Interviewing for a job is stressful but negotiating for the offer is even more so for me. That’s because I am not used to discussing money openly. During the negotiation, I kept telling myself that neither the employer nor I want me to accept an offer I don’t feel was fair. That feeling of leaving something on the table could turn into resentment quickly.
So I asked for more in a short email (it took me about 30 minutes to write) and got a sizable increase in my equity package. The discomfort from negotiating fades quickly, but the consequence lives long.
Software Engineering ⚙️
The Alternative to Roadmaps
When there are interdependencies, roadmaps align teams towards common goals and timelines. At the same time, I’ve seen many cases where my teams’ work based on the roadmap didn’t actually deliver the results. How do we provide the space for iterations while we hold ourselves accountable to other stakeholders?
How We Design Our APIs at Slack
Building a public API is a whole different ballgame than building a private API. One needs to be far more careful about breaking changes and provide more consistency and visibility. As the choices will stay for a long time, more planning and testing are required.
What’s new in GraphQL-Codegen v2?
GraphQL-Codegen v2 is almost here. The Guild has created and shepherds many JS GraphQL tools, but GraphQL-Codegen probably is the most important. The most notable feature is the gql-tag-operations plugin, which works like Babel macros.
People ❤️
Job burnout: How to spot it and take action
I had a conversation with a colleague recently about feeling stuck and having trouble concentrating. After reading this list of burnout symptoms from Mayo Clinic, I believe I am experiencing burnout. Have a look and take some action if necessary.
Why Don’t Tech Companies Pay Their Engineers to Stay?
I agree with the author that companies should match the impact of their employees regardless of their current salary. But I disagree that a longer tenure equals a larger impact. The tenured could lose enthusiasm and go on autopilot, and the fresh eyes could come up with creative solutions.
How To Measure Data Engineering Teams
Quantifying an engineering team’s performance will always be difficult. Still, this article gave me an idea: one set of metrics to track the quality of service (uptime, error rates, etc.) and another set of metrics to track the effectiveness of new feature work. These metrics then can be fed into this resourcing framework.
Business 💸
A look at Americans’ return to workplaces
Envoy, the company that does B2B building access management, published the statistics on how people return to the office.
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