Coach's Corner
Thoughts on dev team leadership, architecture, and building teams that ship.
Developers on Islands
March 30, 2026 · 6 min read
When developers work in isolation — each owning their slice of the codebase and nobody else knowing how it works — the team's velocity number is a fiction. Here's what that actually costs you.
Engineering Leaders Have the Advantage in the Age of AI
March 30, 2026 · 7 min read
The skills that make a great engineering leader — defining outcomes, reviewing output, managing feedback loops — are exactly the skills that make someone effective with AI agents.
Software Development Has Always Been Moving in One Direction
March 30, 2026 · 8 min read
Every major shift in software development has done the same three things: raised the abstraction, compressed the feedback loop, and moved humans further from implementation. Agentic AI is just the latest — and largest — step in that progression.
Splitting Stories: The Skill That Makes or Breaks Sprint Velocity
March 30, 2026 · 8 min read
One of the surest ways to kill a team's productivity is to saddle it with large stories. The tricky part is they don't always look large on the surface.
Tech Debt Is a Choice, Not a Failure
March 30, 2026 · 5 min read
Tech debt gets treated like a dirty word. It isn't. It's a record of a decision made under real constraints. The problem isn't the debt — it's when teams stop tracking it.
Vibe Coding Is Not a Strategy
March 30, 2026 · 7 min read
There's a difference between letting AI write code and working with AI to write good code. One produces output. The other produces craft.
Your AI Code Quality Problem Is Actually a Standards Problem
March 30, 2026 · 6 min read
Developers complaining about AI-generated slop are diagnosing the wrong problem. The code isn't bad because of AI. It's bad because of you.
Your Team Is Doing Scrum. Does It Understand Scrum?
March 30, 2026 · 6 min read
Most teams that 'do Scrum' have learned the ceremonies but missed the point. The ceremonies are not the methodology. They're just the surface.
Skills You Need as a Dev Manager: Product Owner
December 29, 2024 · 2 min read
The primary role of a manager is to remove impediments for your team. This is a multi-part series about other skills you can develop as a Software Development Manager.
Think about RIOTS
September 4, 2024 · 4 min read
RIOTS!!! What do riots have to do with software engineering? Nothing. But it's a handy acronym for thinking about system design.
High Performers vs Good Managers: Lessons from the Hardwood
April 27, 2024 · 7 min read
Promoting high-performing individuals to managerial roles is not always a recipe for success.
MVP in Personal Projects
April 24, 2024 · 2 min read
One of the hardest parts of doing a personal project: MVP. I have a GRAND vision of what this will be. I want to BUILD IT ALL NOW!!!
Managing vs Orchestration and Enablement for Software Development Teams
March 29, 2024 · 2 min read
As a manager in tech, my distaste is growing for the term Software Development Manager. Let's look at some definitions for manage.