In this episode of The CTO Show with Mehmet, we sit down with Eric Müller, Product Engineering Associate Director at Work & Co, to unpack the evolving intersection of AI adoption, digital security, and empathetic leadership.

With a career that spans cybersecurity, product architecture, and agency collaboration, Eric shares how to lead engineering teams through complexity without losing the human touch—especially in today’s AI-driven landscape.

Whether you’re a founder, CTO, product leader, or advisor, this conversation is packed with practical insights and leadership wisdom

💡 What You’ll Learn

• Why AI should augment, not replace, your dev team

• The real risks of trusting LLM output blindly (including “slopjacking”)

• How to balance speed and security in fast-paced product teams

• The overlooked power of psychological safety in engineering culture

• Why technical debt is just business debt—and how to manage it

• Practical ways to communicate security to non-technical leaders

• How to spot and mentor emerging engineering leaders

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🔑 Key Takeaways

• AI is not a silver bullet. Use it to accelerate boilerplate and QA, but keep human oversight for anything mission-critical.

• Security must start early. You can’t patch it in the final sprint—bake it into your culture from day one.

• Empathy wins. In client work and internal leadership, understanding before advising changes everything.

• Trust your inner voice. As a leader, self-trust is a vital compass—don’t let indecision erode confidence.

👤 About Eric Müller

Eric Müller, is an Associate Director focusing on Product Engineering and Digital Security at Work & Co, part of Accenture Song, where leads engineering teams and supported automated processes to deliver high-quality digital products for the past decade. With over 20 years of experience in engineering and security, Eric has worked across various industries including banking, social media, B2B, retail, fashion, and online gaming. His extensive background includes significant roles at Wells Fargo Bank, Charles Schwab, Razorfish, and Mekanism, where he delivered award-winning projects for clients such as Microsoft, Business Wire, Anza, and Vibrant Planet. Eric fosters empathetic leadership and transparent communication to build resilient, high-performing tech teams.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericmullersf/

https://work.co/

Episode Highlights

00:00 – Intro & Eric’s journey from Gen X hacker to engineering leader

04:00 – AI adoption: Hype vs. Doomerism, and where the real value lies

07:00 – Finding the sweet spot for GenAI in engineering

10:00 – The tension between speed, usability, and secure code

12:30 – LLM risks: hallucinations, outdated data, slopjacking

15:30 – Explaining AI risk & security to non-technical executives

18:00 – Making clients feel heard: the “make them writer” mindset

22:00 – Coaching engineering teams through compromises and deadlines

29:00 – Psychological safety and what leaders get wrong

33:00 – Leading in a hybrid world: Slack, trust, and async culture

38:00 – Spotting and mentoring the next generation of leaders

41:00 – Why mentorship vs management books

44:00 – Final advice: Trust yourself, and trust your team

In this episode, Mehmet Gonullu sits down with Mary Moore-Simmons, VP of Engineering at Keebo AI, to unpack what it really takes to scale high-performing engineering teams in today’s AI-powered environment. From DevOps and ML Ops to building team culture that lasts, Mary shares hard-won insights from over a decade in engineering leadership across startups and high-growth tech companies.

This is a must-listen for founders, CTOs, and venture investors seeking clarity on where engineering, AI, and culture intersect.

🔑 Key Takeaways

• The shift from traditional DevOps to ML Ops and its impact on team structure

• Why data engineering is no longer optional, even for product-focused engineers

• How to balance velocity with sustainable engineering culture

• The real difference between a CTO and a VP of Engineering

• Why culture must be owned—and modeled—by the CEO to scale

• How Mary mentors future leaders through transparency and structure

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📘 What You’ll Learn

• The traits Mary looks for when hiring for early-stage engineering teams

• How to scope early features in a fast-moving startup environment

• Strategies to shield your team from “firefighting” and maintain focus

• The importance of infrastructure automation in the age of AI

• Mary’s thoughts on whether company culture can truly scale

👤 About the Guest

Mary Moore Simmons is the VP of Engineering at Keebo.ai, where she has been instrumental in shaping the company's innovative approach to data warehouse optimization. A seasoned engineering leader with 10+ years in software, her background includes Director of Engineering at Github and Zcash as well as VP of Engineering at AgentSync. She focuses on building high-performing teams that sustain a healthy culture and growth mindset. She is passionate about authentic and transparent leadership, and building a culture where people can bring their authentic selves to work, where DEIB is table stakes.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mmooresimmons

http://keebo.ai/

https://github.com/mmsthepizzathief

Episode Highlights & Timestamps

00:01 – Mary’s journey: from chemical engineer to VP of Engineering

03:20 – What Keebo AI does and how they optimize Snowflake & Databricks

05:10 – The evolving intersection of software and data engineering

07:00 – Why Mary prioritizes hiring with data and ML experience

08:30 – DevOps, ML Ops, and keeping engineers happy and efficient

10:50 – The CTO vs VP of Engineering: What really separates the two

13:30 – Balancing velocity vs long-term stability in startup engineering

18:45 – How Mary shields her team from noise and burnout

22:00 – The traits Mary looks for when hiring

23:30 – Authentic and transparent leadership in practice

25:30 – Does culture scale? What Mary has seen work

28:30 – What goes wrong when companies scale too fast

33:00 – Coaching future leaders and creating career ladders

37:00 – Tools, books, and blog posts Mary recommends

38:00 – AI, automation, and what tech excites Mary today

40:00 – Where to connect with Mary