Preface to Tidy Together

How do teams grow software together with conflicting goals and incentives

Teams writing software face real tensions: individual velocity vs. collective code health, shipping features vs. maintainability, different mental models of the system. Beck explores how shared practices—particularly tidying code together—align incentives and build mutual understanding across a team, making long-term growth possible despite these natural conflicts.

Read full essay on Substack ↗

Questions this essay answers

  • How do I align my team when we disagree on code quality vs. speed?
  • What practices help teams develop shared ownership of messy code?
  • Can tidying code together actually improve team dynamics?
← All essays