Software Lead Weekly

Firebreaks and Rapid Repairs
6 minutes read.

"A firebreak in daily life are pre-built areas that stop you from acting stupidly on autopilot and give you a shot to reboot the behaviors you want." -- I've shared this notion with you before, but I think it's worthy of rereading it at our new environment. Take 15 minutes every week to see which areas or behaviors you want to fix to readjust your body and mind.

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Day 11 of Quarantine: I've Built a Robot Friend Because I Feel Lonely.
1 minutes read.

My humble effort to help you start the weekend with a smile on your face, even in this difficult time.

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Why to Start a Startup in a Bad Economy
5 minutes read.

This post from 2008 by Paul Graham is more relevant than ever. Figure out ways to fight for another day by slashing hard on your expenses or finding creative ways to increase your income. Who knows, maybe it will make your company more resilient, and better prepared for when the markets will recover.

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Day 1. Product Idea. Day 2: Core Values
6 minutes read.

I think that defining the way you work as a team is probably one of the most important things you can do, yet feels so painful to do. Let's be honest, it often feels fake, full with empty words and zero meaning in what to do with these values. This is why I enjoyed Chris Hicken's framework - focusing on picking the values to help you make better decisions immediately sets the right tone.

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My Day Job (Also: Night Job) Is CEO of Slack, a Publicly Traded Company With Investors to Whom I Am a Fiduciary, 110k+ Paying Customers of All Sizes, and Thousands of Employees I Care About Very, Very Much. The Last Few Weeks Have Been 🤯😳😢 Here’s What It's Been Like. [Thread]
5 minutes read.

Stewart Butterfield, the CEO of Slack, shares his journal from leading Slack during COVID-19. This is an incredible view of what's going on in a public B2B company, while the market is going crazy: "One thing we can say is that averaging out the best and the worst case to draw a line down the middle doesn’t make any sense. We want to guide to something we know we can achieve, and that means factoring in the downside scenarios more heavily."

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Letter to Myself in Late 2008 (Dealing With a Crisis)
4 minutes read.

When a crisis like COVID-19 hits, it's imperative to change your mindset immediately and act with a 90 days mindset rather than 3 years. There are too many unknowns: impact on people's well-being and productivity, you might be selling now to a different "persona," the product might need to change, etc. Dalton Caldwell shares his experience for founders today, based on his mistakes in 2008.

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@danielgross: A recession sharpens focus from "make something people want" to "make something people *need*"

@JamesClear: How to 80/20 your life: (1) Make a list of the 10 things you spend the most time on. (2) Circle the two that truly drive your results. Do more of those. (3) Look at the others. Eliminate ruthlessly. Automate or outsource what you can. Press pause on the rest. (4) Repeat.