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Changing Responsibilities In an Organization Undergoing Change

When the author's company began to grow, they had to shift their focus from hands-on coding to VP work. After consulting with other leaders, they realized that their primary job was to focus on architecture and team building, rather than coding. They kept notes and reflected on the changes, but eventually left the company because their role had become too distant from the engineering work. They learned that the primary job of an engineering leader changes a lot as a company grows.

Hiring En Masse

When hiring a large number of people, it is beneficial to look for existing teams that are looking for a new opportunity, such as those from companies that are going out of business or pivoting to a different sector. Keeping an eye on these opportunities, acting fast, and having an informal meeting with the whole group can help to build relationships and create a unified team. Communication and honest feedback are key to success, and it is important to remember that hiring a group of technically gifted people does not automatically make a good team.

Don’t Let Yourself Be Held Hostage by Estimates

Stakeholders and PMs often blame engineering teams for not meeting deadlines, but the problem is usually not inaccurate estimates. To fix this, PMs and tech leads should have a clear insight into the type of work a team is completing, and product and engineering should have an opportunity to design things together. Additionally, engineers should update stakeholders promptly if work is under-estimated. The focus should be on prioritization, not estimates.

Outcomes Before Outputs: Measuring Engineering Performance

The text discusses the problem faced by engineering managers (EMs) in effectively monitoring the performance of their teams. The author suggests that instead of measuring activities such as closed tickets or lines of code, EMs should focus on measuring outcomes, specifically the number of epics and features delivered. The author also proposes the creation of a system that allows engineers to track their performance and provides a solid argument against complaints about poor team performance. The author implemented a system that measures five key team performance indicators based on real-time data, including the number of epics completed, the number of epics in progress, the lead time of features, and the roadmap contribution ratio. The author faced initial pushback from engineers but explained that the system serves as guardrails to streamline focus and stay on track. The system also improved transparency and allowed others in the company to have insight into the engineering team's work.

How Early Engagement Can Help Improve Cross-Team Communication

This article discusses a situation where a development team and customer success team had to go back and forth multiple times to implement a feature. To prevent this from happening in the future, the author suggests establishing a Product Council to ensure early engagement of all stakeholders and to prioritize activities. The author also outlines six key principles to ensure smooth communication and alignment between different teams. These include being clear on why, exercising empathy and understanding, owning responsibility, acknowledging frustration, establishing a common ground, and moving into a solution.

How to Motivate Distracted or Disengaged Team Members

As a leader, I have taken various actions to help my engineers with their demotivation and disengagement, such as encouraging time-management techniques, blocking calendars for professional development, handing over areas of work, switching work context, and journaling. I have also been inspired by Lara Hogan's book, Resilient Management, to better understand my employees' needs. I have learned that different people need different things to stay motivated and that it is important to nurture and encourage motivation and engagement.

Merging a Web and Mobile Team: A Tale of Two Cultures

When tasked with merging the mobile and web teams at Zynga Poker, the engineering leader had to solve the challenge of resolving both the technical and cultural divides. To do this, they co-located the teams, made the mobile team first-class citizens, encouraged social interaction, and mixed them around spatially and functionally. However, they did not address the architectural differences in the platform, which caused issues later. Ultimately, the teams were successfully merged.

Drive Accountability and Ownership by Embracing Mistakes

This article discusses how introducing "failure forums" and a peer-nominated contest to highlight excellence helped to create a safe culture and boost morale in a dysfunctional team. It also helped to drive ownership for improvements, increase engagement, and build loyalty. It taught people how to interact with leadership and accept mistakes, which was especially beneficial for younger people.

Get More Done by Working Less

When faced with an overwhelming amount of responsibilities, it is necessary to carefully decide where to reduce involvement. To succeed, managers must find a balance between distancing themselves too much from the details and staying stuck firmly in them. This is a challenge that every manager will have to face. One manager, faced with managing three teams, decided to prioritize his time and develop levers inside his organization, quickly setting up leaders for all his teams, and reflecting on his work at the end of the week.

