The Software Architects' Newsletter June 2024

[InfoQ Live Logo] The Software Architects' Newsletter June 2024 [View in browser]( Welcome to the InfoQ Software Architects' Newsletter! Each month, we bring you essential news and experience on emerging patterns and technologies from industry peers. This month, we focus on "Architects, Distinguished Engineers, and Staff Plus: The Evolution of Technical Careers". Roles, patterns, and practices from this topic span the entire "diffusion of innovation" graphs in our April 2024 reports: [InfoQ Software Architecture and Design Trends Report]( and [InfoQ Culture & Methods Trends Report](. Key challenges remain, including how to build your career and that of the people around you that you lead, mentor, or sponsor. News Fostering Healthy Tech Teams in a DevOps World Building healthy DevOps-focused teams responsible for a broad area can be challenging, [Brittany Woods argued at QCon London](. Several frameworks, such as DORA and SPACE, provide metrics indicating team health to measure success. These can help ensure the team is moving in a positive direction. Psychological safety matters for healthy teams to ensure each software engineer brings their own lived experiences to build better products. Use Engineering Strategy to Reduce Friction and Improve Developer Experience [Will Larson](, an experienced CTO and author of "[An Elegant Puzzle](", discussed the [problems that engineering strategy solves]( in this QCon SF talk recording. He provided examples of fundamental engineering strategies, guidelines on rolling out engineering strategies, and troubleshooting why a strategy rollout isn’t working. Transitioning from a Software Engineering Role into a Management Role Software engineers who want to become good at leading engineers [can use everyday opportunities to practice management](. [Peter Gillard-Moss]( gave a talk at QCon London, where he shared his experience with becoming a manager and provided tips and ideas for engineers aiming to become managers. Gillard-Moss suggested that engineers who want to be good at leading engineers should "practice in the small". He said there are everyday opportunities for engineers to practice management. You don't need authority. Many engineers who end up as engineering managers are often spotted because they are showing flares of management in their teams. Addressing the Gender Imbalance in Technical Leadership In this Engineering Culture by InfoQ podcast, [Shane Hastie]( spoke to [Neria Yashar]( about [overcoming the gender imbalances in engineering](, especially in leadership roles. There is still a huge imbalance around women in engineering management roles, and there are concrete things that organizations can do to encourage and enable more diversity. Yashar argued that awareness is the starting point for addressing the imbalances and inherent biases. Men must stand up as allies and recognize when bias is showing up. She also stated that growth and learning only happen when people leave their comfort zones. Sponsored [2024 NoSQL Database Trend Report - Sponsored by RavenDB]( [2024 NoSQL Database Trend Report]( In this report, we’ll discuss 5 key trends we are seeing in the NoSQL space, drawing on data from the StackOverflow 2023 Developer Survey and the JetBrains 2023 Developer Ecosystem, which both offer insights into how developers use databases with their technology stack. We’ll examine the current usage breakdown between relational and non-relational databases, highlight where NoSQL solutions tend to fit into the picture, and more. Download the whitepaper “[2024 NoSQL Database Trend Report](”, sponsored by RavenDB Case Study Accelerating Technical Decision-Making by Empowering ICs with Engineering Strategy Maintaining communication channels between individual contributors (ICs), managers, and executives is vital as organizations grow. This article explores how Carta has harnessed the power of a small group of senior engineers to bridge the gap between global strategy and local decision-making. This group is called the "Navigators". [Dan Fike](, Carta's CTO, and [Shawna Martell](, a Senior Staff Engineer at Carta, explain how they [combine a written engineering strategy with the Navigators](, who help teams interpret the engineering strategy within their domains. (An [InfoQ podcast]( on this topic is also available.) Navigators replace a need for consensus and boost velocity by combining technical context, domain context, strategic alignment, and judgment to make engineering decisions quickly. Carta has 12 Navigators for a ~400-person engineering organization. Those Navigators are directly