Joel KempAs a Senior engineer, how do I motivate my teammates to work harder?If you’re an engineer motivated to maximize your impact, or if you’ve come from a company that had a faster delivery pace, it can be…Sep 20, 20232Sep 20, 20232
Joel KempAs a Senior engineer, how do I know if I’m operating at the Staff level?When you’re a senior-level engineer (i.e., focused on being impactful in a single team), it’s hard to tell how far you are from being…Aug 16, 20232Aug 16, 20232
Joel KempAs a teamless Staff+ engineer, how do you avoid feeling lonely?From what I’ve seen, Staff+ engineers are usually heavily involved in a team/squad, or are squadless. If you’re newly squadless (and want…Mar 2, 2023Mar 2, 2023
Joel KempAs a Staff+ engineer, when do you get pulled into a new project?Non-Staff Engineers are typically pulled into a project once an initiative already has-buy in and needs to be technically detailed for…Feb 8, 2023Feb 8, 2023
Joel KempAs a Staff+ engineer, when do you step in?As a Staff+ engineer that opens up opportunities for Senior+ engineers to lead, it can be hard to know when to step in (ideally without…Feb 3, 2023Feb 3, 2023
Joel KempHow Staff+ engineers can benefit from lurking in many chat roomsThis post assumes you’re working in an environment with heavy use of chat applications. If the majority of your team collaborates in…Jan 20, 2023Jan 20, 2023
Joel KempAs a Staff+ engineer leading multi-team projects, when do you code?A coworker asked me this question and I thought my answer could be helpful to others struggling with the same ambiguity (though biased to…Jan 13, 2023Jan 13, 2023
Joel KempStaff+ engineering archetypes at SpotifyI haven’t seen it written about much publicly, but I deeply connect with and often use the Spotify Staff+ engineering archetypes when…Jan 13, 20232Jan 13, 20232
Joel KempPhrasing your impact in promotion packetsI see a lot of engineers struggle with phrasing their impact in promotion packets. I think the same problem could manifest itself in 1:1…Jan 9, 2023Jan 9, 2023
Joel KempArchitect thinking: Peeking into the product’s futureI have this habit of asking product managers questions about whether or not customers will need a particular feature in the future. Product…Nov 15, 2022Nov 15, 2022
