William Viana

Today we shipped a beta for Lately: a simpler way to use @wordpressdotcom and share letters with close friends. It lets you blog as simply as you chat. You gather what caught your eye during the week and publish each Friday. More in our announcement! wordpress.com/blog/2026/05/2…

This weekend, I finished Shreyas Doshi's Improving Your Product Sense course (maven.com/shreyas-doshi/…), which I found transformative and highly recommend, particularly for those in product roles. williamviana.blog/2024/12/16/tra…

Minha primeira keynote! 😱 Não poderia estar mais feliz (e nervosa 😅). Espero atender às expectativas! 💪🏻❤️

Effective Ways to Learn from Others' Experiences: Manager Voltron and Leadership Dens williamviana.blog/2024/09/09/eff…

@shreyas Well, I guess it depends on what you think is complementary to your current skills. Or do you think content is usually more important, and hence it should be a constant focus, for long term goals?

@vianasw Indeed this is a valid way to think. Looks like about 14% of respondents would agree. Although this is not the best growth approach if one has some other career goals - for instance, starting a company some day.

As you internalize the Content-Confidence-Context model, think & answer these questions: Which one of these leaders will a majority of people report as being amazing / most inspiring / absolutely loved working for them / etc? (there is 1 correct answer) A leader who spikes on:

Her: take me to somewhere expensive Me:

@shreyas Confidence + context seem harder to learn and emulate. It requires soft skills, intuition, and a sensibility that’s difficult to teach. Content seem easier, at least to me. That’s why I try to pay attention to leaders who are good at confidence + context.

Now answer this: Learning from which one of these leaders is most likely to have the greatest long-term impact on your career? A leader who spikes on:

On the political spectrum of Europe, Kamala and other mainstream Democrats would be center right. That's not remotely close to communism, not even close to democratic socialism (which is center left on the European spectrum). On the other hand, Trump is very clearly on the side of the authoritarian far right. That is a clear danger to freedom and democracy. Trump's platform is also a clear danger to the economy, as Goldman Sachs and many economists have said. You clearly have no idea what communism is, and you don't realize you are supporting a fascist. Or perhaps you do...

@iamposti Oh no 😣

Losing my Airpods right before boarding a 13h flight. FML.

@tonymorbin @Carnage4Life Not enough hours to do what I want while also having a full time job.

@vianasw @Carnage4Life I agree, but you don't have to retire to do any of that stuff - just do it. Life is now. I am past retirement age, fit, healthy, travel, able to retire comfortably or WFH, not sure if/when I will retire. If I do there's AI stuff I'd like to do, & maybe write another book .

I miss the innocence of the early blogging days. No trying to monetize your audience. No algorithms. No funnel talk. It was fun and playful. People were genuinely excited to share their weird obsessions and interests. I will forever try to recreate that corner of the internet.

Looking for a few good folks to help with one of the largest migrations in history, 500M+ Tumblr blogs to WordPress: ma.tt/2024/08/people…

This took me many years to understand: some people’s implicit goal in every interaction is to project themselves as higher status relative to the person they are interacting with. That motivates (and explains) their body language, what they say, and how they say it. How to deal with such people at work? 1) If you report to them, and you don’t like this style, frankly you can’t do a whole lot. Just plan an exit / change when / if it makes sense for you. I know this is not ideal in theory but often in practice it is your only viable option [0] 2) If they are a peer of yours, frustrate them by being completely impervious to their shenanigans. This requires high self-confidence. They will eventually stop doing this with you and be forced to start focusing more on the content. Most likely you won’t be their favorite peer to work with, because you don’t bend to their need to be liked for their dominance. But such is life 🤷🏾‍♂️ 3) If they report to you, show by example how treating everyone like a peer is more effective to get things done & better for one's mental health. It takes some time & a few hard feedback chats, but they will eventually build self-awareness to shift their style in certain situations. Final notes: - A lot of these dominance-craving folks don’t actually know they are doing this. Some will respond to feedback, but most never even receive feedback on this. - This blind spot hurts these folks most in job interviews, where it is vital for a candidate to be cognizant and respectful of power dynamics. - In everyday life, this is the person who will refuse to adjust their line of motion even slightly as you are walking towards them on a narrow sidewalk. If you don’t make way for them, they will just bump into you. No matter what, they won’t even adjust their line of motion slightly to avoid colliding with you. While this feels very silly and childish to us, this is something most of these folks do instinctively, not intentionally. Some will mature out of this tendency, but many never do. ~ [0] One exception when dealing with such a manager is when you have built huge credibility at higher levels of the company (often the case if you’ve made outsized contributions or if you were very early in the company). In that case, try to assess if senior management is aware of this problem. If not, make them aware, and proceed accordingly. In all situations, tread very carefully.

GOD FUCKING DAMMIT waitbutwhy.com/2016/05/clueyn…

Meetup tips williamviana.blog/2024/08/12/mee…

We’re looking for an #UnrealEngine dev!!! @DifffuseStudio #proceduralcontent #3dart

@shreyas So good. Love it.

Hitting committed dates is one of the top things that causes stress for PMs & Engineers in a product team. In this video, I share a simple & effective technique I learned at Stripe for dealing with the inherent imprecision of scoping, estimates & dates: youtu.be/rk0ZY31X050

Nothing beats the feeling of standing in Times Square. Except maybe standing in Times Square and seeing Automattic on the Nasdaq Tower 🤩 So proud to be featured in this iconic spot 🏙️ Thanks again to @Forbes, @BessemerVP, and @SalesforceVC for honoring us on the @cloud100 list!