Matt Spitz joins our latest podcast to discuss leading beyond domain expertise! As Head of Engineering @ Vanta, Matt shares his experience managing & developing a security program in the early days of Vanta before hiring for a specialized skillset. We also cover strategies on maximizing security at your organization as it grows, developing a company culture that invests in security, identifying when your org is ready to hire a domain expert, and how to effectively communicate with & lead domain experts within your org. In addition, Matt reveals what qualities he believes a security culture expert should possess & how eng leaders (who aren’t domain experts in security) can help set the org’s right technical direction.ABOUT MATT SPITZMatt Spitz is the Head of Engineering at Trust Management Platform provider, Vanta, where he helps companies practice better security. Previously, he co-founded and led Dropbox's NYC office, started a company, and has built and scaled diverse engineering teams solving complex product and infrastructure challenges. He lives in San Francisco and rides his bike to work."The value that I can provide to all these departments is visibility and context. The perfect strategy for support or something like security doesn't exist. It's contextual, right? And the things that we are trying to do as a business, the things that are happening outside of those departments that maybe I have visibility into, that is value that I can provide to those people in shifting their strategy and setting the right strategy that's contextually appropriate.”- Matt Spitz   Join us at ELC Annual 2023!ELC Annual is our flagship conference for engineering leaders. You’ll learn from experts in engineering and leadership, gain mentorship and support from like-minded professionals, expand your perspectives, build relationships across the tech industry, and leave with practical prove strategies.Join us this August 30-31 at the Fort Mason Center in San FranciscoFor tickets, head to https://sfelc.com/annual2023SHOW NOTES:Matt’s observations around leading beyond your expertise (2:45)Leadership tactics to employ when transitioning to a role outside your expertise (5:02)Matt's transition from Dropbox to Vanta (7:31)Paradigm shifts when transitioning between large & small orgs (9:01)How to improve in leading teams beyond your skill set (11:01)Recommendations for probing / gathering information from experts (13:19)Matt’s experience leading a successful security program before hiring an expert (15:27)Strategies to maximize the area of security as an individual (18:27)How to lay the foundational elements of an early-stage security program (22:14)Knowing when your org is ready for a domain-specific expert (24:05)Indicators to identify when seeking an expert (25:12)Frameworks for hiring / managing an expert beyond your domain (27:03)Evaluating culture fit in hiring security experts (28:54)Effective communication strategies when working with various domain experts (31:44)Setting the right technical direction when you’re not the expert (34:40)Rapid fire questions (36:22)LINKS AND RESOURCESLost Dogs - Matt’s Pearl Jam cover bandThis episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

Han Yuan, Founder of Post-PC Labs, joins us to discuss some of the biggest converging trends hitting our industry – the rise of AI along with the tech bubble that’s poised to burst at any time. We cover not only these trends’ impact on eng leaders, but we also cover how technology trends can drive opportunities for eng leaders to become key strategic partners toward their orgs’ business strategy. Han shares advice for how to evaluate business needs, align your attitude / work toward those goals, earn a seat at the leadership table, build credibility, and use that credibility to implement strategic changes.ABOUT HAN YUANHan Yuan is the founder of Post-PC Labs, LLC.  Post-PC Labs is wholly-owned and funded by Han, powered by a global team of freelancers. The group's focus is building cash-flow breakeven projects with product-market fit.  Early investment themes include wellness and corporate productivity.Before Post-PC Labs, Han was SVP of Engineering at Upwork, where he led one of the world's most distributed engineering teams:  350+ engineers in 40 countries around the world.  In this role, Han was responsible for any function that had anything to do with a computer, including Information Security, IT, QA, Application Engineering, Cloud Engineering, Data Science, Infrastructure Engineering, and Program Management.  During his tenure at Upwork, Upwork's revenue doubled, and the company went public in 2018.In a previous life, Han was an influential mobile engineering leader, having incubated world-class teams for eBay and Netflix.  Han's early work in mobile proved that it was possible to sell billions of dollars of goods and entertain hundreds of millions of people globally using just a mobile phone.  Together with his teams, Han helped launch and scale the eBay and Netflix programs from small incubation teams.  At eBay, he was the first engineer on his team. When Apple announced its one billionth download in the app store and celebrated the top 25 apps in the store of all time, eBay and Netflix were both on the list.Han started his career in enterprise software specializing in the finance and human resources domains and was a co-founder of Buddystumbler.com.  