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Beyond Coding

Beyond Coding

Patrick Akil 252 Episodes Jul 22, 2026

For software engineers ready to level up. Learn from CTOs, principal engineers, and tech leaders about the skills beyond coding: from technical mastery to product thinking and career growth. Created by Patrick Akil.

Episodes

AWS Veteran: How Real Engineering Teams Run Agents
AWS Veteran: How Real Engineering Teams Run Agents Jul 22, 2026 01:53:17 "I need to stop using Opus. This doesn't work." That was Heitor Lessa's conclusion after a refactor cost him 200 million tokens, and it forced him to rebuild the entire agent workflow now used across 1,400 engineers. Heitor spent 11 years at AWS, built Lambda Powertools to 230 billion API calls a week, and in this episode he walks through the full SDLC workflow on screen, from discovery to merge c
What Senior Engineers do Differently (Vercel VP)
What Senior Engineers do Differently (Vercel VP) Jul 15, 2026 00:28:15 What senior engineers do differently has less to do with output than most career ladders suggest, and Lindsey Simon, VP of Engineering at Vercel, has watched the distinction sharpen as everyone in the valley becomes a "member of technical staff." From why new grads with hackathon years might out-prepare engineers with six years on the job, to what happens when PR throughput stops being your lever,
Why the Fastest Engineers Are Falling Behind
Why the Fastest Engineers Are Falling Behind Jul 9, 2026 00:40:05 The fastest engineers are falling behind, and Kitze was one of them. He built his reputation on raw coding speed, then realized his coding wasn't competing with anyone's coding anymore, it was competing with their setups. Wake-up call for developers: Kitze now runs 140 projects solo with agent loops, and in this episode he breaks down what separates the engineers pulling ahead from the ones gettin
AI Cloud CTO: Which Engineering Skills Are Most In-Demand Right Now
AI Cloud CTO: Which Engineering Skills Are Most In-Demand Right Now Jul 1, 2026 00:58:44 Danila Shtan runs engineering at Nebius, one of the biggest AI clouds in the world, and he told me exactly which engineers he hires on the spot. There are only hundreds of people on the planet with the skill he wants most, and it is not the one you are grinding on. We get into which engineering skills are actually scarce and well paid today, and which ones are quietly on the way out.In this episod
Career Expert: Why Applying to Jobs No Longer Works
Career Expert: Why Applying to Jobs No Longer Works Jun 24, 2026 00:46:39 120,000 tech workers have been laid off in 2026, yet there are 60,000 open roles. Engineers applying are sending out 100 applications for zero replies. Former Reddit, Uber and Disney Plus recruiter Keki Mwaba breaks down why the market broke, why every resume now looks identical, and what gets you hired when yours looks like everyone else's.In this video, we cover:Why 120,000 layoffs and 60,000 op
Why the Frontrunners Say Coding Is Solved BUT Engineering is Not
Why the Frontrunners Say Coding Is Solved BUT Engineering is Not Jun 17, 2026 00:51:46 Jeroen Gordijn and Jeroen Dee: two frontrunners who stopped writing code months ago and say software development is already solved. Typing code is no longer necessary, but what matters more now? If you're an engineer that loves coding, you're in a tougher spot than you might realize.In this video, we cover:- Why writing code is "solved" but engineering isn't- Spec-driven development and how to get
Why The Best Software Engineers Are Solving Code Review Bottlenecks Now
Why The Best Software Engineers Are Solving Code Review Bottlenecks Now Jun 10, 2026 00:40:29 AI generates 10x more code, but your senior engineers still review it by hand and it's burning them out. Even Google admits code review is now the bottleneck nobody knows how to solve.Florian Buetow, AI engineer at Xebia, has been running experiments to eliminate the human from the review loop entirely, and what he found changes where engineers should focus their effort.In this episode, we cover:W
Google DeepMind Lead: The New Rules of Software Engineering
Google DeepMind Lead: The New Rules of Software Engineering Jun 3, 2026 00:23:45 Are you ready to adapt to the rapidly evolving rules of software development? In this deep dive, Logan Kilpatrick, Director and Engineer at Google DeepMind, breaks down how AI agents, advanced model-product symbiosis, and tools like Gemini 3.5 Flash are fundamentally shifting the engineering bottleneck. Learn how to maintain your competitive advantage by moving beyond the keyboard to focus on prob
Addy Osmani: Top Tier Software Engineers vs. AI Agents. The Mindset You Need
Addy Osmani: Top Tier Software Engineers vs. AI Agents. The Mindset You Need May 28, 2026 00:17:56 As AI agents transform software engineering, how do you leverage them without losing your coding skills or risking production disasters? In this episode, Google Cloud AI Director Addy Osmani breaks down the shift from babysitting basic models to mastering advanced agent harnesses.Discover how to safely delegate complex technical tasks while maintaining your human engineering identity and setting u
What World Class Software Engineers Do That You Don't
What World Class Software Engineers Do That You Don't May 20, 2026 00:32:51 After 250 episodes of Beyond Coding, a pattern shows up again and again: the engineers who thrive aren't the ones chasing the newest tool or the cleanest code. They're the ones who learn fast, keep things simple, and understand the business they're building for. This special pulls the sharpest moments from recent guests into one conversation about what actually makes a great software engineer in 2
What Separates Cracked Software Engineers From Everyone Else
What Separates Cracked Software Engineers From Everyone Else May 6, 2026 00:38:57 Reddit Reacts is back. I'm taking the most controversial takes on software engineering from Reddit and giving you my unfiltered perspective on what's happening, from juniors leveraging AI tools, to the culling of engineers who refuse to adapt, to whether you should take a gap year after a layoff.In this episode, we cover:How to become technically "cracked" and what really separates great engineers
How Elite Software Engineers Are Using Agents to Get Sh*t Done
How Elite Software Engineers Are Using Agents to Get Sh*t Done Apr 29, 2026 00:47:29 Most engineers are using AI coding tools without understanding what they actually are and it's costing them. Microsoft Certified Trainer Rob Bos has trained thousands of engineers on AI tooling, and he sees the same gaps in fundamentals show up again and again, regardless of seniority. This is what you need to know:What an LLM actually is (and why understanding this changes how you use it)Why prom

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