Best Tacho Podcasts (2024)

1
Exploring Developer Productivity with AI: Insights from Airbnb, GitHub, and Jumio 35:25

28m ago35:25

35:25

In this week's episode, Abi is joined by industry leaders Idan Gazit from GitHub, Anna Sulkina from Airbnb, and Alix Melchy from Jumio. Together, they discuss the impact of GenAI tools on developer productivity, exploring challenges in measurement and enhancement. They delve into AI's evolving role in engineering, from overcoming friction points to…

1
How SiriusXM revamped their platform and developer experience | Jared Wolinsky 40:58

1M ago40:58

40:58

In this week's episode, Abi welcomes Jared Wolinsky, Vice President of Platform Engineering at SiriusXM, to delve into the inner workings of platform engineering at SiriusXM. Jared sheds light on their innovative approach to prioritizing projects, emphasizing alignment with overarching business goals. They explore how these strategies boost develop…

1
Developer Experience at American Express | Michelle Swartz (American Express) 45:00

1M ago45:00

45:00

In this episode, Michelle Swartz, Vice president of Developer Enablement American Express, shares insights on improving developer experience. She discusses the creation of an onboarding bootcamp and the development of the AmEx Way Library for better knowledge management. Michelle explains how AmEx balances standardization and flexibility with the c…

1
DORA, SPACE, and DevEx: Choosing the right framework | Laura Tacho + Abi Noda 39:35

2M ago39:35

39:35

This week’s episode is a recording from a recent event hosted by Abi Noda (CEO of DX) and Laura Tacho (CTO at DX). The episode begins with an overview of the DORA, SPACE, and DevEx frameworks, including where they overlap and common misconceptions about each. Laura and Abi discuss the advantages and drawbacks of each framework, then discuss how to …

1
The science behind DORA | Derek DeBellis (Google) 47:50

2M ago47:50

47:50

In this week's episode, we welcome Derek DeBellis, lead researcher on Google's DORA team, for a deep dive into the science and methodology behind DORA's research. We explore Derek's background, his role at Google, and how DORA intersects with other research disciplines. Derek takes us through DORA's research process step by step, from defining outc…

1
How Slack fully automates deploys and anomaly detection with Z-scores | Sean Mcllroy (Slack) 33:49

3M ago33:49

33:49

This week we’re joined by Sean Mcllroy from Slack’s Release Engineering team to learn about how they’ve fully automated their deployment process. This conversation covers Slack’s original release process, key changes Sean’s team has made, and the latest challenges they’re working on today. Discussion points: (1:34): The Release Engineering team (2:…

1
What’s up with internal developer portals? | Chris Westerhold (Thoughtworks) 36:13

3M ago36:13

36:13

This week’s episode is the recording of a live conversation between Abi and Chris Westerhold (Thoughtworks Head of Developer Experience). This conversation is useful for anyone early in their journey with developer portals or platforms: Abi and Chris discuss common approaches to solving these problems, pitfalls to avoid, building vs. buying, and mo…

1
10 years of driving developer productivity at Yelp | Kent Wills (Yelp) 45:14

4M ago45:14

45:14

On this week's episode, Abi interviews Kent Wills, Director of Engineering Effectiveness at Yelp. He shares insights into the evolution of their developer productivity efforts over the past decade. From tackling challenges with their monolithic architecture to scaling productivity initiatives for over 1,300 developers. Kent also touches on his expe…

1
How “instructional engineers” improve developer onboarding at Splunk | Gail Carmichael (Splunk) 39:31

4M ago39:31

39:31

This week we’re joined by Gail Carmichael, Principal Instructional Engineer at Splunk. At Splunk, Gail’s team is responsible for improving developer onboarding, which they do through a multi-day learning program. Here, Gail shares how this program works and how they measure developer onboarding. The conversation also covers what instructional engin…

1
Bootstrapping a developer portal | Adam Rogal (DoorDash) 54:43

5M ago54:43

54:43

In this episode we’re joined by Adam Rogal, who leads Developer Productivity and Platform at DoorDash. Adam describes DoorDash’s journey with their internal developer portal, and gives advice for other teams looking to follow a similar path. Adam also describes how his team delivered value quickly and drove adoption for their developer platform. Di…

