You can't have AI without DevOps | GitHub’s Martin Woodward
The single biggest predictor of success with AI isn't the model you choose, it's the DevOps culture you've already built. Martin Woodward, VP of Developer Relations at GitHub - and the sixth person to ever use Copilot - joins us to explain why this surprising insight is key to the new era of autonomous coding agents. He traces the evolution of GitHub Copilot from a simple autocomplete to a powerful agent that opens its own pull requests, arguing that AI's true power is as a massive accelerant for the iterative loops high-performing teams have already perfected.Martin explains that teams with strong guardrails for shipping quickly and safely are best equipped to leverage this AI revolution because they can trust the accelerated output. He also reveals how top teams use the key technique of custom instructions to guide Copilot toward writing the code of the future, not just mimicking the code of the past. This conversation uncovers how new agentic workflows are 'tricking' developers into improving their communication and documentation skills, providing a crucial look at the cultural foundations required to thrive in the AI-accelerated enterprise.Check out:AI code review tools: 2025 evaluation guideFollow the hosts:Follow BenFollow AndrewFollow today's guest(s):Martin's GitHub Galaxy Keynote: Watch "The AI-Accelerated Enterprise”GitHub Copilot: Learn more about the tools and featuresGitHub Universe Conference: Look out for announcements for the upcoming conferenceConnect with Martin: Martin's Social Media Hub (Martin.Social)Connect with Erika on LinkedIn Referenced in today's show:GPT-5: Overdue, overhyped and underwhelming. And that’s not the worst of it.Auf Wiedersehen, GitHub ♥️I Tried Every Todo App and Ended Up With a .txt File[BUG] Claude says "You're absolutely right!" about everything · Issue #3382 Why MCP’s Disregard for 40 Years of RPC Best Practices Will Burn EnterprisesSupport the show: Subscribe to our Substack Leave us a review Subscribe on YouTube Follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn Offers: Learn about Continuous Merge with gitStream Get your DORA Metrics free forever
--------
57:36
--------
57:36
The art of letting go as a manager | Transcend’s Minh Nguyen
What's the hardest habit for a top engineer to unlearn in a leadership role? For Minh Nguyen, VP of Engineering at Transcend, it was breaking the "I'll do it myself" mentality. In this episode, she shares her impressive journey from individual contributor to VP at the same high-growth startup, offering a rare and honest look at this challenging transition. Drawing on her background in philosophy, Minh details the hard-won lessons of reorienting from hands-on coding to high-impact leadership, from learning to delegate to setting a clear, communicable strategy.The conversation then shifts from personal growth to organizational design. Minh dives into the practicalities of scaling, revealing why Transcend structures teams around customer problems instead of technical stacks. She candidly discusses her experience pivoting away from a "catchall" platform team to a more effective, product-focused model. This episode is a deep dive for any leader on building a resilient, high-fidelity engineering culture that thrives under pressure, packed with invaluable insights for navigating the challenges of growth.Check out:The DevEx guide to AI-driven software developmentDownload: The 6 trends shaping the future of AI-driven development Follow the hosts:Follow BenFollow AndrewFollow today's guest(s):Connect with Minh Nguyen on LinkedInLearn more about Transcend: Transcend.ioConnect with Jennifer Riggins on LinkedInReferenced in today's show:This Start-Up’s $20 Billion Sale Died. It Came Fighting Back.Perplexity is using stealth, undeclared crawlers to evade website no-crawl directivesIf you're remote, rambleAI promised efficiency. Instead, it’s making us work harder.Writing code was never the bottleneck!Support the show: Subscribe to our Substack Leave us a review Subscribe on YouTube Follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn Offers: Learn about Continuous Merge with gitStream Get your DORA Metrics free forever
--------
42:50
--------
42:50
AI agents are knocking. Is your API ready to answer? | GraphQL’s Matt DeBergalis
The rise of AI agents is more than a tooling upgrade - it's a fundamental rewiring of the entire developer experience, with your APIs at the very center. We're joined by Matt DeBergalis, co-founder and then-CTO-now-CEO (congrats Matt!) of Apollo GraphQL, to explore this massive transformation. He introduces the emerging concept of "agent experience," explaining why systems built for human developers are not ready for the unprecedented scale of AI calling APIs.Matt argues that as the old rules of software development get re-evaluated, engineering leaders must rethink their entire stack. He presents a powerful analogy: a structured data layer like a graph is the perfect "left brain" for the "right brain" creativity of LLMs. This provides the semantic precision and guardrails needed for AI to act reliably, enabling a future