4 Key Tips for First-Time Managers Growing into Their Role

Aspiring ICs who want to become managers face many challenges, such as maintaining technical competency, developing people skills, understanding project management, and improving prioritization skills. To stay technical, ICs should do code reviews, QA, and side projects. People skills include empathy, candor, and being comfortable giving directions and taking feedback. Project management involves organizing, planning, and seeing the big picture. Prioritization skills involve understanding the difference between important and urgent tasks and assigning value to each. Finally, aspiring managers should be honest with themselves and patient with the transition.

Managing Managers: A Lesson in a Mindset Shift

When a first-line manager is promoted to a senior manager or director, they must learn to adjust their mindset and focus on new responsibilities while giving their team room to grow. The author took an inventory of tasks a manager must do, identified what they were personally accountable for, and figured out how to do status checks and which ceremonies they had to attend. They also learned the importance of managing up, articulating why tasks are important, and the difference between managing ICs and managers.

How To Create a Successful Onboarding Plan for New Hires

When the author joined their company, they saw the onboarding process as an opportunity to make new hires effective contributors to the engineering organization. They developed a structured onboarding plan, which included sections on business strategy, competition, financial analysis, marketecture, technical architecture, project management, software management, and support. The plan was iterative and the author collected feedback from peers, HR, and their boss. The plan was eventually adopted as a standard and a new role was created to upkeep the document. The author learned to be iterative, take on tasks independently, and not take feedback personally.

When Shared Ownership No Longer Works

A problem arose when multiple product teams were working on the same technical and data foundation, resulting in a lack of attention to shared systems. To address this, a new team was created to focus on platform investments and shared systems, resulting in a dramatic reduction of build breakage and improved testing. The lessons learned from this experience were to listen to people's pain points, assign ownership of shared code, and share ownership of tech debt.

Managing a Manager for the First Time: Things I Learned the Hard Way

After promoting his best engineer to a manager, the team started to perform poorly. In hindsight, the manager realized he had been unclear about his expectations and had not been transparent about what he cared about. He created an expectation template to ensure alignment and transparency between himself and his managers. This experience taught him the importance of being explicit about expectations and what he cares about.

Benefits of Organizational Transparency

This article discusses the problem of achieving full visibility in a company with multiple locations and shifts. The author developed an operational software to solve this problem, which was decentralized, web-based, and cost-effective. The software was incrementally integrated into the process and included 10-11 functional areas, such as account management and marketing. The software enabled visibility, coordination, and collaboration, and was hugely successful. The author advises other companies to build a team to write operational software to be used in-house and create a culture that requires everyone to use the same tool.

How to Differentiate Yourself

Differentiating yourself from other directors is not about your individual skills, but rather what the company needs. To do this, focus on the gaps in the company and what you can do to help fill them. Invest time in learning the necessary skills and show initiative by coming up with your own mini-project and team. This is a great way to create a mini career path and build confidence while adding value to the company.

From Corporate to Entrepreneur: A Personal Journey

After feeling like he was getting further and further from technology and having to manage a demanding work-life balance in Silicon Valley, the VP of Engineering decided to start his own company. He and his partner took a risk and started a business in healthcare, learning the process themselves and being able to provide the service as much as possible. After five or six years, their endeavor paid off and they were able to expand to 12 and then 20 locations. The mindset shift from being an executive to wearing many hats and being responsible for every detail brought him joy and he was immensely enjoying it.

Being the Right Fit in Face of the Reorganization

A senior employee was not motivated by their current role and was facing resentment and frustration. To address this, the manager had an open conversation with the employee to identify what they wanted to do and what the organization needed. This allowed them to identify potential opportunities that could fit the employee, but in the end, the employee decided to pursue a different role. The manager learned that it is important to give people space to reflect on what they want and to be realistic and honest when discussing potential opportunities.

How Clarity Can Help Retention

A person with exceptional competencies was hired at a previous company, but he felt like he was not the right fit. Through a series of open and transparent conversations, the person was able to make a decisive contribution and become one of the highest performers on the team. The conversations allowed for a candid exchange of views and opinions, and the person was able to express his views and take ownership of the key problems and challenges. The lessons learned from this experience include not writing people off who don't feel like the right fit, the power of vulnerability and transparency, and the importance of listening to people who are troubled by a particular challenge.

