Does anyone else have codified principles and how useful are they?

#1

Post by anayar » Wed, Jul 15, 2020, 2:06 AM UTC

At my small startup, we've been codifying our design and engineering principles to a much greater degree ever since COVID forced us remote.

You can find them here: https://www.shapedlikeat.com/articles/a-few-design-principles

My question is, is this something folks outside the large Ubers and Airbnbs are doing and, if so, how useful have you actually found it? Is it something that is referred to often? Or does it become a relic that's lost in the depths of Notion.

Curious to get a pulse on how much of our current documentation spree is warranted and how much is overkill.

Cheers!

Re: Does anyone else have codified principles and how useful are they?

#2

Post by caminmccluskey » Wed, Jul 15, 2020, 2:30 AM UTC

We use them in my current company. I've found them useful and they have great buy in across the engineering org. There does need to be a certain level of commitment to make it worthwhile, feedback needs to be taken onboard and processes and reward need to align to the principles also.

Engineering Principles: https://github.com/Skyscanner/engineering-principles Some background (may be slightly out of date): https://medium.com/@SkyscannerEng/an-update-on-our-engineeri...

In summary - definitely useful, but to avoid the issue you raised around documentation like this becoming a relic you need to commit as an organisation to living by the principles and reviewing them often enough

(*all my opinions - not the necessarily the opinions of my employer)

Re: Does anyone else have codified principles and how useful are they?

#3

Post by anayar » Wed, Jul 15, 2020, 3:44 AM UTC

caminmccluskey wrote: post #2

We use them in my current company. I've found them useful and they have great buy in across the engineering org. There does need to be a certain level of commitment to make it worthwhile, feedback needs to be taken onboard and processes and reward need to align to the principles also. Engineering Principles: https://github.com/Skyscanner/engineering-principles Some background (may be slightly out of date): https://me…

This is awesome, thanks for sharing that! Can I ask a quick prying question -- who writes these principles and who approves them over on your end?

Effectively trying to gauge - is it grassroots and from the ground up, implemented and vetted by the engineers or is it more top-down "we need a way to align engineering at scale" development?

Mostly wondering about adoption and imagining whether my approach of pushing this into our team is the way to go or if it's worth allowing a collective to determine the working principles. Sorry for all the questions, you sparked my curiosity :)

Cheers!

Re: Does anyone else have codified principles and how useful are they?

#4

Post by caminmccluskey » Wed, Jul 15, 2020, 10:27 AM UTC

anayar wrote: post #3

caminmccluskey wrote: post #2

We use them in my current company. I've found them useful and they have great buy in across the engineering org. There does need to be a certain level of commitment to make it worthwhile, feedback needs to be taken onboard and processes and reward need to align to the principles also. Engineering Principles: https://github.com/Skyscanner/engineering-principles Some background (may be slightly out of date): https://me…

This is awesome, thanks for sharing that! Can I ask a quick prying question -- who writes these principles and who approves them over on your end? Effectively trying to gauge - is it grassroots and from the ground up, implemented and vetted by the engineers or is it more top-down "we need a way to align engineering at scale" development? Mostly wondering about adoption and imagining whether my approach of pushing thi…

My pleasure, glad it was interesting.

It's a semi-grassroots initiative, there is a steering committee made up of various engineers, some of whom are involved in engineering education. The work is supported by senior engineering leadership.

The other core idea is that these principles are internally open source, and as such are there to be refined by engineers.