Operating notes

Moving fast safely, and knowing where systems actually fail.

Practical writing for technical leaders and operators. Essays syndicated from Reliability Lounge, the operator community Matt McGowan founded.

Essays

High-signal notes on shipping discipline, incident practice, and operational scale.

Should work fully consume your life? On burnout, communicating overload, and scheduled disconnects that reset mood and productivity.

LinkedIn · Work-life balance series · Part 2

Reliability Lounge

Under pressure, teams skip the basics. The fastest path to signal is often DNS, routing, or power - not exotic failure modes.

Dec 3, 2025 · incident response, reliability

Reliability Lounge

Speed is a discipline when you know what you can learn in production - and what you cannot afford to break.

Nov 12, 2025 · velocity, operational discipline

A sequenced playbook for extreme growth without reckless provisioning.

Moving fast safely

A 90-day infrastructure playbook (~900% at ASRC Federal): sequencing decisions before servers.

Case study · ASRC Federal + composite patterns