Support Engineering Is Engineering

Support engineers at Railway are full-stack engineers who focus on building interfaces between humans and systems. They use a unique approach that prioritizes bringing structure to human interactions and efficient information transmission. The team uses the OSI model of support engineering, where every support outreach is an opportunity to improve the product. They treat users as customers and aim to repair cracks in the product and provide soft landings for users who fall through the cracks. The team has a rotating support function that includes non-technical staff and product area experts, which frees up engineers to build lasting product improvements. The team educates users through open-source documentation and builds forms to resolve user issues quickly. They also centralize communications and automate on-call handover notices to reduce context switching. The goal is to have 1 support engineer for every 1M total users and compound their abilities through a feedback control loop, ultimately aiming to 100x the product and organization.

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