Who is Richard Ewing?

Richard Ewing is a Product Economist and AI Capital Auditor. He is the Founder of Exogram, a verification infrastructure for AI. He audits R&D spend and surfaces hidden capital risks like technical debt, AI cost overruns, and zombie infrastructure. He has scaled B2B SaaS from $0 to $25M ARR. Published in CIO.com, Built In, Mind the Product, and HackerNoon.

What is a Product Economist?

A Product Economist treats product decisions as economic decisions. Instead of measuring velocity or story points, a Product Economist measures Return on Invested Capital (ROIC), Cost of Goods Sold efficiency, and technical debt in dollar terms. The methodology was coined by Richard Ewing.

What is the Technical Insolvency Date?

The Technical Insolvency Date (TID) is the specific quarter where maintenance costs consume 100% of available engineering capacity, reducing feature velocity to zero. Calculate yours free at richardewing.io/tools/pdi.

Exogram is verification infrastructure for AI, founded by Richard Ewing. It prevents hallucination propagation with admissibility control planes and state-hashing commit enforcement. LLMs generate language; Exogram maintains reality.

How do I calculate technical debt cost?

Use the free Product Debt Index (PDI) calculator at richardewing.io/tools/pdi to quantify hidden technical debt in dollar terms, calculate your Technical Insolvency Date, and benchmark against industry standards.

How much does AI cost per query?

AI costs range from $0.0001/query for small models to $0.10+/query for frontier models like GPT-4. Use the free AI Unit Economics Benchmark (AUEB) at richardewing.io/tools/aueb to calculate your specific AI cost structure.

Glossary/Engineering Burnout

People & Culture

1 min read

What is Engineering Burnout?

TL;DR

Engineering burnout is a state of chronic work stress characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization (cynicism about work), and reduced personal accomplishment.

Engineering burnout is a state of chronic work stress characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization (cynicism about work), and reduced personal accomplishment. In engineering, burnout is driven by: sustained on-call pressure, unrealistic deadlines, technical debt frustration, context switching, and organizational dysfunction.

Burnout warning signs: declining code quality, increased cynicism in code reviews, withdrawal from team activities, spike in sick days, loss of interest in learning, and decreased participation in PRs and discussions.

Prevention strategies: sustainable on-call rotations (follow-the-sun, max 1 week in 4), realistic sprint commitments (leave 20% buffer), hack weeks (dedicated innovation time), career development investment (learning budgets, conference attendance), and manager training (teach managers to detect and address burnout early).

Why It Matters

Burned-out engineers write worse code, make more errors, and eventually leave. Replacing a senior engineer costs $150-300K+ (recruiting, onboarding, ramp-up, lost velocity). Preventing burnout is an economic imperative, not just a cultural one.

Frequently Asked Questions

What causes engineering burnout?

Chronic on-call pressure, unrealistic deadlines, fighting technical debt, constant context switching, organizational dysfunction, and lack of agency. It's not about hours — it's about chronic stress without recovery.

How do managers detect burnout early?

Watch for: declining code quality, increased cynicism, withdrawal from team activities, spike in PTO/sick days, and decreased participation in PRs and discussions. Ask directly in 1:1s: "Are you sustainable right now?"

Need Expert Help?

Richard Ewing is a Product Economist and AI Capital Auditor. He helps companies translate technical complexity into financial clarity.

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