Han has a B.S and M.S in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from U.C. Berkeley with a minor degree in Computer Science and a Management of Technology Certificate from the Haas School of Business."That's the language that you need to communicate with your colleagues, your peers. That's what everybody else understands. They're not going to understand, 'Oh, we need to migrate the data center to the cloud.' They're not going to understand that, 'Hey, these are all the technical reasons why a forklift could be very complicated.' You have to put it in terms that the business is going to understand. That is going to be the art, and along the way, I think if you use that framework, it helps your own teams understand why their work is relevant to the business.”- Han Yuan   Join us at ELC Annual 2023!ELC Annual is our flagship conference for engineering leaders. You’ll learn from experts in engineering and leadership, gain mentorship and support from like-minded professionals, expand your perspectives, build relationships across the tech industry, and leave with practical prove strategies.Join us this August 30-31 at the Fort Mason Center in San FranciscoFor tickets, head to https://sfelc.com/annual2023SHOW NOTES:Converging industry trends that eng leaders should be aware of (2:45)The impact of these trends on tech leaders (6:54)“Opaque” technology & how it can drive innovation in eng leaders (9:48)Emerging opportunities that may intimidate, such as LLMs (11:34)Han’s litmus test to determine your risk of irrelevance as an eng leader (12:55)Framework for eng leaders to increase their value-add to business / product strategy (15:31)Evaluating the business’s needs & aligning your values toward those goals (18:02)How eng leaders can make strategic impact on the business (19:37)Key questions to help eng leaders identify strategic solutions (22:30)Tips for establishing (or reestablishing) your role as a strategic partner (24:00)How Han built credibility during his time @ Upwork (27:40)Using newfound credibility to implement strategic changes (29:54)Rapid fire questions (32:28)LINKS AND RESOURCESSapiens – A Brief History of Humankind - Sapiens, the book, takes us on a breath-taking ride through our entire human history, from its evolutionary roots to the age of capitalism and genetic engineering, to uncover why we are the way we are. Sapiens focuses on key processes that shaped humankind and the world around it, such as the advent of agriculture, the creation of money, the spread of religion and the rise of the nation-state. Unlike other books of its kind, Sapiens takes a multi-disciplinary approach that bridges the gaps between history, biology, philosophy and economics in a way never done before. Furthermore, taking both the macro and the micro view, Sapiens conveys not only what happened and why, but also how it felt for individuals.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

Abi Noda, Co-founder & CEO @ DX returns to the show to discuss his latest research on measuring & improving developer productivity, and provides a practical, developer-focused framework to give you clear, actionable insights into what to measure and where to focus in order to improve developer productivity. Abi reveals the inspiration behind his whitepaper / research, elements of their new DevEx framework, and how eng leaders can implement it into their org’s practice in order to increase developer productivity. We also cover the evolution of measuring developer experience (including output metrics, DORA & SPACE frameworks) and the benefits / shortcomings of each approach. In addition, learn not only the importance of having a dedicated DevEx team, but also how to implement these insights if your org isn’t ready to have a dedicated team yet.ABOUT ABI NODAAbi (@abinoda) is the CEO and co-founder of DX, the world's first developer experience management platform. He was previously the CEO and founder of Pull Panda, which was acquired by GitHub in 2019. At GitHub he led research collaborations with Dr. Nicole Forsgren, McKinsey, and Microsoft Research, which was the impetus for founding DX."Oftentimes, organizations that are larger that get started with these types of measurements in their framework, they're really surprised. They realize that, 'Oh man, there's all these opportunities we didn't even realize and developers are telling us these are the most important things. These aren't the things we're working on and we need to shift our focus.' So, I think there's a huge opportunity to refocus by getting a holistic picture of the developer experience.”