Mews R&D Check-In
Hosted by Jan Meissner, our R&D Community Lead, this podcast takes you behind the scenes with Mews' engineering, design, product management, content design, data science, and more. Explore the stories, collaborations, and insights that fuel innovation across the company.
Mews R&D Check-In
José Silva: We are only successful if the teams are successful
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— A Mews R&D Check-In on scaling architectural practices, reducing the cognitive tax for product teams, and why engineering maturity matters more than ever
In this episode of the R&D Check-In our host Jan Meissner sits down with José Silva, Chief Architect, to demystify how technical leadership and systemic architecture operate at scale in a modern R&D organization.
José shares his organic transition from a visual-focused web designer to Chief Architect, emphasizing that senior technical leadership is less about forced ambition and more about naturally bridging gaps between divisions. The conversation dives deep into AMET (Architecture Modernization and Enablement Team) and how Mews rejects the traditional, siloed architecture team in favor of a dynamic, collaborative "practice." José breaks down how AMET uses specialized architectural "runways"—covering APIs, data, and governance—to proactively pay the "coordination tax" and alleviate the cognitive overload on product teams so they can focus entirely on value delivery.
A major focus of the episode is the rapid evolution of AI and its massive impact on organizational foundations. José highlights how AI drastically amplifies an ecosystem, warning that an unstable architecture will only see its weak spots targeted faster by automated agents. The discussion shifts toward the future of governance, moving from human-led documentation to machine-readable guardrails that protect the organization while allowing AI teammates to safely run loose. Finally, José shares his personal passion for "engineering maturity," discussing the importance of mentorship, navigating corporate subjectivity, and creating psychological safety so that engineers of all levels feel safe challenging senior technical decisions.
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