Notes from the field.

Short essays on hiring engineers, scaling systems, and not getting burned by your own architecture. Written by our practice leads.

Hiring
Apr 12, 2026 · 5 min read

Three signals a senior engineer is actually senior

Years of experience lie. Here's what we look at instead during technical screens.

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Consulting
Mar 28, 2026 · 7 min read

The migration audit we run before touching code

Why we spend the first week reading dashboards instead of writing tickets.

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Culture
Mar 14, 2026 · 4 min read

Embedding well: contractors becoming teammates

A short checklist for the first 30 days of a new placement.

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Cloud
Feb 22, 2026 · 6 min read

Cutting AWS spend without firing anyone

The cheap wins, the medium wins, and the deep refactors that pay back in a year.

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Data & AI
Feb 4, 2026 · 8 min read

RAG that actually works in production

Evaluation harnesses, retrieval tuning, and the boring plumbing that separates demos from products.

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Hiring
Jan 18, 2026 · 5 min read

Why we replaced take-home tests with live coding

A six-month experiment, the data behind the switch, and what we'd do differently.

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Culture
Jan 2, 2026 · 4 min read

Quarterly retros that don't waste anyone's time

A template we've iterated on for two years. Borrow it.

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Consulting
Dec 12, 2025 · 6 min read

Saying no: the engagements we turn down

A short list of patterns that mean we're not the right fit.

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