在一家AI初创公司担任创始工程师

而且，你知道，有些人可能会说提高报价的最佳方式是制造竞争。

And, you know, some might say the best way to increase your your offer is by having competition.

但我认为，在早期公司里，当你作为仅有的两三个人之一加入时，对创始人来说，你的全心投入、准备就绪和乐于助人的态度意义重大。

But I think that early stage companies where you're joining as just, like, one or two people, it really means a lot to the founder that you are bought in, ready to go, excited to help them.

他们希望你感到满意，想确保你得到一份好待遇。

And they want you to be happy, they wanna make sure that you have a good deal.

我想说的是，你在网上读到的那些关于谈判的通用建议，首先很多是针对与无面孔的大公司谈判的情况——那些给你报价的人，比如招聘经理或HR，他们并不拥有决策权，只是拿着既定数字来完成招聘任务，他们不会有太多情感因素，所以那些建议在这种情况下确实有效。

I will say, like, you know, the general advice of negotiation that you read online, first of all, a lot of it is written when you're negotiating against faceless corporations, where the person giving the offer, let's say an injury manager or HR, they don't own this thing, they're given numbers and they have a job to do, which is close people, and they don't have too much emotion, and a lot of that advice will work, you know, like that they do.

但如你所说，在初创企业中，人才是关键，团队规模很小，创始人们确实很在意。我要说的是，很多优秀的创始人根本不会向那些不认同他们事业的人发出邀约，因为公司还处于早期阶段。

But as you say, in a startup it's people, it's a very small team, the founders do care, and I will say this, like a lot of lot of good founders will actually just not make offer to peoples who they don't think believe in what they do because it's so early.

所以我觉得你的做法——当然，你知道——可能与所有常规建议背道而驰，因为这些建议本就不适用于这种情况。

So I I feel like what what you did, of course, you know, like, it probably goes against all the advice out there because the advice is not for this.

我认为保持真实、保持热情很重要。

Like, I feel being authentic, like, being excited.

我不能代表所有创始人发言，但我认识一些创始人，我确实认为诚实很重要。说到底，很多时候跟随直觉是个相当不错的策略。

I cannot talk for all founders, but I know some founders, and I I I do think this means an honestly, like, in in the end, following your gut is a pretty good strategy a lot of times.

关于直觉有个有趣的事，实际上在收到offer的前一天，我正在做决定。

A funny thing about gut is that, actually, the day before the offer, I was making the decision.

我当时有个年收入1000万且正在翻倍的公司，还有WARP。

I had, you know, the 10,000,000 ARR company that was doubling, and I had WARP.

那时候我在丹佛。

I'm in Denver at the time.

前一晚我的胃确实不太舒服，我想是因为它感受到了我将要做的事和我真正想做的事之间的冲突。

And my stomach was actually acting up the the night before because I think it was feeling that it was the the dissonance between, like, what I was gonna do versus what I really wanted to do.

有件事我听说也很不寻常，没人会建议这么做，但你依然做了——就是当公司给你发offer时，他们通常会要求你提供推荐人，让你和其他人聊聊，或者在他们发offer前做背景调查。

Now one thing I've heard that is also atypical and no one will suggest, but you still did it, is, you know, when a company makes you an offer, they often ask for references for you to talk with other people or before they make an offer.

我听说你和Zach（Warf的CEO）也这么做了。

I heard you did that with Zach, Warf's CEO.

这这具体是怎么发生的？

How how did that happen?

是的。

Yeah.

我其实在之前翻出了那封邮件，看到我当时写道：嘿，Zach。

I actually pulled up the email before this, and I saw that I said like, hey, Zach.

对此我真的很兴奋。

Really excited about this.

很乐意把我的推荐人信息发给你。

Happy to send you my ref checks.

我还想进一步了解你作为管理者是怎样的。

I would also like to learn more about how you are as a manager.

你能给我发一些你之前管理过的人的推荐信吗？特别是当他们还是初级工程师的时候。

Can you send me references for people that you have managed before, especially when they were junior engineer?

政策要求。

Policy.

我的意思是，我其实会建议每个人都这么做。

I mean, I I would recommend everyone to to do this, actually.

他们说，你不是离开公司，而是离开管理者。

They say, like, you you don't leave companies, you leave managers.

在初创公司，你无法选择你的经理。

And at a start up, you can't pick your manager.

你不能离开团队。

You can't leave a team.

比如，我的

Like, my

这个在那里。

This there.

是的。

Yeah.

就像我在谷歌工作的朋友可能在一个团队过得不好，但他们可以转到另一个团队。

Like, my friends working at Google could be having a bad time with one team, and then they could switch to another team.

在初创公司，你就和那位经理绑定了。

At a start up, you are married to that manager.

所以你需要尽可能多地了解与他们共事会是怎样的体验。

So you need to learn as much as possible about what it would be like working with them.

顺便说一句，在任何面试流程中，背景调查都是最重要的环节。

And you have like, reference checks are, by the way, the most important part of any interview process.

有时候这甚至比现场面试本身还要重要。

Like, that is sometimes even more important than the on-site itself.

那你现在的初创公司也会做背景调查吗？

So at your current startup, you're also doing reference checks?

一直都会。

Always.

一直？

Always?

一直。

Always.

你现在做背景调查时会重点看什么？毕竟你作为创始人经历过另一面，能稍微分享一下思路吗？

And what do you look in a reference check now just kind of, you know, thinking a little bit from from a founder, you've been on the other side?

因为我感觉这些做法正在回归，但似乎没怎么听人提起过。

Because I I feel they are coming back, but I I don't hear it that frequently.

我认为很多人并不清楚如何做好背景调查。

I don't think a lot of people know how to do it well.

如果我作为创始人评估候选人，最关键的问题是：你愿意再次与这个人共事吗？

If I, as a founder, am evaluating a candidate, the most important question I ask is, would you want to work with this person again?

而我期待的答案不是简单的'愿意'。

And the answer I'm looking for is not yes.

我想要的答案是'百分百愿意'。

The answer I'm looking for is hell yes.

我甚至不明白你为什么要问我这个问题。

I I don't even know, like, why you've been asking me this question.

你们能拥有这样的人才实在太幸运了。

Like, you're so lucky to have this person.

我不知道你们公司内部发生了什么，但你们是怎么招到这种人才的？

Like, I don't know what's happening in the waters of your company, but, like, how are you able to pull someone like this?

这才是我想要听到的评价。

That is what I'm looking for.

如果我听到的是'哦，我觉得他们可能不错'或者'是的，他们很强'，这种评价对我来说就像是不合格的推荐，通不过我的测试。

If I'm hearing like a, oh, like, yeah, I think that they could be great or like, yeah, they're very strong, that to me is like a bad reference track that does not pass my my test.

一天的试用工作是个很好的初步判断方式，但和长期共事还是不一样的。

One day of a work trial is a very good good prog approximator, but it's just not the same as, like, working long term with someone.

所以这点非常重要。

So this is very important.

其实我认为工程师拥有很大的议价权，因为优秀的人才总是更抢手。

I actually think that, like, engineers have a lot of power and leverage, because the good ones a lot more people want them.

但与此同时，你很难评估在这家AI初创公司工作会是怎样的体验，因为外界可参考的信息并不多。

But at the same time, it's very hard for you to assess, like, what is it gonna be like working at this AI startup, because, it doesn't have that much reference points from, from the outside.

因此评估他们的管理能力至关重要。

So it's very important to assess how they are as a manager.

作为初级或资历较浅的员工加入公司，我认为最糟糕的情况之一就是进入一家不培养、不指导、不提拔年轻人的企业。

As a junior or more junior person entering a company, I think one of the ways that you could have a bad time is if you join a company where they don't promote and mentor and grow, younger people.