1
A deep-dive on the Thoughtworks Tech Radar | Rebecca Parsons, Camilla Crispim, Erik Dörnenburg (Thoughtworks) 45:36

5M ago45:36

45:36

In this episode, Abi has a fascinating conversation with Rebecca Parsons, ThoughtWorks's CTO, Camilla Crispim, and Erik Dörnenburg on the ThoughtWorks Tech Radar. The trio begins with an overview of Tech Radar and its history before delving into the intricate process of creating each report involving multiple teams and stakeholders. The conversatio…

1
Measuring and rolling out AI coding assistants | Eirini Kalliamvakou (GitHub) 47:43

6M ago47:43

47:43

This week's guest is Eirini Kalliamvakou, a staff researcher at GitHub focused on AI and developer experience. Eirini sits at the forefront of research into GitHub Copilot. Abi and Eirini discuss recent research on how AI coding assistance impacts developer productivity. They talk about how leaders should build business cases for AI tools. They als…

1
Measuring developer productivity at Airbnb | Christopher Sanson (Airbnb) 40:57

7M ago40:57

40:57

Christopher Sanson is a product manager at Airbnb who is dedicated to enhancing developer productivity and tooling. Today, we learn more about Airbnb's developer productivity team and how various teams use metrics, both within and outside the organization. From there, we dive even deeper into their measurement journey, highlighting their implementa…

1
Leading a DevEx team through transformation | Ana Petkovska (Nexthink) 26:35

7M ago26:35

26:35

In this episode, Abi speaks with Ana Petkovska, who is currently leading the developer experience team at Nexthink. Ana takes us through her journey of leading a DevOps team that underwent multiple transformations. She explains how her team went from being a DevOps team to EngProd and eventually DevEx. Ana elaborates on her team's challenges and th…

1
How LinkedIn defines and tracks key developer productivity metrics | Grant Jenks (LinkedIn) 52:23

8M ago52:23

52:23

In this episode, Abi chats with Grant Jenks, Senior Staff SWE, Engineering Insights @ LinkedIn. They dive into LinkedIn's developer insights platform, iHub, and its backstory. The conversation covers qualitative versus quantitative metrics, sharing concerns about these terms and exploring their correlation. The episode wraps up with technical topic…

1
Building an internal developer platform at CVS Health | Jim Beyers (CVS Health) 31:08

8M ago31:08

31:08

This week's episode is with Jim Beyers, VP of Engineering Enablement at CVS Health. Jim joined CVS a year ago to lead an effort to build an internal developer platform. Abi and Jim discuss how Jim joined CVS to build an internal developer platform, what brought him to the job, and how the developer experience fits into the broader transformation go…

1
The Platform PM role at Spotify | Nils Loodin (Spotify) 52:10

8M ago52:10

52:10

This week we spoke with Nils Loodin, Platform Product Manager at Spotify. Nils describes how his role in platform product management works, including unique challenges, approaches, and career considerations. Nils also discusses some of the recent changes within Spotify's platform organization, including shifting teams from tech-centric to journey-c…

1
Evolving platform and enablement at Thomson Reuters | Justin Wright, Matthew Dimich (Thomson Reuters) 41:18

8M ago41:18

41:18

This week we’re joined by Justin Wright and Matthew Dimich, who lead Platform Engineering and Engineering Enablement at Thomson Reuters. Justin and Matt give an inside look at how they’ve evolved their organization’s structure and approach over the past 8 years. Discussion points: (1:03) Founding the platform team (5:49) The current organizational …

1
Key findings from the 2023 State of Devops Report | Nathen Harvey (DORA at Google) 45:59

9M ago45:59

45:59

This week’s episode dives into the DORA research program and this year’s State of DevOps Report. Nathen Harvey, who leads DORA at Google, shares the key findings from the research and what’s changed since previous reports. Discussion points: (1:10) What DORA focuses on (2:17) Where the DORA metrics fit (4:35) Introduction to user-centric software d…

1
Atlassian’s journey with developer experience | Preeti Kota (Atlassian) 44:55

9M ago44:55

44:55

This week we’re joined by Preeti Kota, the Head of Engineering for Compass at Atlassian. Preeti walks us through Atlassian’s journey with developer experience: including how they measure DevEx, and how they drive improvements through efforts at both the organization and team levels. Preeti also talks about how this journey has led to the developmen…

