Performance reviews are typical in larger organisations. Reports get anxious about a bad review or a pay rise below their expectations. Managers feel the process is cumbersome, wasteful and are concerned they are not being fair with all team members. In this article, I go through 7 tips to make performance reviews painless and fair for everybody involved.

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As an Engineering leader, you are keen to reduce burnout risk and consider hiring a couple of contractors when the team needs to deliver a large project fast. But are you fully aware of the trade-offs? This article covers the benefits and risks of working with engineering contractors as well as the measures you can put in place to maximise your chances of success!

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The Plot technology strategy

Jun 20 2022 · 10 min read · Comments

I wrote this article as part of my role as VP Engineering at Plot. I wanted to share it here as an example of what a technology strategy could look like. It was our best guess at the time and by no means perfect!

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10x developers really exist

May 9 2022 · 4 min read · Comments

Since the original 1968 article, there has been a lot of debate around the figure of the 10x developer. We're talking about engineers who are an order of magnitude better than their peers by whatever measure. These engineers exist, but not in the way most people describe them.

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Understanding the why is essential to the success of a project and the team's performance. A group of people who don't understand users or their problems cannot build a high-quality product. Here are a few practices Engineering Managers can put in place to help their teams understand their users better.

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