我在朋友的公司见过这种情况，他们是最初参与创业的10人元老。

I've seen this happen at my friends' companies where they would be the first 10 people who built the company.

然后公司一旦发展顺利，他们就会被高管取代。

And then as soon as the company does well, they are replaced by executives.

尽管他们创建了公司，投入了大量时间、精力和青春为公司奋斗，却始终无法超越最初加入时的基层职位。

And then they're never promoted beyond the entry level that they were in even though they built the company and they spent a lot of their time and effort and youth and energy working on the company.

因此在我的背景调查中，了解年轻初级员工获得多少机会非常重要。

So it was really important in my reference check to check how much opportunity did someone young and junior get.

比如，职业发展对话是怎样的？

Like, what were career conversations like?

晋升机制如何运作？

How did promotions work?

在困难时期情况如何？

What was it like during the tough times?

而Zach通过了——甚至超出了所有测试标准：我访谈过两位曾是他手下应届生/实习生的工程师，他们后来都很快晋升为Google Sheets的工程总监。

And Zach passed, like, exceeded all of the tests in that I talked to two engineers that were new grads slash interns working for Zach and then very quickly became director of engineering at, Google Sheets.

显然他是那种愿意押注年轻人才并助力其晋升的人。

So he was clearly someone who would bet on young talent and then help to promote them.

我在Warp一次又一次地看到这种情况，许多年轻的应届毕业生被赋予团队领导职位，或能够负责Warp最关键的项目流程，因为Zach总是押注于年轻人才。

And I saw that again and again at at Warp where a lot of, younger new grads were given positions of tag lead or being able to, run the most critical, project streams at Warp because Zach always bets on the young talent.

我认为总体来说，这听起来是个很棒的战略——试着获取或要求未来经理的推荐信，并询问他们你所关心的问题。

I I think that in general, this probably sounds like a great strategy of trying to get or or asking for references from your future manager and asking them about what you care.

比如在你的情况下可能是：'我能有职业发展路径吗？'如果你寻求的是稳定性的话。

You know, this might be, in your case, was like, yeah, can I have a career trajectory if you're looking for, let's say, stability?

或许可以关注这一点。

May maybe look for that.

但我觉得这真是件被低估的事。

But I think it's just, like, such an underrated thing.

我还没听说过其他人这么做，所以恭喜你实践并分享了这个方法。

I I haven't heard anyone else do this, so congrats on on doing and sharing it with us.

是啊。

Yeah.

最后我想补充的是，即使不是为了评估，也可能是为了寻求建议。

The the last thing I'll add there is that even if it's not for evaluation, it could be for advice.

比如说，你怎样才能与这位经理最佳配合？

Like, how would you be able to work with this manager best?

比如，也许要坚持每周的一对一会议。

Like, maybe it's, like, insist insisting on the weekly one on ones.

也可能是以某种特定方式主动寻求建议。

Maybe it's about, like, proactively asking for advice in this specific way.

这样做对你没有坏处，你完全可以将其视为获取如何与他们更紧密合作的建议。

So it doesn't hurt you to do it, and you can always frame it as you that you're getting advice on how to work closer with them.

我很喜欢米歇尔分享Warp如何创立以及她作为创始工程师加入的故事。

I love how Michelle shared the story of how Warp was founded and how she joined as a founding engineer.

谈到初创企业的创立，这正好与我们资深赞助商Linear的起源相呼应。

Talking about the founding of a startup touches nicely on the origin of our seasoned sponsor, Linear.

Linear的创意诞生于其创始人在Airbnb、Coinbase和Uber经历高速增长阶段时。

The idea for Linear came about when their founders were going through hyper growth phases at Airbnb, Coinbase and Uber.

正如你所预料的那样，随着真正规模化的到来，这些公司开始放缓脚步。

As you'd expect with real scale, these companies started to slow down.

过去只需几天完成的事情开始需要数周，有时甚至数月，并非因为人们工作不够努力，而是因为有更多需要协调的环节。

What used to take days started taking weeks, sometimes even months, not because people worked less harder but because there were a lot more moving parts that needed to be coordinated.

举个例子，在Uber早期，一名工程师大约五天就能完成新支付方式Google Wallet的集成、测试并上线到应用中。

As an example, in the early days of Uber, it took a single engineer about five days to integrate, test, and ship a new payment method to the app Google Wallet.

但几年后，我的团队三名工程师花了约两个月才完成Google Pay的开发和发布，因为需要更多规划、与利益相关方协调、与其他团队协作以及对接供应商。

But years later, it took around two months for three engineers on my team to build and release Google Pay because there was so much more planning, coordination with stakeholders, working with other stakeholder teams, and the vendor themselves.

随着团队规模扩大，产品开发受到的影响尤为严重。

As teams grow in size, product development gets hit particularly hard.

参与流程的每个团队都使用不同的工具和工作流。

Every team involved in the process uses a different set of tools and workflows.

这种碎片化意味着无法规模化地回答：哪些功能已承诺交付、哪些存在风险、实际责任人是谁、我们为谁开发这个功能。

This fragmentation means there is no scalable way to answer what has been committed, what's at risk, who's actually accountable, who are we building this feature for.

这常常完全是一团乱麻。

It's often a total mess.

传统做法是通过增加人手或召开更多进度会议来弥补工具上的不足。

The conventional approach is to compensate for tooling gaps with more headcount or with more status meetings.

但根据我的经验，这并没有多大帮助。

But in my experience, it doesn't help much.

这就是Linear存在的意义——为高速发展的团队提供所需的清晰度和协调性，而无需额外负担。

This is why Linear exists, to give high growth teams the clarity and coordination they need without the overhead.

Linear的创始人打造了一款他们希望在那段混乱的高速扩张时期能拥有的工具。

Linear's founders build a tool they wish they had during those chaotic hypergrowth scaling phases.

你可以亲自在linear.apppragmatic上试用，看看为什么Ramp和Clay等团队也纷纷转投。

You can try it yourself at linear.apppragmatic and see why teams like Ramp and Clay also switched over.

现在让我们回到米歇尔，聊聊她作为Warp创始工程师的时光。

And now let's get back to Michelle and her time as a founding engineer at Warp.

当你加入Warp时，你从事了哪些技术工作？你是如何找到所谓的技术栈或定位的？

When you joined Warp, what kind of technologies did you work on and how did you find your so called kind of stack or place?

因为你后来谈到，在初创公司或科技公司里，往往有更多产品与基础设施、前端与后端的区分。

Because you later talked about how, you know, in startups or in tech companies, there's kind of like more product and more infrastructure, more front and more back end.

你最终在这个维度上处于什么位置？

Where did you end up in this sense?

Warp的技术栈最初其实是基于JavaScript开始的，然后我们并没有

So the stack at warp actually first started out with JavaScript, and then we didn't

连TypeScript都不是吗？

Not even TypeScript.

哦，是TypeScript。

Oh, it was TypeScript.

哦，TypeScript啊。

Oh, TypeScript.

好吧。

Okay.

然后两三个月后，我们决定废弃那个代码库，用Rust彻底重写了所有东西，就像从头开始重建一切。

And then two to three months in, we decided to scrap that repository and rewrite every just, like, rebuild everything in Rust.

我必须问问为什么，虽然我大概能猜到原因。

I have to ask why, although I I suspect why.

是的。

Yeah.

这是出于性能考虑，同时也是为了开发速度。

So it was for performance reasons, and it was also speed of development.

是的。

Yeah.

虽然用JavaScript快速推出代码很容易，但我们随后需要花费大量周期进行测试，针对各种性能限制进行压力测试。

So while it was really fast to push out JavaScript code, we then needed to spend a lot of cycles testing, stress testing it against a lot of performance constraints.