1
Shopify’s developer happiness survey | Mark Côté (Shopify) 44:21

10M ago44:21

44:21

This week we’re joined by Mark Côté, who leads the Developer Infrastructure organization at Shopify, to learn about their developer survey program. Mark shares what went into designing and running the survey, what they’ve done to drive participation rates higher, and how they interpret their data. Mentions and links: Follow Mark on LinkedIn Read Sh…

1
Leading platform engineering at Trivago | Thomas Khalil (Trivago) 30:52

11M ago30:52

30:52

Thomas Khalil, Head of Platform and SRE at Trivago, describes how the teams reporting into him are structured, the tactics they’re using to increase awareness of their work, and how they demonstrate their impact. Discussion points: (1:17) The pillars of the Central Platform organization (2:18) The organization’s focus on time to market and efficien…

1
Enabling teams to drive their own productivity improvements | Jenny McClain (Toast) 43:36

11M ago43:36

43:36

This week’s guest is Jenny McClain, who leads R&D Team Enablement at Toast. Jenny’s team focuses on enabling individual teams at Toast to drive their own productivity improvements, and this conversation dives into how they tackle this problem. Discussion points: (1:19) How the R&D Enablement team works (2:50) Why the team was formed (4:31) The type…

1
How Google measures developer productivity | Ciera Jaspan, Collin Green (Google) 1:14:12

12M ago1:14:12

1:14:12

This week we’re joined by Ciera Jaspan and Collin Green, who lead the Engineering Productivity Research team at Google. Ciera and Collin have written several papers from studies they’ve conducted, and this discussion covers the insights from their research as well as their work more broadly at Google. Discussion points: (1:19) About the Engineering…

1
A customer service approach to improving DevEx | Jason Kennedy (One Medical) 44:30

1y ago44:30

44:30

This week we’re joined by Jason Kennedy, Senior Engineering Manager of Developer Experience at One Medical. Jason’s team takes a uniquely customer-driven approach to improving the developer experience, and in this episode he describes their philosophy and how it works in practice. Jason explains how they shadow developers, how they run surveys, and…

1
Behind the scenes with Extend’s developer experience team | Matthew Schrepel and Luke Patterson (Extend) 59:40

1y ago59:40

59:40

Matthew and Luke lead Extend’s Developer Experience team, a team that has approached their work in a way that is more forward-thinking than most. In this episode, they cover how they deliver impact at multiple levels of the organization, their journey with productivity metrics, and how they’ve made DevEx a C-level concern. Discussion points: (1:40)…

1
Platform teams vs enabling teams | Manuel Pais (Team Topologies) 53:26

1y ago53:26

53:26

Manuel Pais delves into one of the concepts covered in his book “Team Topologies”: platform and enabling work. Manuel shares how he views the strategy behind when and how to invest in platform or enabling work. This conversation also goes into each type of work in more detail, covering topics such as measuring cognitive load and where platform engi…

1
A close look at Peloton’s developer experience survey | Thansha Sadacharam (Peloton) 58:34

1y ago58:34

58:34

Thansha Sadacharam, who leads Tech Learning and Insights at Peloton walks us through the journey of building the company’s developer experience survey. She shares what went into the survey’s design, rollout, and maintenance, as well as the different teams involved. Discussion points: (1:19) Where the idea for running a developer survey originated (…

1
A better way to measure developer productivity | A special episode with Laura Tacho and Abi Noda 1:08:29

1y ago1:08:29

1:08:29

In this episode, Abi is interviewed by Laura Tacho about the new paper he co-authored with Dr. Nicole Forsgren, Dr. Margaret-Anne Storey, and Dr. Michaela Greiler. Abi and Laura discuss the pitfalls of some of the common metrics organizations use, and how the new paper builds on prior frameworks such as DORA and SPACE to offer a new approach to mea…

1
The developer experience of building a database | Tara Hernandez (MongoDB, Google) 39:36

1y ago39:36

39:36

Tara Hernandez, the VP of Developer Productivity at MongoDB, joins the podcast to give an inside look at what the developer experience looks like at an organization that develops a database. Here, Tara shares what it looks like to develop, test, and release changes at MongoDB, while also providing insight into how the company invests in developer p…

