Knowledge shared by our community

Changing Brand Perception

This case study describes the challenge of increasing the conversion rate of a local e-commerce company's product description page. To address this, a strategy was created to build verticals for certain categories, and a team of three was assembled to research what buyers care about for each category. The research was presented to the management and approved for implementation. The key lessons learned were that complacency is not enough for large e-commerce companies, and it is important to keep evolving and changing according to customer needs.

What to Do When You Don't Have a Product Vision

In order to create a successful product vision, it is important to talk to stakeholders, research industry trends, and develop a compelling vision for the next 3 years. Additionally, it is important to understand the business values and capacity building of the company and to not compare the startup to companies with millions in funding. With this approach, it is possible to create a high-level roadmap and achieve success.

Choosing the Perfect Implementation of Agile

New managers and teams often struggle to establish a steady rhythm of work. Agile methodology is often used to help teams plan sprints and set objectives and key results (OKRs). Teams should also use a scorecard-based system to assign tasks fairly, and ensure that no single person is overburdened. Additionally, managers should prioritize the mental health of their team and solicit their advice to foster a sense of ownership.

Regrouping With the Help of the Data

Retrospectives are a great tool for managers to use to identify inefficiencies and improve team performance. Suggestions such as having each team member come up with one thing that is working well, one thing that is not working, and one suggestion can be used to discuss any broken processes. Regular checkpoints throughout the sprint can help prevent problems from getting too far ahead of the team. Data-driven approaches to mapping out the road ahead can be used to accurately predict how much work can be done in a sprint and to plan for future quarters. This removes the sense of hierarchy and allows managers to make informed decisions.

What Makes a Great One-on-One?

This article discusses the importance of one-on-one meetings with reports as a manager. It suggests that managers should establish a sense of trust with their reports by being friendly and engaging in conversations. It also suggests that managers should ask their reports about their projects and engagement level, and provide timely feedback for their growth. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of scheduling 1:1s without any meetings before or after, and rescheduling them if missed.

The Journey Into Management

This article discusses the decision of whether or not to become a manager. It outlines the transition between individual contributor and first-time manager, and provides advice on how to navigate this space. It also provides lessons learned from the author's experience, such as understanding the two different roles of a manager, balancing technical work with managerial duties, and being honest with oneself about the decision.

An Engineer’s Place in Product Creation

An engineering leader's role is not limited to building software, but also includes being involved in the roadmap and planning stages of a product. This helps to ensure that the product is informed and realistic. It is also important for engineering leaders to understand the basics of the market that the product manager is solving for, as this directly impacts the technical solution. By creating a partnership between product managers and engineers early on, both parties can make better and more informed decisions.

Take Opportunities to Think Like a Product Manager

This article is about a software engineer who wanted to incorporate performance into a higher-quality and more useful product. He found that many people did not understand the value of a quicker product experience, so he searched for a way to articulate the value of performance in a manner that non-engineers would appreciate. He found that by tying performance to customer service metrics, such as ticket deflection, he was able to show the value of performance to product managers. He learned that engineers should not presume that performance is accepted or important to other teams, and that they should be patient when communicating technical concepts to product leadership teams.

Motivating Your Team to Deliver Results

A company without a dedicated product team or leader needed a point of alignment to agree on who their customers were and what service or product they were providing. To achieve this, they created a product vision roadmap which detailed who they served, what problem they were solving, why it was a problem, and what their approach to solving the problem was. This document provided aspirational alignment and kept everyone in the company and customers on the same page. It also showed empathy for their customers' customers, and was a living document that moved with their customers' wants and needs and with the market. The lesson learned was that sales goals and tech will not motivate a whole team, and a product vision roadmap creates alignment around a shared vision of an outcome that everyone sees as beneficial.

Improving the Quality of a Platform with Empathy

In order to address critical issues with their platform, a company delved into the root cause of the problem, identified hotspots where bugs were common, formed short-term and long-term goals, created a roadmap, and improved their company culture around the change. They kept the initial principles from their platform's value prop when rearchitecting, shared their overarching problem with their team, and used empathy for their customers to improve the quality of their work.

Overcoming Hiring Constraints

This company faced the challenge of not finding potential candidates fit for positions available within their company when expanding. To overcome hiring constraints and meet their goals, they devoted their time to researching different target locations, conducted surveys, and created a cross-functional team. They also hired local recruiters and invested in marketing strategies to target potential talent. Lessons learned include allocating resources to a professional local recruiter, understanding the qualities the company is looking for in prospective employees, and investing in marketing strategies.

Creating an Engineering Vision

This article outlines the steps taken to create an engineering vision process. The steps include understanding the company vision, performing a SWOT analysis, researching trends, creating 1-pagers, formulating objectives and goals, and creating OKRs. Capacity planning and aligning the engineering vision with the organization's mission statement and values were important lessons learned. It is essential to draw a line between the overall vision and the one-year OKRs to ensure cohesiveness.

How to Hire, Train, and Align a Technology Team

In order to scale up his technology team, the author had to create a hiring process, rethink their marketing strategy, and develop a training process to close the skill gap. He also created a buddy system to help new members develop their skills and established feedback loops to provide actionable feedback. Lastly, he created a transparent career ladder and compensation bands to ensure that new members had clarity on long-term growth and career trajectories. The author learned that it is essential to train the talent acquisition team to be brand ambassadors, to experiment with the training process, and to take time to create a just and fair career ladder and compensation scale.

Evolving as a Young Tech Founder

The author faced multiple challenges when transitioning from founder to CTO, such as collaboration and an overload of tasks. To improve collaboration, the author practiced and prepared for meetings, created agendas, and thought of communication from another point of view. To gain a higher skill set, the author consumed tech media and practiced attempting to solve problems without writing code. To manage the extensive workflow, the author used their email as a to-do list and prioritized tasks. The author learned that collaboration and communication skills should be learned in college, paranoia is essential when being a founder, and preparation should look different depending on what is being prepared for.

How to Address Challenges in Geographically Distributed Team

As a lead architect at a multinational retailer, the author faced a challenge when the offshore team was unable to meet the sprint target due to a lack of detail in the solution designs provided by the onshore team. To address this, the author brought both teams together to discuss their challenges and find a middle-ground solution. The author also implemented cultural training to help bridge the gap between the two teams, and monitored the improvement of the new design template. The lessons learned were to bring people together to understand the root cause of issues, be mindful of cultural differences, and identify and monitor specific metrics.

