Andrés — Paternity Leave

🌸

Andrés is on
Paternity Leave

From TBD · Back TBD

I'm spending this time with my family and fully disconnected. I'll be back soon and can't wait to reconnect with everyone!

👋

I'm not disappearing

Paternity leave doesn't mean I go dark. I'll have regular check-ins with Eli, Nerea, Amaia and Dalila — I want to follow how Clara Labs evolves, David's growth, how Guido settles in, and stay connected to the team's momentum. I'm available — just not on everything, and not every day.

🏗️

While I'm away — what's changing

A few structural changes will be in place during my leave:

👩‍💼 Amaia will report to Eli (15Five & Harvest only)

👩‍💼 Dalila will report to Nerea (15Five & Harvest only)

🤝 Eli & Dalila will be the points of contact for Cooper (fewer overlapping hours with Nerea) — a great opportunity for Dalila to establish herself further as a Web PM. 🚀

⚙️

Stack & Tech direction

No major tech changes expected — but a few things I'd love to see move forward:

🤖 AI adoption: we could technically give access now, but the margin for error is still too high. Rollout will be gradual. When Eli & Nerea feel someone is ready, they'll get Claude Code Enterprise — full access.

⚡ Accelerating development through skills: Diego and Amaia have been working on a system to boost developer productivity. The idea is simple — instead of each dev figuring out how to do things from scratch, we define skills (structured prompts + rules) that encode how Terra builds things. A dev should be able to say "build me the card-c component following this skill" and get a result that already follows our conventions, structure and quality bar. Diego and Amaia have been laying the groundwork here — the goal is to roll this out progressively so every dev on the team can leverage it. This is one of the most important things to keep pushing while I'm away.

🐘 WordPress foundation: we've been building a standard base that every WordPress project at Terra should start from. The idea is that any developer — regardless of how long they've been on the team — can pick it up, understand how it's structured, and start building without having to ask how things work. Everything is organized in a predictable, modular way. One of the goals is also to be able to generate documentation automatically with AI, so the project always documents itself as it grows. The end result should be a foundation that saves time, reduces mistakes, and makes onboarding to any project much smoother.

🛠️ CLI: directly tied to the WordPress foundation above — the CLI is what makes it all usable day-to-day. Instead of manually creating files and folders, a dev can just run a command and have a new module, hero, or component scaffolded instantly, already following Terra's structure and conventions. The more polished the CLI gets, the faster and more consistent the team builds. Less time on setup, more time on actual work. The CLI is also a powerful tool for scaffolding new modules — making it one of the most practical ways to keep the team building fast and consistently.

🖖 Interactive / AI-driven projects: if we ever build something that requires a reactive frontend with meaningful interactivity or AI integration, the decision framework is clear — Vue.js first (ecosystem, packages, practicality), Alpine.js second for lighter cases. No React unless there's a very strong reason.

🧪 Clara Labs: integrate digital, content, and design skills into the system we're building — as soon as possible. This is a complex project, and once the CMS is ready, the clock starts. Beyond the fact that the departments may not yet have a clear picture of what they want, this is a project that needs a product owner. If no one steps up, dev should take that role — because at the end of the day, we sold them a system, and it needs to work as a system.

🚫

What we don't do while I'm out

To keep things stable and avoid decisions that are hard to undo:

🏗️ No architectural decisions on active projects without flagging them first — if something feels like a big structural call, park it until I'm back or loop in Nerea or Eli.

📦 No unnecessary tech dependencies — no React where it isn't needed, no Python. The only room for exploration is for highly reactive UI cases, where Alpine.js could be considered (we ran some tests with María, but this is unlikely to come up).

🔀 Scope decisions can be made by Cooper or María if needed. That said, one clear guideline: if we have a retainer with a client and something comes up that goes slightly over hours — but genuinely improves our process or the quality of our work — it's worth doing. Investing in a good working relationship and better output is always the right call.