- Abi Noda   Join us at ELC Annual 2023!ELC Annual is our flagship conference for engineering leaders. You’ll learn from experts in engineering and leadership, gain mentorship and support from like-minded professionals, expand your perspectives, build relationships across the tech industry, and leave with practical prove strategies.Join us this August 30-31 at the Fort Mason Center in San FranciscoFor tickets, head to https://sfelc.com/annual2023SHOW NOTES:The background behind Abi’s developer productivity research & why it matters (2:50)The evolution of measuring developer productivity (5:50)Moving beyond output metrics to DORA (and how that fell short of solving engineering measurement problems) (7:43)Challenges, drawbacks, and limitations to current measurement approaches (like DORA & SPACE) (11:51)What is the SPACE framework & how it manifests in eng orgs (15:14)Distinction between measuring the notion of productivity vs. focusing on measurements that improve productivity (17:07)Overview of Abi’s new DevEx framework & examples of it in use (19:52)Recommendations for frontline managers, ICs, engineers, etc. to apply the DevEx framework (22:26)How DevEx uncovers blind spots (like requirements quality) (24:21)When engineering orgs should consider separating out productivity (27:44)Strategies for broad-scope leaders to apply the DevEx framework (29:21)Using local teams to address specific DevEx issues (31:30)Why the VP of Eng / org leadership’s values drive developer experience (33:00)Tips for implementing the DevEx framework as a startup vs. mature company (35:06)How Abi is incorporating DevEx strategies into his own company @ DX (37:47)What positive developer experience looks like within an eng team (39:35)The most important step a team w/o a DevEx team can take (41:29)Rapid fire questions (43:17)LINKS AND RESOURCESAbi’s new DevEx whitepaper - “DevEx: What Actually Drives Productivity” by Abi Noda, DX, Margaret-Anne Storey, University of Victoria, Nicole Forsgren, Microsoft Research, Michaela Greiler, DXObviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It - Obviously Awesome goes beyond teaching you what positioning is and why you should care. It gives you a step-by-step process that any startup can follow to position their product, service or company. This book will teach you how to find your product’s “secret sauce” and then sell that sauce to those who crave it.Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind - The first book to deal with the problems of communicating to a skeptical, media-blitzed public, Positioning describes a revolutionary approach to creating a "position" in a prospective customer's mind-one that reflects a company's own strengths and weaknesses as well as those of its competitors.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

In this episode, we redefine what successful, productive engineering looks like with Tammarrian Rogers. As the former Inclusive Engineering Director @ Snap, Tammarrian shares her perspective on global relational healing and what pulled her away from her traditional eng leadership role to explore this topic further. We cover the importance of incorporating relational healing practices into eng leadership & product development, the importance of the “healing profit,” how technology can help manifest healing opportunities for users, and how to align eng teams on embracing relational healing as a practice. We also cover how individual eng leaders can build awareness around internal self-talk – critical & positive – and explore self-love / reflection practices daily.ABOUT TAMMARRIAN ROGERSTammarrian (@tammarrian) has enjoyed acquiring over 30 years of engineering leadership experience in both hardware and software at General Motors, Apple, Microsoft and Snap.  She has had the opportunity to lead cross-functional teams with a focus on inclusive product engineering, quality assurance, release management and product localization and globalization.  She has also served on community non-profit and for-profit organizations including Ada Developers Academy, NordVPN, Northwest Tech Equity Initiative (NWTEI) and OPTYVA, a social purpose organization with a business sustainability focus.In November 2021, Tammarrian left her position as Snap’s first Inclusive Engineering Director to redirect her energy to developing methodologies that promote and facilitate global relational healing; healing that will lead to a sustainable, healthy planet and future for us humans.  Ultimately, her goal is to systematically embed these successful methodologies into emerging and evolving technologies.As a solo nomad today, Tammarrian is enjoying meeting and connecting with people and land around our world. You’ll likely find her on an urban or nature hike, in some body of water or giving much love to a stranger’s dog."We really have to be aware of what is the impact of the product that we're building on our communities beyond the typical metrics that we use to say that we're being successful. So for example, we talk a lot about success being financial, right? It's a profit. How are we profiting? And that also hinges upon everything from our engagement metrics, the visits, the retention, the click-through rate. Whatever your product is, what is it that you're measuring to say that you're building and retaining a community of people and you're growing your business? We're all familiar with that, and I think what I'm inviting us to do as engineering leaders across our industry is to shift the currency of success and to bring in an entirely different currency.”