How to Manage an Employee With Depression

A team leader took on a person with depression for a short-term assignment, and had to manage the person's mental wellbeing alongside the team's delivery timelines. The leader signposted the person to relevant support services, was empathetic, transparent with the team, and encouraged the person to join a mental health programme. The leader also created a calendar for the person to manage their work and time off, and had regular conversations with them. This experience taught the leader to do research, not make assumptions, and be vocal about their support for diversity.

Why Engineers Need to Understand Business Perspectives

In a previous organization, the author was responsible for creating a value proposition to take to the client and create work for the company. Through collaboration with internal leads and senior leaders, the author created a 4 million GBP sales pipeline and a million GBP sales opportunity for the product. The author learned that it is important to understand business problems, collaborate and build a network, and engage with stakeholders early on.

Internalizing Your Company Values

This article discusses the importance of having a strong, values-based culture in a company. It explains how having a documented culture and values can help bridge cultural differences, solve conflicts, and form hiring processes, rewards/promotions, and increase employee engagement. It also suggests ways to reinforce values, such as using discretionary bonuses and publicizing values.

Providing Support Through Excellent Documentation

This article discusses the importance of having a single source of truth for a company that works remotely. It explains how a living handbook that documents everything from the CEO's seat preferences to how to book PTO can help employees stay on the same page. It also emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to suggest improvements and update procedures, and to document why they are doing things a certain way. Finally, it highlights the success of the company in managing a globally-distributed team with over 130 members in 30 different countries.

Creative Recruitment Strategies to Hire Great Candidates

This article discusses the challenge of building a diverse team in a highly competitive landscape. It outlines the steps taken to actively source candidates, such as closing the public job posting and introducing monthly “Sip ‘n Source” events. It also discusses inclusive hiring practices, such as requiring candidates to speak to at least one non-male interviewer, offering adjustments to the interview process, and providing feedback surveys. The article concludes with the lessons learned, such as the importance of feedback, hiring based on trajectory, and the benefits of a diverse group.

Changing Brand Perception

This case study describes the challenge of increasing the conversion rate of a local e-commerce company's product description page. To address this, a strategy was created to build verticals for certain categories, and a team of three was assembled to research what buyers care about for each category. The research was presented to the management and approved for implementation. The key lessons learned were that complacency is not enough for large e-commerce companies, and it is important to keep evolving and changing according to customer needs.

What to Do When You Don't Have a Product Vision

In order to create a successful product vision, it is important to talk to stakeholders, research industry trends, and develop a compelling vision for the next 3 years. Additionally, it is important to understand the business values and capacity building of the company and to not compare the startup to companies with millions in funding. With this approach, it is possible to create a high-level roadmap and achieve success.

Choosing the Perfect Implementation of Agile

New managers and teams often struggle to establish a steady rhythm of work. Agile methodology is often used to help teams plan sprints and set objectives and key results (OKRs). Teams should also use a scorecard-based system to assign tasks fairly, and ensure that no single person is overburdened. Additionally, managers should prioritize the mental health of their team and solicit their advice to foster a sense of ownership.

Regrouping With the Help of the Data

Retrospectives are a great tool for managers to use to identify inefficiencies and improve team performance. Suggestions such as having each team member come up with one thing that is working well, one thing that is not working, and one suggestion can be used to discuss any broken processes. Regular checkpoints throughout the sprint can help prevent problems from getting too far ahead of the team. Data-driven approaches to mapping out the road ahead can be used to accurately predict how much work can be done in a sprint and to plan for future quarters. This removes the sense of hierarchy and allows managers to make informed decisions.

What Makes a Great One-on-One?

This article discusses the importance of one-on-one meetings with reports as a manager. It suggests that managers should establish a sense of trust with their reports by being friendly and engaging in conversations. It also suggests that managers should ask their reports about their projects and engagement level, and provide timely feedback for their growth. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of scheduling 1:1s without any meetings before or after, and rescheduling them if missed.

The Journey Into Management

This article discusses the decision of whether or not to become a manager. It outlines the transition between individual contributor and first-time manager, and provides advice on how to navigate this space. It also provides lessons learned from the author's experience, such as understanding the two different roles of a manager, balancing technical work with managerial duties, and being honest with oneself about the decision.

An Engineer’s Place in Product Creation

An engineering leader's role is not limited to building software, but also includes being involved in the roadmap and planning stages of a product. This helps to ensure that the product is informed and realistic. It is also important for engineering leaders to understand the basics of the market that the product manager is solving for, as this directly impacts the technical solution. By creating a partnership between product managers and engineers early on, both parties can make better and more informed decisions.

Take Opportunities to Think Like a Product Manager

This article is about a software engineer who wanted to incorporate performance into a higher-quality and more useful product. He found that many people did not understand the value of a quicker product experience, so he searched for a way to articulate the value of performance in a manner that non-engineers would appreciate. He found that by tying performance to customer service metrics, such as ticket deflection, he was able to show the value of performance to product managers. He learned that engineers should not presume that performance is accepted or important to other teams, and that they should be patient when communicating technical concepts to product leadership teams.

Motivating Your Team to Deliver Results

A company without a dedicated product team or leader needed a point of alignment to agree on who their customers were and what service or product they were providing. To achieve this, they created a product vision roadmap which detailed who they served, what problem they were solving, why it was a problem, and what their approach to solving the problem was. This document provided aspirational alignment and kept everyone in the company and customers on the same page. It also showed empathy for their customers' customers, and was a living document that moved with their customers' wants and needs and with the market. The lesson learned was that sales goals and tech will not motivate a whole team, and a product vision roadmap creates alignment around a shared vision of an outcome that everyone sees as beneficial.

Improving the Quality of a Platform with Empathy

In order to address critical issues with their platform, a company delved into the root cause of the problem, identified hotspots where bugs were common, formed short-term and long-term goals, created a roadmap, and improved their company culture around the change. They kept the initial principles from their platform's value prop when rearchitecting, shared their overarching problem with their team, and used empathy for their customers to improve the quality of their work.

