Nicholas Simmons

𝗧𝗥𝗔𝗡𝗦𝗟𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗢𝗡 (𝗦𝗛𝗢𝗥𝗧𝗘𝗡𝗜𝗡𝗚) 𝗢𝗙 𝗚𝗘𝗢-𝗔𝗗𝗗𝗥𝗘𝗦𝗦𝗘𝗦 we recently face the problem of shipping: on daily basis we need to quickly ship a lot of merchandise packages to many North American areas (incl. Canada, US), via the cheapest carrier and within a certain time limit. the business operation usually runs well, until it does not... the shipping addresses, that we need to ship the package to, are basically free text, no matter how we regularize it. these addresses are transferred to us (together with the purchase orders) via various marketplaces incl. Amazon, eBay, Walmart, etc. they usually don't care about the correctness of address, while all these marketplaces want are just that we deliver the packages on time so that the customers are satisfied. on the contrary, if we cannot deliver promptly, our marketplace rating (and that's AI/ML too?) will decrease, and when that reaches the lower threshold we may get delisted... which can be scary... when Amazon, eBay, Walmart, etc. provide all these geo-addresses, who is going to validate (& consume) them? it would be the shipping carriers, notably UPS, Fedex, Purolator, etc. perhaps due to speedy operation, they only accept an extra short address, e.g. 40 char. but the reality is, some address can be really long, esp. those French addresses in Quebec. so technically the problem on the address is: 𝗥𝗔𝗪 𝗜𝗡𝗣𝗨𝗧: - any length - no labelling, or labelling not accurate    - (𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘳 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘵 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘦 "𝘛𝘰𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘰" 𝘢𝘴 𝘢 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘦, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘈𝘮𝘢𝘻𝘰𝘯 𝘮𝘢𝘺 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘷𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘥𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘱𝘤𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘥𝘢𝘵𝘢) - may contain non-address data    - (𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘳 𝘮𝘢𝘺 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘦 "𝘨𝘭𝘢𝘴𝘴, 𝘧𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘪𝘭𝘦, 𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘭𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘤𝘢𝘳𝘦" 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘥𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴2 𝘧𝘪𝘦𝘭𝘥, 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘦𝘭𝘴𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘶𝘳𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘴𝘦 𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘦𝘳, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘩𝘰𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘴𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘱𝘢𝘴𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘶 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘺𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘴 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦...) - can usually be recognized by Google GeoCoding API    - (𝘎𝘰𝘰𝘨𝘭𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘶𝘴𝘶𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘴𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘦𝘯𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘴𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘢𝘥𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘰 𝘓𝘢𝘵-𝘓𝘰𝘯𝘨, 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘯𝘰𝘵 100% 𝘨𝘶𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘦𝘥)    - (𝘯𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴, 𝘎𝘰𝘰𝘨𝘭𝘦 𝘥𝘰𝘦𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘥𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴, 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘰 40 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘳 𝘰𝘳 𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴) 𝗥𝗘𝗤𝗨𝗜𝗥𝗘𝗗 𝗢𝗨𝗧𝗣𝗨𝗧: - max. 40 char - interpretable by major North America shipping carriers (e.g. UPS, Fedex, Purolator)    - (𝘴𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘥𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘢𝘨𝘦) 𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗕𝗟𝗘𝗠: - how can we translate these long (North America) addresses, from long raw text, into 40-char text that can be reasonable recognized to a geo-location?

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🌟 Exciting times ahead! Next week, my team at Shopify will be coming together to “burst" in-person. This will be my first time meeting the majority of these super humans in real life and I couldn’t be more thrilled. Shopify thrives as a remote organization, but the value of in-person connection cannot be overstated. Meeting face-to-face allows us to build deeper relationships, foster trust, and enhance collaboration in ways that virtual interactions sometimes fall short. It’s about those spontaneous conversations, the shared laughs, and the energy that comes from being in the same room together. These moments of in-person engagement are integral to creating a cohesive and motivated team and will propel us forward in the months to come. I feel very thankful that Shopify believes this as well and allows us to prioritize opportunities to gather. I’m looking forward to the shared brainstorming sessions, meals, and most importantly, the connections we’ll strengthen during this time together. See you in Toronto! 🚀🇨🇦🙌 #remotework #engineeringleadership #distributedteams #remotecollaboration

