Root Cause

In this episode of Root Cause we sit down with Eric Lubow, a CTO who treats organizations like distributed systems, which means the root cause of a broken team is usually a design problem, not a people problem. Eric has spent more than 20 years building and repairing teams and platforms, from co-founding SimpleReach to running engineering through dozens of acquisitions at Thrasio, and he is now Chief Product and Technology Officer at Mapp. He is also a jiu-jitsu coach, and that shapes how he leads. We get to the root cause of what actually makes a team healthy, why becoming a manager means changing your definition of done, and why ceding control is the part nobody warns you about. We talk about leading AI agents the way you would lead a person, why silent heroes quietly turn into silent burnouts, and how to hire into a team instead of into a vacuum. Honest and specific, with none of the leadership-content platitudes, including the lonely parts of the job most people at the top never say out loud.00:00 Introduction: What Makes a Healthy Team03:05 Jiu-Jitsu, Languages, and a Healthy Ego08:23 Martial Arts, Balance, and "Everything Is Maintenance"13:12 Teams as Distributed Systems and Conway's Law16:38 The IC-to-Manager Transition: Ceding Control19:10 Delegation and a New Definition of Done22:24 Giving Away Your Legos23:49 Can You Learn to Be a Manager?25:21 Don't Just Become the Opposite of Your Bad Manager27:54 Leading AI Agents Like You Lead People31:55 Will AI Replace People? Force Multiplier, Not Replacement36:45 What Actually Makes a Team Healthy38:56 Adoption Curves and Why Teams Mimic Leaders42:06 A Culture of Sharing vs Shadow IT and Shadow AI47:41 The Hero Problem: Silent Heroes, Silent Burnout53:20 Burnout, Boundaries, and Trusting the Team55:33 Hiring Into a Team, Not a Vacuum1:02:15 The Loneliness of Leadership1:06:48 Why "I Don't Know" Is a Sign of Strength1:09:13 Book Recommendations: Sci-Fi and Leadership1:13:49 What Eric Would Tell His Younger Self1:15:45 The Most Benign Thing You're Proud OfFind Eric at: • Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/eblubow/ • His blog: https://eric.lubow.org (which heavily influenced this episode) • Beyond the Belt podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@beyondthebeltpodFind me (Nune) at:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nisabek/ Substack: https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/

In this episode of Root Cause we sit down with Orel Zilberman, the solo builder behind WriteStack, the biggest tool out there for Substack creators. Orel spent 599 days shipping around ten products that made zero dollars, then picked one thing, stuck with it for six months, and turned it into a six-figure business. He has lived three versions of solo building in three years: before the current AI tooling, as it arrived, and now. We get to the root cause of what AI actually changed for one-person companies and what it didn't. Building got faster, but knowing what to build, and sticking with it long enough to find out if it works, is exactly as hard as it always was. Honest and unfiltered, including the messy parts most "become an entrepreneur" content leaves out.00:00 Introduction to Root Cause and Solo Building04:57 The Journey of Building WriteStack06:42 What is SubStack and WriteStack?09:28 "Why Bother" if the platform / big players will replace you13:14 "Why bother" if AI will replace all SaaS14:46 Knowing WHAT to Build and How to Distribute18:30 Finding the Right Idea to Stick With23:22 Learning from Opportunities and Failures26:10 Navigating the Cold Start Problem28:10 Leveraging AI Tools for Productivity30:49 The Future of Software Engineering in the Age of AI33:53 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs37:20 Being Better Than Most38:49 Book Recommendations and Lifelong Learning41:04 Reflections on Education and Career ChoicesFind Orel at: • His product - https://www.writestack.io/  • His journey - https://theindiepreneur.substack.com/  • Substack notes analysis - https://thewritingedge.substack.com/ • Substack profile - https://substack.com/@orelzilbermanFind me (Nune) at:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nisabek/ Substack: https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/