Overcoming Hiring Constraints

This company faced the challenge of not finding potential candidates fit for positions available within their company when expanding. To overcome hiring constraints and meet their goals, they devoted their time to researching different target locations, conducted surveys, and created a cross-functional team. They also hired local recruiters and invested in marketing strategies to target potential talent. Lessons learned include allocating resources to a professional local recruiter, understanding the qualities the company is looking for in prospective employees, and investing in marketing strategies.

Creating an Engineering Vision

This article outlines the steps taken to create an engineering vision process. The steps include understanding the company vision, performing a SWOT analysis, researching trends, creating 1-pagers, formulating objectives and goals, and creating OKRs. Capacity planning and aligning the engineering vision with the organization's mission statement and values were important lessons learned. It is essential to draw a line between the overall vision and the one-year OKRs to ensure cohesiveness.

How to Hire, Train, and Align a Technology Team

In order to scale up his technology team, the author had to create a hiring process, rethink their marketing strategy, and develop a training process to close the skill gap. He also created a buddy system to help new members develop their skills and established feedback loops to provide actionable feedback. Lastly, he created a transparent career ladder and compensation bands to ensure that new members had clarity on long-term growth and career trajectories. The author learned that it is essential to train the talent acquisition team to be brand ambassadors, to experiment with the training process, and to take time to create a just and fair career ladder and compensation scale.

Evolving as a Young Tech Founder

The author faced multiple challenges when transitioning from founder to CTO, such as collaboration and an overload of tasks. To improve collaboration, the author practiced and prepared for meetings, created agendas, and thought of communication from another point of view. To gain a higher skill set, the author consumed tech media and practiced attempting to solve problems without writing code. To manage the extensive workflow, the author used their email as a to-do list and prioritized tasks. The author learned that collaboration and communication skills should be learned in college, paranoia is essential when being a founder, and preparation should look different depending on what is being prepared for.

How to Address Challenges in Geographically Distributed Team

As a lead architect at a multinational retailer, the author faced a challenge when the offshore team was unable to meet the sprint target due to a lack of detail in the solution designs provided by the onshore team. To address this, the author brought both teams together to discuss their challenges and find a middle-ground solution. The author also implemented cultural training to help bridge the gap between the two teams, and monitored the improvement of the new design template. The lessons learned were to bring people together to understand the root cause of issues, be mindful of cultural differences, and identify and monitor specific metrics.

How to Manage an Employee With Depression

A team leader took on a person with depression for a short-term assignment, and had to manage the person's mental wellbeing alongside the team's delivery timelines. The leader signposted the person to relevant support services, was empathetic, transparent with the team, and encouraged the person to join a mental health programme. The leader also created a calendar for the person to manage their work and time off, and had regular conversations with them. This experience taught the leader to do research, not make assumptions, and be vocal about their support for diversity.

Why Engineers Need to Understand Business Perspectives

In a previous organization, the author was responsible for creating a value proposition to take to the client and create work for the company. Through collaboration with internal leads and senior leaders, the author created a 4 million GBP sales pipeline and a million GBP sales opportunity for the product. The author learned that it is important to understand business problems, collaborate and build a network, and engage with stakeholders early on.

Internalizing Your Company Values

This article discusses the importance of having a strong, values-based culture in a company. It explains how having a documented culture and values can help bridge cultural differences, solve conflicts, and form hiring processes, rewards/promotions, and increase employee engagement. It also suggests ways to reinforce values, such as using discretionary bonuses and publicizing values.

Providing Support Through Excellent Documentation

This article discusses the importance of having a single source of truth for a company that works remotely. It explains how a living handbook that documents everything from the CEO's seat preferences to how to book PTO can help employees stay on the same page. It also emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to suggest improvements and update procedures, and to document why they are doing things a certain way. Finally, it highlights the success of the company in managing a globally-distributed team with over 130 members in 30 different countries.

Creative Recruitment Strategies to Hire Great Candidates

This article discusses the challenge of building a diverse team in a highly competitive landscape. It outlines the steps taken to actively source candidates, such as closing the public job posting and introducing monthly “Sip ‘n Source” events. It also discusses inclusive hiring practices, such as requiring candidates to speak to at least one non-male interviewer, offering adjustments to the interview process, and providing feedback surveys. The article concludes with the lessons learned, such as the importance of feedback, hiring based on trajectory, and the benefits of a diverse group.

Changing Brand Perception

This case study describes the challenge of increasing the conversion rate of a local e-commerce company's product description page. To address this, a strategy was created to build verticals for certain categories, and a team of three was assembled to research what buyers care about for each category. The research was presented to the management and approved for implementation. The key lessons learned were that complacency is not enough for large e-commerce companies, and it is important to keep evolving and changing according to customer needs.

What to Do When You Don't Have a Product Vision

In order to create a successful product vision, it is important to talk to stakeholders, research industry trends, and develop a compelling vision for the next 3 years. Additionally, it is important to understand the business values and capacity building of the company and to not compare the startup to companies with millions in funding. With this approach, it is possible to create a high-level roadmap and achieve success.

Choosing the Perfect Implementation of Agile

New managers and teams often struggle to establish a steady rhythm of work. Agile methodology is often used to help teams plan sprints and set objectives and key results (OKRs). Teams should also use a scorecard-based system to assign tasks fairly, and ensure that no single person is overburdened. Additionally, managers should prioritize the mental health of their team and solicit their advice to foster a sense of ownership.

Regrouping With the Help of the Data

Retrospectives are a great tool for managers to use to identify inefficiencies and improve team performance. Suggestions such as having each team member come up with one thing that is working well, one thing that is not working, and one suggestion can be used to discuss any broken processes. Regular checkpoints throughout the sprint can help prevent problems from getting too far ahead of the team. Data-driven approaches to mapping out the road ahead can be used to accurately predict how much work can be done in a sprint and to plan for future quarters. This removes the sense of hierarchy and allows managers to make informed decisions.

What Makes a Great One-on-One?

This article discusses the importance of one-on-one meetings with reports as a manager. It suggests that managers should establish a sense of trust with their reports by being friendly and engaging in conversations. It also suggests that managers should ask their reports about their projects and engagement level, and provide timely feedback for their growth. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of scheduling 1:1s without any meetings before or after, and rescheduling them if missed.

The Journey Into Management

This article discusses the decision of whether or not to become a manager. It outlines the transition between individual contributor and first-time manager, and provides advice on how to navigate this space. It also provides lessons learned from the author's experience, such as understanding the two different roles of a manager, balancing technical work with managerial duties, and being honest with oneself about the decision.

An Engineer’s Place in Product Creation

An engineering leader's role is not limited to building software, but also includes being involved in the roadmap and planning stages of a product. This helps to ensure that the product is informed and realistic. It is also important for engineering leaders to understand the basics of the market that the product manager is solving for, as this directly impacts the technical solution. By creating a partnership between product managers and engineers early on, both parties can make better and more informed decisions.

Take Opportunities to Think Like a Product Manager

This article is about a software engineer who wanted to incorporate performance into a higher-quality and more useful product. He found that many people did not understand the value of a quicker product experience, so he searched for a way to articulate the value of performance in a manner that non-engineers would appreciate. He found that by tying performance to customer service metrics, such as ticket deflection, he was able to show the value of performance to product managers. He learned that engineers should not presume that performance is accepted or important to other teams, and that they should be patient when communicating technical concepts to product leadership teams.

Motivating Your Team to Deliver Results

A company without a dedicated product team or leader needed a point of alignment to agree on who their customers were and what service or product they were providing. To achieve this, they created a product vision roadmap which detailed who they served, what problem they were solving, why it was a problem, and what their approach to solving the problem was. This document provided aspirational alignment and kept everyone in the company and customers on the same page. It also showed empathy for their customers' customers, and was a living document that moved with their customers' wants and needs and with the market. The lesson learned was that sales goals and tech will not motivate a whole team, and a product vision roadmap creates alignment around a shared vision of an outcome that everyone sees as beneficial.

Improving the Quality of a Platform with Empathy

In order to address critical issues with their platform, a company delved into the root cause of the problem, identified hotspots where bugs were common, formed short-term and long-term goals, created a roadmap, and improved their company culture around the change. They kept the initial principles from their platform's value prop when rearchitecting, shared their overarching problem with their team, and used empathy for their customers to improve the quality of their work.

Overcoming Hiring Constraints

This company faced the challenge of not finding potential candidates fit for positions available within their company when expanding. To overcome hiring constraints and meet their goals, they devoted their time to researching different target locations, conducted surveys, and created a cross-functional team. They also hired local recruiters and invested in marketing strategies to target potential talent. Lessons learned include allocating resources to a professional local recruiter, understanding the qualities the company is looking for in prospective employees, and investing in marketing strategies.

Creating an Engineering Vision

This article outlines the steps taken to create an engineering vision process. The steps include understanding the company vision, performing a SWOT analysis, researching trends, creating 1-pagers, formulating objectives and goals, and creating OKRs. Capacity planning and aligning the engineering vision with the organization's mission statement and values were important lessons learned. It is essential to draw a line between the overall vision and the one-year OKRs to ensure cohesiveness.

How to Hire, Train, and Align a Technology Team

In order to scale up his technology team, the author had to create a hiring process, rethink their marketing strategy, and develop a training process to close the skill gap. He also created a buddy system to help new members develop their skills and established feedback loops to provide actionable feedback. Lastly, he created a transparent career ladder and compensation bands to ensure that new members had clarity on long-term growth and career trajectories. The author learned that it is essential to train the talent acquisition team to be brand ambassadors, to experiment with the training process, and to take time to create a just and fair career ladder and compensation scale.

Evolving as a Young Tech Founder

The author faced multiple challenges when transitioning from founder to CTO, such as collaboration and an overload of tasks. To improve collaboration, the author practiced and prepared for meetings, created agendas, and thought of communication from another point of view. To gain a higher skill set, the author consumed tech media and practiced attempting to solve problems without writing code. To manage the extensive workflow, the author used their email as a to-do list and prioritized tasks. The author learned that collaboration and communication skills should be learned in college, paranoia is essential when being a founder, and preparation should look different depending on what is being prepared for.

How to Address Challenges in Geographically Distributed Team

As a lead architect at a multinational retailer, the author faced a challenge when the offshore team was unable to meet the sprint target due to a lack of detail in the solution designs provided by the onshore team. To address this, the author brought both teams together to discuss their challenges and find a middle-ground solution. The author also implemented cultural training to help bridge the gap between the two teams, and monitored the improvement of the new design template. The lessons learned were to bring people together to understand the root cause of issues, be mindful of cultural differences, and identify and monitor specific metrics.

How to Manage an Employee With Depression

A team leader took on a person with depression for a short-term assignment, and had to manage the person's mental wellbeing alongside the team's delivery timelines. The leader signposted the person to relevant support services, was empathetic, transparent with the team, and encouraged the person to join a mental health programme. The leader also created a calendar for the person to manage their work and time off, and had regular conversations with them. This experience taught the leader to do research, not make assumptions, and be vocal about their support for diversity.

Why Engineers Need to Understand Business Perspectives

In a previous organization, the author was responsible for creating a value proposition to take to the client and create work for the company. Through collaboration with internal leads and senior leaders, the author created a 4 million GBP sales pipeline and a million GBP sales opportunity for the product. The author learned that it is important to understand business problems, collaborate and build a network, and engage with stakeholders early on.

Internalizing Your Company Values

This article discusses the importance of having a strong, values-based culture in a company. It explains how having a documented culture and values can help bridge cultural differences, solve conflicts, and form hiring processes, rewards/promotions, and increase employee engagement. It also suggests ways to reinforce values, such as using discretionary bonuses and publicizing values.

Providing Support Through Excellent Documentation

This article discusses the importance of having a single source of truth for a company that works remotely. It explains how a living handbook that documents everything from the CEO's seat preferences to how to book PTO can help employees stay on the same page. It also emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to suggest improvements and update procedures, and to document why they are doing things a certain way. Finally, it highlights the success of the company in managing a globally-distributed team with over 130 members in 30 different countries.

Creative Recruitment Strategies to Hire Great Candidates

This article discusses the challenge of building a diverse team in a highly competitive landscape. It outlines the steps taken to actively source candidates, such as closing the public job posting and introducing monthly “Sip ‘n Source” events. It also discusses inclusive hiring practices, such as requiring candidates to speak to at least one non-male interviewer, offering adjustments to the interview process, and providing feedback surveys. The article concludes with the lessons learned, such as the importance of feedback, hiring based on trajectory, and the benefits of a diverse group.

