LT#359 Why we sabotage our careers

Why we sabotage our careers
10 minutes by John Cutler

Self-sabotage at work often starts as protection. The behaviors that work against us may also be guarding something real, like our values, our sense of self, or the pain of past experiences. Trying to fix these patterns through constant self-monitoring can make things worse. Sometimes the goal isn't to correct ourselves but to make peace with all the competing parts of who we are.

Don’t sacrifice quality for speed (ElevenLabs definitely doesn’t).
sponsored by Meticulous

Agents are writing code faster than ever. They even review their own work. But who’s reviewing them? One does a passable job and ships a buggy fix, the next copies it. Bugs spread faster than anyone can catch them. Leadership at Dropbox, Notion & ElevenLabs refused to trade this quality for speed. With Meticulous, every change is exhaustively verified, with zero developer effort.

The insider
7 minutes by Michael Lopp

Large systems have a "happy path" for common tasks, but unusual problems send you down a frustrating "sad path" where no one knows what to do. Your only hope is finding an Insider, a rare person who deeply understands how the system actually works. Unlike others who just follow scripts, Insiders are genuinely curious about the systems around them and want to help. They are hard to reach, but worth every effort.

I'm not doing 996.
16 minutes by Elena Verna

AI companies are normalizing extreme work hours, but long hours aren't the same as ambition or talent. Elena points out this culture filters out parents, caregivers, and anyone with a life outside work, which narrows the range of people building these products. Companies should reward output, not availability. And no matter how supportive your employer is, you have to protect your own time, because no one else will do it for you.

The power of the strategic initiative postmortem
15 minutes by Whitney Zimmerman

After a strategic initiative ends, reviewing what was assumed, what happened, and what beliefs need updating helps build real learning over time. These reviews rarely happen, and when they do, they tend to blame execution rather than examining the strategy itself or how well it was mobilized. Shopify's 2022 staff memo is a strong example of candid, assumption-based reflection done right. According to Whitney, CEOs should lead these reviews and hold a high bar for honest analysis over tidy conclusions.

Do I really have to do pricing?
5 minutes by Noa Ganot

Pricing often falls to product leaders with little guidance. Start by understanding the value your product creates, then find a way to measure it, either directly or through a useful stand-in metric. Noa argues the pricing model also needs to be simple for customers to understand and predict, while still covering your costs and growing with usage. You don't need to master pricing, but you can't ignore it.

And the most popular article from the last issue was:

• Google cloud outage takes down major EU banks

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