Structure before effort
When a team slows down, the cause is almost never how hard people are working. It is usually where a boundary was drawn, or who is allowed to decide.
About
Abhishek
Vice President, Engineering
I have spent the better part of two decades in engineering — first building systems, then building the teams that build them. Today I lead engineering at [company], where I am responsible for [scope: platform, headcount, business lines].
Most of my time goes to three things: setting technical direction that survives contact with a roadmap, designing organisations that can absorb change without stalling, and developing the people who will do this job after me.
I write here to think that through in public. The pieces are longer than a post and shorter than a book, and they are aimed at people doing this job rather than people describing it.
How I think
Three things I keep coming back to
Not a philosophy. Just the patterns that have held up across enough organisations to trust.
Decisions over frameworks
Frameworks travel badly between organisations. Judgement travels — knowing which problems are structural, which are temporary, and which need someone to be told the truth.
Context is an asset
An engineer who has lived with a system for two years holds a map that exists nowhere else. Most reorganisations write that asset off without ever recording it.
Background
Where I have worked
The short version. The longer one is on LinkedIn.
- [2021 — present]
[Vice President, Engineering] [Company]
[What you own, and what changed because you were there.]
- [2016 — 2021]
[Senior Director, Engineering] [Company]
[One line.]
- [2011 — 2016]
[Engineering Manager] [Company]
[One line.]
- [2004 — 2011]
[Software Engineer] [Company]
[One line.]
Working on the same problems?
I am glad to hear from engineering leaders, founders and anyone who disagrees with something I have written.