintained software for a while knows that it tends to rot over time. It takes deliberate effort to prevent that from happening. In this post I will talk about a story how one team successfully dealt with it and conclude with some practical tips. Read the full story on substack:

Vision, Mission, Goals, Objectives, Roadmap, Plans, Milestones, Policies — In Strategy Basics we touched on multiple related words and based on the feedback they deserve their own post with examples to build a common language. Read the full article for free here: Strategy glossary Note: I'm teaming up with ChatGPT to bounce ideas, generate examples and utilize its massive training model to nail the…alexewerlof.substack.com

Tips and mistakes to avoid when applying to software engineering jobs at top tech — It is the layoff season and some of us may need to get into the interview mode. I’ve done hundreds of interviews in the past few years to hire the best talent but I’ve spent a significant time on the other side of the interview table as well. In this post, I will go through my top 3 favorite interview lessons hoping to shorten the learning curve for some of you who may be on the job market.

Why strategy is important and what does it mean? — Strategy is a great tool of alignment and change leadership. Over the past couple of years I’ve been working on a few key strategies, first as an executor, then as a contributor and finally as a creator. …

I’ve been interviewing, shaping the recruitment pipeline, onboarding and working closely with other Staff engineers. In my current gig as a Senior Staff engineer, I find myself digging into a new cluster (roughly 100–200 people) every few months which means I practically need to be onboarded as if I was new. I also mentor aspiring senior engineers who are on their way to becoming full blown Staff engineers. A common theme is the differences between senior engineers and Staff engineers which start from day 1.

When it comes to books, less is more. 👉I have recently moved to Substack. Read the full story here: https://alexewerlof.substack.com/p/slow-reading

Resumes, job ads, personal intros and even funerals have one thing in common: they use “year” as a unit of experience. This is fundamentally wrong! I’ve recently moved to substack. Read the full story over there.