我在我们的JavaScript应用中做过一件事：绘制了一千个矩形，然后开始滚动终端，结果滚动功能崩溃了。

So one thing I did with our JavaScript app was that I drew a thousand rectangles, and then I started scrolling the terminal and the scrolling was breaking.

没错。

Yeah.

对我们来说能绘制大量矩形至关重要，因为终端会输出大量锁等内容，所有操作都必须非常快速。

And it's extremely important for us to be able to draw a lot of rectangles because, yeah, like, terminals output a lot of a lot of locks and everything needs to to to be really fast.

开发者群体中有种强烈共识：他们只会使用底层构建的高性能终端。

There was also a very strong sentiment amongst amongst developers that they would only use high performance terminals that were built low level.

因此即使有两个功能完全相同的应用，只要是用Rust构建的那个，分发效果就会好得多。

So even if there were two applications that were completely identical, but one was built in Rust, it would just be distributed a lot better.

大家会喜欢的。

People would love it.

那时候人们就已经有这个想法了，Rust社区虽然规模小但增长迅速且充满热情，所以用Rust开发对市场营销也非常重要。

People would you had this at the back time back then, like, the Rust community was was small but growing very fast and extremely passionate, and so it was also very important for marketing that we built it in Rust.

特别有趣的是，当我们决定用Rust开发后，Zach给每个人都送了O'Reilly的Rust书籍。

It was very, really funny when we decided to do to build in Rust, then Zach sent the O'Reilly Rust book to every everybody.

包括我、另一位创始工程师Alok，我们每天都会研读。

So me, the founding engine the other founding engineer, Alok, and he, and then we would just read every day.

每次学到新知识，我们就会说'哦，把之前写的代码重写一遍吧'。

And then every time we learn something new, we're like, oh, let's rewrite what we wrote previously.

这里unwrap用得太多了，得去修改一下。

There are way too many unwraps, so let's go fix that.

我们还有幸与Nathan Sobo共事，他是Atom编辑器的发明者，后来创建了Zedd。

We also had the privilege of working with, Nathan Sobo, who was, the inventor of the Atom editor and then eventually started Zedd.

他拥有丰富的Rust开发经验。

And he had a lot of Rust experience.

每天他都会和我结对编程，我因此学到了所有真正高效的Rust惯用法。

And every day, he would pair program with me, and I just learned all of the Rust, idioms that work really well.

我想结对编程确实有效。

I guess pair programming does work.

哦，是的。

Oh, yeah.

我真的很享受和Nathan结对编程的过程，因为我学到了很多能显著提升IDE使用体验的小技巧。

I really enjoyed pair programming with Nathan, because I learned a lot of, like, small ergonomical things that makes a big difference in in using the IDE.

你之前问过关于产品工程与基础设施工程的问题。

You asked a question earlier about, like, product engineering versus infrastructure engineering.

对。

Yeah.

其实早在'产品工程师'这个词还没成为大众词汇的很多年前，我就写过相关文章。

And I wrote a piece, like, many many years ago before the word product engineer even became in everyone's lexicon.

产品工程和产品优先编码，指的是那些更关注用户问题、热衷于解决用户痛点的人，他们把技术视为达成目的（即用户影响）的手段。

Product engineering and product first coding are, like, people who are more motivated by user problems and excited about solving user impact, and then they see technology as a means to an end, so user impact.

然后还有那些代码优先的人，他们往往更倾向于基础设施工程，对最佳性能、最佳库和代码优雅性充满热情。

And then there's, like, the code first people who tend to more map onto infrastructure engineering where they're really excited about, like, know, the best performance, the best libraries, elegance.

通过我在Robinhood的实习经历，我发现我本质上更像是一名产品工程师。

I found through my Robin Robinhood internship that I very much am like a product engineer at heart.

我发现产品工程与基础设施工程的划分方式，比前端和后端的划分更能体现工程思维的本质差异，因为人们的思维模式大致会分为两个阵营。

And I find that this division of product versus infrastructure engineering is a way better split, the thing about engineering, than front end and back end, because of the mental models of, like, people tend to segment into, like, roughly speaking, two camps.

所以那些产品优先、关注用户影响的人选择计算机科学，是因为这门学科能为人们创造价值。

So the product first people who care about user impact, they've gone into computer science because of the things that computer science can do for people.

而第二类人则是代码优先型，他们真正热衷于代码本身，热衷于突破代码的极限，这类人往往更适合解决基础设施问题。

And then the second camp, which is code first people who are really excited about the code itself and really excited about pushing the limits of of code, and they tend to map to more infrastructure problems.

当你把人们划分为前端和后端时，这实际上与人们的思维模式存在错配。

When you split people, up in front end and back end, it's diff it's like it does a mismatch in the mental models of, people.

这是我的亲身经历。

Like, this is my experience.

我曾在一家实习公司担任前端工程师，当时分配给我的任务只有实现设计稿。

I was a front end engineer at one of my internships, and all I was given are monks to implement.

因此我无法为用户解决问题。

And so I wasn't able to solve problems for users.

于是我就想，哦，我要转去做后端工程。

So then I felt like, oh, I wanna go to back end engineering.

而在另一次实习中，我被分配到了基础设施部门。

And then in my other internship, I was placed into infrastructure.

我花了两周时间从Amazon Athena迁移到Presto，所做的就是写SQL和迁移数据库角色权限。

So I spent two weeks migrating from Amazon Athena to Presto, and all I did was write SQL and migrate data boat database roles.

而我最终从事的工作更接近底层，但我并没有真正看到自己在解决任何用户问题。

And I was finally working on something that was closer to the metal, but also I wasn't really seeing how I was solving any user problems.

这让我觉得，哦，哇。

And so it made me feel like, oh, wow.

也许我并不真的想做软件工程。

Like, maybe I don't really wanna do software engineering.

直到我获得那个机会——我极力争取加入Robinhood新闻标签团队后，我才终于意识到，哇。

And it was only after I got that, opportunity and I I I advocated for joining the news tab team, the Robinhood news team, that I finally saw, like, woah.

我真心热爱解决用户影响问题和用户问题。

Like, I truly love solving user impact problems and user problems.

在解决用户问题的过程中，我得以运用前后端等工具。

And then while solving the user problems, I get to use tools like back end and front end.

对我来说使用哪种工具并不重要，关键在于我是否解决了用户的问题——比如他们能看到什么新闻以及呈现形式。

And it didn't matter to me which one I was using as long as I was solving the problem of, like, the user, which is what news do I see and how does it look.

而且我确实感受到'产品工程师'这个概念，它更像一个动词或流行语，正在初创企业间广泛传播。

And and, like, I I really sense that product engineer, it's also a kind of a verb or or a phrase that that is now spreading across startups.

现在很多初创企业都在专门招聘产品工程师。

So many startups are now hiring specifically product engineers.

这确实正在发生。

So it is happening.

作为创始人，我想你迟早会招聘产品工程师（如果还没开始的话）。除了编码能力和基础技能外，

As a founder yourself, I assume at some point you will hire product engineers if you're not already hiring, but what would you look for, like, outside of the, like, this person can code and, you know, has the basics.

你会通过哪些特质来判断一个人是否适合做产品工程师？

But what what what are the things that will tell you if, like, okay, this person would be good at product engineering versus maybe not as much?

一个关键信号是他们是否曾为本质上以产品为先的公司工作过。

One key signal is whether or not they have worked for a company that was product first in nature.

比如，如果他们曾从事过更偏向用户端的SaaS工具，如Figma、Notion或Slack，你就知道这些公司非常注重产品优先的思维，他们挑选的也是产品优先型人才。

Like, if they had worked on more of like a user facing type SaaS tool like Figma, Notion, or Slack, you know that those companies are very focused on product first thinking, and they pick people who are product first.

