Addy Osmani

This book fills a gap in literature about technology leadership. Many books on leadership exist; likewise, many books on approaching technology from the perspective of business leadership exist; however, not a lot of books talk about how to lead from a technologist’s angle. People working in software are usually really smart people. They know and respect “game” when they see competence and mastery in their field. But mentorship from books or from seasoned leaders is hard to come by for show more those who themselves aspire to lead. This book fills that gap with practical lessons learned from Google’s rise.

This book covers everything and is as comprehensive as an academic textbook. The research literature informs its perspective including Google Projects Oxygen and Aristotle. These internal projects sought to identify the most useful practices of successful managers at their company. Yet the practical side of management also shines through these pages. Like the best management books, it never strays far from results like productive teammates, fulfilling work, and maximizing effectiveness. It’s simply the most complete book on IT leadership that I’ve read so far. It’ll fill a lasting place in the marketplace of technology books.

Following modern leadership theory, Addy Osmani asserts that anyone can lead, regardless of title. He identifies common pitfalls technologists make when moving from a coding-heavy job to a people-heavy role. Importantly, he describes in depth how personality interacts with the art of coding. The personalities of programmers are notoriously difficult to master, and not many books are careful when categorizing them. This book, grounded in practice, is as insightful and innovative at that task as I’ve read anywhere else.

If you’re in the technology industry and want to contribute to your team, this work is for you. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a coder, tester, or manager: If you want to make your team better by leading helpful change, this book can identify a path forward – even if you don’t want to change your current job responsibilities. It’s filled with the idealism, erudition, and inventiveness that has propelled Google forward to change the world… and might just propel your workplace forward, too. show less

The first half of the book was very good. Osmani introduces the reader to the theory behind Backbone.js, then carefull walks through the development of a simple “To Do” application, providing code (error-free!) and discussion of how newly-introduced code parts integrate with what we've already done and what they mean in the Backbone.js environment.

After two courses through the increasingly complex demo application, the book went beyond my level of interest, introducing extensions like show more Marionette and then covering modularization using Require.js. No doubt those latter parts were as carefully written and reviewed as the first parts, so developers with a deeper interest in the framework shouldn't take my lack of interest as any sort of criticism.

Osmani comes across as good-natured and certainly knows the material. The code samples work, explanations are thorough without any sort of condescension, and the content is well-organized. A developer with some JavaScript experience can pick things up typing through the code samples – I completed my first (small, but non-trivial) Backbone application with little trouble immediately after completing Osmani's first two demos.

I did notice in my first solo project that I had little idea how to implement the “model” part of the MV* (as he calls it) framework. Looking back, I saw that the total utilization of that part of the framework in Osman's first demos totaled a dozen lines of code, mostly setting some defaults. I see that as a shortcoming of the book and is the reason for 4 rather than 5 stars. show less

The sections on jQuery, Backbone, and Knockout aren't as essential as they used to be, but still provide useful context. It's important to remember how much of a wild west the JS ecosystem was, and how far we've come, but also how simple JS remains and how much you can do without requiring massive frameworks or libraries. These patterns are useful and used today, and will continue to outlive the framework du jour