Ethan Foulkes - 10 words for building software successfully.

Software development success doesn't come from how well you build the things you need.

Success comes from knowing what NOT to do, and making sure no one does those things!

Sounds simple, but it's actually incredible hard to do.

You need expertise from designers, product managers, and developers. Each of these teams is full of frameworks, experts and industry jargon.

More importantly, this expertise needs to be aligned with executives, salespeople and marketers.

Alignment is hard when you speak different languages, and if you aren't fluent in someone else's language...it's easy to talk past each other and not even realize it.

After decades of working in this world, we've landed on 10 words that explain the 3 first principles everyone in a company needs to understand for true alignment to happen.

Come check out the 3 animated short stories that will give everyone in your company a common language to understand and combat the most common anti-patterns that take teams off course.

About Ethan Foulkes - Greenville, SC
Simplifying work.
Socials
  / ethanfoulkes  
https://magicbuttonlabs.com/

Ethan is the CEO of Magic Button Labs. His passion for simplifying explanations for how dev, design, and product management interact has led to the creation of Klutch as a bridge between the business and technical worlds. The Klutch framework uses fun, real-life stories to teach the first principles of outcome driven development using plain English.

Presented on August 16, 2025 at the Carolina Code Conference in Greenville, SC
https://carolina.codes

Sponsored by...
Flywheel - https://www.flywheelgreenvillesc.com/
Vonage - https://developer.vonage.com/en/home
ThoroughCare - https://www.thoroughcare.net/

Organized by Brightball, Inc - https://www.brightball.com/