Daniel's path started in QA — a discipline that trains you to think in edge cases, failure modes, and user empathy. He talks about how that foundation shaped his leadership style, the difficult shift from leading engineers to leading managers, and why remote culture requires intentional design rather than improvisation.
What we covered
- QA to leadership
- managing managers
- remote culture
What I took away
- QA thinking trains leaders to look for failure modes in systems — including team systems
- Managing managers requires letting go of technical problem-solving as your primary value
- Remote engagement doesn't happen naturally — it needs structured rituals and deliberate inclusion
- Feedback is a leadership skill that needs as much development as any technical one