Linear: move fast with little process (with first engineering manager Sabin Roman)
Brought to you by: • Launch Darkly — a platform for high-velocity engineering teams to release, monitor, and optimize great software. • Sevalla — Deploy anything from preview environments to Docker images. • WorkOS — The modern identity platform for B2B SaaS. — On today’s episode of The Pragmatic Engineer, I’m joined by fellow Uber alum, Sabin Roman, now the first Engineering Manager at Linear. Linear, known for its powerful project and issue-tracking system, streamlines workflows throughout the product development process. In our conversation today, Sabin and I compare building projects at Linear versus our experiences at Uber. He shares insights into Linear’s unique approaches, including: • How Linear handles internal communications • The “goalie” program to address customer concerns and Linear’s zero bug policy • How Linear keeps teams connected despite working entirely remotely • An in-depth, step-by-step walkthrough of a project at Linear • Linear’s focus on quality and creativity over fash shipping • Titles at Linear, Sabin’s learnings from Uber, and much more! Timestamps (00:00) Intro (01:41) Sabin’s background (02:45) Why Linear rarely uses e-mail internally (07:32) An overview of Linear's company profile (08:03) Linear’s tech stack (08:20) How Linear operated without product people (09:40) How Linear stays close to customers (11:27) The shortcomings of Support Engineers at Uber and why Linear’s “goalies” work better (16:35) Focusing on bugs vs. new features (18:55) Linear’s hiring process (21:57) An overview of a typical call with a hiring manager at Linear (24:13) The pros and cons of Linear’s remote work culture (29:30) The challenge of managing teams remotely (31:44) A step-by-step walkthrough of how Sabin built a project at Linear (45:47) Why Linear’s unique working process works (49:57) The Helix project at Uber and differences in operations working at a large company (57:47) How senior engineers operate at Linear vs. at a large company (1:01:30) Why Linear has no levels for engineers (1:07:13) Less experienced engineers at Linear (1:08:56) Sabin’s big learnings from Uber (1:09:47) Rapid fire round — The Pragmatic Engineer deepdives relevant for this episode: • The story of Linear, as told by its CTO • An update on Linear, after their $35M fundraise • Software engineers leading projects • Netflix’s historic introduction of levels for software engineers — Where to find Sabin Roman: • X: https://x.com/sabin_roman • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sabinroman/ Where to find Gergely: • Newsletter: https://www.pragmaticengineer.com/ • YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/mrgergelyorosz • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gergelyorosz/ • X: https://x.com/GergelyOrosz — References and Transcripts: See the transcript and other references from the episode at https://newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/podcast — Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@pragmaticengineer.com. Get full access to The Pragmatic Engineer at newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/subscribe