- Tammarrian Rogers   Join us at ELC Annual 2023!ELC Annual is our flagship conference for engineering leaders. You’ll learn from experts in engineering and leadership, gain mentorship and support from like-minded professionals, expand your perspectives, build relationships across the tech industry, and leave with practical prove strategies.Join us this August 30-31 at the Fort Mason Center in San FranciscoFor tickets, head to https://sfelc.com/annual2023SHOW NOTES:Tammarrian’s transition from eng leadership @ Snap (2:45)Redefining what a productive day means & focusing on global relational healing (5:09)How Tammarrian felt pulled to move away from traditional eng leadership (6:31)Exploring what global relationship healing means (10:03)Strategies for building awareness around critical internal talk (12:16)Frameworks for practicing self-love (13:47)Tammarrian’s strategies for diverting outward distractions & focusing inward (15:32)Using your physical space to impact your perspective & vice versa (18:15)Encouraging eng leaders to consider the “healing profit” (20:19)Technology / products that manifest healing opportunities (23:12)An example of how Snap’s technology helped users feel seen (25:19)Make sure your team is aligned on if healing is a value (28:06)Tammarrian’s approach to dissonance between perceived & actual lived-out values (31:25)Active ways someone can transition from surviving mode to thriving mode (35:32)The No. 1 practice to embody the thriving mindset (38:20)Rapid fire questions (39:49)LINKS AND RESOURCESProfit Without Oppression - Profit Without Oppression unapologetically identifies the systems, institutions, and policies that privilege the few while excluding and harming the many. This book charts an inclusionary strategic path forward that seeks to develop an economic ethos and series of business models that are supremacy, coercion, discrimination, and exploitation free.The Silent Patient - A shocking psychological thriller of a woman’s act of violence against her husband—and of the therapist obsessed with uncovering her motive.Humankind: A Hopeful History - International bestseller Rutger Bregman provides new perspective on the past 200,000 years of human history, setting out to prove that we are hardwired for kindness, geared toward cooperation rather than competition, and more inclined to trust rather than distrust one another.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

We tackle the trend toward engineering efficiency with Alamelu Radhakrishnan, Head of Engineering Operations @ Shopify. She reveals strategies to move your eng org toward greater efficiency while maintaining high levels of impact & creativity. We also share how eng leaders can identify opportunities for efficiency, giving engineering a seat at the leadership table during efficiency-focused conversations, frameworks for removing toil within your eng team, how to avoid burnout while optimizing for efficiency, and the role of decision-making in maximizing efficient eng orgs.ABOUT ALAMELU RADHAKRISHNANAlamelu leads Engineering Operations at Shopify, leading the teams responsible for building the systems and technical programs that power Shopify RnD. Her mandate is to maximize the impact of engineers on Shopify’s Missions, and her role spans across team health, engineering craft excellence, strategic planning and prioritization, and successful business operations within RnD.Prior to Shopify, Alamelu has worked with some of Canada’s most innovative product and consulting agencies, leading software delivery teams and helping organizations leverage technology across a variety of industries.Alamelu finds joy in solving business problems through technology, strives for organizational excellence, and is passionate about supporting and sponsoring underrepresented folks in the industry. Alamelu lives in Toronto, and loves food, travel, the outdoors, and horror movies."The thing that I've been telling my team is that this is not a time to get through. This is a time to lean in. Let's not treat it as, 'Oh my God, you focus on efficiency. Let's just do it, and then it'll be done. It'll be back to the fun times.' These are the fun times. They're just fun in a different way, but these constraints are making us even more creative, and these challenges are going to lead to us doing some of the best work of our lives. That's the exciting thing, and so I think the way through the fear is actually into excitement."- Alamelu Radhakrishnan   Join us at ELC Annual 2023!ELC Annual is our flagship conference for engineering leaders. You’ll learn from experts in engineering and leadership, gain mentorship and support from like-minded professionals, expand your perspectives, build relationships across the tech industry, and leave with practical prove strategies.Join us this August 30-31 at the Fort Mason Center in San FranciscoTo get early access to tickets - email us at annual@sfelc.comJoin Jellyfish's GLOW conference on 5/16 & 5/17 to maximize engineering impact!Learn from industry experts, connect and share challenges with peers as you learn effective strategies to expand your leadership!Register now at https://www.jellyfishglowsummit.com/SHOW NOTES:How Alamelu’s role @ Shopify is like an extension of eng leadership (2:52)Working yourself out of a job & identifying blind spots in the eng org (5:23)Alamelu’s approach to building a new system from scratch (7:00)Prioritization strategies when developing new systems (10:34)Inside the industry trend toward optimizing for efficiency vs. experimentation (11:45)Recommendations for how managers can find opportunities / make adjustments (14:10)Frameworks for helping your eng team overcome fear & embrace creativity (16:50)How to communicate the impact of engineering on the business (19:44)Ensure engineering has a seat at the table during efficiency conversations (21:37)The value of ad hoc vs. planned meetings (24:08)Alamelu’s perspective on helping eng teams find time for flow (26:19)Why leadership should