Changing Brand Perception

This case study describes the challenge of increasing the conversion rate of a local e-commerce company's product description page. To address this, a strategy was created to build verticals for certain categories, and a team of three was assembled to research what buyers care about for each category. The research was presented to the management and approved for implementation. The key lessons learned were that complacency is not enough for large e-commerce companies, and it is important to keep evolving and changing according to customer needs.

What to Do When You Don't Have a Product Vision

In order to create a successful product vision, it is important to talk to stakeholders, research industry trends, and develop a compelling vision for the next 3 years. Additionally, it is important to understand the business values and capacity building of the company and to not compare the startup to companies with millions in funding. With this approach, it is possible to create a high-level roadmap and achieve success.

Choosing the Perfect Implementation of Agile

New managers and teams often struggle to establish a steady rhythm of work. Agile methodology is often used to help teams plan sprints and set objectives and key results (OKRs). Teams should also use a scorecard-based system to assign tasks fairly, and ensure that no single person is overburdened. Additionally, managers should prioritize the mental health of their team and solicit their advice to foster a sense of ownership.

Regrouping With the Help of the Data

Retrospectives are a great tool for managers to use to identify inefficiencies and improve team performance. Suggestions such as having each team member come up with one thing that is working well, one thing that is not working, and one suggestion can be used to discuss any broken processes. Regular checkpoints throughout the sprint can help prevent problems from getting too far ahead of the team. Data-driven approaches to mapping out the road ahead can be used to accurately predict how much work can be done in a sprint and to plan for future quarters. This removes the sense of hierarchy and allows managers to make informed decisions.

What Makes a Great One-on-One?

This article discusses the importance of one-on-one meetings with reports as a manager. It suggests that managers should establish a sense of trust with their reports by being friendly and engaging in conversations. It also suggests that managers should ask their reports about their projects and engagement level, and provide timely feedback for their growth. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of scheduling 1:1s without any meetings before or after, and rescheduling them if missed.

The Journey Into Management

This article discusses the decision of whether or not to become a manager. It outlines the transition between individual contributor and first-time manager, and provides advice on how to navigate this space. It also provides lessons learned from the author's experience, such as understanding the two different roles of a manager, balancing technical work with managerial duties, and being honest with oneself about the decision.

An Engineer’s Place in Product Creation

An engineering leader's role is not limited to building software, but also includes being involved in the roadmap and planning stages of a product. This helps to ensure that the product is informed and realistic. It is also important for engineering leaders to understand the basics of the market that the product manager is solving for, as this directly impacts the technical solution. By creating a partnership between product managers and engineers early on, both parties can make better and more informed decisions.

Take Opportunities to Think Like a Product Manager

This article is about a software engineer who wanted to incorporate performance into a higher-quality and more useful product. He found that many people did not understand the value of a quicker product experience, so he searched for a way to articulate the value of performance in a manner that non-engineers would appreciate. He found that by tying performance to customer service metrics, such as ticket deflection, he was able to show the value of performance to product managers. He learned that engineers should not presume that performance is accepted or important to other teams, and that they should be patient when communicating technical concepts to product leadership teams.

Motivating Your Team to Deliver Results

A company without a dedicated product team or leader needed a point of alignment to agree on who their customers were and what service or product they were providing. To achieve this, they created a product vision roadmap which detailed who they served, what problem they were solving, why it was a problem, and what their approach to solving the problem was. This document provided aspirational alignment and kept everyone in the company and customers on the same page. It also showed empathy for their customers' customers, and was a living document that moved with their customers' wants and needs and with the market. The lesson learned was that sales goals and tech will not motivate a whole team, and a product vision roadmap creates alignment around a shared vision of an outcome that everyone sees as beneficial.

Improving the Quality of a Platform with Empathy

In order to address critical issues with their platform, a company delved into the root cause of the problem, identified hotspots where bugs were common, formed short-term and long-term goals, created a roadmap, and improved their company culture around the change. They kept the initial principles from their platform's value prop when rearchitecting, shared their overarching problem with their team, and used empathy for their customers to improve the quality of their work.

Overcoming Hiring Constraints

This company faced the challenge of not finding potential candidates fit for positions available within their company when expanding. To overcome hiring constraints and meet their goals, they devoted their time to researching different target locations, conducted surveys, and created a cross-functional team. They also hired local recruiters and invested in marketing strategies to target potential talent. Lessons learned include allocating resources to a professional local recruiter, understanding the qualities the company is looking for in prospective employees, and investing in marketing strategies.

Creating an Engineering Vision

This article outlines the steps taken to create an engineering vision process. The steps include understanding the company vision, performing a SWOT analysis, researching trends, creating 1-pagers, formulating objectives and goals, and creating OKRs. Capacity planning and aligning the engineering vision with the organization's mission statement and values were important lessons learned. It is essential to draw a line between the overall vision and the one-year OKRs to ensure cohesiveness.

How to Hire, Train, and Align a Technology Team

In order to scale up his technology team, the author had to create a hiring process, rethink their marketing strategy, and develop a training process to close the skill gap. He also created a buddy system to help new members develop their skills and established feedback loops to provide actionable feedback. Lastly, he created a transparent career ladder and compensation bands to ensure that new members had clarity on long-term growth and career trajectories. The author learned that it is essential to train the talent acquisition team to be brand ambassadors, to experiment with the training process, and to take time to create a just and fair career ladder and compensation scale.

Evolving as a Young Tech Founder

The author faced multiple challenges when transitioning from founder to CTO, such as collaboration and an overload of tasks. To improve collaboration, the author practiced and prepared for meetings, created agendas, and thought of communication from another point of view. To gain a higher skill set, the author consumed tech media and practiced attempting to solve problems without writing code. To manage the extensive workflow, the author used their email as a to-do list and prioritized tasks. The author learned that collaboration and communication skills should be learned in college, paranoia is essential when being a founder, and preparation should look different depending on what is being prepared for.

How to Address Challenges in Geographically Distributed Team

As a lead architect at a multinational retailer, the author faced a challenge when the offshore team was unable to meet the sprint target due to a lack of detail in the solution designs provided by the onshore team. To address this, the author brought both teams together to discuss their challenges and find a middle-ground solution. The author also implemented cultural training to help bridge the gap between the two teams, and monitored the improvement of the new design template. The lessons learned were to bring people together to understand the root cause of issues, be mindful of cultural differences, and identify and monitor specific metrics.

