- Pointer
- Posts
- Issue #732
Issue #732
Essential Reading For Engineering Leaders
Friday 10th July’s issue is presented by Gauntlet
Online Wednesday July 15 at 5CT
Byron Mackay breaks down the Gauntlet learning model and argues that the environment beats the curriculum, explaining what makes it unlike college or a coding camp, and how immersing top engineers in a single topic in Austin drives growth that online courses cannot replicate.
You'll learn:
Why the learning environment matters more than the curriculum
What separates Gauntlet from college, bootcamps, and online courses
How immersion in one topic accelerates real skill development
What training engineers to work AI-first at scale looks like
— Wes Kao
tl;dr: “The problem is, when you spend too much time describing the situation (i.e. the context or background), you take time away from the other parts of STAR, all of which are more interesting and relevant. The situation should be a brief set up, so you can let the other parts of your STAR story really shine.”
Communication CareerGrowth InterviewAdvice
— Thorsten Ball
tl;dr: “Just had a (great) conversation about ownership and engineering here and I realized that I often use the phrase “ownership” or allude to it, but haven’t explained what “ownership” means to me in a while.”
Management Culture
tl;dr: Online Wednesday July 15 at 5CT. Byron Mackay breaks down the Gauntlet learning model and argues that the environment beats the curriculum, explaining what makes it unlike college or a coding camp, and how immersing top engineers in a single topic in Austin drives growth that online courses cannot replicate. You'll learn: (1) Why the learning environment matters more than the curriculum. (2) What separates Gauntlet from college, bootcamps, and online courses. (3) How immersion in one topic accelerates real skill development. (4) What training engineers to work AI-first at scale looks like.
Promoted by Gauntlet
AI Event
— Michael Lopp
tl;dr: “Everyone cares about the compensation (base salary, bonus, and stock). That’s the data they care about, but where did this pile of compensation come from? Who decided how big it is? And how is it allocated? It is a long, complicated, and large process that began over a year ago. And as a Senior Leader, it’s your job to figure it out.”
Leadership Management Compensation
“Don’t find fault, find a remedy.”
— Adam Bender
tl;dr: Adam explores software ecology as a framework for understanding sociotechnical systems. By examining the impact of emerging technologies and rapid growth on developer ecosystems, he investigates how culture and technical choices navigate the challenges of scaling environments.
IndustryTrends Scale Architecture
— Kaia Colban
tl;dr: We sat down with their AI Platform Manager, who walked us through the three-layer skills system behind it: company, team, and personal skills that stay versioned and cascade down. Steal the structure for your own org.
Promoted by Lore
Management CaseStudy AI
— Mathias Verraes
tl;dr: “This week, I participated in Thoughtworks’ Future of Software Engineering retreat in Engelberg, Switzerland. It was an invite-only event with about 60 industry leaders, hosted by Martin Fowler. The event used an open space format, where all sessions had the form of group debates, mostly focused on agentic development. Here are some of my observations on the changing role of software design.”
IndustryTrends Architecture Agents
— Lukas Niessen
tl;dr: “The thing is, architecture decisions are different from regular code decisions. They’re harder to reverse, they affect more people, and they often involve trade-offs that aren’t purely technical. You need buy-in. You need the right people in the room. And you need a process that doesn’t turn into endless meetings or bikeshedding. Here’s the approach I’ve found works well, both in my consulting work and in teams I’ve led.”
Leadership Architecture
— Jim Benton
tl;dr: “One observability gap that we wanted to improve last year was our understanding of how hosting costs were allocated across product features. For example, how much does it cost to operate the parts of API that are used to send and receive messages? Start a stream? Send a friend a Nitro gift?”
DeepDive Metrics Infrastructure
Null Pointer
Same Diff
Hand-drawn by Manu. View the Null Pointer series.
Most Popular From Last Issue
Be The Idiot - Kirill Bobrov
Notable Links
Herdr: Agent multiplexer in your terminal.
Mellea: Library for writing generative programs.
Orca: ADE for working with a fleet of parallel agents.
Plannotator: Plan and code review for your agents.
Tau: Minimalist agent that teaches you to create coding agents.
How did you like this issue of Pointer?1 = Didn't enjoy it all // 5 = Really enjoyed it |