encourage eng teams to “remove the toil” (27:44)Areas of toil that Alamelu has identified & how to address them (29:51)How to alleviate burnout while shifting toward efficiency (33:04)Decision-making as an opportunity for greater efficiency (36:24)Rapid fire questions (39:06)LINKS AND RESOURCESLand of the Giants - Big tech is transforming every aspect of our world. But how? And at what cost? In Land of the Giants: Dating Games, The Verge and New York Magazine's The Cut trace the evolution of the multi-billion dollar dating app industry.Cloud Cuckoo Land - Five protagonists dwell in the heart of Cloud Cuckoo Land: Anna and Omeir, on opposite sides of the city walls during the 1453 siege of Constantinople; teenage idealist Seymour and octogenarian Zeno in an attack on a public library in present-day Idaho; and Konstance, on an interstellar ship bound for an exoplanet, decades from now. Anna, Omeir, Seymour, Zeno, and Konstance are dreamers and outsiders who find resourcefulness and hope in the midst of peril. A book written in ancient Greek—the story of Aethon, who longs to be turned into a bird so that he can fly to a utopian paradise in the sky—provides solace and mystery to these unforgettable characters.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

Welcome to the ELC Annual Pop-Up Podcast Booth! This episode features behind-the-scenes conversations of engineering leaders who joined us at ELC Annual last October. These community members jumped into our recording studio to share their best strategies for good communication and providing critical feedback; using OKRs to realign your org; lessons learned from early leadership days; balancing speed vs. quality within your eng team; how technology shifts / bets impact your org; challenges with rapidly changing workspaces between remote, in-person & hybrid; creating a culture of pride & celebrating wins; and combining empathy with the best engineering qualities to determine what you really want.Our featured guests include:Nate Lee, CISO @ TradeshiftGaurav Nigam, VP of Engineering @ WorkBoardCynthia Tham, VP of Engineering @ GMG AmericasMitchell Arnett, Engineering Manager @ Life360Jeremy Eastwood (Head of Eng @ Drone Deploy) & Dobromir Montauk (VP of Engineering @ Doxel.AI)Lizzie Masutov, Co-Founder & CEO @ QuotientShweta Saraf, Director of Platform Engineering @ NetflixWen Hsu, Founder & CEO at Wen CoachingJoin us at ELC Annual 2023!ELC Annual is our flagship conference for engineering leaders. You’ll learn from experts in engineering and leadership, gain mentorship and support from like-minded professionals, expand your perspectives, build relationships across the tech industry, and leave with practical prove strategies.Join us this August 30-31 at the Fort Mason Center in San FranciscoTo get early access to tickets - email us at annual@sfelc.comJoin Jellyfish's GLOW conference on 5/16 & 5/17 to maximize engineering impact!Learn from industry experts, connect and share challenges with peers as you learn effective strategies to expand your leadership!Register now at https://www.jellyfishglowsummit.com/SHOW NOTES:Why Nate Lee @ Tradeshift believes good communication is critical as an eng leader (7:06)Know your audience, meet them where they’re at & learn to communicate up (8:44)Strategies for delivering critical feedback (11:00)Gaurav Nigam @ WorkBoard: how OKRs can be used to resync your org (14:35)Tips for first-timers establishing realistic OKRs (17:56)Things Cynthia Tham @ GBG Americas wishes she knew when she started her eng leadership journey (20:21)Identifying & maintaining consistent behaviors as an eng leader (22:58)Mitchell Arnett @ Life360 discusses speed vs. quality (25:19)Components that lead to a culture of success around speed & quality (29:01)Jeremy Eastwood @ Drone Deploy & Dobromir Montauk @ Doxel.AI on how tech shifts impact eng orgs (32:41)Jeremy & Dobromir’s predictions for the next technology curve (37:14)Commit to change & don’t go in half-heartedly (39:55)How to navigate hybrid & remote work challenges w/ Lizzie Matusov @ Quotient (48:11)Lizzie’s advice for returning to in-person networking (50:42)Practices for navigating shifting work environments between remote, hybrid & in-person (53:07)Lizzie’s vision for successfully integrating teams & developing a sense of belonging (56:23)Tips for starting conversations around belonging within eng teams (1:02:10)Shweta Saraf @ Netflix reveals how her org has built a culture of celebration (1:04:11)Tips for building moments of self-recognition as an eng leader (1:08:11)Strategies for establishing goals & providing clarity (1:10:59)Create a safe space for experimentation (1:16:57)Wen Hsu on the most important question you can ask yourself (1:19:26)Recommendations for taking steps toward what you really want (1:22:33)How to prioritize making time to move toward your “north star” (1:25:13)This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

