Martin Zokov Blog

Dec 8, 2025

Why More Meetings Slow Down Delivery (And What Works Instead)

Is your software team collaborating? I’m sure most leaders in tech would happily exclaim “Yes!” and you certainly would be correct to some extent. So the next important question is: “How are you collaborating?” Collaboration is one of the most misunderstood activities in software development. All software is built in some form of collaboration, but what often happens is we introduce multiple layers of process that introduce various levels of friction. If you’ve read my previous articles, you’l

By Martin Zokov

Dec 1, 2025

Tech Bottlenecks Killing Your Team's Velocity (And How to Fix Them Without AI)

Productivity in software engineering is a very contentious topic. Especially with AI being such a big deal in recent years. Companies rush towards whatever AI tool they can with the goal of increasing their developers’ productivity. But here’s the thing: AI tools can help, but they won’t fix fundamental bottlenecks in your delivery system. You can give developers the best AI coding assistant in the world, but if your deployment process takes 4 hours and requires manual steps, you’re still goin

By Martin Zokov

Nov 24, 2025

How to 10x the Value of a Product Team

Product Management can be one of the most high-leverage roles on a software team. When done well, product managers can dramatically increase the value a team delivers. When done poorly, they become bottlenecks that slow everything down. The nature of the job is very holistic to begin with and involves a very varied skillset-analyzing data, understanding psychology, communicating effectively, making trade-offs, and more. This puts PMs at a great spot to contribute to the core concept we’ve been

By Martin Zokov

Nov 17, 2025

How Team Structure Creates Bottlenecks (And How to Fix It)

Last time, we explored how viewing your company as a single system-not separate departments-reveals hidden bottlenecks. When you optimize one part (like sales hitting targets), another part struggles (developers drowning in work). Today, we’re going deeper: how your team structure creates those bottlenecks in the first place. The Transformation Failure Rate Did you know that 70-80% of change/transformation initiatives fail? And that’s according to McKinsey-the same people who consult on such

By Martin Zokov

Nov 3, 2025

The #1 Reason Software Delivery Stalls (And How to Fix It)

Your team shipped 3 features last sprint. But stakeholders are still asking “when will X be done?” You’ve tried everything: more developers, better tools, tighter deadlines. Yet delivery still feels harder than it should be. If you’re an engineering manager, tech lead, or CTO, you know this frustration. The problem isn’t what you think it is-and the solution starts with a fundamental shift in how you view your organization. The Mental Model That Changes Everything Everything stems from a si

By Martin Zokov