但在面试中，你也可以通过候选人回答问题的方式来大致判断。

But then in an interview, you can also kind of tell based on how the candidate answers questions.

所以当你询问他们过去的工作内容时，有些人会大谈特谈那些很酷的技术，而另一些人则会关注业务问题，比如‘我们每年要流失70万美元给亚马逊’这类情况。

So when you ask them, what they were doing, some peep at their previous roles, some people will focus a lot on, like, the very cool technology, and then others will focus on the business problem of, like, oh, like, you know, we were leaking $700,000 a year to Amazon.

因此，我们迁移到自托管的开源Presto系统至关重要。

And so it was very important that we migrated over to our own open source hosted Presto.

然后我们完成了迁移，这就是业务上发生的变化。

And then we did this, and then this is what happened to the business.

而不是说‘对我们来说做这件事很重要，但由于种种原因非常困难’这类泛泛之谈。

As opposed to, like, oh, like, you know, it was very important for us to do this thing, and it was very difficult because of x y z reasons.

接着我们尝试使用这个库，但它却无法正常工作。

And then we used this library, but then this library didn't work.

你知道吗？

You know?

你确实能看出区别。

You could really tell the difference.

而且对我们的面试流程来说，加入一个产品环节也非常重要，我们会问人们：他们会如何改进终端？

And it was very important also for our interview process to involve a product round where we asked people, like, you know, what would they change about the terminal?

以及他们会如何改进他们正在使用的某个喜爱应用？

And what would they change about a favorite app that they're already using?

首先，那些具备产品思维的最佳人才会对如何改进产品有自己的见解，其次，他们懂得如何从用户角度来阐述这些改进。

And then the best people who are thinking in terms of product would know how well, first of all, would have an opinion about how how to improve a product, and then second of all, would know how to talk about it from the user's, perspective.

最后，他们能够根据用户可见的里程碑来为产品制定阶段性目标。

And last of all, are able to create milestones in that product based on user visible milestones.

因此，如果你有100件事要做，你会希望以用户在每个阶段都能感知到变化的方式来分组和排序任务，而不是把60%的时间花在提升性能或降低延迟上——这些改进直到前端部署后用户才能察觉。

So you would want if you have, like, a 100 things to do, how do you group it and sequence the the things to do in a way where every milestone, the user could see a difference as opposed to, like, maybe spending, like, 60% of your time improving performance or latency that would not be seen by the user until this front end was added, for example.

是的。

Yeah.

所以我听到的是，理解业务、关心产品，以及许多我们过去可能仅与产品经理相关联的特质，现在这些变得越来越重要。

So I'm I'm hearing that, like, understanding the business, caring about the product, like, having a lot of things that we might have associated purely in the past with just product managers, having some of that is increasingly important.

而对于那些完全不愿涉足这些领域的工程师来说，这也完全没问题。

And, you know, for engineers who will have none of it, that's also fine.

但感觉他们可能越来越适合从事基础设施工作，或者那些不需要考虑产品的地方。

But it it feels like increasingly they might be a better fit for infrastructure work or places where you don't need to think about product.

有些公司或团队有专门的产品经理来处理所有产品相关事务，工程师只需负责实现，这听起来可能没那么有趣，但这样的地方确实存在，而且有些工程师很欣赏这种模式。

There's, like, someone or company where there is a product manager and they they take care of all of that and it's just implementation, which sounds a little bit less fun, but these places exist and some people, there are engineers who appreciate this.

数量太多了。

There are so many.

我是说，而且它们都极其重要。

I mean, and they're all extremely important.

当你在一家规模庞大的公司工作时，比如性能、内存这些基础设施的使用就变得至关重要。

When you are you're at a company with a lot of scale, like, really, like, performance memory, like, the infrastructure you use is so important.

但对于初创企业来说，你才刚刚起步，所以需要有人能填补公司各个方面的空缺，而初期规模通常还不需要处理诸如每秒千万级请求这样的事务。

But then when you're talking about startups, you're just starting out, And so you need someone who is able to plug in all the holes in the company and that the scale at the very beginning doesn't tend to be something that requires, like, 10,000,000 billions of roles to handle or, like, request per second to handle.

是的。

Yeah.

那么你曾是一名创始工程师。

So you've you've been a founding engineer.

你现在是创始人。

You're now a founder.

显然，你也在招聘创始工程师。

Clearly, you're also hiring founding engineers.

在Warp公司，你们也招聘产品工程师。

And at Warp, you also hire product engineers.

你认为产品工程师和创始工程师有什么区别？

How do you think a product engineer versus a founding engineer differs?

还是说只是时间节点的不同？

Or or do they is it just the timing?

或者说也存在一些性格差异或不同挑战类型？

Or is it also a little bit of different personality or different kind of challenges?

是的。

Yeah.

这是个非常好的问题。

That's a very good question.

我想说，创始工程师与产品工程师，他们更像是不同的维度。

So I would say, like, founding engineer versus product product engineer, they're, like, different axis.

你可以是创始产品工程师。

So you could be a founding product engineer.

你可以是创始基础设施工程师，也可以是后期阶段的产品工程师、后期阶段的基础设施工程师，或是更后期的软件工程师、AI工程师。

You could be a founding infrastructure engineer, or you could be, like, a later stage product engineer, a later stage infrastructure engineer, later later stage, software engineer, AI engineer.

我认为人们对定义可能有分歧，但在我看来，如果你是在公司成立最初几个月内加入的前五名左右员工，就算是创始工程师。

I think that folks might differ on the definition, but I think founding engineer counts if you are in the first five or so that joins within the first few months of the company starting.

根据我的定义，产品工程师是指那些热衷于解决用户问题，并能全栈实现这一目标的人。

A product engineer, in my definition, is someone who is excited about solving user problems, and they are full stack in being able to do that.

所以他们可以开发前端功能、后端功能，或者端到端的完整功能。

So they could go in and build a front end feature, a back end feature, or something that's end to end.

他们也可以涉足AI领域。

They could also go into AI.

他们可以从事基础设施工作。

They could go into infrastructure.

他们会运用编程领域的各种工具来解决用户问题。

They would use whatever tools in the two belt of programming to solve the problem for the user.

我认为现在初创企业发布这些职位描述的方式，实际上他们更倾向于寻找纯粹的前端工程师。

I think these days, the way that startups are putting these job descriptions out, I think that they are actually more looking for purely front end engineers.

现在已经没人用前端工程师这个称呼了。

No one uses the term front end engineers anymore.

我觉得当有人阅读职位描述时，应该仔细研读，因为我认为这里很多初创企业使用'产品工程师'这个词更像是'纯前端工程师'的同义词。

I think when someone is, like, reading a job description, one should read it closely because I think that a lot of startups here are using the word product engineer more as a kind of like a synonym for front end only engineering.

所以并不是所有公司都指我们刚才讨论的那种产品工程师？

So so not all of them mean the product engineer that we were talking about?

是的。

Yeah.

比如，在你现在的初创公司里，面对所有这些AI工具，你觉得会怎样？

What what what do you think today at your startup, for example, now that we have all these AI tools?

你认为这会让我们更少进行结对编程吗？即使人们在同一空间工作？

Do you think it's gonna push us away from even pair programming even if people are in the same space?

还是说，你认为坚持结对编程的人实际上会从中获益良多？

Or or or do you think, you know, the the the people who still do it are actually gonna benefit a lot from it?

我觉得随着AI的兴起，现在每个人都在和AI进行结对编程。

I think almost like with the rise of AI, everyone now is pair programming with an AI.

有个可以交谈的人或机器人，能让每个人每天都有个橡皮鸭（倾诉对象），这有助于大家进步。

And having someone to talk to or some bot to talk to allows everyone to have a rubber duck every day, and that helps everyone get better.