Sandeep Chennakeshu, Chief Operating Officer @ Uhnder Inc., joins us to discuss how eng leaders can adopt a GM mindset & strategies for building a resilient business. The author of Your Company Is Your Castle, Sandeep also reveals the key structural elements of all successful businesses, methods to improve your business’s financial fitness / cash flow, how to overcome operational inefficiencies, why strong decision-making matters when it comes to saving money, and much more.ABOUT SANDEEP CHENNAKESHUSandeep has spent thirty-four years in three industries and led teams across the globe that pioneered amazing products in wireless (2G, 3G, 4G mobile phones, Bluetooth, Mobile-Satellite technology), semiconductors for consumer, automotive, and medical electronics, and safety-critical software for cars, medical equipment, nuclear power plants, high-speed rail, and industrial robots. Along the way, he transformed companies to grow profitably in a sustained manner using the principles outlined in his book “Your Company Is Your Castle”. He is a fellow of the IEEE and a named inventor on 180 issued patents."The single metric that I use to say, 'Am I doing well?' Because how do I know that the cash I'm generating is a good or bad? I use a very simple metric. If you take the enterprise value and you multiply it by the cost of borrowing money, your free cash flow must be higher than that product. When I'm doing better than that metric, then I know that I have a future.”- Sandeep Chennakeshu   Looking for ways to support the show?Send a link to the show to your marketing team! https://sfelc.com/podcastsIf your company is looking to gain exposure to thousands of engineering leaders and key decision-makers, we have sponsorship opportunities available.To explore sponsor opportunities, email us at hello@sfelc.comSHOW NOTES:Sandeep’s most significant career milestones (2:23)Why there is no difference between an eng leader & GM (6:39)Sandeep’s passion for & background of transforming business (9:18)Key structural elements of successful companies (12:17)How a successful business resembles a castle (13:59)Strategies to improve financial fitness & generate cash flow (15:17)Metrics to determine how well you’re optimizing your cash flow (17:54)Examples of how strong decision-making led to cost savings (19:45)Frameworks for overcoming operational inefficiencies (22:12)Sandeep’s tips for categorizing / prioritizing where the cashflow’s impact hits (24:21)Why it’s important to stay ahead of the “gorilla in the room” (26:33)Resilient business models utilize stickiness & have high operating leverage (28:23)Questions eng leaders can ask to adopt a more effective GM mindset (33:30)Rapid fire questions (36:02)LINKS AND RESOURCESGetting To Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In: This worldwide bestseller by William Ury provides a concise, step-by-step, proven strategy for coming to mutually acceptable agreements in every sort of conflict.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

Johnny Ray Austin, Head of Technology, Flexible Rent @ Best Egg, joins us to discuss Best Egg’s recent acquisition of Till and some of the strategic & operational shifts that happen post-acquisition. He shares reflections on integrating the team within the new company, communicating both within the leadership team and within the overall team, how product launch / development changes throughout the acquisition process, shifts in the org’s distribution model & its impact on eng functions, and what it’s like relearning your role in the scope of an acquisition. Additionally, Johnny reveals some of his greatest paradigm shifts throughout this period & how the acquisition is better supporting the flexible rent model.ABOUT JOHNNY RAY AUSTINJohnny (@recursivefunk) is an experienced award-winning engineering executive focused on shipping world-class products while building high-performing engineering teams. He is also an international public speaker, speaking on engineering leadership, system design, and the JavaScript programming language. Johnny is the former Chief Technology Officer for Till, a company that built financial products to help renters pay, stay and thrive in their homes. After Best Egg acquired Till in late 2022, he transitioned to Best Egg's Head of Technology for Flexible Rent, where he continues to scale the flexible rent platform to service millions of units."At the time, we were thinking about raising money and also in acquisition and we didn't really know exactly which route we were gonna go down. We shared that with the team. You know, we said, 'Hey, this is path number one. This is path two. Path three is a shutdown.' We were very open in talking about, 'This is a path. It's very unlikely, but this is a thing that could happen.' And so we chose transparency from the very beginning because one, we thought it was the right thing to do. Two, we knew the team could handle it, and three, it was really just one of those things where it was gonna make the process easier."- Johnny Ray Austin   Looking for ways to support the show?Send a link to the show to your marketing team! https://sfelc.com/podcastsIf your company is looking to gain exposure to thousands of engineering leaders and key decision-makers, we have sponsorship opportunities available.To explore sponsor opportunities, email us at hello@sfelc.comSHOW NOTES:Johnny’s pop culture reflections & tips for protecting your energy (2:42)An inside look at Best Egg’s recent acquisition of Till (6:42)What it’s been like post-acquisition to integrate the team (10:12)How leadership communicated with their team throughout the acquisition (12:25)Lessons learned about communicating during early exploratory phase (15:54)Strategies for minimizing distractions resulting from uncertainty (18:08)Helpful conversations to host between leadership for effective