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🧵 The Hidden Developer Growth Secret I Learned From Early Shopify Days (It's not about the tech stack...until it is.) In 2006, I was a young dev in Ottawa running IT services. One coffee chat with Aydin Mirzaee changed my entire perspective on building software. Here's what actually matters: Code Isn't Your Ceiling From: "I need to master the latest framework!" To: "Wait, these founders are teaching me how to think about problems" Learning how successful devs approached problems > memorizing syntax The Real 10x Move From: "Must learn every new tech!" To: "Must understand why this feature matters" Watching early Shopify's obsession with merchant problems taught me more than any architecture doc. Community Compounds From: "I'll just learn online" To: "These local devs are sharing real-world battle stories" Truth: Building alongside others beats watching tutorials. Growth Is Messy From: "Need perfect code!" To: "Need to solve real problems" Plot twist: Those local meetups taught me how to balance technical debt with business needs. Mindset > Stack From: "Ruby vs PHP vs Node?" To: "How are we measuring user impact?" The tech stack debate doesn't matter as much as understanding your users. The Hidden Truth: While everyone's chasing certifications... Real engineering wisdom comes from: Seeing decisions play out Watching products evolve Understanding user impact Building alongside others Sharing real failures What I really learned: Technical skills are table stakes Problem understanding is rare Community beats credentials Impact over implementation Measure what matters Want real growth? Join local dev communities Ask about failure stories Learn decision contexts Share your struggles Build relationships Because while everyone's copying FAANG architectures... Understanding why decisions were made matters more than the decisions themselves. What unexpected lesson changed how you build? Share this with a dev who needs to think bigger 👇 #DeveloperLife #WebDev #Engineering #StartupLife P.S. Great code starts with great problem understanding and the actual need. Everything else is just implementation details.

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Not many people know the story of "why" Zenhub exists...so here it goes👇 Back in 2014, the team that would come to be "Zenhub" was a scrappy group of devs and PMs working at a product studio up in Vancouver. When clients are paying you to do work, they (rightfully so) want to understand where that work is at and “when is this going to be done?” The problem was that we could never answer that question… No matter what project management solution we tried (and believe me, we tried them all), we kept coming back to the same core problem. Context switching... Ie. our devs always felt like they were being forced away from where they were working from (ie. GitHub) in order to update our PM tools. So they didn't update them. Needless to say, this wasn't leading to a productive relationship with our clients. So our devs got together on a weekend to try and fix the problem. What they hacked together was a simple Chrome extension to bring a Trello-esque "task board" into GitHub. And as they say, the rest was history. Well, not really, but we’ll save that story for another set of posts… Reducing context switching has been core to our mission from day one. But while GitHub was the home for teams back in 2014, that's changed. Today that home is Slack. While I know people have a lot of mixed feelings about Slack, it has (for better or worse) become where “work” happens in most modern organizations. That’s why today, we’re announcing early access for an entirely new Slack integration that’s going to be a game-changer for how teams use Zenhub. While platforms evolve, that idea of “reducing context switching” has remained a constant, and we’re excited to double down on that mission with Slack. With this new integration teams will be able to create, plan, and track work in Zenhub all without having to leave a Slack channel. If you want to get hands on with what we’re building and join our early access program, check out the link in the comments below. #slack #github #developers #agile #scrum #projectmanagement #devex

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Something you can’t do with Shopify flows’s native actions to make api calls is do anything with the response that you receive. Thats what this action in flow helper is for.

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I had an interesting discussion with folks from the Chrome and Firefox teams about React Server Components and how they affect the web performance at the Toronto Web Perf Meetup yesterday. The DCL event seems to happen when the last bit of HTML reaches the browser, which can be seconds later. Until that happens, no module or deferred scripts are going to be invoked. Having the browser paint the page before all suspended components load is definitely a good feature, but it doesn't change the fact that we need to deliver all data as fast as possible. All the deferred or module scripts won't load until DCL happens. Have this in mind when you're suspending your components. It's easy to think "it will reach the browser whenever it does" since the users will be able to interact with the website before that, but don't adopt that mindset.

