Eiso Kant, Founder and CEO of Athenian, shares insights on engineering leadership, reflecting on his journey from being a developer focused on building tools for engineers to creating solutions for engineering leaders. His career began with a passion for programming, machine learning, and static analysis, which eventually led him to start a developer tooling company that focused on large-scale source code analysis using machine learning.

Over time, he recognized a gap in the tools available for engineering leaders, who often rely on basic communication tools like email, Slack, and Zoom rather than specialized management software. This realization sparked the creation of his current company, aimed at providing engineering leaders with better tools to improve team performance, increase efficiency, and deliver value faster.

Eiso emphasizes that as engineering leaders move up the ladder—from managing individual contributors to overseeing larger teams—they must give up writing code and instead focus on higher-level strategic decisions. He acknowledges that this transition can be difficult, especially for those who enjoy coding, but the leverage gained from improving teams and processes offers a different kind of satisfaction.

He introduces three key areas engineering leaders should focus on: velocity, quality, and outcomes. Velocity relates to how fast teams are moving and where bottlenecks exist. Quality refers to the impact on end-users, including bugs and downtime. Outcomes focus on where teams invest their efforts—whether it's developing new features, paying down technical debt, fixing bugs, or doing maintenance.

Eiso stresses the importance of making informed trade-offs as an engineering leader. He explains that in the early stages of a company, speed is essential to achieving product-market fit, even if it leads to technical debt. However, as the company scales, leaders need to balance speed with quality, ensuring the team can continue to deliver new features while maintaining a manageable level of technical debt and bugs.

He also highlights the role of data in making these decisions, though he cautions against relying on metrics without context. Metrics can inform decision-making, but they should not be treated as rigid goals. Instead, leaders must apply judgment and adapt their strategies based on the evolving needs of the organization.

As organizations grow, Eiso explains that engineering leaders need to shift from informal processes to more structured systems for managing bugs, technical debt, and overall productivity. He underscores the importance of cultivating a culture of continuous improvement, where teams are aligned around clear goals and objectives. This includes setting specific targets, such as reducing the time from code commit to production, and identifying the initiatives necessary to achieve those goals.

In summary, Eiso offers a comprehensive view of engineering leadership, emphasizing the need to transition from hands-on coding to high-level decision-making, the importance of balancing speed and quality, and the role of data in guiding team performance. He brings valuable insights from his own experience building developer tools and managing engineering organizations, offering practical advice for leaders looking to scale their teams effectively.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/eisokant/