Product Stability

Comparing Level 1 and Level 2

Level 1

Level 2

Description

At Level 1, product stability means learning to see reliability as part of your job. You're focused on writing code that works—but also beginning to understand the systems and practices that help keep it working over time. You begin learning about the guardrails your team relies on: CI pipelines, linters, automated tests, review processes, monitoring, and incident response. You start asking how your changes might introduce risk or create confusion, and you begin to take responsibility for writing clear, maintainable code that fits into a broader system of stability. Good habits here lay the foundation for reliable software. You're not just writing code—you're building on a set of engineering practices designed to earn customer trust.

Description

At Level 2, product stability becomes a proactive part of how you build. You understand the systems and practices that reduce risk—like testing, code review, observability, and deployment practices—and you participate in them deliberately. You start to spot instability before it reaches production, and you improve how your team prevents, detects, and recovers from issues. You no longer just work within the safety rails—you reinforce and expand them.

Key Behaviors

  • •
    Tests work locally before merging or deploying
  • •
    Follows team standards for version control and deployment
  • •
    Responds quickly when bugs are discovered in their code
  • •
    Pays attention during bug triage or postmortems
  • •
    Asks for help when unsure how changes might impact stability

Key Behaviors

  • •
    Writes and updates automated tests to prevent regressions
  • •
    Uses metrics, logs, and alerts to validate stability after changes
  • •
    Proactively raises risk or fragility in planning or review
  • •
    Advocates for test coverage, clarity, and small PRs
  • •
    Identifies patterns in incidents and builds safeguards against repeat issues

Common Struggles

  • May prioritize speed over quality
  • Might not recognize patterns in the bugs they introduce
  • Can lack awareness of broader system dependencies

Common Struggles

  • May lean too heavily on manual testing or QA
  • Can struggle to balance speed with stability in fast-moving work
  • Might delay or deprioritize non-critical reliability improvements

Success Indicators

  • Test your work before it impacts others
  • Fix bugs promptly and learn from them
  • Follow safety practices in version control, merging, and deployments
  • Begin to think about how your code behaves under real-world conditions

Success Indicators

  • Build with stability in mind, not as an afterthought
  • Use tools and process to validate changes before and after deploy
  • Write code that's predictable, testable, and easy to troubleshoot
  • Flag instability even when it's not yet a full-blown problem

Mindset Shift

From:

"I fix bugs."

To:

"I prevent problems before they happen."

Mindset Shift

From:

"I work safely within the system."

To:

"I improve the system that keeps us safe."

Questions to Ask Yourself

  • Have I tested this in realistic conditions?
  • What edge cases might break this code?
  • What's the rollback plan if something goes wrong?

Questions to Ask Yourself

  • Where are we still relying on hope instead of safeguards?
  • How confident are we in detecting problems after deploy?
  • What parts of our system are hard to trust—or hard to fix?

Build These Habits

  • 1
    Write clear, defensive code
  • 2
    Learn from incidents and postmortems
  • 3
    Ask reviewers about risk areas or regression concerns

Build These Habits

  • 1
    Monitor stability metrics regularly
  • 2
    Review PRs and deployments with a risk-aware mindset
  • 3
    Invest in tests, alerts, or process changes that reduce future incidents

Seek Feedback

  • "What part of this change worries you most?"
  • "Is there a simpler or safer way to solve this?"
  • "Have we seen this type of issue before?"

Seek Feedback

  • "What's the most fragile part of this system?"
  • "Are there warning signs we've learned to ignore?"
  • "What would make this easier to debug or recover from?"

Signals You're Ready to Level Up

  • Fewer regressions in your code
  • Faster fixes with fewer side effects
  • Increased care in how changes are tested and deployed

Signals You're Ready to Level Up

  • You build guardrails before failure happens
  • You're trusted to work independently on high-risk or sensitive code
  • Your work increases confidence, not just functionality

Focus Summary

  • Catch issues early
  • Learn from mistakes
  • Build what lasts

At Level 1, stability is about awareness and responsibility. It's learning to see your code not just as correct—but as resilient.

Focus Summary

  • Prevent more
  • Patch less
  • Build with confidence

At Level 2, stability is a habit. You don't just avoid problems—you help design a system that avoids them for everyone.