Engineering management after the cost of code collapsed
https://karimjedda.com/engineering-management-after-cost-of-code-collapse/If programmer productivity was something we actively optimized for, we wouldn't have cram programmers like sardines in warm and noisy open floor offices with 2000 ppm CO2 levels and then further constantly interrupt them with emails and slack pings and meetings all day long, Jira rigmarole wouldn't make up a significant portion of what they did, programmers would have instead mostly been thinking and programming.
We've always had the ability to 2X if not 10X the output of each and every one of those poor souls. You don't end with this sort of programming purgatory because it's a productivity optimum, it very clearly isn't, but because it's a billable hours optimum and/or an org chart clout optimum and/or because of Jevons paradox got hands even in business management and the IT department was allocated too many dollars.
There are a lot of (excruciatingly) long-form posts about what folks are pioneering but not a whole lot of follow up about what failed. Where are the short posts on the negative space? How did halving your staff work out? Flattening your org? All those dark factories, what haven't they produced? How about all the other things tried, failed, and unceremoniously scrapped?
We need to explore and communicate the negative space more efficiently. Don't repeat the same mistakes, and don't make me read 2653 words when 300 do it better.
Does this guy have access to Gemini 4 already?
I'm guessing Gemma 4 was happy to be mistaken for Gemini and didn't catch this mistake.
Not everything has to be written as though it’s a middle manager’s idea of what makes for a good TED talk.
LLMs have brought a different unlock, and for everything we're seeing become easier, it allows people learn to use the tools to take on solving problems that couldn't be approached before.