我认为随着回归办公室的趋势兴起，大家有更多机会坐在一起，学习他人如何使用工具——这在远程办公时期是无法实现的，因为Warp最初就是远程优先的公司。

I think that with the rise of the return to office, there's also a lot more opportunities for sitting next to each other and just learning how people use their tools that we didn't get during the remote time because warp was remote first.

而在最初两年里，我...我甚至从没见过Zach本人。

And during the first two years, I I don't think I I ever saw Zach in person.

哦，天哪。

Oh, wow.

是啊。

Yeah.

没错。

Yeah.

2020年那会儿。

During 2020.

当然。

Of course.

对。

Yeah.

那时候确实如此。

It it it was that time.

在你现在的初创公司Flint，你们使用AI的程度有多高？

At your current startup, how much are at Flint, how much are you using AI?

哦，一直都在用。

Oh, all the time.

现在几乎必须使用AI来编程，这样才能提高工作效率。

Like, it's almost a requirement at this point to use AI to code because then you can be more productive.

你最喜欢用哪些工具？或者说你最常用的工具有哪些？

What are your favorite tools or your common commonly the tools that you reach for?

一直都是Cloud Code。

Always Cloud Code.

你还经常用IDE吗？还是用得少了？

Do you still use the IDE or not as much?

或者用来审查代码？

Or to review stuff?

我们在IDE里使用Cloud Code。

So we use Cloud Code inside the IDE.

嗯。

Mhmm.

是的。

Yeah.

是在VS Code里还是...我不确定你们是用Cursor还是其他编辑器。

Inside Versus Code or or I'm not sure if you can do Cursor or one of them.

是Cursor，我们还有个工程师只用VIM编码，所以他在Jamf上用Cloud Code。

It's Cursor, and then we have an engineer who only codes on VIM, so he uses Cloud Code on Jamf.

哦，但Cloud Code在那里也能运行。

Oh, but then Cloud Code runs there as well.

这挺酷的。

That's pretty cool.

真疯狂，我们这么快就从只用IDE——或者说大多数工程师——转变到真正开始适应这种方式。

It's crazy how how quickly we've we've changed from, like, ID only or most engineers to actually just, like, warming up to this.

是啊。

Yeah.

技术在进步嘛。

Technology gets better.

你之前提到个有趣的话题，关于加入早期初创公司（尤其是AI初创公司）时的一些警示故事，有些工程师可能会觉得被创始人坑了。

One interesting topic that you mentioned earlier is some cautionary tales about how when you're joining an early stage startup, especially an AI startup, some engineers can feel a little bit, like, screwed by founders.

而且，你知道，我觉得我们讨论过你如何成功在一家AI公司获得优厚offer，创始人各方面都很完美，但我觉得有必要谈谈你可能见过或听过的一些负面模式，以及如何避免，因为现在AI初创公司和招募工程师的创始人如雨后春笋般涌现，有时候事情可能好得不像真的。

And and, you know, I I I think, you know, we talked about how you managed to, like, you know, get a great offer at an AI company with a founder who, like, checked all the boxes, but I think it's important to talk about some negative patterns you might have seen or heard and and how to avoid it because, again, there's an explosion of startups, of AI startups, of founders who want to recruit engineers, and sometimes, I guess, things can be too good to be true.

是啊。

Yeah.

是啊。

Yeah.

我在朋友中也察觉到很多人觉得，特别是创始人可能会被大公司收购挖走，成为公司里唯一从收购中获得金钱利益的人。

I I'm I'm sensing a lot amongst my friends as well that people feel like, specifically, the founder might be acqui hired away by a bigger company and then be the only one in the company that received any monetary benefit from

这种收购。

the acquisition.

我们在新闻中见过这种情况。

That that we've seen in in the news.

是啊。

Yeah.

有些创始人被挖走后，团队就被晾在一边。

Some of the founders being hired away and then the team is left hanging.

这正是人们真正害怕的具体情况。

That is the specific scenario that people are really scared of.

我有个朋友告诉我，正因为现在创始人被股权收购的情况频发，她决定直接加入OpenAI，因为那里更安全。

And I had a friend who told me that because of all these equity hires of the founders that's happening, like, she's just she's just gonna join OpenAI instead because it's safe.

我认为关键在于真正了解创始人的品格。

I think it's all about, really understanding the character of the founder.

了解创始人的一个好方法就是做背景调查。

One great way to find out about the founder is to do reference checks.

比如，这个人是否真的品行端正，对员工慷慨大方，关心团队？

Like, is this, yeah, is this someone who actually has a good character, who is generous with their people, who care about their team?

另一个很好的判断标准是看创始人自己是否曾是创始工程师，因为只有亲身经历过那种生活体验和同理心——从公司初创时一行代码都没有的日子，到写出第一行代码，再到拥有第一个用户，以及那些没有用户的日子——所有这些痛苦和挣扎才能培养出这种理解：

The other good approximator is to see if the founder themselves were founding engineers to begin with because there's just, like, that lived experience and empathy that you just cannot get unless you went through the the ritual of having been a founding engineer where you're in there, you know, the day that there wasn't even any code to the day that there was code, and then the day we had our first user, the days where we didn't have the first user, like, all that, like, pain and struggles to now have, like, all this this empathy that, hey.

这些人把职业生涯托付给我，他们承担了很大风险。

Like, these folks are entrusting me with their career, and they are taking a lot of risk.

我无法想象自己会不给他们提供二次机会、收购要约和其他机会的世界。

I cannot see a world in which I wouldn't offer secondaries and tender offers and opportunities to them.

这是个巨大的牺牲。

It's a big sacrifice.

或许甚至值得在面试中专门询问这些问题：如果公司要进行新一轮融资，创始人会套现部分股份，其他员工是否也有机会参与？

And and maybe it's even worth asking on the interview specifically these questions that if the company was to was to have some as a kind of raise a new round and the founders would take secondaries, would it be offered to other employees?

如果发生收购，你会带着团队一起走吗？

If there was an acquisition to happen, would you bring the team with you?

我想，虽然这不具约束力，但我觉得人们不问而大家默认的情况与主动询问是有区别的——尤其是对那些看似发展势头迅猛的初创公司而言，多问一句总没坏处。

I guess, you know, it's not binding, but I feel there's a difference between when people don't ask and everyone just assumes versus it doesn't hurt too much to ask potentially, especially if it's a startup that seems to have just a rocket ship trajectory.

哦，是的。

Oh, yeah.

绝对如此。

Absolutely.

在当前形势下，你完全有筹码提出这个要求。

You definitely have the the leverage to ask that in in these times.

我的意思是，这是个前置问题。

It's I mean, it's an antecedent of question.

对吧？

Right?

最坏的情况是他们不回答，或者拒绝回答，或者说些含糊其辞的话。

Worst thing is that they don't answer it or or they refuse to answer or they can say something.

对吧？

Right?

这样你至少能获得一些参考信息。

And then you have some data point.

是的。

Yeah.

另外关键不是过分纠结他们的具体回答，而是要注意他们是否事先思考过这个问题。

The other thing is also to not listen too hard on what their answer is and to listen to whether or not they had thought about it before.

当我问扎克如何看待早期员工时，很明显他已经思考这个问题多年了。

When I was asking Zach about, like, how he thought about early employees, like, it was very clear that he had been thinking about it for years.

所以他的回答非常深思熟虑，这显然是他长期思考的课题。

And so the answer that came out was very well thought out, and it was a really obvious thing for him to be thinking about.

相比之下，你知道，一个不够深思熟虑的经理可能会给你一个不错的答案，但很明显他们是临时想出来的。

Whereas, like, you know, a less thoughtful manager might give you a good answer, but it's very clear they just came up with it on the spot.

现在你有了自己的初创公司，你知道，你已经从在公司工作转变为成为创始工程师，现在又创立了自己的公司，恭喜你们脱离隐秘模式

So now that you have a startup and, you know, you you've now moved from from, again, being being working at companies to being a founding engineer, so now founding your own company, and congratulations on coming out from Stealth

谢谢。

Thank you.

关于Flint，在你与硅谷或其他创始人交流的环境中，以及根据你自身的经验，你认为招聘世界级工程师需要什么条件？

With with Flint, How do you find what does it take to hire world class engineers in an environment like Silicon Valley or with other founders you're talking to and also from your own experience?

我认为关键在于展现出你对团队的高度重视，珍视团队中的每一位成员，并且在你与他们之间建立深厚的信任——你会竭尽所能确保他们能获得良好的体验。

I think it's about showing that you care a lot about the team and that you value people on your team and that there's high trust between you and them that you will do every measure it takes to make sure that they are gonna have a good time.

同时还要怀有宏大的愿景——这家公司将如何改变世界，它必将成就非凡，而此刻正是一个改变世界的机会。

And then it's also about having really big vision about how this company is going to change the world, and it's gonna be huge, And that this is a chance to change the world.

说到这个，你的初创公司Flint，能否聊聊你是如何构思出关于网站的创意？以及你正在构建的产品，还有你如何看待这些AI智能体将如何改变世界和互联网？

Speaking of which, your your your startup, Flint, can we talk about how you came up with the idea around websites and also how, you know, both what you're building, but also how you're thinking these AI agents will change the world, the web.

也就是说网站本身将具备自主行动能力。

So the website itself become agentic.

它们能自我构建。

They build themselves.

这意味着如果你早晨醒来发现竞争对手连夜上线，你的网站已经自动生成了一个对比页面，将你与竞争对手进行比较。

That means that if you wake up in the morning to a competitor having launched overnight, your website would have already generated you a comparison page that compares you with the competitor.

接着它已经开始优化转化率，并持续追踪你们产品间的每日差异，实时更新。

And then it's already optimizing for conversions, and it's also keeping track of the differences in your product and them every day and then updating it.

原本需要五家代理商耗时三个月完成的工作，现在你睡一觉的功夫就搞定了。

So something that would have taken five agencies three months to do suddenly gets done overnight when you were sleeping.

我们还在考虑自动化所有围绕这一点的其他营销工作流程。

And we're thinking of also automating all of the other marketing workflows around that.

比如，我们可以接入你的销售电话和Gong通话记录，然后找出你可能遗漏的产品销售或解决方案页面。

Like, we can hook into your sales calls and your Gong calls and then find out ways of selling your product or solution pages that you might be missing.

哦，哇。

Oh, wow.

是啊。

Yeah.

这完全是另一个层次了。

And proper next level.

哦，是啊。

Oh, yeah.

营销人员真的非常喜欢这个。

Like, marketers really love this.

我不仅是说从营销角度，从软件工程层面来看，你们整合了所有这些不同的输入渠道来收集反馈并最终生成内容。

I mean, I'm not just talking obviously from the marketing angle, but just from a from a software engineering and how you have, like, all these, like, different input channels to capture feedback and then to eventually generate.

这听起来真的很酷。

This sounds really cool.

没错。

Yeah.

它正在为网络带来自主性。

It is bringing autonomy to the to the web.

我们正在构建一种新型互联网，网站不仅由AI生成、为AI服务，而且正在成为AI本身，变得更加动态和主动。

We're we're really building a new kind of Internet here where the website is now not only generated by AI and for AI, but it's also becoming AI itself to be more dynamic and proactive.

我的联合创始人曾在Neural公司负责自动驾驶汽车团队的运营。

My cofounder actually ran Teams at Neural, which is an autonomous vehicle company.

我们经常讨论自主网站与自动驾驶汽车的相似之处，它们都通过感知系统接收数据。

And we talk a lot about how autonomous websites are similar to autonomous vehicles in that it does they they take in data through a perception system.

然后会有一个决策系统来决定，好吧，

Then there's a decision making system about, okay.

比如根据这个竞争对手的情况，根据这些销售电话的内容，我们该采取什么行动？

Like, based on this competitor, based on these sales calls, like, what should we do?

接着它会通过一个控制系统来实际执行页面更新。

And then it would then have a control system that then actually implements the pages.

然后这个循环会重新开始：根据页面在市场环境中的表现，我们下一步该怎么做？

And then it would then start off that loop again where based on how the page is doing in the environment, which is the market, what should we then do?

通过将所有这些感知、决策和控制系统整合到同一实体中，我们最终形成了闭环反馈。

So by putting all of that perception, perception, that decision making, and control, systems into the same entity, we finally closed the feedback loop.

这就是为什么传统上需要五个机构相互协调才能构建一个页面的原因。

That is the reason why it requires five agencies talking to each other to build a page.

我们之所以需要五个机构，是因为当时有独立的工具和不同的专业领域需要在彼此间传递信息。

We had to have the five agencies because there were separate tools and different specialties to be passing information between.

现在如果你把所有工具整合到同一实体中，就会形成一个闭环，让网站持续为你的业务自我优化。

And now if you put all of the tools in the same entity, you start having a closed loop where the website continuously optimizes itself for your business.

这非常令人兴奋。

It's very exciting.

所以第一阶段就是：让我们基于实时数据流对市场做出响应。

So the first phase is that, which is let's respond to your market based on real real time data streams.

下一阶段将实现根据访客身份进行页面实时变形与重构。

And then the next phase will be real time morphing and shape shifting of the page based on who is visiting.

比如来的是医疗行业高管，我们就变形页面以突出医疗案例研究或合规性要求。

It could be a health care executive that comes, and then we morph the page to highlight, health care case studies or, like, compliance related requirements from health care.

我们甚至能即时生成针对该医疗高管的销售演示，无需点击联系销售再苦等一周的Zoom会议——网站就能现场生成精准演示。

And then we could even generate a sales demo that's specifically for that health care executive Instead of needing to click contact sales and then wait a week for a Zoom call where someone is extremely bored talking to you, you just have the the website generate a demo closely on the spot.

如果是AI代理访问，网站还能切换不同的沟通方式。

And then if it's an AI agent that's visiting, we can also speak different the website could also speak differently.

这个代理不想用HTML语言交流

The agent doesn't wanna speak in HTML.

他们想用MCP协议交流

They wanna speak in MCP.

他们想通过工具调用、API、Markdown和JSON进行交流

They wanna speak in tool calls, APIs, markdown, JSON.

我们正在构建一种全新的代理间协议，旨在重新定义代理与网络的交互方式

There is a new agent to agent protocol that we're building here to redefine the way that agents interact with the web.

我们还提出了'代理网络'的概念——与其通过谷歌搜索链接，不如让代理之间相互交流，判断哪些代理更可信，并快速沟通以促成交易。

We also create the concept of an agentic web where instead of going to Google, to find, links, You could have the agents talk with each other to tell which agents are more credible than others and be able to communicate very quickly to help to sell a customer on a deal.

这太有意思了！虽然我们现在——至少我个人——主要关注大语言模型如何改进开发工具、改变工作方式，但别忘了这些工具还能彻底改变其他领域，比如重塑我们对网站的认知，让网页变得极度动态化和个性化。

This is so interesting because I I feel like we're so focused right now, or at least I'm so focused on how LLMs can help developer tools, like, just, you know, change how how we do things, that we cannot forget that there's a whole world out there where where these tools can really just, you know, like, change a bunch of stuff like how how we think of websites and how dynamic they are and how, like, ultra dynamic or ultra personalized they can be.

这真的太酷了。

This is really cool.

是啊。

Yeah.

我们所熟知的互联网即将发生变革，而Flynn正在构建这一未来。

Everything we know about the Internet is about to change, and and Flynn is building that.

即便是今天，我们正在解决的一个非常有趣的问题几乎达到了研究级别。

Even today, one really interesting problem that we're solving, it's almost a research level problem.

这个问题涉及创建符合品牌形象的落地页。

It's in terms of creating on brand landing pages.

从表面看可能很简单——不就是选个背景色和字体排版然后生成页面吗？

So it might seem very simple from the outside because, like, oh, like, can't we just, like, choose the background color and the typography of a page and then turn out a page?

但事实证明，尤其在当下，品牌形象至关重要。

Turns out that, like, especially today, brand is very important.

如果你是SaaS公司，绝不会在试图签约财富500强客户时展示一个由AI随意生成的页面。

You wouldn't put a if you're a SaaS company, you wouldn't put, like, a, like, a cursor generated page in front of a Fortune 500 client you're trying to trying to close.

你需要确保页面从每个像素点都完美契合品牌调性。

You wanna make sure that your page really matches your brand down to the very pixel.

我们在Flint中开发了一项能力，可以创建出如同客户亲手打造的页面。

And we have developed a capability in in Flint to create a page that looks almost as if the customer themselves built it.

比如，我们与Cognition合作，既负责他们的活动页面，也处理诸如风帆与光标对比页面这类内容，这些甚至被大语言模型引用。

So, like, we work with Cognition, on the events pages as well as their comparison pages between windsurf and cursor, for example, and that's being cited by LLMs.

在我看来，你之所以能走到今天，部分原因可能是你作为初创公司的创始工程师，见识过太多东西——虽然可能还有其他因素。

So it feels to me, you know, you've gotten exposed, like, one part of how you got here, maybe you've gotten otherwise, but it feels you really got here because you were at a founding engineer at a start up, you've seen so many things.

那么对于渴望成为创始工程师加入团队的软件工程师，比如AI初创公司或快速发展的初创企业（如今这类公司大多与AI相关，但并非全部），你有什么建议？

So what would your advice be to software engineers who would love to join as a founding engineer, maybe an AI startup or a fast roll startup these days, a lot of them are AI, not all of them.

对于已有一定领域经验的人，你认为哪些策略可能对他们有效？

It's someone who has some experience in the field, what tactics you think might work for them?

关键在于证明你有AI开发经验，因为这项技能目前需求极高，而且技术非常新颖。

It's about showing that you've built in AI before because that skill is very much high in in demand, and it's very new.

相对而言，真正开发过AI产品的人非常少。

Very few people, relatively speaking, have ever built an AI product before.

所以只要利用周末时间学习如何开发AI产品，就能让你从众多人中脱颖而出。

So just spending, like, some time over weekends knowing how to build an AI product already helps you stand out above many people.

确实。

Yeah.

我们所说的AI产品，指的是那些底层使用大语言模型（LLMs）来实现各种功能的产品。

And by an AI product, we mean something that is is using LLMs underneath the hood to to do what whatever it might be.

我不知道。

I don't know.

可能是基于LLMs的搜索引擎，或是任何能解决你痛点的东西。

May may that be just a search engine based on LLMs or or anything that scratches your itch.

对。

Yeah.

确实，任何能解决你痛点、利用这些模型或补全API的东西都算。

Really, any anything that scratches your itch that uses any of the the models, the completion APIs.

要想在这个角色上表现出色，首先要选对创始人。

In terms of excelling in that role, it starts off with picking the right founder.

但一旦加入后，关键就在于主动承担那些没人愿意做、但对业务最重要的事。

But then once you do join, it's all about volunteering to do the things that no one no one wants to do, but it's the most important thing for the business.

所以我做了大多数工程师认为最糟糕的工作——成为公司在Hacker News上的公开代表，在Warp时期。

So I did what most engineers would consider to be the worst job ever, which is to be the face of the company on Hacker News at Warp.

于是我写了博客文章。

So I wrote the blog posts.

我把它们发布在Hacker News上，并回答了Hacker News上的所有问题。

I published them on on Hacker News, and I answered all the questions on on Hacker News.

我主动创建了公司Twitter账号，为公司撰写推文，还在任何开发者工具公司真正考虑做YouTube之前，为公司开设了YouTube频道。

I went out there and I created our company Twitter, and I was writing tweets for the company, then starting a YouTube channel for the for the company before any developer tool company has really thought about doing YouTube.

创建Discord频道，记录每一条反馈，建立GitHub仓库，这些虽然与工程无关，但却是公司真正需要的。

Starting a Discord channel, like, filing every feedback, starting the GitHub, like, things that are, like, very different, like, outside of engineering, but the the business really needed.

与此同时你还在继续做你的工程工作。

And and then you you are still doing your engineering job.

你仍然在修复bug等等，但除此之外，你还在思考如何帮助公司。

You are still, like, you know, like fixing bug and etcetera, but on on the top of it, like, you're figuring out how to help the company.

对吧？

Right?

是的。

Yeah.

是的

Yeah.

你必须确保你的首要工作仍是软件工程

You you still have to make sure that you're doing your your number one job, is software engineering.

因此这仍需作为主要关注点，只有在主业表现良好的情况下，你才应该主动承担其他事务

So that needs to still stay the main focus, and you should only volunteer for other stuff if you are already doing well in your main job.

做这些事并学习如何处理的益处在于，你能了解企业的实际需求

The benefit of doing a lot of these things and learning how to do a lot of these things, is that then, you get to learn what businesses need.

比如，你就能提出不仅限于开发工具公司的创意点子

You know, you can come up with ideas that are not, like, just developer tool companies, for example.

由于我做了所有这些事并负责人员招聘，我记得在一次董事会后，创始人联系我说：'Vishal，你招揽了这么多增长部门的人才'

And at one point, because I was doing all of these things and then hiring all the people, I remember, like, it was after one of the board meetings, my my founder reached out to me and said that, hey, like, Vishal, like, you hired all these people in growth.

我希望你担任增长部门负责人

I want you to be head of growth.

从现在起，你将创建并管理这个团队

You're going to be starting and managing this team from now on.

我也不知道。

And I don't know.

我当时才22岁，突然就成了高管，每季度要向董事会汇报那些惊人的增长数字和营收数据。

I was, like, 22 at the time and suddenly an executive suddenly reporting to the board every quarter on that, like, wow wow numbers and revenue.

除非你主动承担各种杂事，否则根本不会有这种机会。

You wouldn't get that unless you volunteer to do random things.

而且要确保每次做这些事时，都完成得异常出色。

And then make sure that every time you do this, you do them exceedingly well.

因为这不仅仅关乎你在某个领域的表现。

Because it's not necessarily just about doing well in that, like, domain.

关键在于让创始人明白，无论交给你什么任务，你都能完美完成。

It's about the founder knowing that whenever they pass you a job to be done, it will be done excellently.

没错。

Yep.

这样你就能获得越来越多的职责。

And then this way, you get more and more responsibilities.

最终，我负责领导WARP的企业销售工作。

Eventually, I ended up leading enterprise sales for WARP.

哦，哇。

Oh, wow.

因为我们遇到了一个问题：开始收到大量来自使用WARP公司的安全调查问卷。

Because we had this problem where we started getting a lot of security questionnaires from companies that were using WARP.

我发现了这个问题，当时就想，哦，这不是安全问题。

And I saw that problem, and I was like, oh, this is not a security problem.

这是企业销售的机会。

This is an enterprise sales opportunity.

