Avery Pennarun:

Good engineering decisions add up. So do shortcuts.

In infrastructure software, users eventually feel both. They may not see the architecture, the incident review, the release process, or the quiet argument someone had to win to avoid a bad abstraction. But they feel the result when the product is reliable, understandable, and doesn’t create extra work.

That’s the kind of product Tailscale has tried to build from the beginning.

As we grow, the job gets harder. More customers, more platforms, more use cases, and more critical infrastructure all raise the bar. We need the right amount of structure: enough to help good decisions travel across teams, not so much that people spend their time servicing the structure.

That’s the context for today’s news: Mike Shaver is joining Tailscale as our VP of Engineering.

Mike has spent much of his career working on software that sits between people and complicated systems: Mozilla, Firefox, Facebook’s shift from web to mobile, security products, developer platforms, systems programming, and edge infrastructure.

That background matters for Tailscale. We’re bringing Mike in to help us keep doing the hard parts carefully, while keeping the product useful, reliable, and understandable for the people who depend on it.

That’s my version. Conveniently, Mike has his own.

Infrastructure people actually use

Hi, I'm Shaver.

One technical throughline in my career has been building platforms: flexible systems that help other people build valuable things.

I've had the good fortune to do that on products with enormous reach, including Firefox, Facebook's mobile application, and Shopify. As a developer, I helped write a JavaScript JIT, Linux filesystem code, protocol handlers, software update systems, and more. As a manager, I led Firefox's performance overhaul for 4.0 and the engineering side of Facebook's pivot to mobile.

In the best environments, I know how to do about 80% of my job, and I'm surrounded by people who are the best in the world at the other 20%. That's how you keep learning.

I feel like I've found that environment at Tailscale. There are a number of ways I think I can help the organization succeed, and just as many things I'm excited to learn more deeply.

A great platform makes hard things easy and impossible things possible. It expands the capabilities of the people building on top of it.

I think engineering leadership works the same way.

If I can create an environment with clear decision-making, room to learn from mistakes, and the confidence to take on hard problems, then the engineers, the ones actually building the product, can accomplish things that surprise even themselves.

Tailscale matters because connecting things matters.

Making complex networking straightforward means more people can spend their energy building useful things instead of fighting infrastructure. The less time people spend thinking about the network, the more time they can spend creating value on top of it.

As Tailscale grows, our customer base, product surface area, and responsibilities all grow too. That means we need to make sure that engineering judgment scales along with the company.

Tailscale makes connectivity, identity, and security easier. I think engineering leadership should make building software easier in much the same way.

The role is to make sure the right tools and processes stay out of the way. My job is to help people create, explore, and build. Then get out of the way.

My goal is to improve processes and tooling, and help every engineer at Tailscale work on the things they are passionate about. If someone is happy and focused, they are generally productive and impactful, too.

If we can create that environment together, I think it will show up clearly in the product. We'll continue earning users’ trust by making Tailscale reliable and easy to use, while expanding what it can do.

I've been a happy Tailscale customer for years. I've worn a Tailscale T-shirt long enough that people occasionally stop me and ask, "Tailscale? That's awesome. Do you work there?"

Until now, the answer was, "Nope. Just a fan."

I'm excited to finally have a different answer.