So I’m a new team lead for a group of awesome engineers. I feel like I’m too essential to this team, apparently they don’t do quite as well when I’m on holidays which worries me. I often try to explain what i know but it doesn’t seem to change the situation. I’m not getting specific feedback from anyone on how to improve my ability to disseminate information which might be because folks are intimidated/generally anxious. Does anyone here have any strategies to help others to grow and share your knowledge? Book recommendations are welcome too!

Does anyone else struggle to complete tech books, like the later chapters are way less interesting?

Might be novelty/ADHD

Currently learning go and I’m really enjoying it. It’s been a while since I learnt a new programming language and the experience is different to what I remember. I’m reading an o reilly book and when about how they implemented a common feature of programming I’m like oh no they didn’t. I think this is what normal feel when they read celebrity gossip. Hash tag goto.

Have any of your guys had any success in networking? I feel like if I connected with more technical professionals I could advance so much further but also build meaningful connections with people who already have a lot in common with me.

I've been a programmer for almost 19 years but I actually think the best code I've ever written is something that while it provides value to other people I'm the only one who actually uses it. In the company where I work we have major events that have to be supported by a number of different teams across about 5 time zones and each engineer has a limited set of roles that they can perform during the event. Anyway it was painful just watching people trying to create a schedule so I wrote something with Linear Programming to automatically generate the schedule. It ensures that people don't work for longer than 4 hours in a row, don't work from more than 8 hours from the first hour to the last hour on call, get 12 hours rest between engagements and the work load is evenly distributed across the team. Creating conditions in Linear Programming is weird, imagine trying to turn a series of linear equations into boolean logic, it can be done and once you can wrap your head around it it's really fun. It was my first time writing anything in it and I don't see it coming up a lot in my career. My favourite part of this project is that the end result was that engineers were less exhausted. I really hope that doesn't remain the best code I ever wrote, I don't think it will but it will require a conscious intention.

It may be shocking to you if you are involved in management but actually pressuring people to meet arbitrary deadlines is not an effective way to improve productivity

So I bought a new phone, I was super excited getting it, I even got to open it at work with my colleagues watching. It was really nice, the S8 is an attractive phone... Until it started crashing very very regularly. I want to go back to my old phone, that's how bad it is. Turns out this is a common experience, how can this be at the top of all the review lists if it has this problem? Is the assumption that you are going to install stock android as soon as you get it? Or is someone paying for reviews?