Episode 20: Strong Opinions, Thoughtfully Held, With Dave Holbrook

Описание: What happens when a perfectly designed software system crashes in production because of a single deployment error? You learn the most important lesson in engineering: If you write it, you run it.

In this episode, Ben and Noah welcome long-time colleague and technology thought leader Dave Holbrook (Principal Engineer at http://Owner.com). Dave shares his journey from the world of massive enterprises to the fast-paced reality of hyper-growth startups. The trio dives deep into the "unsexy" reality of software architecture...navigating office politics, managing crushing technical debt, and why the goal of "zero tech debt" is a dangerous fantasy.

Dave also pulls back the curtain on his daily workflow, revealing how he uses AI agents to write tests, generate specs, and manage tickets, and explains why he believes the unit cost of code is heading to zero.

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

Enterprise vs. Startup: Why great technical decisions sometimes get overruled by corporate politics (and how to deal with it).
The "You Write It, You Run It" Philosophy: A painful story about a memory leak and a DCOM error that changed Dave's career.
The Truth About Tech Debt: Why software starts rotting the moment it ships, and how to negotiate pay-down time with leadership.
AI in Practice: How Dave uses AI tools (like Cloud Code and Linear) for Test-Driven Development and spec generation.
Hot Take: Why "Best Practices" don't exist and the term should be banned.

Connect with Us:

Ben Griswold | Grizen: https://grizen.com
Noah Heldman | OutcomeSource: https://outcomesource.com
Dave Holbrook on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidbholbrook/