#8 | Sunday reads for EMs

My favourite reads of the week to make your Sunday a little more inspiring.

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Social Capital: The Compound Interest of Your Engineering Career

tl;dr: If you want to understand why high-performing engineers plateau you need to read this one. It's often because they lack social capital, not technical skills. Key insight here is the "lone genius ceiling": brilliant individual contributors who can't scale their impact because they haven't invested in trust, credibility, and relationships. The author breaks down practical micro-habits that turn networking from awkward small talk into systematic influence-building that actually moves work forward.

Leadership co-processing with LLMs

tl;dr: A CTO shares six specific ways he uses LLMs as a "co-processor for his brain". From basic prompting to "pair prompting" with teammates to using AI as a contrarian advisor. The standout technique is treating LLMs like an executive assistant to break through decision paralysis and organizational stalemate. What makes this practical is the specific prompts and examples showing how to structure these interactions, plus the insight that writing to an LLM forces you to slow down your thinking and consider alternatives you'd normally skip.

Challenge Network

tl;dr: Most leaders live in echo chambers that slowly degrade their decision-making, so you need to deliberately build a "challenge network". People who will tell you when you're wrong. Choose thoughtful critics (not just smart people), set explicit expectations for tough feedback, and make it a regular habit rather than a crisis response. Worth implementing the practical tactics like asking "What's most likely to go wrong here?" instead of "What do you think?" and actually tracking what you do with the feedback you receive.

Time Management

tl;dr: Comprehensive overview of time management techniques from Burkeman's 3/3/3 method to the Eisenhower Matrix, but the real value is in the anti-multitasking section citing Stanford research showing it takes 23+ minutes to regain focus after interruption. The piece reinforces that these aren't just productivity hacks. They're cognitive strategies that align with how our brains actually work. Best for managers who want a structured approach to reclaiming focus.

The Case for Being Lazy

tl;dr: "Being lazy on principle" means working harder upfront to automate, simplify, and systematize so you can be genuinely lazy later. Like automating TOIL, building reusable platforms, or coaching teams to solve their own problems instead of doing it for them. The insight about transitioning from mid to senior engineer is spot-on: stop trying to be clever with complex code and embrace boring, maintainable solutions.

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Leading your engineers towards an AI-assisted future

What did you read recently that you would like to share?