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Quick story time!📸 When RenoAssist approached me about building Canada's most comprehensive renovation directory in Webflow, I knew we had to get creative. Jack Hunter (their brilliant founder) had this amazing vision, but Webflow CMS alone just wasn't going to cut it. Instead of saying "it can't be done," we said "let's make it happen!" The solution? A beautiful tech sandwich: Webflow's sexy frontend (because we're not savages 😉) Xano doing the heavy lifting backend Cloudflare keeping everything fast and secure The results have blown everyone away: ✅ Lightning-fast directory searches ✅ Perfect URL structure for local SEO ✅ Real-time sitemap updates ✅ Smooth pagination that handles thousands of listings And yes, we still use Webflow CMS for the simple stuff - because sometimes the original recipe works just fine! Huge thanks to Jack Hunter for trusting the process. Sometimes the best solutions come from pushing boundaries! 🙌 Who else is out there pushing Webflow beyond its limits? Would love to hear your stories! #WebDevelopment #Innovation #ClientSuccess #nocode #webflow

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My FAVORITE part of the job as a PM is something I get to do as an entrepreneur too and I love it——- it’s PRODUCT DISCOVERY. Can’t believe it’s part of a job lol cause it’s so much fun! You’re just talking to a certain type of people/ personas, and asking curious questions to know them deeply, identifying problem patterns to build product hypothesis on… And then, you get to go back to them and ask them if it’d solve the problem… if it goes well, you literally have found a happy friend (for life if you wanna put in the effort)!!! I mean, whaaaaaaaat? Making friends is part of my job, now? Who would have thought? Definitely not teenager Arunima who was getting super scolded by her mom for being “too social” for a Boards-exam-studying-student. I got 95%+ or something (def 90+), don’t worry, but according to my Mom I could have done much better if I was more “focused” lol… Joke’s on you my (best in the whole world) Mumma, cause being social is kinda in the JD now 😎 I’m just loving it so much. Atleast today lol. There are thorny days too fam, to be clear. When I’m working on the most boring operational stuff and thinking about things I never had to think of or care about cause of being such a pampered corporate employee, alas! All in all tho, 2025 Arunima do feel she is exactly where she’s supposed to be. And if you’re reading this post TILL this point, YOU HAVE A HUGE HAND in helping me get past the tough times in 2024… thank you so much for reading my long expressive essays and filling the void I felt when I didn’t have a team to just discuss things with. Extra-TMI-level personally, having the “social” feeling of community I had here in 2024 is a huge reason why I was able to be productive with long lonely working sessions on research stuff and some emotional processing of stepping into an entrepreneurial life. So, while I am aware of the lawyer/mentor/friends advice I often get on having a more traditional “executive presence” online, and at the risk of creating wrong/inaccurate/half-baked perceptions about me…. I wanna say that LinkedIn has changed my life. The last decade I wouldn’t have been able to achieve even a quarter of the things I was able to achieve, if my dear Stanford friend didn’t introduce me to this Networking tool that could help me grab opportunities in the US while being a college student in India, and not an IITian at that haha. Thank you, Network. And thank you, LinkedIn. And I hope that I’m able to help more and more hard-working people in the world use LinkedIn to network more efficiently in ‘25, through NavHub AI. Let’s see what adventures are ahead, hopefully atleast as many wins as learnings from mistakes/ failures…. But then again, yo girl has done an almost-PhD in turning adversities to opportunities until there just are enough wins to make an year count! #Entrepreneurship #ProductManagement #Innovation

