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- File an issue/make a PR!
See https://review.firstround.com/the-indispensable-document-for-the-modern-manager
This document is tested and true from my experience, but it is also partly aspirational. I may not always be on top of all the items I have mentioned, but these serve as guidelines for myself in doing my best work, and how to best work with me.
- Empathy: understanding people's needs and helping them.
- Enthusiasm: I believe that enthusiasm is the best compounding investment for change that's always in your own control.
- "Making shit happen" (words from previous customer testimonial)
- Clear north star: I maintain a strong image of what "good" looks like as an engineering organization, and frameworks for how to get there within a business.
- Understanding what communicating effectively with a broader set of stakeholders outside of engineering/product/design looks like
- Precisely defining what about empathy and enthusiasm make the people around me more effective, so that I can scale those to my larger team
- Ananas are pineapples.
- In a past life, I studied East Asian studies (mostly modern China) as part of my time at Brown. It's still largely one of my favorite topics to learn and chat about. Still planning my next backpacking trip there!
- Sometimes music - the fact that it... exists? Just blows my mind!
- Trying to learn how to swim so I can escape from Alcatraz!
- Pinegrove
- Hitsujibungaku
- Julien Baker
- AKFG
- Bon Iver
- Most urgent to least urgent: phone -> text -> slack -> project management tool -> mention on knowledge base/github/doc -> email
- I process things gradually rather than on-the-fly. I process things best alone, writing on paper, and/or taking a walk. If presented with new and unexpected information during a realtime conversation, I will prefer to let you know that I don't have a response at the moment, and ask for a timeline in which you expect a follow-up. If I'm needed to make a decision on the fly, I will default to decisions that are cheaply reversible.
- Accordingly, I find that the best way for me to collaborate tends to start asynchronously. The more clearly you can outline a problem or discussion in written text first, the more meaningfully I will be able to participate. If not provided, I will often specifically ask for specifics in text to prepare in advanced. If we need to meet synchronously, please try to attach a meeting agenda.
- I am upfront with my timeline expectations when I send communication. I will let you know if something is non-urgent (non-urgent), at your next availability (by default), or with a specific timeline (i.e. By end of week). I tend to communicate at all times of the day - whenever the relevant thought occurs.
- If I am unable to respond to something immediately, I will acknowledge that I've received your message, and let you know when I'll be able to get back to you.
- I find it most helpful to communicate decisions and thought processes with frameworks: what are the options, what are we evaluating them against, and how might we stack rank or prioritize. When I don't have a clear framework for something in mind, or am brainstorming fluidly, I will let you know upfront.
- When learning about a new domain, I tend to write down or ask questions as they come, but as I get a sense of the larger picture, I'll prune through these questions to what's still relevant.
- When I'm asked to deliver a specific business outcome or asked to solve a particular business need, as opposed to when I'm asked to implement a specific feature. I prefer to understand the context for problems deeply, so that I can have confidence in making decisions asynchronously and autonomously.
- When I'm able to have my ear to the ground not just to the work what I'm immediately responsible for, but the people and systems that surround my work. I find that I often operate in "Glue" roles well within the team's I've een a part of. Accordingly, I prefer to be invited to more communication channels and knowledge bases than I'd necessarily be able to participate in. I am more frustrated when I did not know that something existed, than when I am included in something where the context may be out-of-scope.
- When I'm able to fail fast, understanding that there are appropriate guardrails in place.
- Similarly, I tend to bias towards action/measuring in practice over finding the perfect solution in one fell-swoop, as long as I understand/place the guardrails (or otherwise, taking action in a way that is cheaply reversible).
- As an IC, I try to take work off your plate, end-to-end. That means starting by clearing setting and maintaining expectations, getting ahead of when things change, and following through on loose-ends.
- As someone managing execution across people, I will try to set those same expectations with you, and set up processes and systems to address any gaps I find that need to be filled to me to do my job.
- I default to trusting you, rather than not. I will assume that you're very good at your job!
- I am not good at your job. I will do my best to first provide you the context that you need, answer questions, or otherwise serve as a brainstorming partner.
- On the same note, I tend to ask a lot of questions when I'm operating in a new domain or working with someone new. These are meant purely to inform me out of interest and curiosity, and not questioning your expertise! I'll try to make the distinction clear if necessary, and if that's not clear, let me know.
- I trust you to let me know if something I ask from you or doing with you is not working. I do my best to read in between the lines, but sometimes I'll still miss things!
- Ask and you shall receive; don't ask and you may receive! With that said...
- I'm committed to letting you know when I've appreciated working on something with you and why loudly and proudly!
- I give direct constructive feedback in private within two different time frames: 1) as soon as it impacts what I/the team is directly responsible for 2) after project wrap-up.
- I give feedback with specific examples and suggestions for alternatives (if intending to be constructive)
- I try to share significant feedback both in writing and synchronously. In writing, so that we both can refer back to it, and synchronously in order to have an open opportunity for discussion.
- Sometimes I may give feedback in a way that rubs off poorly - it's likely because I'm overly excited about the discussion/conflict at hand, having difficulty separating my own circumstantial emotions from the situation at hand, and ultimately listening poorly. I'd appreciate if you call me out if you're comfortable, and if I notice my behavior myself later, I'll apologize.
- Please share direct feedback with me as soon as you are comfortable, or as soon as I am hurting your/your team's success.
- I respond best to feedback with specific examples and suggestions for improvement.
- In the case that that's not possible, I will do my best to understand and act on your feedback, but I ultimately will need your help in order to do my best to improve.
- I often don't respond feedback immediately. This might look like thanking you for your feedback, and then setting another time to check in (if it requires action). I need time to take a step back, remove myself emotionally, and respond appropriately. If feedback requires on the fly action, then I may struggle but will do my best, but you should take that into account if I follow up later on.
- Please share feedback on things that I am doing well as much as things that I can improve! This let's me be intentional about working with you in a particular way that may or may not have been intentionally the first time around.
- If I'm not receiving feedback from you after working with you in some significant capacity, I will ask for it! I'd like for this to be simple and at your convenience though, so I often default to sending around google forms.
I tend to find my most significant disagreements tend to stem from different understandings of the problem, rather than fundamental misalignments in how to approach solving a problem. I tend to approach conflict resolution accordingly:
Are we aligned on:
- The problem?
- The goals?
- The scope of the goals?
- The stack ranking of priorities in case we need to make tradeoffs?
I operate closely to my calendar. Please check it out! If you have questions, let me know if you'd like to schedule something in advanced via slack/chat/dm. I try to keep these up-to-date:
- My normal operating hours
- Focus blocks
- Meetings that I for sure need to/will attend vs. Optionally might
- Vacation/pto/sick/travel time