Architecture Council: An Idea for Advancing Organizational Strategic Orientation

When the author joined their previous organization, they noticed a lack of strategic thinking within technical leadership. To address this, they established the Architecture Council, an advisory body to provide strategic orientation to day-to-day engineering decisions. The Council was made up of key technology people from various teams and ran two types of meetings: regular strategic discussions and on-demand technology or product reviews. As a result, the organization was able to move from a localized, fragmented and short-term level to a strategic, long-term level. The author also learned lessons about the size of the Council, its advisory nature, and the importance of writing a charter.

Changing Responsibilities In an Organization Undergoing Change

When the author's company began to grow, they had to shift their focus from hands-on coding to VP work. After consulting with other leaders, they realized that their primary job was to focus on architecture and team building, rather than coding. They kept notes and reflected on the changes, but eventually left the company because their role had become too distant from the engineering work. They learned that the primary job of an engineering leader changes a lot as a company grows.

Hiring En Masse

When hiring a large number of people, it is beneficial to look for existing teams that are looking for a new opportunity, such as those from companies that are going out of business or pivoting to a different sector. Keeping an eye on these opportunities, acting fast, and having an informal meeting with the whole group can help to build relationships and create a unified team. Communication and honest feedback are key to success, and it is important to remember that hiring a group of technically gifted people does not automatically make a good team.

Don’t Let Yourself Be Held Hostage by Estimates

Stakeholders and PMs often blame engineering teams for not meeting deadlines, but the problem is usually not inaccurate estimates. To fix this, PMs and tech leads should have a clear insight into the type of work a team is completing, and product and engineering should have an opportunity to design things together. Additionally, engineers should update stakeholders promptly if work is under-estimated. The focus should be on prioritization, not estimates.

Outcomes Before Outputs: Measuring Engineering Performance

The text discusses the problem faced by engineering managers (EMs) in effectively monitoring the performance of their teams. The author suggests that instead of measuring activities such as closed tickets or lines of code, EMs should focus on measuring outcomes, specifically the number of epics and features delivered. The author also proposes the creation of a system that allows engineers to track their performance and provides a solid argument against complaints about poor team performance. The author implemented a system that measures five key team performance indicators based on real-time data, including the number of epics completed, the number of epics in progress, the lead time of features, and the roadmap contribution ratio. The author faced initial pushback from engineers but explained that the system serves as guardrails to streamline focus and stay on track. The system also improved transparency and allowed others in the company to have insight into the engineering team's work.

How Early Engagement Can Help Improve Cross-Team Communication

This article discusses a situation where a development team and customer success team had to go back and forth multiple times to implement a feature. To prevent this from happening in the future, the author suggests establishing a Product Council to ensure early engagement of all stakeholders and to prioritize activities. The author also outlines six key principles to ensure smooth communication and alignment between different teams. These include being clear on why, exercising empathy and understanding, owning responsibility, acknowledging frustration, establishing a common ground, and moving into a solution.

How to Motivate Distracted or Disengaged Team Members

As a leader, I have taken various actions to help my engineers with their demotivation and disengagement, such as encouraging time-management techniques, blocking calendars for professional development, handing over areas of work, switching work context, and journaling. I have also been inspired by Lara Hogan's book, Resilient Management, to better understand my employees' needs. I have learned that different people need different things to stay motivated and that it is important to nurture and encourage motivation and engagement.

Merging a Web and Mobile Team: A Tale of Two Cultures

When tasked with merging the mobile and web teams at Zynga Poker, the engineering leader had to solve the challenge of resolving both the technical and cultural divides. To do this, they co-located the teams, made the mobile team first-class citizens, encouraged social interaction, and mixed them around spatially and functionally. However, they did not address the architectural differences in the platform, which caused issues later. Ultimately, the teams were successfully merged.

Drive Accountability and Ownership by Embracing Mistakes

This article discusses how introducing "failure forums" and a peer-nominated contest to highlight excellence helped to create a safe culture and boost morale in a dysfunctional team. It also helped to drive ownership for improvements, increase engagement, and build loyalty. It taught people how to interact with leadership and accept mistakes, which was especially beneficial for younger people.

