Interviews and Resources for Engineering Managers and Leaders
Where are you located?
Napa Valley, California. I recently moved to Napa after decades in Marin, just north of San Francisco. My company has a small office in Las Vegas, but I work primarily out of my home office in Napa and travel to San Francisco, Silicon Valley, etc. as necessary for conferences, meetings, and consulting engagements.
What is your current role?
Founder and CEO of Wanderful, Inc. – we publish interactive storybook Apps for iOS and Android tablets and phones,
Current role: Host, Coaching for Leaders podcast
Location: Orange County, California
What is your background and how did you get into management?
I had the privilege of managing lots of part-time staff in college (poorly, I might add). I discovered early on that while I did not naturally manage well, I had a desire to get better in order to help others grow.
In my first full-time job,
Location: New York City
Current role: Director of Engineering at VTS
What’s your background and how did you get into management?
I come from a software engineering background, but I’ve always had a passion for product and business. I’m a serial entrepreneur: I co-founded BillMonk in 2005 (tracks informal debt between friends, like roommates splitting bills; company was sold to Obopay) and the I co-founded Precision Polling in 2010 (self-serve IVR phone surveys;
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Current Role: Director of Engineering at Stitch Fix
What’s your background and how did you get into management?
I’m a programmer. I always liked computers and from the time I was a kid, I thought programming was just the coolest thing.
I went to school for comp sci, then got a job at a big defense contractor, because if you graduate with a comp sci degree in the DC area that’s just what you do.
Location: San Francisco and Seattle
Current role: Consultant, making software development hum: interim VP engineering, VPE consultation to senior leaders, team practices assessment, agile and scrum training for leaders and teams, VPE / CTO / CIO / director of engineering coaching.
It was six years ago that I struck out on my own as a consultant to untangle the knots in software development, after 25 years doing pretty much the same as a manager,
Location: San Fransisco Bay Area
Current Role: Sr. Director, Engineering/Acting Head of Engineering
What’s your background and how did you get into management?
I started my career as a Software Engineer back in India and moved to the United States to get my Masters degree in Computer Science and AI/ML. I continued my career as an individual contributor for a few years in a small company which had a very flat structure.
Location: Vancouver, BC
Current Role: Director of Engineering
What’s your background and how did you get into management?
My background is completely liberal – I studied Economics and Philosophy and am a self-taught developer! I really loved coding and building little websites and that’s how I got into software (and web) development. I was a web developer for a while and joined Buffer as a full-stack engineer, but transitioned to an engineering manager in my first six months on the team.
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Current Role: Senior Director at Groupon running orders and payments and common engineering team.
What is your background and how did you get into management?
I started my career as an engineer at Amazon in payments many years ago. After a few years in the role, I started to have more leadership responsibilities. One day my manager pulled me into his office and asked me,
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Current Role: Director of Engineering at Teradata
What’s your background and how did you get into management?
I am a technologist at heart, with a startup mindset.
Currently, I oversee key aspects of Analytics Ecosystem and Platform at Teradata, a leading provider of business analytics and data solutions.
Before joining Teradata, I worked for some of the largest technology companies such as Adobe,
Location: Toronto, Canada
Current role: Co-Founder, CTO of Mitterra Ecommerce Solutions and Author of This is Professional Services blog
What is your background and how did you get into management?
I’ve always been a people person. My academic background is a blend of business and tech tech: mathematics, information sciences, and organizational theory, though I contribute my multi-disciplinary background to a complete lack of focus. I just couldn’t choose so I decided to do them all.
