Business-First Engineering
A bi-weekly newsletter for CTOs, engineering leaders, and founders who want their technical teams to drive commercial outcomes.
What You'll Get
Real-World Experience, Not Theory
Every insight comes from actual experience leading technical teams through growth, turnarounds, and high-stakes decisions. No MBA frameworks or consultant speak. Just what actually works.
Technical Decisions Through a Commercial Lens
Learn how to evaluate architectural choices, technology investments, and engineering priorities based on their impact on revenue, retention, and business outcomes. Not just what's technically interesting.
Team Building That Delivers Results
Practical approaches to hiring, retention, culture, and performance that go beyond the typical advice. How to build teams that ship fast, stay motivated, and drive the business forward.
Lessons from Turning Teams Around
Stories and frameworks from taking struggling engineering organisations and making them high-performing. Including the hard conversations, difficult decisions, and what actually moved the needle.
What We Cover
Strategic Technical Leadership
Making architecture and technology decisions that align with business goals, not just technical preferences.
Engineering Team Performance
Building high-performing teams, improving velocity, and creating cultures where people actually want to stay.
Scaling Organisations
Growing teams from 5 to 50 people without losing speed, quality, or team cohesion.
Product and Engineering Alignment
Getting product and engineering working together to ship features that customers actually want and pay for.
Technical Debt and Rewrites
When to refactor, when to rewrite, and how to make the case to stakeholders in commercial terms.
Hiring and Retention
Finding the right people, keeping them motivated, and building teams that deliver consistently.
Who This Is For
CTOs and VPs of Engineering
Leading technical organisations where engineering impact needs to translate directly to business outcomes.
Technical Founders
Building and scaling engineering teams whilst keeping the commercial focus that got you this far.
Engineering Managers Moving Into Leadership
Stepping up from managing a team to leading an organisation and needing to think commercially, not just technically.
Subscribe to Business-First Engineering
Bi-weekly insights on making engineering drive business outcomes.
About Mike Tempest
I'm a Fractional CPTO who's spent the last 15 years leading technical teams at companies like Google, Apple, and high-growth startups. Most recently, I led Risika's transformation from VC-funded to profitable in 18 months, and before that scaled RefME to 2 million users before acquisition by Chegg.
I write about what I've learned building, scaling, and turning around engineering organisations. The good decisions, the mistakes, and what actually drives business outcomes when you're responsible for the technical team.