In this episode of Root Cause we sit down with Ia Mg - seasoned engineer, former CS and digital literacy teacher at the Free University of Tbilisi, and the author of the blog Bits Complicated - to get to the root cause of learning itself, and whether the machines we've built are about to make us better at it or worse.We dig into why everyone should understand technology even if they never write code, why domain knowledge has always mattered more than programmers wanted to admit, and what happens to learning when the answer is always one prompt away. Along the way: tech debt as a tax instead of a failure ("legacy as a service"), the "learning debt" that builds every time you accept a ready-made answer, why conversation-based coding is a process problem and not just an output problem, and why learning might be the most rebellious thing you can still do for yourself.00:00 Guest intro and episode goal02:45 Teaching Programming to Non-Coders04:13 The Importance of Technology Literacy09:41 AI and the Future of Programming16:10 AI as a Teacher of Programming22:16 Evaluating AI Responses in Learning26:49 Concerns About the Next Generation30:08 AI as an Abstraction in Programming33:40 Conversational Development vs. Traditional Coding37:34 Understanding Tech Debt42:09 Learning Debt in the Age of AI45:06 AI is the next social network?46:47 Embracing the Chaos of Innovation47:59 The Joy of Coding vs. AI53:22 Navigating the Job Market in Tech57:30 Book Recommendations01:02:08 Summary of the Discussion01:02:41 Learning as a Rebellious Act01:04:09 Practical Recommendation on using AI consciously01:06:21 Engineering is more than codingFind Ia at: Blog: https://iyamg.com/bitscomplicated/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ia-mgvdliashvili-0b459768/ Find me (Nune) at:Blog: https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nisabek/ 

In this episode of Root Cause we sit down with Adrian Hornsby — former AWS Principal Engineer, founder of Resilium Labs, and author of Why We Still Suck at Resilience — to get to the root cause of what's quietly breaking inside engineering organizations as AI absorbs more of the thinking. We dig into the gap between how we imagine our systems work and how they actually work, why that gap is where all the real learning lives, and what happens to a team when the thinking itself gets delegated to something that sounds confident but doesn't know which walls are load-bearing. 00:00 Pre-show Banter and the Dog01:08 Introduction of the Episode and the Guest05:00 What's Wrong with the Name of the Show07:35 The Importance of Learning from Successes09:53 Defining Work as Imagined and Work as Done13:43 Leading vs Being Hands-On28:49 Learning From the Gap30:39 Chaos Engineering31:31 Load Testing32:50 Game Days34:00 ORRs - Operational Readiness reviews34:41 Learning From the Incident36:25 How AI has Affected the Gap41:57 Navigating the Complexity of AI Delegation43:45 Skill Atrophy and the New Generation of Engineers47:12 Building Tools That Keep You Smart52:18 We Need a Crisis to Slow Down58:30 Building Intuition in AI-Driven Systems01:03:17 The Human Touch in Technology01:07:32 Facing Fears and Embracing Change01:16:28 Question for the Next Guest and ClosingAdrian has generously decided to run a discount with the promocode “rootcausebynune” - for the first 30 copies you can buy his book for as low as 14.99 - that’s over 70% discount over the suggested price!https://leanpub.com/whywestillsuckatresilience/c/rootcausebynune Find Adrian at:Resilium Labs: resiliumlabs.comLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adhorn/ Substack: https://newsletter.resiliumlabs.com/Find me (Nune) at:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nisabek/ Substack: https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/ 

In this very first episode of Root Cause we sit down with Marc Babin - an award-winning digital marketing professional and creator of over a dozen of podcasts - to get to the root cause of personal branding - why it matters more than ever and how a busy professional who doesn't like the empty talks can survive the content noise and still make themselves visible.00:00 Show and Guest Introduction02:54 The Value of Authentic Content in a Noisy World06:18 AI and Content: Good Authentic Content is King09:47 Reel-Thinking vs Podcast Creation13:57 Creating Engaging Content in Niche Markets18:14 Sales vs. Marketing: Building Trust Through Content22:02 The Long Game in Content Creation25:48 Personal Branding in the Digital Age28:28 Setting Up for Success in Content Creation33:05 Overcoming Perfectionism in Content Creation38:27 Embracing the Silence of Early Content43:29 Navigating Privacy and Online Presence48:36 The Discomfort of Starting53:14 The Root Causes of Expert Silence57:53 How to Start Creating Content01:00:30 Question for the Next Guest and ClosingFollow Marc Babin:LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/babinmarc/The Podcast Blueprint Website - https://www.yourpodcastblueprint.com/The Podcast Blueprint LinkedIn Page - https://www.linkedin.com/company/podcast-blueprint/Additional Material mentioned in the episode:The Podcast Consumer 2025 report from Edison Research - https://www.edisonresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/The-Podcast-Consumer-2025-revised-FINAL.pdfRead People Like a Book: How to Analyze, Understand, and Predict People’s Emotions, Thoughts, Intentions, and Behaviors By Patrick King - https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/56199402-read-people-like-a-book