Dear Medium Engineers,

We all have value systems: what we hold true, what we consider good, what we consider to be bad. These values define how we respond to situations and how we make decisions.

Our engineering organization is committed to the notion of distributed authority and individual empowerment; to facilitate this we need alignment around common values and goals. Because the alternative is to regress into command and control systems.

Given where we live, where we work, and how well we all get on, our values are already likely to be very well aligned. But as we grow this will be less obvious and harder to communicate.

This post lays out a set of engineering values that I have tried to discern from talking with and observing you all. They should influence how we make decisions and how we evolve and grow our Engineering Organization.

They are not immutable, help me refine them.

— Dan

Professional & personal growth is more important than team stability

• We want a fluid organization where engineers can work on different parts of the product and on different platforms.
• Roles are not static; we help people grow and change.
• Engineers will have input into product direction.
• Engineers will have input into which projects they work on.

Everyone is a mentor; human connection is the path to bringing out the best in people

• Face-to-face contact with the whole team is important.
• Every engineer should have regular 1:1s with a “manager”.
• Peer mentorship is promoted and encouraged.

Excellent teams require diversity & inclusiveness

• A diverse team is important (gender, ethnicity, personality type, experiences, skills, etc), it exposes us to new perspectives and ideas.
• We want a balance between continuity and variety with whom you work.
• Cliques and factions are harmful and corrosive.
• We give each other the benefit of the doubt.
• We will always remain civil.

Good leaders are active and supportive

• Junior engineers are given adequate support and guidance.
• Mid-level engineers are given opportunities that challenge them and allow them to grow; we should allow them to fail safely.
• Senior engineers will have varied opportunities for leadership: people management, technical leadership, product direction.
• Leadership comes in many forms.

Good engineers are rigorous and resolute

• Simple is better than clever.
• We try to be proactive over reactive.
• We value well-communicated, critical analysis of solutions.
• We use metrics to make good decisions, but aren’t beholden to them.
• We don’t require consensus, but do try to get people on the same page.

Pursuit of greatness is a virtue

• Quality and velocity are not diametrically opposed.
• Technology can enable design that hasn’t yet been imagined.
• Design may require technology that hasn’t yet been invented.
• We want to pave the way in how engineering teams operate and function.
• We want to inspire other engineering teams.
• Our team can be one of the best engineering teams.