🔥 No large refactors without approval — Nerea has the final say. Punky should not be touched, except for isolated function improvements. The PHP Core Framework may see changes driven by Nerea. Everything else stays as-is.

🎨 Frontend HTML/SCSS should not change. The last accepted structure is the one established in Unison, which introduced some variations — the team needs to be aware of this and align around it. No new foundations or structural deviations beyond what Unison defines.

🙅 No skipping the foundation — new WordPress projects should follow the standard base. No custom setups "just this once."

💸 No new tooling costs without checking first. The exception: tools we already use — Resend, Railway, Supabase — may need plan upgrades as usage grows, and that's fine. Same goes for AI tooling. But any brand new paid subscription waits until I'm back.

⚙️

Processes to keep running

🚨 Incidents: Washington Panel should have email notifications set up so that if something breaks or goes down, the right people are alerted automatically — not just one inbox. We should also have pre-approved client-facing messages ready to send when needed — María should approve these. If someone gets alerted, the flow is: discuss internally first, then escalate to Cooper if it needs to go to the client.

🔗 Commit & Connect: Dalila will run the meeting. Before scheduling it, there needs to be a clear reason to hold it — a topic, something worth sharing, a decision to make. If there's no real agenda, cancel it. No meeting for the sake of meeting.

🆕 New incoming projects: Nerea, Eli, Amaia and Dalila will handle scoping and intake for any new projects that come in while I'm away.

🏖️

Vacations & coverage

A few things to keep in mind around time off:

📅 Delivery dates and vacations shouldn't overlap — if someone is transitioning between projects and happens to be off, try to ensure 1–2 days of overlap to hand things off properly. This will be harder to manage in August, so plan ahead.

☀️ Nerea has vacations in August — Eli, Guido, María and David should be able to cover that gap between them. Worth aligning early so nothing falls through.

👥

Resourcing

The resourcing spreadsheet stays as the source of truth. A few things to keep in mind:

📋 The resourcing plan stays as defined in the spreadsheet — no new hires expected while I'm out. View resourcing spreadsheet →

🤝 Dalila should know that, while no hiring is planned, she can lean on María to source freelancers when needed — particularly for copy and content loading tasks.

⚙️ Nerea should focus on building tools that streamline and automate the content upload process — making it faster and less dependent on manual effort.

📊 Nerea also knows she needs to keep pushing Washington Panel — building the features Dalila and the devs need to have better visibility and control over batches, pages, and modules currently in development. This tool has proven useful across the whole dev team.

🚩

Yellow & red flags to watch

Things that could realistically go wrong. Worth keeping an eye on:

🔴 Unflagged architectural decisions — a "small" technical change that seemed fine ends up being hard to reverse. If it feels architectural, it needs to be flagged to Nerea or Eli before it's done.

🔴 Washington Panel notifications not in place — if something breaks and there's no alert system, the client finds out before the team does. This needs to be set up before it matters.

🟡 Clara Labs without a clear owner — there's no one leading this, and dev isn't in a position to drive it independently. This project needs a clear direction set by Cooper, communicated to Mara y Nerea, so everyone knows who owns it and what's expected.

🟡 Scope creep by accumulation — a client asks for one small thing, then another, then another. There are no big projects on the horizon, but there's a lot coming. The people in charge don't yet have the skill to recognize when it's becoming too much — that instinct takes time to develop. Every request, however small, needs to be logged and escalated before committing.

🟡 Cytable running on momentum — this project moves forward on energy and goodwill, not a clear billing structure. That's fine until it starts delaying Clara or other paying clients. It needs to stay in its lane and not eat into time that belongs to billable work.

🟡 August coverage gaps — Nerea's vacation + general summer leave can leave real holes if not planned early. This one needs proactive alignment, not last-minute improvising.

🟢 Commit & Connect losing its purpose — if the meeting runs without a real agenda, it quietly becomes useless. Dalila needs to hold the bar: no topic, no meeting.

✅

Checklist

Things to keep an eye on while I'm out. Check off when handled.

+ Add task