where user experiences are personalized "to 11" and APIs become the core business asset. This conversation is a crucial guide for leaders on how to prepare by prioritizing higher-level system design, and why clear communication and architecture are becoming far more critical than handwriting code.Check out:The DevEx guide to AI-driven software developmentDownload: The 6 trends shaping the future of AI-driven development Follow the hosts:Follow BenFollow AndrewFollow today's guest(s):Explore Apollo GraphQL's graph infrastructure and MCP tooling: ApolloDevConnect with Matt on LinkedInConnect with Andrew Boyagi on LinkedInReferenced in today's show:Anthropic caps Claude Code usageOpenAI introduces study modeReady or not, age verification is rolling out across the internetAtlassian research: AI adoption is rising, but friction persistsSupport the show: Subscribe to our Substack Leave us a review Subscribe on YouTube Follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn Offers: Learn about Continuous Merge with gitStream Get your DORA Metrics free forever
--------
59:13
--------
59:13
The people-pleaser in the machine | Wayfound’s Dr. Tatyana Mamut
Your AI is learning to lie to you. It's not malicious—it's just trying to be a people-pleaser. This dangerous phenomenon, known as AI sycophancy, is what happens when we train models with outdated incentives.Dr. Tatyana Mamut, an anthropologist, economist, and the CEO of Wayfound, joins us to explain why treating AI like traditional software is a critical mistake. She provides a revolutionary playbook for building AI you can actually trust, starting with how to manage AI agents like employees with clear roles, goals, and performance reviews. She then introduces the radical solution of an "AI supervisor"—an AI that manages other agents to ensure accountability. This all builds toward her vision for the "multi-sapiens workforce," where humans and AI collaborate to build the companies of tomorrow.This is an essential guide for any leader aiming to build the culture and systems necessary to manage AI effectively.Check out:Workshop: The AI upgrade to your SDLCThe DevEx guide to AI-driven software developmentFollow the hosts:Follow BenFollow AndrewFollow today's guest(s):Connect with Dr. Tatyana Mamut on LinkedInFollow the latest from Wayfound on LinkedInConnect with Kelly Vaughn on LinkedInKelly's Connect with MeAndrew's Connect with MeReferenced in today's show:Replit deleted a customer’s entire production database.Silicon Valley AI Startups Are Embracing China’s Controversial ‘996’ Work ScheduleI've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that againEvaluating LLMs on real long-horizon business tasksSupport the show: Subscribe to our Substack Leave us a review Subscribe on YouTube Follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn Offers: Learn about Continuous Merge with gitStream Get your DORA Metrics free forever
--------
1:00:41
--------
1:00:41
Is your AI strategy built for speed or stability? | Qodo’s Itamar Friedman
Is your team's AI strategy tailored for a fast-moving startup or a high-stakes enterprise? The answer could determine your success or failure. We're rejoined by Itamar Friedman, co-founder and CEO of Qodo, to break down what separates engineering teams that truly thrive with AI from those that are just experimenting, explaining why the path to success is fundamentally different for a startup that needs speed versus a large enterprise that must untangle bottlenecks.Itamar reveals his vision for the evolution from "vibe coding" to a more mature "grounded coding" that relies on structured workflows and rich, automated context. He also points to the trend of dev platform teams as the future "agent keepers" who will own the holistic and safe implementation of AI. Itamar provides an actionable playbook for leaders: map your current processes, identify your biggest bottleneck, and find a specialized AI tool for that specific problem.Check out:The DevEx guide to AI-driven software developmentWorkshop: The AI upgrade to your SDLCFollow the hosts:Follow BenFollow AndrewFollow today's guest(s):Learn more about Qodo qodo.aiConnect with Itamar Friedman on LinkedInFollow AI thought leader Andrej KarpathyReferenced in today's show:Announcing the real next chapter of WindsurfI still care about the codeMcDonald’s AI Hiring Bot Exposed Millions of Applicants’ Data to Hackers Who Tried the Password ‘123456’Meta poaches even more AI talent Block launches a grant program for high impact OSS contributions to gooseSupport the show: Subscribe to our Substack Leave us a review Subscribe on YouTube Follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn Offers: Learn about Continuous Merge with gitStream Get your DORA Metrics free forever
Dev Interrupted is the go-to podcast for software engineering leadership. Each week, hosts Andrew Zigler, Ben Lloyd Pearson, and Dan Lines sit down with industry experts to explore the strategies, struggles, and stories behind high-performing software teams. Paired with weekly industry news coverage, the conversations dive deep into the real challenges that define excellence in modern tech.
UK