Get More Done by Working Less

When faced with an overwhelming amount of responsibilities, it is necessary to carefully decide where to reduce involvement. To succeed, managers must find a balance between distancing themselves too much from the details and staying stuck firmly in them. This is a challenge that every manager will have to face. One manager, faced with managing three teams, decided to prioritize his time and develop levers inside his organization, quickly setting up leaders for all his teams, and reflecting on his work at the end of the week.

4 Key Tips for First-Time Managers Growing into Their Role

Aspiring ICs who want to become managers face many challenges, such as maintaining technical competency, developing people skills, understanding project management, and improving prioritization skills. To stay technical, ICs should do code reviews, QA, and side projects. People skills include empathy, candor, and being comfortable giving directions and taking feedback. Project management involves organizing, planning, and seeing the big picture. Prioritization skills involve understanding the difference between important and urgent tasks and assigning value to each. Finally, aspiring managers should be honest with themselves and patient with the transition.

Managing Managers: A Lesson in a Mindset Shift

When a first-line manager is promoted to a senior manager or director, they must learn to adjust their mindset and focus on new responsibilities while giving their team room to grow. The author took an inventory of tasks a manager must do, identified what they were personally accountable for, and figured out how to do status checks and which ceremonies they had to attend. They also learned the importance of managing up, articulating why tasks are important, and the difference between managing ICs and managers.

How To Create a Successful Onboarding Plan for New Hires

When the author joined their company, they saw the onboarding process as an opportunity to make new hires effective contributors to the engineering organization. They developed a structured onboarding plan, which included sections on business strategy, competition, financial analysis, marketecture, technical architecture, project management, software management, and support. The plan was iterative and the author collected feedback from peers, HR, and their boss. The plan was eventually adopted as a standard and a new role was created to upkeep the document. The author learned to be iterative, take on tasks independently, and not take feedback personally.

When Shared Ownership No Longer Works

A problem arose when multiple product teams were working on the same technical and data foundation, resulting in a lack of attention to shared systems. To address this, a new team was created to focus on platform investments and shared systems, resulting in a dramatic reduction of build breakage and improved testing. The lessons learned from this experience were to listen to people's pain points, assign ownership of shared code, and share ownership of tech debt.

Managing a Manager for the First Time: Things I Learned the Hard Way

After promoting his best engineer to a manager, the team started to perform poorly. In hindsight, the manager realized he had been unclear about his expectations and had not been transparent about what he cared about. He created an expectation template to ensure alignment and transparency between himself and his managers. This experience taught him the importance of being explicit about expectations and what he cares about.

Benefits of Organizational Transparency

This article discusses the problem of achieving full visibility in a company with multiple locations and shifts. The author developed an operational software to solve this problem, which was decentralized, web-based, and cost-effective. The software was incrementally integrated into the process and included 10-11 functional areas, such as account management and marketing. The software enabled visibility, coordination, and collaboration, and was hugely successful. The author advises other companies to build a team to write operational software to be used in-house and create a culture that requires everyone to use the same tool.

How to Differentiate Yourself

Differentiating yourself from other directors is not about your individual skills, but rather what the company needs. To do this, focus on the gaps in the company and what you can do to help fill them. Invest time in learning the necessary skills and show initiative by coming up with your own mini-project and team. This is a great way to create a mini career path and build confidence while adding value to the company.

From Corporate to Entrepreneur: A Personal Journey

After feeling like he was getting further and further from technology and having to manage a demanding work-life balance in Silicon Valley, the VP of Engineering decided to start his own company. He and his partner took a risk and started a business in healthcare, learning the process themselves and being able to provide the service as much as possible. After five or six years, their endeavor paid off and they were able to expand to 12 and then 20 locations. The mindset shift from being an executive to wearing many hats and being responsible for every detail brought him joy and he was immensely enjoying it.

Being the Right Fit in Face of the Reorganization

A senior employee was not motivated by their current role and was facing resentment and frustration. To address this, the manager had an open conversation with the employee to identify what they wanted to do and what the organization needed. This allowed them to identify potential opportunities that could fit the employee, but in the end, the employee decided to pursue a different role. The manager learned that it is important to give people space to reflect on what they want and to be realistic and honest when discussing potential opportunities.