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WAIT Are you telling me that now Shopify is using LLM's to make more simple the generation of GraphQL queries?? 😮 .dev Assistant gotta be one of the best features for developers from Shopify, you don't know how complicated it can be for someone to jump into GraphQL without previous knowledge (and the docs are not so easy to read for the beginners). This definitely will push a lot of new features and developments within stores! 🙌 🙌 🙌 This is an amazing way, and a very useful one too, of using LLM's instead of just adding a chat helper to your favorite instant messaging app 😅 Check a demo video from Shopify here! https://lnkd.in/eQcbUg2D #Shopify #ShopifyPlus #GraphQL #Storefront #APIs #LLM #FrontEnd #Learning #Lifehacks

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Are you ready to unlock the full potential of Product Operations? 🔍 Only 2 weeks left until Product Ops: 101 - Getting Started with Product Operations on October 30, 2024, led by Denise Tilles! With only 2 spots left, this hands-on workshop will give you practical tools to implement and scale Product Ops strategies. By the end, you'll have a clear roadmap to drive better outcomes within your organization. Secure your spot now: https://lnkd.in/exBcs2V5 🎟️ #productops101 #productoperations #productmanagement #workshop

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Sup fam!! Relationships are everything!! They're the core of your engineering platform. Your team's design docs, software patterns, pull requests, and GitOps workflows all need to pass through a complex network of relationships before becoming meaningful to stakeholders. Before that, they're just bytes sitting on Jeff Bezos' disks. How are your relationships doing? Which relationships need some light touching up? Which ones need some serious investment? How about that one person on that one team? How about on _your_ team? Are you tracking these gaps with the same effectiveness you're tracking tech debt? It takes an intentional effort to build meaningful connections and to show peers you're a stakeholder in _their_ success. It's worth your time -- not to mention you'll feel great!! Want to optimize your engineering platform? Start by investing in your relationships!

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Shopify is proving that small changes can make a BIG impact. Faster cart loading speeds—up to 50% faster with the Winter25 release—mean smoother customer experiences and happier merchants. This is what innovation looks like: practical improvements that drive real results. Way to lead, Shopify! What do you guys think of this? Let me know in the comments below. Read more: https://lnkd.in/dkrqpSsK

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Ever found yourself staring blankly at your 🖥, unsure where to start on a creative work project? Recently I shared a new Copilot tip with my fellow Customer Experience PMs at MSFT: using Copilot to develop an adoption asset for a new feature. The results were so impressive that I'm excited to share them with you! Copilot wasn’t just a time-saver (it shaved four hours off my usual workflow)— it was a creativity booster. Here's how I leveraged Copilot to elevate my ✍: ✅ 1. Groundwork: I began by gathering relevant content to ensure Copilot stayed true to our product's branding & facts. Prompt: Help me find documents (files, emails & chats) that contain information about <specific topic> that could be used as sources of input for an <adoption asset> I need to create ✅ 2. Brainstorming: Copilot helped me brainstorm compelling subject lines that connect emotionally with the audience. - Start by giving Copilot a specific role in your prompt - Define role at beginning of prompt, Copilot executes instructions in order.   Prompt: Act as a marketing copywriter and generate a list of 5 headlines for an <adoption asset > to help <e.g., announce the launch of new product>. The headline should compel <target audience > to read on, so they <how you want to appeal to reader emotionally>. ✅ 3. Drafting: I set specific guidelines for the output, from structure to style, ensuring the content was impactful and precise. - Be specific about the elements you want included in the asset - Specify information sources. Type ‘/’ in the text input area to quickly reference files and/or people. -  Check for accuracy Prompt: Act as a marketing copywriter and help me draft an engaging and informative <adoption asset > targeted at <audience>. The goal is to <e.g., announce the launch of new product>. The adoption asset should catch the reader's attention, inform them about <e.g., the availability of new feature/product>, and inspire them to <e.g., start using it today>. Include the following elements: ·      An introduction that captures attention and introduces <new product> ·      An overview of key features and benefits. ·      Instructions on how users can get started ·      A call to action that <e.g., encourages use> Use the information from </name of file> to help you write the email. The tone should be <e.g., professional yet inviting>. ✅ 4. Refining: We then simplified technical jargon and explored various tones and headings to better resonate with our audience. Prompt: Condense this complex information into a succinct, engaging summary focusing on [specific aspect] ✅ 5. Final review: Promoting Copilot to 'editor-in-chief', I ensured the final draft was inclusive, engaging, and polished. Prompt: As a copy editor, please review this text and provide suggestions for making it more inclusive and engaging.  Provide feedback on how to enhance its impact. Imagine what you could achieve with the extra time gained!

