Core Track

Every role reads this first. Engineers, designers, PMs.

This is the shared baseline. If you’ve read this, the rest of the team can reference any of it without translating for you.

Read in order. End to end. Once. If you only have 30 minutes, read Foundations and Thinking: they’re the highest leverage.

1. Foundations#

How to operate as a high-performing IC.

• How to be Successful: leverage, taste, action
• General Mental Models
• Delegate What You Know
• Mochary audits, do once a quarter:
  • Energy Audit
  • Time Audit
  • Zone of Genius

2. Thinking#

Find the actual problem before solving it.

• Clear Thinking
• Operating With Clarity
• Symptoms Aren’t Problems
• Find the Root

3. Communication#

Make your thinking land.

• Clear Communication
• Lead With the Conclusion
• Write Like the Reader Is in a Hurry
• Feedback & Difficult Conversations
• Handling Difficult People

4. Operating Cadence#

The rituals that keep a team moving.

• Goal Setting
• Biweekly 1:1
• Quarterly 1:1
• Performance Reviews
• Annual Self-Review
• Quarterly Planning: Rock Sizing
• The DRI: the accountability-partner role, and the DRI Weekly Sync
• Retros: project, quarterly, incident

5. Career#

• Career Levels Overview
• Social Capital

Going Deeper#

External writing worth reading once, then revisiting.

• Sam Altman: How to Be Successful
• Sam Altman: Productivity
• Paul Graham: Maker’s Schedule, Manager’s Schedule
• Naval: How to Get Rich (without getting lucky), leverage, judgment, specific knowledge
• Jason Yip: It’s Not Just Standing Up: Patterns for Daily Stand-ups
• Lara Hogan: Questions for our first 1:1
• Will Larson: lethain.com, engineering leadership archive

When You’re Done#

Read your role track:

• Product Engineer
• Product Manager
• Product Designer