How to Manage an Employee With Depression

A team leader took on a person with depression for a short-term assignment, and had to manage the person's mental wellbeing alongside the team's delivery timelines. The leader signposted the person to relevant support services, was empathetic, transparent with the team, and encouraged the person to join a mental health programme. The leader also created a calendar for the person to manage their work and time off, and had regular conversations with them. This experience taught the leader to do research, not make assumptions, and be vocal about their support for diversity.

Why Engineers Need to Understand Business Perspectives

In a previous organization, the author was responsible for creating a value proposition to take to the client and create work for the company. Through collaboration with internal leads and senior leaders, the author created a 4 million GBP sales pipeline and a million GBP sales opportunity for the product. The author learned that it is important to understand business problems, collaborate and build a network, and engage with stakeholders early on.

Internalizing Your Company Values

This article discusses the importance of having a strong, values-based culture in a company. It explains how having a documented culture and values can help bridge cultural differences, solve conflicts, and form hiring processes, rewards/promotions, and increase employee engagement. It also suggests ways to reinforce values, such as using discretionary bonuses and publicizing values.

Providing Support Through Excellent Documentation

This article discusses the importance of having a single source of truth for a company that works remotely. It explains how a living handbook that documents everything from the CEO's seat preferences to how to book PTO can help employees stay on the same page. It also emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to suggest improvements and update procedures, and to document why they are doing things a certain way. Finally, it highlights the success of the company in managing a globally-distributed team with over 130 members in 30 different countries.

Creative Recruitment Strategies to Hire Great Candidates

This article discusses the challenge of building a diverse team in a highly competitive landscape. It outlines the steps taken to actively source candidates, such as closing the public job posting and introducing monthly “Sip ‘n Source” events. It also discusses inclusive hiring practices, such as requiring candidates to speak to at least one non-male interviewer, offering adjustments to the interview process, and providing feedback surveys. The article concludes with the lessons learned, such as the importance of feedback, hiring based on trajectory, and the benefits of a diverse group.

Changing Brand Perception

This case study describes the challenge of increasing the conversion rate of a local e-commerce company's product description page. To address this, a strategy was created to build verticals for certain categories, and a team of three was assembled to research what buyers care about for each category. The research was presented to the management and approved for implementation. The key lessons learned were that complacency is not enough for large e-commerce companies, and it is important to keep evolving and changing according to customer needs.

What to Do When You Don't Have a Product Vision

In order to create a successful product vision, it is important to talk to stakeholders, research industry trends, and develop a compelling vision for the next 3 years. Additionally, it is important to understand the business values and capacity building of the company and to not compare the startup to companies with millions in funding. With this approach, it is possible to create a high-level roadmap and achieve success.

Choosing the Perfect Implementation of Agile

New managers and teams often struggle to establish a steady rhythm of work. Agile methodology is often used to help teams plan sprints and set objectives and key results (OKRs). Teams should also use a scorecard-based system to assign tasks fairly, and ensure that no single person is overburdened. Additionally, managers should prioritize the mental health of their team and solicit their advice to foster a sense of ownership.

Regrouping With the Help of the Data

Retrospectives are a great tool for managers to use to identify inefficiencies and improve team performance. Suggestions such as having each team member come up with one thing that is working well, one thing that is not working, and one suggestion can be used to discuss any broken processes. Regular checkpoints throughout the sprint can help prevent problems from getting too far ahead of the team. Data-driven approaches to mapping out the road ahead can be used to accurately predict how much work can be done in a sprint and to plan for future quarters. This removes the sense of hierarchy and allows managers to make informed decisions.

What Makes a Great One-on-One?

This article discusses the importance of one-on-one meetings with reports as a manager. It suggests that managers should establish a sense of trust with their reports by being friendly and engaging in conversations. It also suggests that managers should ask their reports about their projects and engagement level, and provide timely feedback for their growth. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of scheduling 1:1s without any meetings before or after, and rescheduling them if missed.

The Journey Into Management

This article discusses the decision of whether or not to become a manager. It outlines the transition between individual contributor and first-time manager, and provides advice on how to navigate this space. It also provides lessons learned from the author's experience, such as understanding the two different roles of a manager, balancing technical work with managerial duties, and being honest with oneself about the decision.

An Engineer’s Place in Product Creation

An engineering leader's role is not limited to building software, but also includes being involved in the roadmap and planning stages of a product. This helps to ensure that the product is informed and realistic. It is also important for engineering leaders to understand the basics of the market that the product manager is solving for, as this directly impacts the technical solution. By creating a partnership between product managers and engineers early on, both parties can make better and more informed decisions.

Take Opportunities to Think Like a Product Manager

This article is about a software engineer who wanted to incorporate performance into a higher-quality and more useful product. He found that many people did not understand the value of a quicker product experience, so he searched for a way to articulate the value of performance in a manner that non-engineers would appreciate. He found that by tying performance to customer service metrics, such as ticket deflection, he was able to show the value of performance to product managers. He learned that engineers should not presume that performance is accepted or important to other teams, and that they should be patient when communicating technical concepts to product leadership teams.

Motivating Your Team to Deliver Results

A company without a dedicated product team or leader needed a point of alignment to agree on who their customers were and what service or product they were providing. To achieve this, they created a product vision roadmap which detailed who they served, what problem they were solving, why it was a problem, and what their approach to solving the problem was. This document provided aspirational alignment and kept everyone in the company and customers on the same page. It also showed empathy for their customers' customers, and was a living document that moved with their customers' wants and needs and with the market. The lesson learned was that sales goals and tech will not motivate a whole team, and a product vision roadmap creates alignment around a shared vision of an outcome that everyone sees as beneficial.

Improving the Quality of a Platform with Empathy

In order to address critical issues with their platform, a company delved into the root cause of the problem, identified hotspots where bugs were common, formed short-term and long-term goals, created a roadmap, and improved their company culture around the change. They kept the initial principles from their platform's value prop when rearchitecting, shared their overarching problem with their team, and used empathy for their customers to improve the quality of their work.

