StaffEng

Dec 28 2021 22 ep. 46 mins 272

StaffEng Podcast artwork

Conversations with software engineers who have progressed beyond the career level, into Staff levels and beyond. We discuss the areas of work that set Staff-plus level engineers apart from other individual contributors; things like setting technical direction, mentorship and sponsorship, providing engineering perspective to the org, etc.Hosted by David Noël-Romas (@davidnoelromas) and Alex Kessinger (@voidfiles).

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Alex Kessinger (Stitch Fix) and David Noël-Romas (Stripe)

Dec 28 2021 67 mins

This episode is a celebration of the journey we have been on as this podcast comes to a close. We have had such a great time bringing you these interviews and we are excited about a new chapter, taking the lessons we have learned forward into different spaces. It's been a lot of work putting this show together, but it has also been such a pleasure doing it. And, as we all know, not

Peter Stout (Netflix)

Dec 14 2021 52 mins

The structures of an organization can often be self-reinforcing, and in a changing environment, this becomes a recipe for future vulnerabilities. That is why senior ICs need to play a slightly discordant role at times by alerting teams to issues conventionally outside of their bubble of concern. Peter Stout is a Technical Director at Netflix where he has a cross-functional role at

James Cowling (Convex)

Nov 30 2021 48 mins

Often the biggest impacts a Staff Engineer can make in their organization are not technical but rather people-related. When teams are value-aligned due to good leadership, they go on to make larger impacts than they would otherwise have. As Senior Principal Engineer at Dropbox for almost a decade, James Cowling learned a lot about how people think and work together, and he joins us

Bryan Berg (Stripe)

Nov 16 2021 50 mins

Staff engineers may not get much time to code anymore, but this does not mean problem-solving and system design is not an integral part of their day-to-day. Today’s guest is Bryan Berg, Staff Engineer at Stripe, and he joins us to talk about the nuances of his position and his unique approach to the many challenges it entails. As a Staff Engineer, Bryan acts as Tech Lead of the T

Ben Ilegbodu (Stitch Fix)

Nov 02 2021 35 mins

Today we talk to Ben Ilegbodu, Principal Frontend Engineer at Stitch Fix, about how he manages to stay close to the code at a senior level. We hear how he arrived at Stitch Fix and what his first tasks were to identify the pain points in customer teams. From getting the IC's on his side to learning the importance of marketing your ideas to upper management, Ben talks us through his

Ashby Winch

Oct 19 2021 40 mins

Moving from an architect role to a product-oriented one might seem like a big leap, but there are overlaps between the two roles. Today's guest, Ashby Winch, has recently made this transition, and in today's episode, they share what this has been like. Up until recently, Ashby was an architect, with their most senior role at a large logistics operation in the U.K. Now, they have sh

Josh Kaderlan (Lob)

Oct 05 2021 33 mins

Today’s guest is Josh Kaderlan, Staff Software Engineer at Lob, a direct mail and address verification API company that automates and simplifies direct mail and address verification, giving businesses greater flexibility, visibility, and accuracy of offline communications and data. There are so many different and non-traditional paths to becoming a staff engineer and, in today’

Ben Edmunds (Wayfair)

Sep 21 2021 43 mins

During today’s conversation, we speak with Ben Edmunds, Senior Staff Engineer at Wayfair. You’ll hear all about his role at Wayfair, from his day-to-day active projects and how he goes about setting OKRs to the legacy and new deploy tooling he uses, and the method he has adopted to guide engineers. Ben shares ample advice for young engineers and stresses the value of learning m

Nell Shamrell-Harrington (Microsoft)

Sep 07 2021 42 mins

Today’s guest is a principal software engineer at Microsoft who works at the interface between external and internal elements of the organization. Nell Shamrell-Harrington works on the ClearlyDefined open source project, which tracks open source licenses across open source ecosystems, and is also part of the Rust Foundation's Board of Directors. In today’s episode, you’ll hea

Rich Lafferty (PagerDuty)

Aug 24 2021 49 mins

Oscillating between the roles of individual contributor and management has been a recurring theme on this show. Our guest today, Rich Lafferty, has some special insights into this pattern that can help anyone looking to improve their work. Rich works as a Staff Site Reliability Engineer at PagerDuty and has spent many years interfacing with various departments and building projects