#Technical Leadership

Posts on leading through technical judgment, standards, and architectural influence.

April 2, 20269 min read

Trial By Fire

Teams spend months hiring a strong candidate. Sourcing, interviews, debriefs, approvals, compensation, notice period. Everyone treats the hire like a serious investment. Then th...

March 19, 20267 min read

Why Headcount Math Lies

In 1911, Frederick Winslow Taylor published and helped cement one of management’s oldest instincts. In simple terms, break work into measurable units, optimize for efficiency, a...

March 16, 20268 min read

Capacity Is the Roadmap

When I was young, I worked in carpentry during the summers. Summer was busy. New buildings had to go up. Stables needed repairs. Barns needed extensions. Sheds had to be built o...

March 13, 20268 min read

The Roadmap Is Not the System

A few years ago, my father decided to build a house in the . On the surface, it was easy to like the idea. A quiet place. A porch. A garden. Somewhere to disappear for a while....

February 10, 202612 min read

What Good Looks Like

A few companies back, my manager and I inherited a group of teams after layoffs. Confidence was already low. People didn't believe in the systems we maintained. Stakeholders los...

October 5, 20253 min read

Managers Have Been Vibe Coding All Along

Everyone’s been talking about vibe coding lately. I’ve been doing it myself. two projects. and . It’s the kind of work where you don’t analyze, architect, or overthink. You star...

October 3, 202510 min read

Stop Wasting Brainpower

How many times have you found yourself saying: “I worked all day, but I didn’t get anything done.” I know, we have all been there. We feel bad about it, too. On the surface, it...

September 17, 202512 min read

Climbing No More

Engineers have been reaching a common ceiling in their careers for decades. The pattern goes like this: an individual contributor gets promoted to a senior software engineer, an...

August 1, 202510 min read

Technical Deep Dives

When someone asks for a technical deep dive, they don’t care if . They want proof that you actually understand the beast you’ve built. Can you walk me through the system like yo...

February 14, 20258 min read

Bridging the Management Disconnect

I’ve seen this happen over and over. A successful engineer . They are eager to build great teams and support their people. They know some of the leaders before didn't do that. T...

July 30, 20248 min read

From Engineer to Manager

I often get asked whether someone should transition into management. In the past, this might have been the only viable growth path. However, in most large organizations today, t...

January 24, 20247 min read

Handling Competitive Dynamics

A healthy level of competition can fuel innovation, drive individuals to excel, and push teams to achieve remarkable results. However, when competition crosses the line and beco...

January 9, 20245 min read

Should Dev Managers Code?

As someone who's been navigating the world of software development for a while, I often think about what it really means to be a good development manager. It's a bit like being...

November 26, 20234 min read

Bireysel Katılımcılar ve Yöneticiler

İş hayatında sıkça karşılaştığımız yöneticilik(management) ve bireysel katılımcı (BK / individual contributor) rolleri, aslında birer yaşam tarzını temsil eder. Bu iki rol, kişi...

November 25, 20237 min read

Leading from Where You Are

When we were building Areca, a realtime billing engine for Turk Telekom, we were a small team competing against giants like Amdocs. They had the brand recognition, the scale, an...

November 16, 20235 min read

Coding in Leadership

When you start coding, you start the adventure. It feels like unlocking a new world of logic and creativity. From programming classes where we tried to solve pyramid programs to...

November 6, 202315 min read

Becoming a Rockstar Engineer

In the software development realm, people often debate about 10x engineers or rockstars. But what does that really mean? How can you become one? There isn’t an easy answer, but...

June 12, 202214 min read

System Design Interviewing Tips

System design interviews are inherently subjective. Outcomes depend on many factors, including the backgrounds of both the interviewer and the candidate. Even if both have exper...

February 7, 202212 min read

Building a Technical Vision

A technical vision is the compass of an engineering organization. It sets the longterm direction. I believe it should define the "why" and "where" behind the technical choices t...

January 13, 20224 min read

Manager as a Service

What would a manager as a service look like? What kind of systems would a manager resemble? How can you describe a manager’s responsibility through various systems? Here’s my ta...

December 31, 20208 min read

Risk Comes First

You probably saw many cliché stuff about risking everything. Not risking is the biggest risk and all. While there is a truth to that, risk needs to be an appetite. Remember what...

September 28, 201912 min read

Yazılım Mühendisliği Kariyer Merdiveni

Yazılım şirketleri, mühendislik mesleği seviyelerini dikkatlice oluşturmalı ve çalışanlardan ne beklendiğini, roller arasındaki farkı ve kariyer gelişimi için alanları açıklayan...

December 25, 20176 min read

How Teams Choose Language

Choosing a programming language is one of the most defining decisions in software development. It shapes how a team writes, maintains, and reasons about their system. Today, the...

July 25, 20168 min read

Who needs an Architect?

An architect? According to Wikipedia, an architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. So, we obviously have derived the role from civil...