1
How teams use productivity metrics at LinkedIn | Max Kanat-Alexander (LinkedIn, Google) 53:19

1y ago53:19

53:19

Max Kanat-Alexander, the Tech Lead for the Developer Productivity and Insights Team at LinkedIn, shares an inside look at LinkedIn’s metrics platform and how teams across the organization use it. Discussion points: (1:31) Why Max shares how his team is measuring productivity (3:20) Why some teams use metrics and some don’t (6:03) The types of metri…

1
Inside Etsy’s multi-year DevEx initiative | Mike Fisher (Etsy, PayPal) 52:40

1+ y ago52:40

52:40

Mike Fisher, the former CTO at Etsy, spearheaded a multi-year developer experience initiative aimed at improving developer happiness and efficiency during his time at Etsy. Here, he shares the story of that initiative, including the pillars of the program and the investment that went into it. Towards the end of the conversation, Mike also shares hi…

1
Implementing a developer portal | Karl Haworth (American Airlines) 54:09

1+ y ago54:09

54:09

Karl’s team at American Airlines were early adopters of Backstage, and in this episode he shares their journey of implementing and rolling out a developer portal. He also describes two of the extensions his team has built for their portal. Discussion points: (1:24) Where the idea of building a developer portal came from (7:24) What the developer ex…

1
Bringing the product management discipline to platform teams | Russ Nealis (Plaid) 45:11

1+ y ago45:11

45:11

As product lead, Russ Nealis has been focused on introducing the discipline of product management in the Developer Foundations organization. This episode discusses the reasons why PMs are currently uncommon in platform organizations, examples of when having a PM has been helpful, and more. Discussion points: (1:23) Russ’s role at Plaid (2:49) Why p…

1
Intercom’s approach to a great on-call experience | Brian Scanlan (Intercom) 1:10:24

1+ y ago1:10:24

1:10:24

In this deep-dive episode, Brian Scanlan, Principal Systems Engineer at Intercom, describes how the company’s on-call process works. He explains how the process started and key changes they’ve made over the years, including a new volunteer model, changes to compensation, and more. Discussion points: (1:28) How on-call started at Intercom (10:11) Br…

1
How Instagram Reels manages reliability | Jack Li (Instagram, Shopify) 56:28

1+ y ago56:28

56:28

Jack Li explains how his production engineering team rolled out a new incident review process, how they’ve made the case for investing in reliability, and specific tools his team has built to improve reliability. — Discussion points: (1:25) How Jack became interested in reliability (3:24) Where the Instagram Reels team fits into the broader organiz…

1
A masterclass on DORA – research program, common pitfalls, and future direction | Nathen Harvey (Google) 54:45

1+ y ago54:45

54:45

Nathen Harvey, who leads DORA at Google, explains what DORA is, how it has evolved in recent years, the common challenges companies face as they adopt DORA metrics, and where the program may be heading in the future. — Discussion points: (1:48) What DORA is today and how it exists within Google (3:37) The vision for Google and DORA coming together …

1
An inside look at the SPACE framework | Dr. Margaret-Anne Storey (co-author, SPACE) 37:48

1+ y ago37:48

37:48

This week's guest is Dr. Margaret-Anne Storey, who goes by the name Peggy. Peggy is a professor of Computer Science at the University of Victoria, the Chief Scientist at DX, and co-author of the SPACE Framework, which is the topic of focus in this episode. Today’s conversation discusses what the SPACE framework is and what went into developing the …

1
Spotify’s failed #SquadGoals | Jeremiah Lee (Spotify, Stripe) 43:33

1+ y ago43:33

43:33

This week’s guest is Jeremiah Lee, who was previously a manager at Stripe and product manager at Spotify. This conversation focuses on org structure, and specifically Jeremiah’s experience with the popular squad model from Spotify. Jeremiah provides the backstory on where the model came from, what parts of the model were a challenge, and advice for…

1
How much to invest in platform work | Jean-Michel Lemieux (Shopify, Atlassian) 52:45

1+ y ago52:45

52:45

Jean-Michel Lemieux, former CTO of Shopify and VP of Engineering at Atlassian, explains how to advocate for investing in platform work, which projects to fund, and what distinguishes a great platform leader. — Discussion points: (1:38) Jean-Michel’s definition of platform work (6:44) Why reliability, performance, and stability do fall within platfo…

