A team goes out and installs a new lawn at a customer’s property. They’ve been there since 6am, it’s now 8pm, and they’ve finally got all the sod laid. The last step in the runbook says to program the sprinkler system. But the sprinkler system is broken, and nobody on the team can get it […]
You change a config file. The behavior doesn’t change. “That’s impossible. I literally just changed it.” But did you? Is DNS pointing where you think it’s pointing? Did you forget to restart Apache to reload the config? Are you even SSH’d into the right server? Is your code maybe hitting a different JDBC connection string […]
After I published my last post about Power Tools (er, I mean AI), a reader asked me a fair question. “OK, so what do you do with your expensive workers who are being paid more than the current market will bear?” It’s a good question, and I think the answer is actually the flip side […]
I used to think this was just a cranky saying from impatient people who couldn’t delegate. Now, after three decades in the industry, I realize it’s uncomfortably true. But not for the reasons I originally thought. Here’s the pattern. A team is struggling. They reach out for help. I come in, assess the situation, and […]
Years ago I worked on a software project for specialist users. They hated it. Absolutely despised this application. When I finally got the chance to visit the dev team in Long Beach, what I discovered what that almost none of them had ever actually used the software they were building. Some had never even seen […]
We’ve all been in this meeting. Someone presents an idea. It’s not perfect, but it’s solid and it could work. And then that guy raises his hand. “Well, have you considered…” What follows is fifteen minutes of edge cases, hypotheticals, and thinly veiled condescension. The idea gets picked apart. The presenter gets demoralized. The meeting […]
Once upon a time, there was a small business owner who hired workers and crafters to do carpentry work: framing houses, roofing, all kinds of construction. These workers spent their days swinging hammers and driving in nails to get the job done. Then one day, the business owner discovered a new tool: the nail gun. […]
It seems like we’ve been seeing a lot of layoffs in the tech sector lately. More than usual. I’ve been thinking about this lately because I saw an analogy online that stuck with me. Someone said something like, “I’m a PhD and one of the world’s best electric vehicle scientists! Why would they lay me […]
I’ve been noticing a pattern at work lately: people getting frustrated with their teammates because “It’s easy, why are we having challenges?” After this happened more than once while discussing a project that was facing implementation challenges, I started thinking about it. Was it easy, what the team was struggling with? If it truly was […]
After extensive soul-searching and several conversations with Claude, I’ve identified my New Year’s resolutions for 2026. I know what you’re thinking—these sound like terrible resolutions. But hear me out. 1. I Resolve to Be Lazier Specifically, I resolve to use more AI, more automation, and more tools. And to stop doing things that don’t have […]
Knuggets of Knowledge 