Rent the Runway

October 13, 2026

Mar 26 Mar 26 Sharing Our Engineering Ladder Camille I gave a talk last year at the NYC CTO summit on how and why to introduce structure into an engineering organization (slides available here). I am a fan of structure and the clarity that it can provide an organization, despite its potential downsides. I’m not going to talk about the WHY very much in this post, but I thought it was about time that I helped with the HOW. Creating an engineering ladder (that is, the job descriptions and levels of an engineering organization) is a daunting task. If you do a half-hearted job, you’re likely to cause more problems than you solve. The very first ladder I presented to my team was based on the ladder at Foursquare*. It was very simple, with one or two descriptive elements per "attribute" of engineering (technical skill, communication skill, etc), and by all accounts worked very well for their team. I hoped that this style of providing fewer details would result in people being less obsessed with the ladder, less likely to try to negotiate their level on "technicalities". Boy was I wrong. Almost immediately I had engineers debating me over whether they were at the right level, and there was a great deal of anxiety and confusion throughout the organization. I left room for generous interpretation, and it made it difficult for me to explain what I really wanted and expected. In addition to the ladder causing problems inside of my team, we were having a hard time evaluating candidates during interviews and determining what level to hire them into. Particularly at the more senior levels, it wasn’t clear what the criteria for success really looked like. So, together with my tech leads and engineering managers, we rewrote the ladder to be more specific. It has been very helpful both for the process of reviews and promotion committees as well as for the process of hiring. I have since shared my ladder privately with several engineering managers around the country who were looking for inspiration, and today we’re making it public for the benefit of all. I’m sharing this ladder not to suggest that it is the be-all end-all of engineering ladders, but to give you what I hope is a more thorough starting point than you might have seen elsewhere. After all, no one is really writing these ladders from scratch, whether we pull directly from other companies (as this one does at points), or indirectly from our past experience, so the more data points the merrier. Without further ado, I present our engineering ladder, in both spreadsheet, and long-winded text, warts and all. Please feel free to clone this ladder and update it for use in your own organizations. <ul> <li>A special thanks to Harry Heymann, Jason Liszka and Andrew Hogue, authors of the original Foursquare eng ladder! </li> </ul> Camille Facebook0 Twitter LinkedIn0 Tumblr 0 Likes Camille Camille Cras mattis consectetur purus sit amet fermentum. Integer posuere erat a ante venenatis dapibus posuere velit aliquet. Aenean eu leo quam. Pellentesque ornare sem lacinia quam venenatis vestibulum. Sep 29 As seen On Apple TV: A HackWeek Memoir Mar 4 ChatOps! Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the ‘Bot Upgrade to Premium to see salary and compensation for all jobs. Location Bharatpur,

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Common Interview Questions And Answers

1. HOW DO YOU PLAN YOUR DAY?

This is what this question poses: When do you focus and start working seriously? What are the hours you work optimally? Are you a night owl? A morning bird? Remote teams can be made up of people working on different shifts and around the world, so you won't necessarily be stuck in the 9-5 schedule if it's not for you...

2. HOW DO YOU USE THE DIFFERENT COMMUNICATION TOOLS IN DIFFERENT SITUATIONS?

When you're working on a remote team, there's no way to chat in the hallway between meetings or catch up on the latest project during an office carpool. Therefore, virtual communication will be absolutely essential to get your work done...

3. WHAT IS "WORKING REMOTE" REALLY FOR YOU?

Many people want to work remotely because of the flexibility it allows. You can work anywhere and at any time of the day...

4. WHAT DO YOU NEED IN YOUR PHYSICAL WORKSPACE TO SUCCEED IN YOUR WORK?

With this question, companies are looking to see what equipment they may need to provide you with and to verify how aware you are of what remote working could mean for you physically and logistically...

5. HOW DO YOU PROCESS INFORMATION?

Several years ago, I was working in a team to plan a big event. My supervisor made us all work as a team before the big day. One of our activities has been to find out how each of us processes information...

6. HOW DO YOU MANAGE THE CALENDAR AND THE PROGRAM? WHICH APPLICATIONS / SYSTEM DO YOU USE?

Or you may receive even more specific questions, such as: What's on your calendar? Do you plan blocks of time to do certain types of work? Do you have an open calendar that everyone can see?...

7. HOW DO YOU ORGANIZE FILES, LINKS, AND TABS ON YOUR COMPUTER?

Just like your schedule, how you track files and other information is very important. After all, everything is digital!...

8. HOW TO PRIORITIZE WORK?

The day I watched Marie Forleo's film separating the important from the urgent, my life changed. Not all remote jobs start fast, but most of them are...

9. HOW DO YOU PREPARE FOR A MEETING AND PREPARE A MEETING? WHAT DO YOU SEE HAPPENING DURING THE MEETING?

Just as communication is essential when working remotely, so is organization. Because you won't have those opportunities in the elevator or a casual conversation in the lunchroom, you should take advantage of the little time you have in a video or phone conference...

10. HOW DO YOU USE TECHNOLOGY ON A DAILY BASIS, IN YOUR WORK AND FOR YOUR PLEASURE?

This is a great question because it shows your comfort level with technology, which is very important for a remote worker because you will be working with technology over time...