My Top 24 Picks from my 280+ Article Reads in 2024

I've read 288 articles in 2024, spanning from Staff+ engineering leadership, to organizational strategy, GenAI trends, and many technical topics. I’ve also gone deeper into career development, financial independence, psychology, and writing both on professional mastery and personal growth.

Big differences from 2023:

• 288 articles read in 2024 vs. 350+ in 2023.

ChatGPT o1 insights comparing both lists:

Here are some possible “aha!” angles to highlight when comparing your 2024 vs. 2023 article reads:

1- A Deeper Dive Into Organizational Strategy:

You’ve leaned into strategy-focused articles (Seven Transformations of Leadership, WTF Is Strategy?, Can you say what your strategy is?). There’s a strong theme around aligning teams, communicating vision, and driving company-wide outcomes—potentially reflecting a move from “how to build better software” toward “how to steer the bigger ship.”

2- Shift Toward Staff+ & Exec Content:

In 2024, there’s a noticeable uptick in “Staff+,” “Executive,” and “Leadership Principles” articles (e.g., When Staff Engineer Is an Anti-Pattern, Level Up: Breaking Through to Executive). This suggests a stronger focus on higher-level leadership skills and moving beyond day-to-day engineering concerns.

3- Embracing GenAI & Future-Tech Topics:

There are more highlights touching on AI and next-gen computing in 2024 (How GenAI Is Reshaping Tech Hiring, The GPT Era Is Already Ending, Five Proven Prompt Engineering Techniques). This signals you’re keeping pace with emerging tech trends and exploring how AI impacts software development and career paths alike.

While 2023 had broad engineering themes, in 2024 you have more specialized articles—like When Network Is Faster Than Cache and Legacy Modernization Meets GenAI. You’re drilling down deeper into cutting-edge or niche technical challenges.

4- Continued Blend of Personal Growth & Professional Mastery:

From Mind to You and Your Research, you’re still reading “personal development” content, but it’s more integrated with career growth than in 2023. This fusion shows a holistic approach: leveling up as both an individual and as a leader.

5- Stronger Focus on Behavioral & Soft Skills:

You’ve spent more time highlighting articles around persuasion, mental models, and coaching (e.g., Harnessing the Science of Persuasion, The Truth About Mental Models, Executive Coaching). You’re clearly diving into the “people” side of leadership.

6- Interview & Career Coaching Content:

There are multiple new entries regarding interviews and staff-level promotions (A Complete Guide to Interviewing, How to Get Promoted Beyond Staff Engineer). This suggests a growing focus on helping yourself or others navigate career transitions.

My 24 Favorites From 2024:

Here are My 24 Favorites based on the number of insights I gained from them ranked according to the most influential ideas of the year for me:

1?? Seven Transformations of Leadership - By David Rooke and Bill Torbert

2?? The Magic Loop - By Ethan Evans on Lennys Newsletter

Another relevant article from Ethan that almost made the Top 24:

• 4 Behaviors of Top CEOs (27 highlights)

3?? How to Succeed in MrBeast Production (leaked PDF) - By Jimmy Donaldson

Note: many lessons around scaling with ownership - have a pretty big draft on it coming up.

4?? What Changed in 50 Years of Computing: Part 1, 2 & 3 - By Gergely Orosz

Note: I was planning to do something very similar than Gergely did, go back to Fred Brooks original piece and try to quantify what is still relevant and what is not, and I think he did a much better job than I ever could.

5?? Elon Dreams and Bitter Lessons - By Ben Thompson

6?? How to Become a More Effective Engineer - By Cindy Sridharan on PragmaticEngineer

7?? Why Senior Employees Need to Audit and Verify Things for Themselves — It's Not (Only) That We Don't Trust You - By David Anderson

Other relevant articles (and incredibly insightful for me) from David that almost made the Top 24:

• A Complete Guide to Interviewing Candidates — From Competencies to Questions to Debriefs (41 highlights)
• No More Excuses: Trading Blame for Action. Practical Steps Towards Ownership Instead of Whining (27 highlights)
• Why You Can't Teach Leadership — Experience vs. Instruction (23 highlights)

8?? Developing Leadership Styles - By Will Larson

Other relevant articles from Larson that almost made the Top 24:

• Writers Who Operate (17 highlights)
• Useful Tradeoffs Are Multi-Dimensional (14 highlights)
• Hard to Work With (13 highlights)
• Layers of Context (10 highlights)

9?? Leadership Principles - Part 1 & 2 - By Mike Fisher

Note: The Marine Corps 11 Leadership Principles PDF referred by Mike on his piece deserve a big note here, another post coming up on that soon)

?? The Duck-Rabbit & the Polarities of Leadership - By Richard Hughes-Jones

1??1?? When Staff Engineer Is an Anti-Pattern - By Alex Ewerl?f

Other two articles from Alex that were big inspirations for my talk at QConBoston back in June):

• Beyond Staff Engineer (12 highlights)
• 6 Ways Staff Engineers Help Reach Clarity (3 highlights)

1??2?? Can you say what your strategy is? (HBR) - By David Collis and Michael Rukstad

Note: Still on Strategy, another piece that deserves a mention by Adam Fishman :

• WTF Is Strategy? (34 highlights) on fishmanafnewsletter.com

1??3?? Product Strategy Notes - By Ravi Mehta

1??4?? Is It Time to Leave Your Job? - By Adam Fishman & Ravi Mehta

1??5?? Unlocking Optionality in Your Career - By Adam Fishman

Another related article from Adam that almost made the Top 24:

• Growth Skill Building and Your Career (16 highlights)

1??6?? I'm Tired of Social Media: Why I'm Redefining My Digital Life - By Laura Peruchi

1??7?? How to Do Great Work - By Paul Grahan

1??8?? You and Your Research - By Richard Hamming

1??9?? Career Anchors and Career Paths: A Panel Study of Management School Graduates - By Edgar H. Schein

2??0?? How I Read - By Rob Henderson

2??1?? The Death of the Junior Developer - By Steve Yegge

2??2?? Five proven prompt engineering techniques (and a few more-advanced tactics) - By Mike Taylor

2??3?? Legacy Modernization Meets GenAI - By Alessio Eros F. , Tom Coggrave & Shodhan Sheth on martinfowler.com

2??4?? When Network Is Faster Than Cache - By Simon Hearne

Alright, that is it! My Top 24 Picks from my 280+ Reads in 2024 Ranked by Insight & Influence. And, as many of you asked, see below the link to a version of my own Google Sheets with all the articles I read in 2024:

• ?? Google Sheets: My 250+ Reads in 2024 (By @thiagoghisi) on Leadership, Organizational Strategy, Staff+ Career, GenAI, Psychology

It was a lot of work compiling this list, 10+ hours. If you can, please ?? Comment & Share to help me to spread this. Thank You!