1
Principles for driving adoption and platform team growth | Jonathan Biddle (Wayfair) 50:05

1+ y ago50:05

50:05

Jonathan Biddle, Director of Engineering Effectiveness at Wayfair, shares the story of how his team found repeat success and subsequently grew in size and scope. He shares lessons they’ve borrowed from startups, including understanding the adoption curve and knowing your core users, and offers advice for other platform teams looking to move to the …

1
Leading infrastructure change at scale | Ian White (DAT) 50:12

1+ y ago50:12

50:12

Ian White, Director of Platform Engineering at DAT, joined the company to scale their Kubernetes-based cloud infrastructure, which has come under stress as their business has grown over the past couple years. Here he shares how he partnered with developers to learn about their challenges, how we conveyed a vision for how the company needed to evolv…

1
Positioning platform work in a down market | Brian Guthrie (Orgspace, Meetup) 34:22

1+ y ago34:22

34:22

Brian Guthrie, co-founder and CTO at Orgspace and former VP of Engineering at Meetup, has the unique experience of having previously decommissioned his Platform team. In this episode, Brian talks about that story openly, and shares advice for Platform teams to make sure they’re well positioned within their organizations. Discussion points: Brian’s …

1
A deep-dive on real-time feedback and personalized surveys | Max Kanat-Alexander, Or Michael Berlowitz (LinkedIn) 46:40

1+ y ago46:40

46:40

Max Kanat-Alexander and Or Michael Berlowitz (Berlo), share how they gather both periodic and real-time feedback from developers. Discussion points: Overview of the listening channels used by Max and Berlo’s team - [00:00:58] Origin story of the Developer Engagement and Insights team - [00:02:49] Perspectives on volume metrics - [00:05:00] How the …

1
How to define your team's scope and charter | Mark Côté (Shopify) 45:41

1+ y ago45:41

45:41

Mark Côté, Director of Engineering of Developer Infrastructure at Shopify, explains an exercise the Infrastructure group went through to define their boundaries of work. He shares their areas of focus, the team’s guiding principles, how they use their developer happiness survey to decide what to prioritize, and more. — Discussion points: (0:48) Mar…

1
Dropbox's journey with developer productivity metrics | Utsav Shah (Vanta, Dropbox) 44:37

2y ago44:37

44:37

Utsav Shah, who leads Platform at Vanta and previously led Developer Effectiveness at Dropbox, shares the story of Dropbox’s journey with measuring developer productivity. Utsav discusses what he learned about both system and survey-based measures, his opinion on the usefulness of common Git metrics, and more.…

1
Using customer interviews to inform your roadmap | Michael Galloway (Doma, Netflix) 43:14

2y ago43:14

43:14

Michael Galloway (Doma and ex-Netflix) describes his process for interviewing developers to understand where his team should focus. He also explains how he thinks about the strategic value of a Platform team. Resources mentioned: Customer Interview Guide Customer Interview QuestionsBy DX

1
Establishing a DevEx team in a high-growth company | Willie Yao (Notion, Airbnb) 46:46

2y ago46:46

46:46

In this episode, Willie Yao, Head of Infrastructure at Notion and former Head of Developer Infrastructure at Airbnb, provides a unique perspective on how Developer Experience teams work in hypergrowth companies. He shares how Airbnb developed a customer-first mindset internally, what it took to get Airbnb’s leadership invested in that effort, and h…

1
A model for managing requests and complaints from developers | Jasmine James (Twitter) 28:28

2y ago28:28

28:28

Twitter’s Developer Experience team is more mature than most. Here, Jasmine James, a Senior Engineering Manager - Developer Experience, explains how her team manages support requests, why they consider personas as part of their prioritization, and how they present the ROI of the team’s work.By DX

1
From DORA to SPACE to DX - A Fireside Chat with Nicole Forsgren 31:21

2y ago31:21

31:21

In this special episode, Dr. Nicole Forsgren, author of award-winning book Accelerate and co-author of "The SPACE of Developer Productivity", talks about her work with DORA, the inspiration behind the SPACE framework, and how she's thinking about developer experience. Watch the on-demand fireside chat or read the announcement of Nicole joining DX a…

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