We're looking for a software engineer to help us create empowered teams

Sten Pittet -

Hello there, it's Tability!

You might know us as an OKRs platform, but saying that Tability is just about OKRs would be the same as saying that Github is just about Git. The underlying technology (or framework) is crucial, but the purpose is much bigger.

Github's mission is to be where the world builds software, and Git is just a small part of it. Our mission is to create empowered teams, and OKRs are just a small part of it.

Yeah, we don't want workplaces like that.

We're looking for a software engineer (could be backend, frontend, fullstack) to help us get there, and this post is here to explain the problem in more detail as well as giving you a glimpse of the future.

The future of work needs new tools

The best way to deliver a project is to break it down into tiny pieces and ship those in small increments. And to do that, teams have a whole range of platforms they can pick from to help them plan, scope and track their outputs.

Today, orgs are really good at keeping track of what they're building.

But when it comes to why they're building things, it's still a very archaic process. Goals get shoved in forgotten spreadsheets, reporting is a chore, data is all over the place—no one knows what the priorities are.

The result? Instead of having empowered teams that we trust with goals, we still rely on backlogs and keep telling folks what to do—because goal-tracking sucks, and it's much easier to fall back to micromanagement.

Orgs need new tools that are built for outcome-driven collaboration, and that's what we're doing. It's not about creating an OKRs-tracking solution, but rather a place where all teams can shape, discuss and track their future.

It's bigger than OKRs

The Git analogy is relevant here. You can stick to your terminal to use Git, but desktop clients can vastly improve productivity for individuals. Then platforms like Github, Bitbucket and Gitlab make collaboration on software many orders of magnitude easier. They extend the technology to go far beyond the initial capabilities of Git and empower teams to work better together.

I love my terminal, but Bitbucket gives us much more out of the box.

We believe that a similar thing will happen with goal-setting frameworks. You can stick to docs and spreadsheets to track OKRs, but a platform built on top of it can extend the framework to make collaboration on goals many orders of magnitude easier.

There's a lot we can do to improve collaboration on goals.

We're talking about enabling async reviews, linting for strategy, continuous delivery of outcomes, APIs, webhooks, plugin points for goals. There's an exciting world to create where teams will have a simple way to talk about focus with management, while being in control of their work. That's how we can get empowered teams for the future of work.

(I'm an ex-dev, ex-PM turned founder, and yes I believe that we can treat OKRs like code)

Part 3: How we get there


Now we're getting to the exciting bits! Here's the plan that we have for our own future. It's divided into 3 big phases:

  • Phase 1 (now) aka "get your goals out of spreadsheets": build a next-gen goal-collaboration platform. Not a reporting tool, but a true collaboration platform where teams can draft, review, and track execution on their plans.
  • Phase 2 aka "power up your strategy": bring automation, plugins, APIs to goals to make it easier for teams to create their own workflows.
  • Phase 3 aka "a virtual team assistant for every team": use AI to assist teams in setting better goals and identifying issues that need to be taken care of.

The big challenge is to create a platform built both for the team and leadership—all while staying as simple as possible.

And this is where we need your help. We're looking for Software Engineers to join our team to build this platform. To give you an idea, here are some of the things that we want to tackle in the next 12-18 months:

  • A next-gen editor to set and review goals async.
  • Explore ways to treat strategy-as-code (linting, review workflows, OKRs-as-YML...)
  • Explore ways to celebrate achievements (and not just highlight what's getting off-track).
  • Provide a great experience on mobile (responsiveness, React Native app)
  • Make Tability accessible
  • Make the platform pluggable (templates, API, webhooks, apps...)
  • Make the platform smart (auto-detect anomalies, auto-suggest interests).
  • Integrations with other tools.
  • And many more!

About us

We're still a small team, but we punch above our weight. We're funded (pre-seed), fully remote, and product-led. We're makers with a strong bias for shipping early and often. Oh, and we believe in empowered teams!

We know we're not perfect, but we learn fast and are always open to suggestions.

About you

As I mentioned in the intro, we're not fully set on the role. There's a lot we want to do, and whether your a frontend or backend specialist, you're not going to run out of things to do. It's never easy to describe someone in bullet points, but here's a set of things that we're looking for.

  • AU-friendly timezone: we're fully remote, but for this role you'll most likely need to be in a timezone that works well with Australia (the Melbourne/Sydney side of it).
  • Strong development experience (mid or senior): You have a few years of writing code at other startups or world-class companies. You're able to lead projects from start to finish while including best practices in terms of security, reliability, and performance.
  • Familiar with our stack: Tability is built as a Rails API coupled with a React frontend – hosted on a mix of Heroku and AWS.
  • Love solving customer problems: You thrive on understanding customers and helping find the best solution through software.
  • Great written & verbal communicator: You can explain technical challenges in concise and simple terms, easy to understand by the rest of the team.
  • Startup-friendly: You understand that early-stage startups have gaps, and see them as opportunities to grow and improve.
  • Tenaciously proactive: you embrace ownership and enjoy taking initiative.
  • Great attention to detail: Everything you work on is of high quality, and you never skimp on the important details.

Oh, and our values need to resonate with you.

How to apply?

Interested? Learn more about Tability on our website., then fill in this form to help us understand you better.

We'll reply within 48h to let you know if we're a match!

(PS: I'm Sten, co-founder of Tability, and you can send your questions at sten@tability.io)