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Shopify is such a cool story because of the way their existence totally changed their own total addressable market. Shopify made going direct-to-consumer easy. It's not just the storefront bits - it's the app ecosystem. Shopify enabled companies like ShipBob to turn highly physical processes into a software abstraction, dramatically reducing the capital required to launch a real-world DTC business. AWS did the same for software. Twilio did the same for software/telephony interactions. There's no way to "size" the market for category definers like this before they happen... because their very presence creates new markets.

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3 reasons why we brought north of 25 meetings for our team this business week without any adspend or organic traffic. What we do have is our outreach, and let me breakdown why our outreach is so damn effective. 1. Data Engineers A genuine money printer with AI currently is prospecting in creative ways. Things like social media engagement, job postings, strategic hires, funding rounds, media articles… these events are all public data that we can feed to LLMs and do nice stuff… shoutout to Clay 2. Multi-Channel Outreach - 100% TAM maximum If you’ve used Sales Nav or Apollo, you’ll relalize not all contact data is available. Some people have emails we can find, phone numbers, LinkedIn, X… Well whatever channels are available, and there will be atleast 1, let’s tap it. Get the word across to 100% of your TAM with cold-calling, email, and social media DMs. 3. Relationship Selling Now this is an idea we’ve been toying with. This is the framework we use to write our copy, the message-market-fit. Be humanlike, cut the fluff, and cater to the prospect. “Hey <name>. I was Impressed by your practice. Wondering if you experience the following revenue pains…” We aren’t AI generating heaps of BS, nor are we wasting time with a story. Lead with value while retaining the conversational tone. Sales people are great. Data people are great. You need the best of both though 🚀

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In unfortunate news, most Hopin and StreamYard staff are being let go, after the company was sold. In fortunate news: you could hire them! Here are details: Here's a list with 40+ software engineers (senior, staff) as well as engineering managers, product managers, designers and other tech folks who all worked at Hopin / StreamYard. From all that I heard, the company had a high hiring bar. StreamYard was a profitable product, ran by a pretty lean (and motivated!) team. Here is the list of former staff open to being contacted for relevant positions: https://lnkd.in/dMsvQYQV (Feel free to reshare or forward to people who might be hiring!) [As context on the Hopin/StreamYard split and mentions: Hopin acquired the already profitable streaming service StreamYard for $250M in 2021 (after raising about $1B in funding). Hopin sold off it's "core" events business in 2023 for $50M. StreamYard kept operating more-or-less standalone within Hopin, and kept growing in revenue, and stayed profitable. As the rest of Hopin was sold to mobile app developer Bending Spoons, StreamYard was the most valuable asset (and likely what drove the likely large payment Bending Spoons must have made). Hopin has two additional products on the sale: Streamable (also an acquisition) and a community product in beta called superwave]

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The October Montreal.rb talk will be on how to "Tame Complex Queries with Database Views", given by David Cornu, a Staff Software Developer at Patch. Date/Time: Wednesday, October 2, 2024 at 7pm Location: Anticafe Montreal (294 Saint-Catherine St W, Montreal, Quebec, Canada) RSVP link: https://lnkd.in/er8Hz24N Description: PostgreSQL views are a useful tool to make query logic reusable and maintainable. This talk will cover their pros and cons, a couple of real-world use cases, and how to use them in Rails apps using the Scenic gem. Speaker: David is a staff software developer at Patch (a climate tech startup). He cracked open Why’s Poignant Guide to Ruby in 2009 and has been in and out of Rails apps since. #montrealrb #montreal #ruby #rails #talk #presentation #softwareengineering #softwaredevelopment #programming #community

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