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When Farnaz Azmoodeh (CTO @ Linktree) stepped into her new role, she unexpectedly took on product & design just three months in—owning all of engineering, product, and design during a critical period of change. In this episode, Farnaz shares hard-won lessons from that transition, including the mindset shift from delivery to discovery, balancing data vs. intuition in decision-making, knowing when to pivot your product strategy, and building small / fast-moving cross-functional teams. We also cover applying the 80/20 rule to simplify complex product surfaces, her favorite frameworks for pattern recognition, and how to reset assumptions when pattern-matching can backfire. If you’re navigating ambiguity, expanding your scope, or evolving how your org builds product, this episode will help you lead with more clarity, speed, and strategic focus.
Wade Chambers, Chief Engineering Officer @ Amplitude, joins us to discuss what it looks like to empower individual engineers & overall engineering teams and recommendations for creating a culture that cultivates ownership! First, Wade defines what true ownership looks like – and what it doesn’t look like. We cover frameworks for identifying & cultivating high ownership in individuals & across teams, implementing systems that encourage ownership, communicating shared vision / goals, and coaching engineers when passing the baton of ownership. We also discuss navigating difficult conversations around empowerment / ownership – or lack thereof – and Wade shares examples of impactful questions to ask.
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Throughout our discussion, we explored practical strategies to strengthen leadership dynamics, foster collaboration with senior stakeholders.
# Roundtable
# Leading Up
# Engineering Leadership
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In this episode, we’re back with more insights from our local community leaders — discussing leadership insights on strategic decision-making, managing technical debt and fostering true cross-functional partnerships! Funmi Oludaiye (New York City) shares strategies for building strong cross-functional relationships between eng & business leaders. Ketan Gupta (London) breaks down the STIR framework for managing tech debt & aligning it with business value. And Sasha Hall (Toronto) works through examples of how to balance decisive (fast) vs. thoughtful (slow) decision-making. You’ll also learn some of these leaders’ best tips for diving in & getting involved with your local ELC community!
In this episode, Vinod Marur (SVP of Engineering @ Databricks) shares his approach to recalibrating leadership priorities as organizations scale. Vinod breaks down his personal recalibration framework—why he does it every 3–6 months, signals that it’s time to reassess, and how to design communication and collaboration structures that reduce information asymmetry during periods of rapid growth. We dive into rewriting hiring playbooks, tailoring recruitment pitches, and the impact of AI on hiring. Plus actionable strategies for onboarding and empowering senior leaders, identifying the highest-leverage problems to solve, and finding champions to carry key initiatives forward.
We explored practical AI tool adoption strategies, addressed team upskilling challenges, and examined how engineering managers' roles are evolving in response. Key takeaways included the critical importance of continuous learning frameworks, heightened value of emotional intelligence in leadership, and maintaining a problem-solving mindset while navigating technological disruption.
# Roundtable
# AI
# Engineering Leadership
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Jon Hyman (Co-Founder and CTO @ Braze) shares the pivotal moments that shaped the company - from being the only person on call in the early years to identifying (and pivoting) product-market fit. Jon discusses how they navigated early-stage failure modes, carved out areas of product ownership, and made the shift to enterprise customers. Plus how leadership priorities evolve pre- vs. post-IPO and the next evolution of Jon’s leadership growth after almost 14 years at Braze.
During this session, we discussed automating delivery pipelines, managing technical debt, driving change with new technologies, demonstrating engineering’s business value, and developing future leaders who prioritize operational excellence.
# Engineering Leadership
# Leadership
# Roundtable
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In this episode, Rukmini Reddy (SVP of Engineering @ PagerDuty) shares invaluable leadership lessons on navigating transition, uncertainty, and fear. We cover actionable strategies like the five essential questions to lead your team through change, “hugging the elephant” to overcome fear, approaching org change from first principles, shifting from “informed pessimism” to “curious optimism,” and building high-trust peer support! If you're looking to strengthen your leadership and build more resilient engineering teams, this episode is packed with essential insights to help you navigate the toughest challenges with confidence.