Matt Schouten

Thoughts on building people, software, and systems.

Category: Management

  • “We’re ready for change!”

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    The team has just finished presenting their recommendations to their leadership. Leadership is happy about their plan for building the next part of the product. After a small adjustment, leadership is on-board with the sequencing, too. Before the meeting wraps up, the team points out the work would go more quickly, with less risk, more…

  • Overloaded systems and how maintenance fails interestingly

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    I’m married and have three kids in the elementary and middle school age ranges. They’re doing things that normal kids do: growing, learning, being active, participating in sports and other activities. My wife and I both work. Our baseline level of “busy” is relatively high, as it is for any family with three kids at…

  • Outcomes for Employees

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    This started as a blog post for the HI Digital Solutions blog, and never got posted for some reason. I’m pretty sure it had to do with it being drafted in April 2020. I think some things may have been happening around then. Anyway, I’m (re?) posting it here. Enjoy! H.I. Digital Solutions (DS) has…

  • Processes and Outcomes

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    I wrote a blog post for the H.I. Digital Solutions blog! It’s all about Processes and Outcomes, in case you didn’t get that from the title.

  • The Policy Pendulum

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    I’ve been thinking a lot about policies lately. About how they’re sometimes necessary and sometimes not. About don’t scar on the first cut and about how organizational scar tissue can spread to cover related areas of the organization. I’ve been thinking about the freedom of young companies with no policies, and about the freedom of…

  • Running a Decent Intern Program

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    “The new intern shows up next week.” You feel excited and ready for that, right? I don’t know about most companies. I’m guessing most people are happy to have an extra worker around. And most probably don’t know exactly what they’re going to do with their new intern. Want to know what to do? Yeah,…

  • Resources for Transitioning to Agile

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    One of my former interns, an excellent engineer, is working at a company that is transitioning to agile. He asked for some readings and resources I’d recommend. This got a bit longer than a few links, so I decided to turn it into an article instead of a direct message. Without further ado, my recommended…