March 2021 Summaries

Auth0's approach to developing internal tools is centered around enhancing customer success by automating processes and providing visibility into customer interactions. Led by Soledad Pano, the team has evolved from building essential tools during the company's startup phase to maintaining more complex systems as Auth0 has grown. Their stack includes technologies like NodeJS, MongoDB, and React, hosted on Heroku, while balancing internal tool development with customer-facing projects. Pano emphasizes the importance of security and compliance across all tools, although the team dedicates more resources to usability testing for customer-facing products. Decisions to build or buy tools are influenced by the company's stage and needs, with a preference for buying when scalability and specific requirements come into play. Success is measured through internal feedback loops and metrics that align with broader business goals, ensuring internal tools support both team efficiency and customer outcomes. Auth0, a remote-first company, is actively hiring across various functions.

As companies increasingly rely on data to inform their decisions, effectively visualizing large datasets has become crucial. An announcement by Retool introduces a new chart component designed to streamline the creation, updating, and consumption of data visualizations within their platform, allowing for custom and interactive visualizations integrated directly into Retool apps. This component, built on the open-source Plotly library, enables developers to build complex visualizations and facilitates the interactive discovery of insights. It supports various use cases, such as enhancing data-driven actions, visualizing machine learning applications, and providing contextual data insights. Retool’s approach allows users to seamlessly integrate visualization and action, fostering a more efficient and responsive workflow by embedding data visualizations within the environments where teams operate. This integration not only enhances usability but also encourages more consistent use of data in decision-making processes.

Curtis Cummings, a Senior Software Engineer at On Deck, discusses how the company leverages no-code and low-code tools to efficiently scale their internal tooling amidst rapid growth. On Deck, which aims to build a modern online education institution, operates numerous programs and cohorts primarily facilitated through platforms like Slack and custom-built internal tools resembling LinkedIn for ongoing community engagement. The company utilizes tools like Webflow, Airtable, and Zapier to streamline operations, allowing the operations team to independently manage program launches without extensive engineering involvement. They also employ Retool for creating automation tools and custom applications, and while they heavily rely on platforms like Airtable, Curtis notes the limitations and occasional downtimes of such tools. On Deck's approach to building tools involves initially creating MVPs with no-code solutions to validate concepts before committing engineering resources for further development, a strategy that has enabled them to efficiently identify and resolve bottlenecks as they arise.

Developers dedicate a significant portion of their time, over 30%, to creating internal applications, with figures reaching 45% in companies with more than 5,000 employees. This trend is driven by the need to enhance productivity across various business teams, as evidenced by a survey of 650 developers and technical leaders. Internal tools, essential for efficient operations, became even more crucial during the COVID-19 pandemic, with 87% of developers increasing or maintaining their focus on these applications. Companies, especially in the financial sector, prefer tailor-made internal apps for better control over data and workflows, leading to a high demand for custom-built solutions, although low-code and no-code platforms are gaining popularity due to their efficiency and developer satisfaction. These internal tools are deeply integrated with various data sources, supporting a range of functions from customer support to engineering, and are pivotal in improving employee productivity, reducing costs, and enhancing satisfaction. Despite the challenges developers face, such as time constraints and the need for significant impact, the integration and flexibility of internal apps continue to play a vital role in modern business operations.

Vow, an Australian cultured meat company, is focused on producing meat without traditional livestock farming for environmental, culinary, health, and ethical reasons, aiming to create superior meat products by identifying the best-performing cells. Head of Engineering Soroush Pour emphasizes the critical role of internal tools in enhancing productivity and innovation, particularly for their food scientists and operations teams. Vow's engineering team develops both hardware and software tools, with a significant focus on imaging pipelines, liquid handling robotics, and data systems to streamline cell biology processes. Their technology stack includes IoT systems, Postgres, TypeScript, Python, React, and no-code tools like Airtable. Despite challenges in automating scientific processes due to a lack of existing playbooks, Vow prioritizes flexibility and scalability in tool development. Success is measured through direct feedback from internal users, emphasizing a high standard of service. The company is actively hiring software engineers to expand its innovative team.

Devon, a technical SDR at Retool, describes how the implementation of two Retool applications has significantly optimized their sales team's workflow by consolidating user data and automating tasks, allowing more personalized and efficient customer interactions. The SDR Dashboard centralizes information from multiple sources, including Salesforce and social media, enabling fast access to relevant data and seamless communication with colleagues. The Customer Finder app enhances customer conversations by quickly providing industry-specific proof points and insights without extensive research. These innovations have not only increased lead engagement by 30% but also improved data accuracy and team productivity by streamlining processes and encouraging consistent data usage. The integration of Retool with Salesforce allows the team to merge data from various platforms, offering greater analytical capabilities and enabling SDRs and AEs to design custom apps that sync back to Salesforce, ultimately allowing them to work more flexibly and maintain a strong customer focus.

A recent incident at Retool highlighted the challenges and lessons of managing database migrations, particularly with PostgreSQL. The author recounts an unintended two-minute downtime caused by a mishandled database migration, emphasizing the importance of using transactions to maintain database integrity. The discussion extends to various migration strategies, such as safely deleting or renaming columns, conducting data backfills, and adding columns or indices, especially in high-traffic production environments. Specific techniques, such as batching operations and utilizing concurrent index builds, are recommended to prevent outages. The post underscores the significance of configuring the `statement_timeout` setting to mitigate potential issues swiftly, transforming potential prolonged outages into brief disruptions. The insights aim to guide engineers in navigating the complexities of database migrations, ensuring that their applications remain robust and reliable as they scale.

The article explores the insights of Andrew Homeyer, co-founder and CTO of Halp, a conversational ticketing platform now part of Atlassian, focusing on the philosophy and challenges of developing internal tools. Homeyer advocates for a "buy first" approach to internal tools, emphasizing the importance of avoiding unnecessary effort on building them in-house when existing solutions suffice. He highlights the strategic use of SaaS tools to streamline operations and enable non-technical teams to work efficiently, thereby allowing the company to focus on its core mission. While acknowledging the risks and complexities involved in creating and maintaining internal solutions, Homeyer stresses the importance of flexibility and prioritization in addressing bottlenecks quickly, particularly in a fast-growing startup environment. The article also touches on the balance between building essential features into the core product versus utilizing internal tools for temporary solutions, emphasizing the need for agility and judicious investment in tools that enhance productivity without significant engineering effort.