Super Lean Software Startup Engineering Management

Lean software startups manage risk by developing products in short product cycles and through iterative product development. The "lean" part of the equation is to minimize cost while learning quickly so that precious capital resources are maximized. R&D costs are dominant for software startups, so a "lean" model around R&D compensation is also critical. However, in the context of a hot labor market for engineers, the reality of running a lean model is quite a bit more challenging. In this paper, we discuss unique engineering management techniques that have been developed to operate lean software startups. The crux of these techniques is to take advantage of market inefficiencies in the engineering labor markets, and in the process, build an alternative employee/employer interaction model. The practical experience of employing these models is discussed in the context of four startups over the last decade. The model is especially effective for university-based startups.