What Keeps Me Up at Night – Existential Questions for IC Leaders

In this talk, we explore the boogeymen of IC leaders. While critical incidents and uncharted technologies may be scary at the moment, they can also be exactly the challenge that motivates you. However, these questions have come up again and again on my path to IC leadership and made me reconsider my relationship with my career.

  • How can I have 10x impact without working 10x hours?
  • What does Individual Contribution mean beyond code?
  • Am I a [eng, program, product] manager now?
  • How can I tell if what I do matters?
  • Does thinking in 'resources' and 'story points' work?

For each, we will lay out the internal conflict and provide practical methods for addressing each insecurity. 


Speaker

Tina Wright

Area Tech Lead @Grammarly, Interested in System Design and People-First Leadership; Previously @Coursera @TRI and @Google

Tina is an Area Tech Lead at Grammarly, and has worked as a software engineer at Coursera, TRI, and Google. She likes making order from chaos, learning about eclectic topics, and being weirdly opinionated. She studied Computer Science at MIT. Outside of work, she enjoys reading, bouldering, board gaming, and dancing. 

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Date

Wednesday Nov 20 / 02:45PM PST ( 50 minutes )

Location

Ballroom BC

Topics

IC leadership leverage career questions

Slides

Slides are not available

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