Overcoming Hiring Constraints

This company faced the challenge of not finding potential candidates fit for positions available within their company when expanding. To overcome hiring constraints and meet their goals, they devoted their time to researching different target locations, conducted surveys, and created a cross-functional team. They also hired local recruiters and invested in marketing strategies to target potential talent. Lessons learned include allocating resources to a professional local recruiter, understanding the qualities the company is looking for in prospective employees, and investing in marketing strategies.

Creating an Engineering Vision

This article outlines the steps taken to create an engineering vision process. The steps include understanding the company vision, performing a SWOT analysis, researching trends, creating 1-pagers, formulating objectives and goals, and creating OKRs. Capacity planning and aligning the engineering vision with the organization's mission statement and values were important lessons learned. It is essential to draw a line between the overall vision and the one-year OKRs to ensure cohesiveness.

How to Hire, Train, and Align a Technology Team

In order to scale up his technology team, the author had to create a hiring process, rethink their marketing strategy, and develop a training process to close the skill gap. He also created a buddy system to help new members develop their skills and established feedback loops to provide actionable feedback. Lastly, he created a transparent career ladder and compensation bands to ensure that new members had clarity on long-term growth and career trajectories. The author learned that it is essential to train the talent acquisition team to be brand ambassadors, to experiment with the training process, and to take time to create a just and fair career ladder and compensation scale.

Evolving as a Young Tech Founder

The author faced multiple challenges when transitioning from founder to CTO, such as collaboration and an overload of tasks. To improve collaboration, the author practiced and prepared for meetings, created agendas, and thought of communication from another point of view. To gain a higher skill set, the author consumed tech media and practiced attempting to solve problems without writing code. To manage the extensive workflow, the author used their email as a to-do list and prioritized tasks. The author learned that collaboration and communication skills should be learned in college, paranoia is essential when being a founder, and preparation should look different depending on what is being prepared for.

How to Address Challenges in Geographically Distributed Team

As a lead architect at a multinational retailer, the author faced a challenge when the offshore team was unable to meet the sprint target due to a lack of detail in the solution designs provided by the onshore team. To address this, the author brought both teams together to discuss their challenges and find a middle-ground solution. The author also implemented cultural training to help bridge the gap between the two teams, and monitored the improvement of the new design template. The lessons learned were to bring people together to understand the root cause of issues, be mindful of cultural differences, and identify and monitor specific metrics.

How to Manage an Employee With Depression

A team leader took on a person with depression for a short-term assignment, and had to manage the person's mental wellbeing alongside the team's delivery timelines. The leader signposted the person to relevant support services, was empathetic, transparent with the team, and encouraged the person to join a mental health programme. The leader also created a calendar for the person to manage their work and time off, and had regular conversations with them. This experience taught the leader to do research, not make assumptions, and be vocal about their support for diversity.

Why Engineers Need to Understand Business Perspectives

In a previous organization, the author was responsible for creating a value proposition to take to the client and create work for the company. Through collaboration with internal leads and senior leaders, the author created a 4 million GBP sales pipeline and a million GBP sales opportunity for the product. The author learned that it is important to understand business problems, collaborate and build a network, and engage with stakeholders early on.

Internalizing Your Company Values

This article discusses the importance of having a strong, values-based culture in a company. It explains how having a documented culture and values can help bridge cultural differences, solve conflicts, and form hiring processes, rewards/promotions, and increase employee engagement. It also suggests ways to reinforce values, such as using discretionary bonuses and publicizing values.

Providing Support Through Excellent Documentation

This article discusses the importance of having a single source of truth for a company that works remotely. It explains how a living handbook that documents everything from the CEO's seat preferences to how to book PTO can help employees stay on the same page. It also emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to suggest improvements and update procedures, and to document why they are doing things a certain way. Finally, it highlights the success of the company in managing a globally-distributed team with over 130 members in 30 different countries.

Creative Recruitment Strategies to Hire Great Candidates

This article discusses the challenge of building a diverse team in a highly competitive landscape. It outlines the steps taken to actively source candidates, such as closing the public job posting and introducing monthly “Sip ‘n Source” events. It also discusses inclusive hiring practices, such as requiring candidates to speak to at least one non-male interviewer, offering adjustments to the interview process, and providing feedback surveys. The article concludes with the lessons learned, such as the importance of feedback, hiring based on trajectory, and the benefits of a diverse group.

Changing Brand Perception

This case study describes the challenge of increasing the conversion rate of a local e-commerce company's product description page. To address this, a strategy was created to build verticals for certain categories, and a team of three was assembled to research what buyers care about for each category. The research was presented to the management and approved for implementation. The key lessons learned were that complacency is not enough for large e-commerce companies, and it is important to keep evolving and changing according to customer needs.

What to Do When You Don't Have a Product Vision

In order to create a successful product vision, it is important to talk to stakeholders, research industry trends, and develop a compelling vision for the next 3 years. Additionally, it is important to understand the business values and capacity building of the company and to not compare the startup to companies with millions in funding. With this approach, it is possible to create a high-level roadmap and achieve success.

Choosing the Perfect Implementation of Agile

New managers and teams often struggle to establish a steady rhythm of work. Agile methodology is often used to help teams plan sprints and set objectives and key results (OKRs). Teams should also use a scorecard-based system to assign tasks fairly, and ensure that no single person is overburdened. Additionally, managers should prioritize the mental health of their team and solicit their advice to foster a sense of ownership.

Regrouping With the Help of the Data

Retrospectives are a great tool for managers to use to identify inefficiencies and improve team performance. Suggestions such as having each team member come up with one thing that is working well, one thing that is not working, and one suggestion can be used to discuss any broken processes. Regular checkpoints throughout the sprint can help prevent problems from getting too far ahead of the team. Data-driven approaches to mapping out the road ahead can be used to accurately predict how much work can be done in a sprint and to plan for future quarters. This removes the sense of hierarchy and allows managers to make informed decisions.

What Makes a Great One-on-One?

This article discusses the importance of one-on-one meetings with reports as a manager. It suggests that managers should establish a sense of trust with their reports by being friendly and engaging in conversations. It also suggests that managers should ask their reports about their projects and engagement level, and provide timely feedback for their growth. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of scheduling 1:1s without any meetings before or after, and rescheduling them if missed.

The Journey Into Management

This article discusses the decision of whether or not to become a manager. It outlines the transition between individual contributor and first-time manager, and provides advice on how to navigate this space. It also provides lessons learned from the author's experience, such as understanding the two different roles of a manager, balancing technical work with managerial duties, and being honest with oneself about the decision.

