It's interesting to see the security decisions decided by companies. Some value security over usability which can do more harm than good. Two examples... Example one: forcing users to manually type their password A bank I use does not allow me to autofill my password when I log in. I have to manually type it. That's right, I can't even...

Why are software companies so obsessed with dark mode? I saw an app the other day proudly announce in their release notes, their top feature, was the fact they now had dark mode. I have nothing against dark mode but I struggle to see why there’s so much excitement around supporting it. Dark mode makes me think of the old school develop...

Jason Fried made a great statement in a podcast I was listening to. The best way to become more uncertain about something is to ask one more person’s opinion. It’s a challenging thought that encourages me to make decisions without the need of including too many others. -Ben

I learned the other day something about handling my 5 year old son when he is really upset about something. If I try to distract him or downplay his reason for being upset, it can subconsciously teach him that it’s not good to show emotion. Instead I should do the opposite and show him it’s ok to be upset and to show emotion. I can sco...

One thing I’ve been trying to do this past year is to be more self aware. What I think about is a tell tail sign of what’s going on in my inner world. The Bible says to “take every thought captive” (2 Corinthians 10:5). Once a thought has been captured, I ponder whether the thought is truth. I also think about where the thought coming ...

I love this comic. It’s so true! “I’m Glad We All Agree by Jeff Patton” This comic reminds me why it’s so important that we write ideas up first to get everyone on the same page. Discussing verbally can be thwart with problems around everyone leaving a meeting thinking the same thing. Writing ideas up goes along way in saving time and ...

The true test of what one truly believes about themselves, others, the world is put on show based on what they do - their actions. Does what you believe match your actions? If not, maybe you don’t truly believe what you think you do. -Ben

I got this quote from The Manager’s Path book that I listened to back in 2021. What you measure, you improve. How does one improve something if they aren’t sure on the performance of it? This book is highly recommended for juniors all the way up to the leadership of an engineering department. Great quote! -Ben

I was listening to the 37signals founders today talking about some decisions they made around the recent Card Tables feature release. There was a quote DHH mentioned that resonated with me. Build less, don’t build worse. Often we half-ass build a feature just to get it out the door but it’s not at the level it should be. This statement...

Are you listening? I mean, really listening? Or are you thinking about what to say next, what’s for lunch or that thing you have to do later that day? If individuals really feel listened to, that can lead to them feeling understood. If they feel understood, they feel accepted. It’s a challenge to be a good listener in all conversations...

I was listening to the Good enough is fine podcast by the 37signals guys today and it really resonated with how I see software development today. If we aren’t careful, when making a decision for building or upgrading a feature in our applications, we can totally over bake and spend far more time on it than required. In the podcast epis...

A concept that has really been solidified in my mind over the past couple of years is the idea of time preference. As a millennial, it's obvious that my generation has a low-time preference. Delayed gratification is normally weeks or months instead of years or decades. This idea is being fed even more as inflation runs rampant and the ...

For those who call themselves a Christian, we are instructed to pray for those in authority over us (1 Timothy 2:1-2) and submit to governing authorities (Romans 13:1-7). The only time God permits us to disobey earthly authorities is when they require us to do something morally wrong or attempt to rule outside the realm of their author...

“Closing the loop” means to follow up or finalize a discussion with a customer, employee, or colleague. Businesses really flounder when someone (especially a leader) doesn't close the loop. Important discussions and decisions get delayed or forgotten about. People end up focusing on the wrong things when the loop isn't closed. Closing ...

We have an in-person all-in meeting here on the Gold Coast, Australia next month. We decided axe throwing could be fun (should I be nervous?) so I found a local place and wanted to contact them about a booking. I wanted to book in a group of 11 and see if I could split the group in two so we could go with a specific package. Since this...

Another comment in Ask Your Developer reminded me of something I’ve been thinking about for a while now as I’ve been CTO at Tithely. Coders are creative. I swear more than half the engineering department, including our Director of Engineering, Christian Helvin are musicians. Others love to draw or paint. Some are what you’d describe as...

I’m listening to the Ask Your Developer book and something the author Jeff Lawson said really resonated with me. “Business people should share problems, not solutions.” To me this includes Product Managers all the way up to C-level. I 100% agree to this point as it has been my experience. Developers are incredibly talented and when giv...

Yesterday I decided to switch my personal blog from a GitHub pages hosted Jekyll site to HEY World. Boy was that a good move. Being able to compose an “email” to write a blog post is amazing and I can do it directly from my phone which is what I’m doing right now. Writing has never been easier and I’m motivated to write more because th...

I've talked to close to 30 salespeople over the last few months as I've searched for some tooling for 2023. • 10% were really good • 20% were really bad • everyone else were pretty (less than) average salespeople And I'm talking to some big billion-dollar tech companies. Why do I care? Because if I can't effectively communicate my need...

The last 2 years have been a whirlwind for me and my family with our baby girl being born 14 weeks early (she’s doing well 16 months on), the ongoing health crisis, and all the mental battles that come along with a crazy life. But I’m back baby and wanted to share something a little different. Today’s topic is money. In 2021 I went dow...

Building software is hard. It’s an uphill battle and you need endurance as the software matures. Building software is also super satisfying and such an amazing adventure, especially when you start seeing momentum as well as a multitude of happy customers. I think the best software companies aren’t the ones who write the best code but t...

We have been using Domain-Driven Design and Hexagonal Architecture for several years in both legacy and newer products we are building. This post is dedicated to why we use Domain-Driven Design and Hexagonal Architecture. One of our engineers, Josh McRae made the call all those years ago to utilize these approaches and I’m glad we did....

Something on my mind at the moment is the importance of engagement, especially in a distributed workplace. The people who are going to do really well at distributed work are those who engage. What do I mean when I say “engage”? • Participate in your team and company wide meetings. • Communicate to your internal team effectively. • Comm...

I’ll admit, when I started my first company 9 years ago, security wasn’t something that crossed my mind. I just wanted to build great software and fast. I think a lot of start-ups have this same mentality. Get the product out the door and worry about “all the things” later. This article talks about some of the things start-ups should b...

I’ve read Jason Fried’sbooks and really like them. I’ve known about his software Basecamp for years but always thought of it as some project management tool I’d never need. Boy was I wrong. Basecamp to me isn’t a project management tool anymore. Basecamp is a communication platform. And it comes with a philosophy around how we should c...

No matter who you are, a leader, a peer, a follower, valuing someone by encouraging them is big. Whether you’re all in the same room, on the other side of the office or working remotely, it’s quite easy to fail to remember to encourage those around you. Some people are just natural encouragers. Others, like me, not so much. Some people...

We started rolling out Scrum across our engineering team this year and we’ve seen some great success so far. When building software, the “when will it be finished” question is always looming in the face of Product Owners. Attaching deadlines to Scrum is possible. It can, however, be complicated when it comes to committing to meet those...

Onboarding engineers is generally an afterthought for most engineering teams. When you start a project you’re not thinking about how new people are going to be introduced in the future. It’s one of those things I think everyone wants to spend time on but let’s face it, we are too busy coding. This post talks about some practical ways y...

After being acquired by Tithe.ly, a 100% remote company, my team from Elvanto in the last 12 months has gone from everyone in the office to almost all working remotely. I wanted to share our journey in this post. The idea of having remote employees is super scary for most employers. Questions start to roll around in our brains thinking...

Before working at Tithe.ly, I was a little old school at my company Elvanto where everyone worked in the office. Now that I’m at Tithe.ly, they’ve introduced me to the world of remote — and I absolutely love it! I’ll do a write up on switching from traditional office space to working remotely in another post. But for now, I wanted to t...