Readings

“It’s Your Ship” is a leadership book written by D. Michael Abrashoff, a former commander of the USS Benfold, a guided missile destroyer. The book focuses on Abrashoff’s experiences and the leadership principles he applied to transform the performance and culture of his ship.

This book is fantastic and frightening but entirely plausible. It doesn’t seem scientifically possible, but its characters are living people shaken out of the civilization they know into the horror of a world dominated by “triffids”.

Have you, like the rest of the world, speculated as to the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto, anonymous creator of Bitcoin?

The world’s first cryptocurrency, Bitcoin went online in 2009 and has since revolutionized our concepts of currency and money. Not supported by any government or central bank, completely electronic, Bitcoin is a virtual currency based on advanced cryptographic systems.

Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the books, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her “television family.”

This book covers Bitcoin’s blocksize war, which was waged from August 2015 to November 2017. On the surface the battle was about the amount of data allowed in each Bitcoin block, however it exposed much deeper issues, such as who controls Bitcoin’s protocol rules.

A basic and straightforward overview of what Agile is, presenting some framework examples that are well known today, such as Scrum or Kanban—everything condensed in a 100’s pages book that you can read in a couple of hours.

An effective remote work environment is about treating everyone as remote, with everyone in mind having the same level, equality, and information.

Accelerate explores how software development teams using Lean Software and DevOps can measure their performance and the performance of software engineering teams impacts the overall performance of an organization.

Told through the story of one bold company (People First IT), Adapt or Die takes readers through the unparalleled business system known as The Algorithm of Success that has the potential to inspire, ignite, and affect change for all aspects of an organization.

How do we win a game that has no end? Finite games, like football or chess, have known players, fixed rules and a clear endpoint. The winners and losers are easily identified. Infinite games, games with no finish line, like business or politics, or life itself, have players who come and go. The rules of an infinite game are changeable while infinite games have no defined endpoint. There are no winners or losers—only ahead and behind.

Momo is a fairytale that shows the fight between good and evil in our contemporary society, focusing on the lack of time to care for other people.

Team Topologies focuses on how to set up dynamic team structures and interaction modes that can help teams adapt quickly to new conditions, and achieve fast and safe software delivery.

Having more money will make you happier ONLY if that means you’ll have more control over your time.

“I did not intend to get rich. I just wanted to get independent.” Charlie Munger.

This book is a leadership fable about a tech company that is struggling to get more customers. The C level is not working as a team, and they have a hard time coming to any agreements which result in negative morale. Until the new CEO, Catherine Petersen, joins the team, and she is able to recognize the problems and help the team overcome them by understanding the situation.

Start with Why asks (and answers) the questions: why are some people and organizations more innovative, more influential, and more profitable than others? Why do some command greater loyalty from customers and employees alike? Even among the successful, why are so few able to repeat their success over and over?

A radical playbook to empower your people and put your team on a path to continuous improvement.

In this book, the former submarine commander Captain L. David Marquet dives deep into one of the most investigated marine disasters, the sinking of the El Faro, and surfaces with new ideas on leadership and language.

Labeled a parable, an allegory, a myth, a morality tale, a parody, a political treatise, even a vision of the apocalypse. It has established itself as a true classic.

The book focuses on a group of British boys stranded on an uninhabited island, and their disastrous attempt to govern themselves.

A great compilation of all topics that are important for management: 1:1s, performance reviews, hiring and laying off, workplace politics, remote work, and others.

The book is divided into 3 parts: the first part covers things a new manager should know, the second and third parts go into topics that all managers should master.

Software development is about people: when, how and where they can best work together. Not about programming languages or tools. Not about fast computers, networks or internet access.

Soft skills are truly important in IT, more than people tend to think.

This book presents a tale inside the main story that consists of 4 characters: two mice, Sniff and Scurry, and two little persons, Hem and Haw.

The tale is a beautiful metaphor of the different attitudes that people adopt as part of their identity in life when they have to confront any change.

Objects are the central concept of languages like Java, Python, C#. Applying best practices for object design means that your code will be easy to read, write, and maintain.

This book captures dozens of techniques for creating pro-quality OO code that can stand the test of time.

Domain-Driven Design Distilled brings DDD to life. Whether you’re a developer, consultant, or customer, it will help you understand it, so you can benefit from its power.

This book helps you get your web applications back in shape. It contains many techniques for decoupling from infrastructure (like the framework or the database).

“The best guide that brings your coding and architecture skills a level up. All the modern PHP features combined with the elegance of a well-designed modular design.”

Programmers who endure and succeed amidst swirling uncertainty and nonstop pressure share a common attribute: They care deeply about the practice of creating software. They treat it as a craft. They are professionals.

Tap into the wisdom of experts to learn what every programmer should know, no matter what language you use. With the 97 short and extremely useful tips for programmers in this book, you’ll expand your skills by adopting new approaches to old problems, learning appropriate best practices, and honing your craft through sound advice.

Even bad code can function. But if code isn’t clean, it can bring a development organization to its knees. Every year, countless hours and significant resources are lost because of poorly written code. But it doesn’t have to be that way.