Yes you can measure engineering
Jade shares how he likes to measure the value delivery of engineering organizations using the ValueSum metric.
Jade Rubick - Engineering Leadership
Engineering leadership blog by Jade Rubick
Latest posts
How to think about span of control
Understand the tradeoffs of team size and span of control for managers
Written culture is higher leverage
A written culture is higher leverage than it used to be.
How to reason about reliability risk
Outlines an approach to reasoning about reliability risk
Should QA exist
There are a lot of challenges in the way QA and engineering work together. Many eng leaders think you shouldn't have QA. I dig in.
Adding innovation labs
Covers advice for setting up innovation labs in companies, pointing out a lot of the dangers and opportunities.
First agree on the tradeoffs
Jade outlines an approach to getting people with strong disagreements to agree
Calendar rules I learned from an EA
Calendar rules I learned from an executive assistant and colleagues
Some AI surprises in late 2025
Jade shares some observations of things he is seeing that seem unusual or aren't being talked about
Getting out of thrash mode
What do you do when you are too busy to do anything?
Reducing dependencies
At a certain size, organizational dependencies will kill you. Here's a menu of options to fix it.
Some shoulds for strategy
Jade shares some observations of what you need in good strategies.
Don't make your engineering team commit
Commitments trade slower velocity for higher predictability. Is that what you really want?
Piles point out your problems aka why your AI coding is slowing things down
Piles can be a sign of where your problems are. The theory of constraints and why piles are important.
The Campsite Rule
Leave it better than you found it: the campsite rule for engineering teams and organizations
Reflecting power - using power you don't have
I talk about the concept of reflecting power, which is leveraging other people's power and authority.
Product management resources
I share some resources for product managers.
How to develop a sixth sense for the long-term
We talk about some simple techniques to judge the long term trends of a situation.
Task Forces can solve (some of) your cross-functional challenges
We talk through how to use a task force to cut through thorny cross-functional challenges.
Reliability is all stick, no carrot
The reliability space is all stick, no carrot. Here are some ways to produce good results anyway
Your team may need a Hero Rotation
Why your engineering team may need a hero rotation to combine focus and responsiveness
Massively multiplayer retrospectives
How to run a massively multiplayer retrospective
Tiny Thursdays
How to prioritize lots of small things FTW
Why and how to do skip level 1-1s
I share what I've learned about doing skip level 1-1s.
Don't repeat incidents
I share an approach to gradually increasing the reliability of a software development organization, without over or underinvesting in reliability
How to avoid being a bottleneck leader
How to remove yourself from being a bottleneck as a leader
Organizational work and the second job
Organizational work is how to make an organization get better over time, instead of the opposite.
Macho leadership and bro culture
We explore macho leadership and bro culture, how to identify and respond to them, the risks they pose, and techniques for navigating these environments.
Managing a bottleneck team
Feel like your team is the bottleneck? Learn how to address the challenges of managing a bottleneck team.
The danger of fan out work
Fan out work spreads tasks across many teams, leading to hidden, externalized costs and poor incentives. We explore the issue and potential solutions.
Strategy pitfalls (on the Level Up podcast)
I was interviewed on the Level Up podcast. This is a summary of that interview.
Evil staging and gauntlet programs, tools to increase your software reliability
Evil staging and gauntlet programs are chaos engineering inspired, systemic approaches to improve software reliability.
The dangers of unreliable platforms (on the SRE Path podcast)
I was interviewed for the SRE Path podcast. This is a summary of that interview.
Velocity role 4 - the Nowist
This post explores an archetype that makes teams faster -- the Nowist. They move everything towards the present.
Velocity role 3 - the Dodger
This post explores an archetype that makes teams faster -- the Dodger. They dodge obstacles.
Velocity role 2 - the Mole
This post explores an archetype that makes teams faster -- the Mole. They give you intel.
Velocity role 1 - the Subtractionist
This post explores an archetype that makes teams faster -- the Subtractionist. They simplify everything.
Group leadership coaching
Jade Rubick runs group leadership coaching sessions. Sign up if you're interested in learning more.
Organizational danger zones
Organizations have two danger zones they go through as they grow. I describe when they happen, what to watch out for, and how to solve them.
The best approach I've seen for hiring junior engineers
I share a wonderful writeup by John Hyland on the best program I've ever seen for hiring junior engineers
Tactical advice for building effective eng teams, anti-patterns to avoid (Snack bites podcast)
I was interviewed for the Software Snack Bites podcast. This is a summary of that interview.
A detailed look at FaST agile -- a practice well worth your time
An introduction to FaST, describing how it works and what the tradeoffs of adopting it are
Curious about becoming an executive consultant?
I share what I've learned about being a leadership consultant
The ultimate playbook for hiring engineering managers - a step-by-step guide
I share a complete guide to how to hire engineering managers, including a sample interview plan
The secret to holding a candidate review meeting that isn't boring as hell
Avoid the typical boring candidate review meeting, where everyone summarizes their feedback. Instead, use this surprisingly effective approach!
How an executive advisor can help you grow faster and navigate unfamiliar terrain
An executive advisor can help you grow faster and navigate unfamiliar terrain. This post summarizes how to evaluate advisors and what rates to pay for their services
Steel threads are a technique that will make you a better engineer
Steel Threads are a powerful but obscure software design approach. Learning about Steel Threads will make you a better engineer. You can use them to avoid common problems like integration pain. And you can use them to cut through the complexity of system design.
Solving cross-team priorities with a Product Council - an experience report
Jade shares an experience report on the use of a Product Council to solve executive alignment on product direction, and cross-team execution challenges.
A history of Mini-Ms
A history of Mini-Ms -- how this innovative practice came to be.
High trust and low trust organizations
Comparison of the differences between high trust and low trust organizations.