How Clarity Can Help Retention

A person with exceptional competencies was hired at a previous company, but he felt like he was not the right fit. Through a series of open and transparent conversations, the person was able to make a decisive contribution and become one of the highest performers on the team. The conversations allowed for a candid exchange of views and opinions, and the person was able to express his views and take ownership of the key problems and challenges. The lessons learned from this experience include not writing people off who don't feel like the right fit, the power of vulnerability and transparency, and the importance of listening to people who are troubled by a particular challenge.

Architecture Council: An Idea for Advancing Organizational Strategic Orientation

When the author joined their previous organization, they noticed a lack of strategic thinking within technical leadership. To address this, they established the Architecture Council, an advisory body to provide strategic orientation to day-to-day engineering decisions. The Council was made up of key technology people from various teams and ran two types of meetings: regular strategic discussions and on-demand technology or product reviews. As a result, the organization was able to move from a localized, fragmented and short-term level to a strategic, long-term level. The author also learned lessons about the size of the Council, its advisory nature, and the importance of writing a charter.

Changing Responsibilities In an Organization Undergoing Change

When the author's company began to grow, they had to shift their focus from hands-on coding to VP work. After consulting with other leaders, they realized that their primary job was to focus on architecture and team building, rather than coding. They kept notes and reflected on the changes, but eventually left the company because their role had become too distant from the engineering work. They learned that the primary job of an engineering leader changes a lot as a company grows.

Hiring En Masse

When hiring a large number of people, it is beneficial to look for existing teams that are looking for a new opportunity, such as those from companies that are going out of business or pivoting to a different sector. Keeping an eye on these opportunities, acting fast, and having an informal meeting with the whole group can help to build relationships and create a unified team. Communication and honest feedback are key to success, and it is important to remember that hiring a group of technically gifted people does not automatically make a good team.

Don’t Let Yourself Be Held Hostage by Estimates

Stakeholders and PMs often blame engineering teams for not meeting deadlines, but the problem is usually not inaccurate estimates. To fix this, PMs and tech leads should have a clear insight into the type of work a team is completing, and product and engineering should have an opportunity to design things together. Additionally, engineers should update stakeholders promptly if work is under-estimated. The focus should be on prioritization, not estimates.

Outcomes Before Outputs: Measuring Engineering Performance

The text discusses the problem faced by engineering managers (EMs) in effectively monitoring the performance of their teams. The author suggests that instead of measuring activities such as closed tickets or lines of code, EMs should focus on measuring outcomes, specifically the number of epics and features delivered. The author also proposes the creation of a system that allows engineers to track their performance and provides a solid argument against complaints about poor team performance. The author implemented a system that measures five key team performance indicators based on real-time data, including the number of epics completed, the number of epics in progress, the lead time of features, and the roadmap contribution ratio. The author faced initial pushback from engineers but explained that the system serves as guardrails to streamline focus and stay on track. The system also improved transparency and allowed others in the company to have insight into the engineering team's work.

How Early Engagement Can Help Improve Cross-Team Communication

This article discusses a situation where a development team and customer success team had to go back and forth multiple times to implement a feature. To prevent this from happening in the future, the author suggests establishing a Product Council to ensure early engagement of all stakeholders and to prioritize activities. The author also outlines six key principles to ensure smooth communication and alignment between different teams. These include being clear on why, exercising empathy and understanding, owning responsibility, acknowledging frustration, establishing a common ground, and moving into a solution.

How to Motivate Distracted or Disengaged Team Members

As a leader, I have taken various actions to help my engineers with their demotivation and disengagement, such as encouraging time-management techniques, blocking calendars for professional development, handing over areas of work, switching work context, and journaling. I have also been inspired by Lara Hogan's book, Resilient Management, to better understand my employees' needs. I have learned that different people need different things to stay motivated and that it is important to nurture and encourage motivation and engagement.

Merging a Web and Mobile Team: A Tale of Two Cultures

When tasked with merging the mobile and web teams at Zynga Poker, the engineering leader had to solve the challenge of resolving both the technical and cultural divides. To do this, they co-located the teams, made the mobile team first-class citizens, encouraged social interaction, and mixed them around spatially and functionally. However, they did not address the architectural differences in the platform, which caused issues later. Ultimately, the teams were successfully merged.

