Learn to accept risks and live by them. Removing every possible risk results in bland, uninspired work that aims to offend no one.

De-risking everything makes you ship average shit. The fear of failure and making mistakes leads to a culture where safety and mediocrity become the norm. You’re left with something so sanitized that it fails to compete, yet you think it is great.

You should be embracing risks, not removing them.

If you find something broken, ask ‘why’ instead of ‘who’. Then, fix it and move on.

‘Who’ involves blame and diverts energy from progress. Instead of indulging in ego, channel your efforts into the repairs.

Taking responsibility in silence is a testament to leadership and sets a precedent for others.

I’ve never met anyone who burned out from working too much on something they love.

Burnout isn’t about the hours. It’s about the soul-crushing feeling of being undervalued and overwhelmed by things that don’t matter – the bureaucracy, the finger-pointing, the lack of autonomy, and endless processes.

You weren’t hired to be a menu; you were hired to make things happen. Presenting multiple solutions to every problem doesn’t move things forward; it just creates noise and unnecessary debate.

If you’re at a restaurant, options are great. But when you know the best approach, offering bogus choices is just plain stupid. You know what to do, so stop waffling around.

“Prove me wrong, and I’ll change my mind” is a shitty approach.

Teamwork isn’t about winning arguments or proving points. It’s about collaboration, trust, and mutual respect. When you set up a discussion with the premise of proving someone wrong (you included), you’re creating a hostile environment. It’s combative, not cooperative. It wears people down and discourages participation.

“It will just take you five minutes” is one of the most toxic lines you can hear.

Nothing ever takes “just five minutes”. You might spend the time tweaking a color or writing a line of code, but work doesn’t happen in a vacuum. There are context switches, interruptions, back-and-forth discussions, and, more importantly, the mental overhead of getting out and back to your zone.

I take everything personally and don’t trust anyone who says they don’t. It’s either a lie or a sign that they don’t care enough. Emotional detachment is often seen as a strength, but it’s often an excuse for mediocrity.

Standards made sense 100 years ago. Efficiency and consistency were vital then. Today, they often don’t fit.

You need strict standards to build a plane, but Rock wouldn’t exist if Chuck Berry hadn’t tried the unconventional. Read full post “Try the unconventional” →

When you get into a new car, you adjust the seat. Most people raise it to see the hood and the nearest part of the road. It feels like control. But we all ignore that raising the seat reduces our field of view, and we see less of what’s on the road far ahead. Read full post “Lower your seat” →

Setting office hours is a pretentious practice from the nineteen-twenties. It’s an attempt to seem accessible while dictating when you can be bothered. Your team doesn’t operate on your clock, and your office hours are just another way to say your calendar is more important than them.