An Engineer’s Place in Product Creation

An engineering leader's role is not limited to building software, but also includes being involved in the roadmap and planning stages of a product. This helps to ensure that the product is informed and realistic. It is also important for engineering leaders to understand the basics of the market that the product manager is solving for, as this directly impacts the technical solution. By creating a partnership between product managers and engineers early on, both parties can make better and more informed decisions.

Take Opportunities to Think Like a Product Manager

This article is about a software engineer who wanted to incorporate performance into a higher-quality and more useful product. He found that many people did not understand the value of a quicker product experience, so he searched for a way to articulate the value of performance in a manner that non-engineers would appreciate. He found that by tying performance to customer service metrics, such as ticket deflection, he was able to show the value of performance to product managers. He learned that engineers should not presume that performance is accepted or important to other teams, and that they should be patient when communicating technical concepts to product leadership teams.

Motivating Your Team to Deliver Results

A company without a dedicated product team or leader needed a point of alignment to agree on who their customers were and what service or product they were providing. To achieve this, they created a product vision roadmap which detailed who they served, what problem they were solving, why it was a problem, and what their approach to solving the problem was. This document provided aspirational alignment and kept everyone in the company and customers on the same page. It also showed empathy for their customers' customers, and was a living document that moved with their customers' wants and needs and with the market. The lesson learned was that sales goals and tech will not motivate a whole team, and a product vision roadmap creates alignment around a shared vision of an outcome that everyone sees as beneficial.

Improving the Quality of a Platform with Empathy

In order to address critical issues with their platform, a company delved into the root cause of the problem, identified hotspots where bugs were common, formed short-term and long-term goals, created a roadmap, and improved their company culture around the change. They kept the initial principles from their platform's value prop when rearchitecting, shared their overarching problem with their team, and used empathy for their customers to improve the quality of their work.

Overcoming Hiring Constraints

This company faced the challenge of not finding potential candidates fit for positions available within their company when expanding. To overcome hiring constraints and meet their goals, they devoted their time to researching different target locations, conducted surveys, and created a cross-functional team. They also hired local recruiters and invested in marketing strategies to target potential talent. Lessons learned include allocating resources to a professional local recruiter, understanding the qualities the company is looking for in prospective employees, and investing in marketing strategies.

Creating an Engineering Vision

This article outlines the steps taken to create an engineering vision process. The steps include understanding the company vision, performing a SWOT analysis, researching trends, creating 1-pagers, formulating objectives and goals, and creating OKRs. Capacity planning and aligning the engineering vision with the organization's mission statement and values were important lessons learned. It is essential to draw a line between the overall vision and the one-year OKRs to ensure cohesiveness.

How to Hire, Train, and Align a Technology Team

In order to scale up his technology team, the author had to create a hiring process, rethink their marketing strategy, and develop a training process to close the skill gap. He also created a buddy system to help new members develop their skills and established feedback loops to provide actionable feedback. Lastly, he created a transparent career ladder and compensation bands to ensure that new members had clarity on long-term growth and career trajectories. The author learned that it is essential to train the talent acquisition team to be brand ambassadors, to experiment with the training process, and to take time to create a just and fair career ladder and compensation scale.

Evolving as a Young Tech Founder

The author faced multiple challenges when transitioning from founder to CTO, such as collaboration and an overload of tasks. To improve collaboration, the author practiced and prepared for meetings, created agendas, and thought of communication from another point of view. To gain a higher skill set, the author consumed tech media and practiced attempting to solve problems without writing code. To manage the extensive workflow, the author used their email as a to-do list and prioritized tasks. The author learned that collaboration and communication skills should be learned in college, paranoia is essential when being a founder, and preparation should look different depending on what is being prepared for.

How to Address Challenges in Geographically Distributed Team

As a lead architect at a multinational retailer, the author faced a challenge when the offshore team was unable to meet the sprint target due to a lack of detail in the solution designs provided by the onshore team. To address this, the author brought both teams together to discuss their challenges and find a middle-ground solution. The author also implemented cultural training to help bridge the gap between the two teams, and monitored the improvement of the new design template. The lessons learned were to bring people together to understand the root cause of issues, be mindful of cultural differences, and identify and monitor specific metrics.

How to Manage an Employee With Depression

A team leader took on a person with depression for a short-term assignment, and had to manage the person's mental wellbeing alongside the team's delivery timelines. The leader signposted the person to relevant support services, was empathetic, transparent with the team, and encouraged the person to join a mental health programme. The leader also created a calendar for the person to manage their work and time off, and had regular conversations with them. This experience taught the leader to do research, not make assumptions, and be vocal about their support for diversity.

Why Engineers Need to Understand Business Perspectives

In a previous organization, the author was responsible for creating a value proposition to take to the client and create work for the company. Through collaboration with internal leads and senior leaders, the author created a 4 million GBP sales pipeline and a million GBP sales opportunity for the product. The author learned that it is important to understand business problems, collaborate and build a network, and engage with stakeholders early on.

Internalizing Your Company Values

This article discusses the importance of having a strong, values-based culture in a company. It explains how having a documented culture and values can help bridge cultural differences, solve conflicts, and form hiring processes, rewards/promotions, and increase employee engagement. It also suggests ways to reinforce values, such as using discretionary bonuses and publicizing values.

Providing Support Through Excellent Documentation

This article discusses the importance of having a single source of truth for a company that works remotely. It explains how a living handbook that documents everything from the CEO's seat preferences to how to book PTO can help employees stay on the same page. It also emphasizes the importance of empowering employees to suggest improvements and update procedures, and to document why they are doing things a certain way. Finally, it highlights the success of the company in managing a globally-distributed team with over 130 members in 30 different countries.

Creative Recruitment Strategies to Hire Great Candidates

This article discusses the challenge of building a diverse team in a highly competitive landscape. It outlines the steps taken to actively source candidates, such as closing the public job posting and introducing monthly “Sip ‘n Source” events. It also discusses inclusive hiring practices, such as requiring candidates to speak to at least one non-male interviewer, offering adjustments to the interview process, and providing feedback surveys. The article concludes with the lessons learned, such as the importance of feedback, hiring based on trajectory, and the benefits of a diverse group.