Hey, I'm David.
I write software, and I look after the people who write it with me.
Developer turned engineering manager in Toronto. Still in the codebase most weeks, mostly because I like it there.
A bit about me
I got into this because I liked taking things apart to see why they worked. That hasn't really changed. The systems just got bigger, and now there are people attached to them.
I work across the stack. Lately that means a lot of architecture, and a lot of figuring out where AI actually earns its place in a product and where it's just expensive autocomplete. I still care less about shipping the clever thing than about whether the person next to me understands it, can change it, and doesn't dread being on call for it.
Most of my thinking happens on paper first. I'd rather be corrected early than right at the end, and I try not to guess at a problem before I've actually looked at it.
What I keep coming back to
Fruitful over productive
Productive is getting a lot done. Fruitful is doing work that holds up. I told my team this at the start of the year and I've been trying to live up to it since.
Diagnose before you guess
Find the real problem, look at what's actually happening, try a different road than the usual one, then test it small. It works on outages. It works on people. It mostly works on me.
The team is the product
Software is downstream of how people feel about their week. Most of managing is removing friction nobody thought worth mentioning.
Everyone is teaching you something
Including the people you'd rather not learn it from. I keep coming back to a line I read:
No man is your enemy, no man is your friend, every man is your teacher.
Florence Scovel Shinn
Outside of that
Lo-fi and soft jazz when I need to concentrate. Eighties and nineties when I don't, and louder than it needs to be.
I get more done in a café than at a quiet desk. Other people's conversations, close enough to hear and easy to ignore.
Three going at once, all half finished, all genuinely enjoyed.
Most of my clearest thinking happens on paper before it ever reaches a screen.
Early mornings, prayer, and a fast when my head gets too loud. It's the part of the week everything else leans on.
A Raspberry Pi doing more jobs than it should, and always one side project I've promised myself I'll finish. There always will be.
No destination, no podcast. It's the closest thing I have to a reset button.
A glass of wine, or a whiskey if the day earned it. Rarely, and never in a hurry.
Best working weather there is. I'll take a grey afternoon over a bright one most weeks.
Obviously. Cold enough for a jacket, warm enough to still sit outside.
The professional bit
Jobs and titles come and go. The man remains. The details are on LinkedIn.