[This is a post from my series on starting a new job for technical leaders like CTOs, VP Engineering, and Software Development Managers] The crazy thing about managers is that the majority of your job is working with people – and unlike software, which is normally pretty deterministic, people can be unpredictable and difficult to [...]

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Hello everyone! I have a new post – only it isn’t a new post as much as a new section on my blog for new technology managers.  I am not quite done with all the posts yet, and will be finishing over the next couple of weeks. I started collecting and recording my thoughts from [...]

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I love new years resolutions. I am one of those people who is motivated and excited by accomplishments and achievements.  I make lists for everything; and everyday I savor the moments I complete an item on the list. And new years, like birthdays, are a chance to think about the future and plan for what [...]

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As I noted in previous post, I left my role to join a new team.  Before I left, a big part of my time was spent interviewing the potential candidates to replace me.  As I was setting up the process and working with my team, one of the first questions that came up was “How [...]

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At the risk of embarrassing myself terribly, I decided to tell you all a little bit of my “swan” story.  Hopefully a little insight into my path will inspire you a bit on yours…. You see, when most people meet me now they are surprised when I tell them things like: I used to weigh [...]

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Keep an interview on schedule In my previous post on interviewing TPMs, there was a note in the comments about keeping interviews on schedule.  This isn’t the first time people have asked about this topic though, since it is a challenge for any interviewer. You want to make sure candidates have a great experience interviewing. [...]

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This post covers the anatomy of a good interview question and is part of my series on effective interviewing. I have already written about planning ahead for interviews, and a key part of that is having good questions.  There are lots of sites online with questions you can pull from, it is also good to [...]

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In many ways interviewing is an art.  You have one hour (more if you count the cumulative interview time) to assess if the candidate has the desired skills; and, more importantly, if you would enjoy working with them.  That is a lot of ground to cover! And as if finding out all that information wasn’t [...]

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Planning an Offsite

November 15, 2011

When people read my blog, sometimes people email me in response to something I post, or to ask me about ideas.  I generally don’t mind this because it makes me think about problems (and like puzzles, solving problems can be a lot of fun), and it allows me to connect with the people who actually [...]

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Distributed Systems Basics – Handling Failure: Fault Tolerance and Monitoring

November 13, 2011

Since earlier this summer I have been working on a book chapter for the Architecture of Open Source Applications text book.  It is a pretty cool project because there are a lot of great contributors, and all of the profit made from text book sales goes to Amnesty International. My chapter assignment was Distributed Systems, [...]

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