accountable to the CTO. They maintain a one-to-many relationship between Navigators and Engineering teams. Every team is in scope for exactly one Navigator, so there’s never uncertainty about who the Navigator is for a given project. These Navigators serve three sets of people in different ways. First, they serve the engineers and managers on their assigned teams. Navigators are engineers and members of the same teams they serve. They have and maintain a clear understanding of their team’s work and challenges. They balance that with the company's needs and challenges more holistically to make decisions locally that minimize disruption to the team while optimizing for the company. Second, they serve the engineering executive. While Navigators exist as engineers within the company's standard org chart, they also sit near the root of a hypothetical second "influence org chart". They connect directly to an executive and act as influential multipliers to carry the executive's voice deep into the org chart. In turn, they can also carry the voice of engineers up to the executive. This shortcut of information flow does not relieve directors and managers from doing similar work; instead, they tend to cover different (though overlapping) sets of information and context that are key to making good decisions at all levels. This plays out in situations like roadmap planning. A navigator's technical knowledge can help them identify dependencies that might not be immediately obvious to management or the product. Finally, the Navigators serve each other. While they don't operate as a collective or committee, they support each other with additional context, perspective, or feedback. They'll also often collaborate to make decisions that intersect multiple projects or teams. This content is an excerpt from a recent InfoQ article by Ben Linders, "[Accelerating Technical Decision-Making by Empowering ICs with Engineering Strategy](". A podcast on the same topic is also available: "[Decentralizing Decision Making with Shawna Martell & Dan Fike](". To get notifications when InfoQ publishes content on these topics, follow "[Leadership](", "[Team Collaboration](", and "[Staff Plus](" on InfoQ. Missed a newsletter? You can find all of the [previous issues]( on InfoQ. Sponsored [Decoding Microservices: Best Practices Handbook for Developers - Sponsored by Camunda]( [Decoding Microservices: Best Practices Handbook for Developers]( Microservices architectures must be loosely coupled, but they must also communicate effectively to execute at the proper time and in the correct way. Check out the ebook to learn how to avoid this and many other challenges by following best practices. Download the ebook “[Decoding Microservices: Best Practices Handbook for Developers](”, sponsored by Camunda Upcoming Events InfoQ and QCon: For practitioners, by practitioners [InfoQ Dev Summit Munich (Sept 26-27)]( We’re excited to share the full line up of senior software practitioner speakers have been confirmed for InfoQ Dev Summit Munich. Join senior software leaders from Deliveroo, GitLab, Porsche, Siemens, SAP, Deutsche Telekom and more. Learn actionable insights on today's critical dev priorities. [See all speakers](. [QCon San Francisco 2024 (Nov 18-22)]( All 12 tracks and early talks have been announced for QCon San Francisco (Nov 18-22). Take a look at the innovator and early adopter trends identifited by the QCon San Francisco programming committee. [Explore Tracks](. [QCon London 2025 (Apr 7-9)]( QCon London returns April 7-9, 2025! Save your place with our special launch pricing until August 25. Teams of 10+ can get our biggest team saving today. [Register](. About InfoQ Senior software developers rely on the InfoQ community to keep ahead of the adoption curve. One of the main reasons software architects and engineers tell us they keep coming back to InfoQ is because they trust the information provided and selected by their peers. We’ve been helping software development teams adopt new technologies and practices for over 15 years through InfoQ articles, news items, podcasts, tech talks, trends reports, and QCon software development conferences. We hope you find this newsletter useful. If not, you can unsubscribe using the link below. [Unsubscribe]( Forwarded email? Subscribe and get your own copy. [Subscribe](   Follow InfoQ on: [Twitter]( [Facebook]( [Youtube]( [LinkedIn]( You have received this email because you subscribed to "The Architects' Newsletter". To stop receiving the Architects' Newsletter, please click the following link: [Unsubscribe]( - - - C4Media Inc. 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