Engineering Enablement by DX

Jean-Michel Lemieux shares his perspective on how much to invest in platform work, which projects to fund, and how to advocate for more resources.

Show Notes

Jean-Michel Lemieux, former CTO of Shopify and VP of Engineering at Atlassian, explains how to advocate for investing in platform work, which projects to fund, and what distinguishes a great platform leader. 

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Discussion points:

(1:38) Jean-Michel’s definition of platform work 
(6:44) Why reliability, performance, and stability do fall within platform work 
(7:24) The consequences of lacking a product mindset in platform
(9:20) Why and how to advocate for investing 50% of R&D spend in platform work 
(12:31) How Jean-Michel arrived at 50% as the percentage of R&D spend that should be allocated to platform 
(16:09) Jean-Michel’s experiences with different levels of investment in platform work 
(21:59) What percentage of platform investment should go towards keep the lights on work
(24:01) Whether the allocation changes at different company stages
(27:05) Why platform work is consistently underinvested in
(29:00) Why having a platform team could be an anti-pattern
(32:32) How to advocate for this work to leaders
(35:35) What it looks like to over-invest in platform work 
(40:03) How to decide which initiatives to invest in
(47:41) Making build vs buy decisions in platform work 
(49:58) What distinguishes a great platform leader 

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Mentions and links:
Follow Jean-Michel Lemieux on LinkedIn and Twitter
Abi’s post that sourced many of the questions discussed in this conversation
Jean-Michel’s book chapter on platform investments
Jean-Michel’s definition of what platform work is
The podcast episode on what Shopify expects of managers 

Creators and Guests

Host
Abi Noda
Abi is the founder and CEO of DX (getdx.com), which helps engineering leaders measure and improve developer experience. Abi formerly founded Pull Panda, which was acquired by GitHub.

What is Engineering Enablement by DX?

The show focused on developer productivity and the teams and leaders dedicated to improving it. Each episode features in-depth interviews with Platform and DevEx teams, along with the latest research and approaches for measuring developer productivity. Presented by DX (getdx.com), the developer intelligence platform designed by researchers.