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13
Aug
Wednesday Reality: Engineering Begins Where Reality Refuses to Cooperate

Wednesday Reality: Engineering Begins Where Reality Refuses to Cooperate

Engineering begins with an acceptance that reality imposes conditions the designer does not control.
11 min read
11
Aug
Monday Myth: Small Teams Move Faster

Monday Myth: Small Teams Move Faster

In 1989, Volvo opened a car factory at Uddevalla on Sweden's west coast that looked strangely unlike the factories which had come to define twentieth-century manufacturing.
12 min read
06
Aug
The Humility of Reliable Systems

The Humility of Reliable Systems

Reality has never cared how confident the system felt before the lights went out.
8 min read
04
Aug
Monday Myth: Performance Comes from Power

Monday Myth: Performance Comes from Power

True Engineers rarely optimise machines because they admire elegance. They optimise economics.
4 min read
02
Aug
Friday Fun: The Committee That Replaced the Thermometer

Friday Fun: The Committee That Replaced the Thermometer

The first industrial revolution did not merely require bigger machines. It required machines that behaved predictably. Steam engines demanded repeatable boiler pressures. Steel mills demanded consistent furnace temperatures.
4 min read
28
Jul
Monday Myth: "Our Application Is Complex"

Monday Myth: "Our Application Is Complex"

Perhaps software never suffered from an unusual abundance of complexity. Perhaps it suffered from an unusual willingness to admire it.
6 min read
26
Jul
Friday Fun: The Corporate Weather Office

Friday Fun: The Corporate Weather Office

The Corporate Weather Office occupied the fourth floor of the Ministry because weather had, over time, acquired considerable strategic importance.
4 min read
23
Jul
Wednesday Reality: Control Has Mass

Wednesday Reality: Control Has Mass

Modern organisations rather than improving the architecture of work, increase the number of people watching it.
9 min read
19
Jul
Friday Fun: The Office Escape Room

Friday Fun: The Office Escape Room

Long before escape rooms became fashionable corporate team-building exercises, engineers, locksmiths and craftsmen had been designing mechanical puzzle boxes whose sole purpose was to challenge the human mind
3 min read
16
Jul
Wednesday Reality: Engineering Begins Where Certainty Ends

Wednesday Reality: Engineering Begins Where Certainty Ends

Neither the Royal Navy nor NASA expected reality to honour their plans. Charts remained incomplete. Weather changed without warning. Equipment failed. Calculations drifted. Human judgement remained imperfect.
4 min read