Staff Engineer: Leadership beyond the management track

You should buy all of Will Larson's books if you're a software engineer or software engineering manager with hopes of growth and scaling yourself. Great pragmatic guide to the expectations, day to day work lives of Staff Developers and how to get there yourself. Love the interviews with Staff Devs especially, as they're ripe for picking examples, behaviors and tools from!

One of the few books I have read that start to talk about the indeterministic role of Staff Software engineers. Not a silver bullet, but at least gives a few places to start your journey or at least smooth it out a little.

As someone who has been working as a Staff Engineer for several years, this book answered several important questions I had about my role and expectations. Moreover, it clarified things that I've observed (about operating at Staff level), that I didn't understand until now. I wish I have read this book sooner, earlier in my career. FYI, I have both the print and Audible versions. This is not a book about engineering management, and it is not about coding or project management. If that's the mindset you are coming from, this book will disappoint. If you are interested in knowing what comes after a Senior engineering level (whether you are a senior or junior developer), and how to operate at that level and beyond, this is the book for you. There's a certain "filtering" that comes with this topic since engineering positions that come after Senior-levels only occur in mature companies that 1) are sufficiently large, 2) are product or service oriented (not limited to web/IT support to other businesses) and 3) are likely to have substantial IP and patents. I would still recommend this book even for engineers working at firms to do match these criteria, since it covers significant material on how to operate efficiently as a team lead.

I’m sure you get this from a lot of readers. Please add my thanks to the long list and know it is very heartfelt. The collection of interviews were very diverse, and truly helped me see various ways the Staff Engineer role can be viewed in various places. I wish I had read them first perhaps I’d have spent less than 3 months completing the book. It was quite hard getting through the initial chapters. Suggestion: print as 2 different books and keep the interviews rolling in! I’m definitely recommending this!!

Great book for someone considering the path into staff engineer!

This books consists of two parts, the author's mind flow and stories of the success. It was really tedious to read for me the first part since there are just isolated paragraphs. I was waiting for some sort of the narrative development, but no, every new chapter is something completely different without full elaboration, like notes The second part is stories of the “Staff Engineers”, almost all of them follow the same path: join the startup at early stage, spend n-years, take over the expertise, get promoted, and do mentoring and make sure you have a network outside and inside the company. Don’t forget about the Inclusion, it is very important. Nothing about real challenges, tough decisions, burnouts, conflicts, billing dollars impacts. These interviews were recorded during the begining of the COVID-19, so I would like to read it in the 23/24 realities. On a good side, the authors mentions archetypes and does explain how they operate, give an overview of the scope of the Staff+ role scopes and responsibilities. In general, it is good motivation book for anyone who are in the early carries and wants to stay on the engineering path up to the CTO

As an staff engineer myself, having an external perspective of what does the role entitles in other organizations has been tremendously valuable. Some of the guides or initial chapters are very practical but I have thoroughly enjoyed reading the experiences of some of my colleagues in other companies. Highly recommended to anyone looking beginning a staff engineer or to someone that wants to check areas of personal growth

This book is filled up stories of real life staff engineers from multiple companies. The wisdom shared by these engineers is invaluable. I recommend this book for anybody aspiring to be a staff engineer or is a staff engineer.

Transitioning into a new role, and this book was quite helpful for understanding how to navigate the workplace. It has a lot of good points as to how to be effective leader and how to manage your time. Definitely a must read.

It’s great to have a read and get to know the insights from other engineers from different companies. Good points and interesting topics covered in this book.

This book reads very easily, and was very engaging. It's not necessarily full of practical tools, but it is very good at helping challenge your perspective on how you see yourself within the context of your position. Recommended for anyone in, or considering this job role. Also has a section useful for those managing staff engineers.

Beaucoup de supports expliquent la bascule vers un métier de manager mais très peu le chemin du leadership qui est parfaitement décrit dans ce livre !

Define o que é um especialista de verdade e ainda fala de arquétipos percebidos nos Staffs Plus Engineers. Embora seja adpatado a realidade internacional, vale a leitura.