这是对话的开始——如果我们达成企业协议，就能填写你们的问卷，提供SOC2报告，还能配备完善的管理面板和合规控制，只要你们支付这个金额的费用。

This is the start of a conversation in which if we have an enterprise deal, we could we could fill your questionnaires, and we could have SOC two reports, and we could have all these nice compliance controls and admin panel if you paid us, like, you know, this amount of money.

是啊。

Yeah.

正是这类事情能让你在公司里表现出色。

It's it's things like this that really help you, do well in a company.

就是去做那些非常不吸引人、没人愿意做的事，因为不知不觉间，你可能就会负责企业销售了——就因为没人愿意处理安全问卷。

It's doing the things that are very unsexy that nobody wants to do because before you know it, you might be running enterprise sales because no one no one wanted to work on security questionnaires.

这就像个烫手山芋，被推来推去好几个季度，最后落到了我手里。

It was a hot potato that was passed around multiple quarters until it went to me.

我想不用说也知道，如果你作为创始工程师或软件工程师，要处理所有这些事务并保持平衡，在外人看来简直像在问'你怎么能同时做这么多事？'

And and I guess it's probably needless to say, but if you are working as a founding engineer or, like and you're or or even as a software engineer, you're picking up all these things and you're balancing all these things, from the outside, it's like, how are you doing all these things?

作为创始人，这某种程度上是在为创业做准备，因为创始人必须同时平衡所有这些烫手山芋。

I guess as a founder, it's kind of preparing you to be a founder because as a founder, you're you'll definitely have to balance all, you know, all these hot potatoes at the same time.

哦，确实。

Oh, yeah.

创始人和管理者的职责就是接手没人愿意做的事，好让其他人能专注于自己最擅长的领域。

As a the job of a founder and a manager is to always like, it's always about taking the things that no one wants to do so that everyone else can be in their zone of genius.

他们可以把所有时间都花在解决工程问题上，而我会处理那些烦人的事务。

They can spend all their time working on this engineering problem, and, yes, I will deal with Aconus.

最后环节，我们快速回答几个问题吧。

As closing, let's do some rapid questions.

我要问个问题，你想到什么就说什么。

I'm gonna ask a question and then you tell me what comes to mind.

听起来不错吧？

Sounds good?

嗯。

Yeah.

听起来很棒。

That sounds great.

你最喜欢的编程语言是什么？为什么？

What's your favorite programming language and why?

哦，Rust。

Oh, Rust.

每次通过Boro检查器时我都很有成就感，因为要写出能编译通过的代码非常困难。

I feel like I get a lot of satisfaction every time I pass the Boro checker because it's very difficult to write code that compiles.

在Flint你们也用Rust吗？

And at Flint, you use Rust as well?

Flint这边，我们主要用TypeScript。

Flint, we are a TypeScript shop.

我们正在构建自动化网站，以及能自我生成的网站，所以用能构建网站的语言来编写代码很有帮助。

We are building autonomous websites, and we're building websites that build themselves with, like, you know so it's helpful to be writing in a language that builds the website.

我相信Rust迟早会在那里找到用武之地。

I'm sure Rust will find its way in there sooner or later.

好吧。

Alright.

我们拭目以待。

We'll see.

你会推荐哪一两部你喜欢的电影？

What are one or two movies that you would recommend that you enjoyed?

嗯。

Yeah.

我真的很喜欢《武器》这部电影。

I really enjoyed Weapons.

表面看是部恐怖片，但实际非常精彩。

It looks like a horror movie on the outside, but it is very enjoyable.

片中穿插了许多喜剧桥段，我特别喜欢它非线性叙事的方式——故事发生在2000年代初，讲述一群孩子凌晨2点突然离家出走，集体失踪一个月的事件。

There are many comedic moments in it, and I also really enjoyed the nonlinear narrative where it it's a story about sometime in the early two thousands, there were children who started running out of their houses at 2AM, and then they all disappeared for a month.

这部电影改编自真实事件，然后通过虚构叙事来推测可能发生了什么。

And the movie this is a real life story, and then the movie creates a narrative for, like, what could have happened.

每个章节都展现不同角色的视角，每个视角都为故事增添了全新维度，几乎每次切换都改变了影片的类型风格。

And then every chapter in the movie was showing a different, character's perspective, And every perspective added a different way of viewing the story altogether and almost changed the genre each time.

作为恐怖片爱好者，我还注意到每个章节都对应不同的恐怖片经典角色类型，这个设计让我觉得非常巧妙。

And as a horror movie fan, I also saw that every chapter was a different character in a horror movie trope, which I also found that it was really smart.

所以强烈推荐。

So, yeah, highly recommend.

我不是恐怖片爱好者。

I am not a horror movie fan.

我当初看这部电影时完全不知道会看到什么。

I watched this movie not knowing what I got myself.

我得说它令人难忘。

I will say it's memorable.

现在回想起来仍让我不寒而栗，也引发深思。

It still gives me the shivers, and it it still makes me think.

所以这是个很棒的推荐。

So great recommendation.

谢谢。

Thank you.

强烈推荐。

Highly recommend.

米歇尔，感谢你参加这次播客。

So, Michelle, thanks for being on the podcast.

这次对话真的很有趣，让我们看到作为创始工程师能学到多少东西，如何做到这一点，以及如何最终创立自己的公司，用Flint做出激动人心的事业。

This was just really interesting to see, you know, like, how how much you can learn being as a founding engineer, how you can do that, and how it can lead to starting your own company, doing super exciting things with Flint.

祝Flint一切顺利，感谢你的分享。

So good luck good luck with Flint, and thanks for being here.

非常感谢。

Thank you so much.

我总觉得听别人讲述如何成为创始人的经历很有趣，而Michelle的故事让我觉得特别平易近人。

I always find it interesting to hear how someone became a founder, and Michelle's story felt pretty approachable to me.

真正吸引我注意的是Michelle主动承担那些不讨喜的工作。

What really got my attention was how Michelle was volunteering to do the unattractive work.

比如在Warp时与营销机构合作搭建营销网站，这段经历让她获得了创办当前初创公司的灵感和专长——这家公司专注于用AI创建营销和发布网站。

In this case, working with a marketing agency to build marketing websites at Warp, and this got her the idea and expertise to start her current startup, which is about creating marketing and launch websites with AI.

Michelle的故事很好地提醒我们：要成为优秀的创始人，仅懂软件工程可能远远不够。

Michelle's story is a great reminder that to be a great founder, you probably need more than just software engineering.

如果你能理解业务的不同环节，并愿意亲自动手处理非技术性工作，也会大有裨益。

It's also helpful if you understand different parts of the business and you get your hands dirty with non tech work as well.

另一个让我感兴趣的点是Michelle认为GEO（生成式引擎优化，本质是语言模型推荐网站）可能很快会比搜索引擎优化更重要。

One other thing I found interesting is how Michelle thinks that GEO, Generative Engine Optimization basically LMs recommending websites, will soon become perhaps even more important than search engine optimization.

在AI的推动下，网络世界正快速变化，或许网页会因AI和语言模型而变得更具响应性和流动性。

Things are changing fast in the web thanks to AI, and perhaps web pages will become a lot more responsive and fluid thanks to AI and in response to LLMs.

想了解更多关于如何成为一名优秀创始工程师的细节，请查看节目说明中链接的《务实工程师》深度解析文章，包括一篇关于创始工程师实战经验教训的文章。

For more details on how to be a solid founding engineer, see the pragmatic engineer deep dives linked to the show notes below, including an article on lessons from the trenches of being a founding engineer.

如果你喜欢这期播客，请在您喜爱的播客平台和YouTube上订阅我们。

If you've enjoyed this podcast, please do subscribe on your favorite podcast platform and on YouTube.

如果你能为节目留下评分，我们将不胜感激。

A special thank you if you also leave a rating on the show.

感谢收听，我们下期再见。

Thanks and see you in the next one.