The Bike Shed

Sally and Joël join forces to discuss the different ways to interpret the role of a ‘principle’ or ‘staff’ engineer, and the handwaving around what those titles mean in terms of the gradation.

Whilst Joël dives into career progression within the industry, what a staff engineer does and the different archetypes within it, Sally talks about the importance of having principle engineers in the room during AI discussions, and her previous positive experiences working with principle engineers.

—

Joel used the Staff Archetypes page from staffeng.com during this episode’s discussion.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

Don't forget you can now watch every episode of The Bike Shed over on YouTube!

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.

Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Aji is joined by thoughtbot’s own Tess Griffin and Jimmy Thigpen, two members of the recently established AI Ethics Taskforce, to talk about what kind of conversations are going on in the company around AI.

With AI becoming an omnipresent entity in the industry, Tess and Jimmy take a deep dive into how and why the taskforce got started, figuring out what thoughtbot’s stance is around AI in terms of ethics and workflows, and how it relates to their clients.

—

As mentioned in the episode:

Blastoff Rails June 11 - 12, 2026 (past) Albuquerque, New Mexico

Freddy discovers America during the World Cup

Your guests for this episode have been Tess Griffin and Jimmy Thigpen and your host was thoughtbot’s own Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.

Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Aji and Joël join forces to discuss graph and tree structures, and their connection to the emergent properties, attributes and qualities you can find from a largely connected group of data.

Joël dives into their recent graphs and tree work through a contracting system, whilst Aji looks back at when he previously tried to serialise a graph or tree to a database.

—

Watch Joël’s Blue Ridge Ruby talk here, or Matheus’ Ruby Internal talk from last year here.

There’s still time to secure your place at thoughtbot’s upcoming UK meet ups over the next month.

London Tech Leader Meetup - Tuesday June 23rd

Brighton Tech Leader Meetup - Wednesday June 24th

Brighton Ruby - Thursday June 25th

Evolve - Friday June 26th

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.

Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Aji and Sally are back together again, this time to discuss the different apps they use to make their workflows and To Do lists easier and quicker to achieve.

Sally dives into the Notion calendar system which she uses to coordinate her many Google calendars, Aji looks back on using Jira to co-ordinate their international move, before they both reminisce about the benefits of using Alfred as people with ADHD.

—

There’s still time to secure your place at thoughtbot’s upcoming UK meet ups over the next month.

London Tech Leader Meetup - Tuesday June 23rd

Brighton Tech Leader Meetup - Wednesday June 24th

Brighton Ruby - Thursday June 25th

Evolve - Friday June 26th

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.

Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Sally and Joël get technical as they lay out their thoughts on blog posts.

Our hosts pick apart what makes a good technical blog post, why consistent terms are more important than you might think when communicating with your audience, and how to improve your own writing to ensure your reader remains engaged.

—

There’s still time to secure your place at thoughtbot’s upcoming UK meet ups over the next month.

London Tech Leader Meetup - Tuesday June 23rd

Brighton Tech Leader Meetup - Wednesday June 24th

Brighton Ruby - Thursday June 25th

Evolve - Friday June 26th

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.

Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.