coordination (19:18)Questions to help gain personal alignment (21:03)How product launch / development changed mid- and post-acquisition (23:11)Introducing a new methodology to the team (26:14)The new distribution model & its impact on eng functions (28:46)Differences between BNPL & Best Egg’s rent payment model (31:31)What it’s been like for Johnny to relearn his role as part of a broader eng org (34:56)Frameworks for navigating new dependencies (37:05)Johnny’s paradigm shift around planning for scale (39:21)Rapid fire questions (41:50)LINKS AND RESOURCESDark Money: The Hidden History Of The Billionaires Behind The Rise Of The Radical Right - Jane Mayer discusses the results of the most recent election and Donald Trump’s victory, and how, despite much discussion to the contrary, this was a huge victory for the billionaires who have been pouring money in the American political system.Snowfall - Over the course of five seasons, FX’s Snowfall has chronicled how an off-the-books CIA operation contributed to the destruction rock cocaine leveled upon the vibrant community of South Central L.A.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

This is a special episode from our new show “Engineering Founders” - Lizzie Matusov, CEO & Co-Founder @ Quotient, shares her unique founder journey – from Harvard’s dual-degree grad program & Innovation Lab to founding Quotient! She also reveals strategies for fundraising, including utilizing your relationship pipeline, incorporating story arcs into your pitch, overcoming pattern-matching bias, and how fundraising today is different than it used to be. We also cover Quotient’s major pivots, tips for not becoming too attached to your first idea & making space for new ideas, defining idea-mazing & its impact on your product, and developing clarity as a founder. For more episodes of Engineering Founders, subscribe here: https://engineering-founders.simplecast.com/ABOUT LIZZIE MATUSOVLizzie Matusov (@lizziematusov) is the co-founder and CEO of Quotient - a toolkit to supercharge engineering teams. Today, their first tool is an onboarding platform that leverages behavioral research best practices to ramp up engineers more effectively. Quotient’s mission is to democratize access to the best engineering cultures.Previously, Lizzie built software to improve access to medical-grade genetic testing at Invitae. She was also a software engineering consultant at Red Hat, where she built software applications for companies across various industries, including fintech and biotech. She holds a bachelor of science from UCLA, and an MBA and Masters of Engineering Sciences from Harvard."Let's say in a four-month period, you check in with investors or founders that you're working with two or three times. Now what they have is not just one call to base their opinion on, but an entire story arc that they can use to say, 'All right, in August they were doing this and by October they already did this, and then by December they were here. I'm now seeing sort of a preview of what I'm backing.' I think that that really helps founders sort of help investors make decisions, right? You are de-risking for them, you are sharing more of the milestones as you're doing them.”- Lizzie Matusov   ABOUT QUOTIENTQuotient is a toolkit to supercharge engineering teams. Their mission is to democratize access to the best engineering cultures.Today, their first tool is an onboarding platform that leverages behavioral research best practices to ramp up engineers more effectively. With Quotient you can build and deliver a high-quality, research-backed onboarding experience, and get data-driven insights into how your team changes and grows together.Check out Quotient and join the waitlist HERE - https://www.getquotient.com/waitlistLooking for ways to support the show?Send a link to the show to your marketing team! https://sfelc.com/podcastsIf your company is looking to gain exposure to thousands of engineering leaders and key decision-makers, we have sponsorship opportunities available.To explore sponsor opportunities, email us at hello@sfelc.comCheck Out Engineering Founders!We cover the stories, pivotal moments and critical insights from former engineering leaders turned founders - that helped them take the earliest steps to launch!You can find it wherever you get your podcasts - Spotify / Apple / Google / WebSHOW NOTES:The backstory behind Quotient (3:01)Why the atomic unit is the team, not the individual & how that impacts Quotient (4:03)Lizzie’s leadership journey before Quotient (5:25)Why Lizzie chose Harvard’s dual-degree grad program as part of her founder’s journey (8:43)How Harvard’s program helped Lizzie accelerate founding Quotient (12:43)The community aspect of entrepreneurship & Harvard’s Innovation Lab (15:48)Lizzie’s favorite grad school hacks (17:58)Frameworks behind Quotient’s key pivots (20:12)How Quotient pivoted to better support companies & the onboarding process (23:02)Tips for making space for new ideas (25:59)Defining idea-mazing & how it impacts your product / solution (28:13)Where Quotient is in terms of fundraising (31:02)How assumptions & expectations around fundraising have changed (32:43)Collect data points that show your ability to execute, lead, & grow (34:06)Strategies to help overcome pattern matching bias (36:09)How Lizzie utilized story arcs while fundraising for Quotient (38:32)Why clarity as a founder is vital & frameworks for developing clarity (41:05)The renaming process & unveiling the new name “Quotient” (44:52)Rapid fire questions (46:38)LINKS AND RESOURCESShantaram - Gregory David Roberts’ novel following an escaped convict with a false passport who flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of Bombay, where he can disappear. Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, the two enter the city’s hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere.The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine - Michael Lewis documents the real story of the crash that began in bizarre feeder markets where the sun doesn't shine and the SEC doesn't dare, or bother, to tread: the bond and real estate derivative markets where geeks invent impenetrable securities to profit from the misery of lower- and middle-class Americans who can't pay their debts. The smart people who understood what was or might be happening were paralyzed by hope and fear; in any case, they weren't talking.The Long Way To A Small, Angry Planet - Becky Chambers’ novel following a motley crew on an exciting journey through space—and one adventurous young explorer who discovers the meaning of family in the far reaches of the universe.This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/

Madalina Tanasie joins us to share her unique leadership journey as she transitioned from eng to operations, then back to her current technical role as CTO @ Collibra. We also cover strategies to improve engineering efficiency within your organization, factors to consider when scaling eng teams, maximizing your ROI when it comes to R&D, dispelling concerns when implementing culture changes, frameworks for scaling up, and more.ABOUT MADALINA TANASIEMadalina Tanasie is the Chief Technology Officer and an Executive Committee member at Collibra, where she oversees and leads the Software Engineering, Architecture, Production Engineering, Test Engineering, and Security activities.Madalina has over 18 years of software engineering leadership experience and her expertise is in service-oriented architecture, cloud-native distributed systems, and product operations with a focus on engineering practices, scale, and operational excellence. Prior to joining Collibra in 2020, she was the Engineering VP for Medidata Solutions’ Unified Platform Organization, an organization she built from the ground up and led since 2010.She has been recognized as one of the Top 25 Software CTOs of 2023 by The Software Report.Additionally, she is a proud sponsor of Collibra’s Women in Technology, and an active member of CHIEF, a network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders. Ms. Tanasie earned her BS and Master’s in Computer Science at Polytechnics University of Bucharest."The reality is that they need process and structure to eliminate the noise and to create a space for solving really, really deep challenging problems. They actually want the process for the part that is mundane and boring and disruptive. So as they discuss about what's making their life harder than it needs to be, we are coming back to a lack of process, a lack of uniformity, a lack of clear communication channels between themselves or between other departments.”- Madalina Tanasie   Check out QA Wolf!Looking for a way to increase end-to-end test coverage, speed up your release cycles and reduce bugs from shipping to production? QA Wolf will build, run and maintain your test suite - so that you don't have to.QA Wolf gets you to 80% automated end-to-end test coverage in 4 months - and keeps you there – So your team can stay focused on shipping!Learn more & schedule a 30 min demo at qawolf.com/elcLooking for ways to support the show?Send a link to the show to your marketing team! https://sfelc.com/podcastsIf your company is looking to gain exposure to thousands of engineering leaders and key decision-makers, we have sponsorship opportunities available.To explore sponsor opportunities, email us at hello@sfelc.comSHOW NOTES:Madalina’s unexpected career journey, beginning @ Medidata (2:13)How Madalina transitioned from engineering into operations @ Collibra (4:57)Qualities that make Collibra’s culture stand out (5:46)What opportunities stood out when Madalina was evaluating the Collibra role (7:35)Four considerations to keep in mind when scaling eng teams (9:07)The Spotify model vs. Agile model & what worked for Collibra (15:19)Challenges to adopting new management models (19:18)Strategies for navigating people’s expectations (20:58)Insights gained from Madalina’s “listening tour” (23:20)Frameworks for addressing concerns around culture while scaling (25:04)Madalina’s perspectives on improving engineering efficiency (26:51)The right balance between cost of ownership and R&D (30:07)Collibra’s new product introduction process & its impact on R&D (31:28)Questions to help guide teams throughout the new framework (33:11)Rapid fire questions (34:22)This episode wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our incredible production team:Patrick Gallagher - Producer & Co-HostJerry Li - Co-HostNoah Olberding - Associate Producer, Audio & Video Editor https://www.linkedin.com/in/noah-olberding/Dan Overheim - Audio Engineer, Dan’s also an avid 3D printer - https://www.bnd3d.com/Ellie Coggins Angus - Copywriter, Check out her other work at https://elliecoggins.com/about/