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Manish Kumar
Manish Kumar, seated and leaning on one arm, looking into the camera.

Manish Kumar

I buildpossibilities.

Engineer by experience. Builder by mindset.

I've spent nearly two decades in engineering, most of it leading teams. Now I build products and businesses of my own, and share what I learn along the way.

Explore my workGet to know me
Engineering leadership
Across cloud, reliability and security
2 products live
FlashListing and Fidem, built and operated
1 open-source tool
CreatorBrio, MIT licensed

What I build

Products. Teams. Connections. Myself.

Building isn't only about software. It's how I approach people, relationships and my own growth too.

  • Products

    Useful products and the businesses around them, from a rough idea to something people use.

  • Teams

    Hiring strong people, helping them grow, and creating the conditions for good work.

  • Connections

    Relationships and collaboration, and the opportunities that only come from people.

  • Myself

    Fitness, learning and exploration, and testing where my limits actually are.

The mindset

Think bigger, then take action.

Most possibilities stay possibilities because nobody takes the first real step. I like to think big, then do the unglamorous part properly.

Explore my ideas

Featured work

Things I'm building.

  • FlashListing's public sale page for the Oak Park Moving Sale, listing items with prices and availability.

    FlashListing(external site)

    One shareable catalog for a moving, estate or garage sale, with photos, prices and live availability behind a single link.

    Status: Live

  • Two example Fidem findings on an applicant's pay stub, one passed and one recommended for review, each with its evidence.

    Fidem(external site)

    Checks a rental applicant's pay stubs, bank statements and ID for inconsistencies, and shows the evidence behind every finding.

    Status: Live

  • The CreatorBrio editor with a chat panel beside a carousel slide titled Three habits for a slower morning.

    CreatorBrio(external site)

    A local-first studio where a Claude design agent builds on-brand Instagram carousels that export as pixel-exact PNGs.

    Status: Open source

Status: In developmentHachira: AI governance built on evidence, not assumptions.

See all my work

Ideas and insights

What I'm thinking about.

Short insights from what I'm building and learning.

Explore all ideasRead my writing on LinkedIn

  • Insight

    AI in production is a reliability problem.

    Once AI is part of a real system, the hard questions are the familiar operational ones: how it fails, how you notice, and how you recover.

  • Insight

    Building is easier, so judgment matters more.

    AI makes software far easier to build, which makes knowing what's worth building the harder question, and the one I spend more of my time on.

  • Insight

    Engineering, not overengineering.

    Design the boundaries carefully, then split things apart only under real pressure. Complexity added for its own sake is still a cost.

Speaking

Ideas I'd love to bring to the stage.

The talks I'd most like to give, in whatever format suits the conversation.

  • Conference talks
  • Workshops
  • Panels
  • Podcasts
  • Leadership discussions
Let's have a conversation.

  1. When AI Makes Building Easy, Judgment Becomes Everything

  2. The Difference Between Engineering and Overengineering

  3. From Engineering Leader to Builder

  4. Relentless About the Goal. Flexible About the Path.

See all talks

About me

A few things about me.

Manish Kumar in a blue and white floral shirt, seated at a restaurant table with his arms folded, looking straight at the camera.

Most of what I care about comes back to one question: what could this become if someone did the work properly? Outside work, that means family, travel and being a beginner at something new.

More about me

What could we build next?

If you're building something, or thinking about it, I'd like to hear about it.

Get in touch