Drive Accountability and Ownership by Embracing Mistakes

This article discusses how introducing "failure forums" and a peer-nominated contest to highlight excellence helped to create a safe culture and boost morale in a dysfunctional team. It also helped to drive ownership for improvements, increase engagement, and build loyalty. It taught people how to interact with leadership and accept mistakes, which was especially beneficial for younger people.

Get More Done by Working Less

When faced with an overwhelming amount of responsibilities, it is necessary to carefully decide where to reduce involvement. To succeed, managers must find a balance between distancing themselves too much from the details and staying stuck firmly in them. This is a challenge that every manager will have to face. One manager, faced with managing three teams, decided to prioritize his time and develop levers inside his organization, quickly setting up leaders for all his teams, and reflecting on his work at the end of the week.

4 Key Tips for First-Time Managers Growing into Their Role

Aspiring ICs who want to become managers face many challenges, such as maintaining technical competency, developing people skills, understanding project management, and improving prioritization skills. To stay technical, ICs should do code reviews, QA, and side projects. People skills include empathy, candor, and being comfortable giving directions and taking feedback. Project management involves organizing, planning, and seeing the big picture. Prioritization skills involve understanding the difference between important and urgent tasks and assigning value to each. Finally, aspiring managers should be honest with themselves and patient with the transition.

Managing Managers: A Lesson in a Mindset Shift

When a first-line manager is promoted to a senior manager or director, they must learn to adjust their mindset and focus on new responsibilities while giving their team room to grow. The author took an inventory of tasks a manager must do, identified what they were personally accountable for, and figured out how to do status checks and which ceremonies they had to attend. They also learned the importance of managing up, articulating why tasks are important, and the difference between managing ICs and managers.

How To Create a Successful Onboarding Plan for New Hires

When the author joined their company, they saw the onboarding process as an opportunity to make new hires effective contributors to the engineering organization. They developed a structured onboarding plan, which included sections on business strategy, competition, financial analysis, marketecture, technical architecture, project management, software management, and support. The plan was iterative and the author collected feedback from peers, HR, and their boss. The plan was eventually adopted as a standard and a new role was created to upkeep the document. The author learned to be iterative, take on tasks independently, and not take feedback personally.

When Shared Ownership No Longer Works

A problem arose when multiple product teams were working on the same technical and data foundation, resulting in a lack of attention to shared systems. To address this, a new team was created to focus on platform investments and shared systems, resulting in a dramatic reduction of build breakage and improved testing. The lessons learned from this experience were to listen to people's pain points, assign ownership of shared code, and share ownership of tech debt.

Managing a Manager for the First Time: Things I Learned the Hard Way

After promoting his best engineer to a manager, the team started to perform poorly. In hindsight, the manager realized he had been unclear about his expectations and had not been transparent about what he cared about. He created an expectation template to ensure alignment and transparency between himself and his managers. This experience taught him the importance of being explicit about expectations and what he cares about.

Benefits of Organizational Transparency

This article discusses the problem of achieving full visibility in a company with multiple locations and shifts. The author developed an operational software to solve this problem, which was decentralized, web-based, and cost-effective. The software was incrementally integrated into the process and included 10-11 functional areas, such as account management and marketing. The software enabled visibility, coordination, and collaboration, and was hugely successful. The author advises other companies to build a team to write operational software to be used in-house and create a culture that requires everyone to use the same tool.

How to Differentiate Yourself

Differentiating yourself from other directors is not about your individual skills, but rather what the company needs. To do this, focus on the gaps in the company and what you can do to help fill them. Invest time in learning the necessary skills and show initiative by coming up with your own mini-project and team. This is a great way to create a mini career path and build confidence while adding value to the company.

From Corporate to Entrepreneur: A Personal Journey

After feeling like he was getting further and further from technology and having to manage a demanding work-life balance in Silicon Valley, the VP of Engineering decided to start his own company. He and his partner took a risk and started a business in healthcare, learning the process themselves and being able to provide the service as much as possible. After five or six years, their endeavor paid off and they were able to expand to 12 and then 20 locations. The mindset shift from being an executive to wearing many hats and being responsible for every detail brought him joy and he was immensely enjoying it.

Being the Right Fit in Face of the Reorganization

A senior employee was not motivated by their current role and was facing resentment and frustration. To address this, the manager had an open conversation with the employee to identify what they wanted to do and what the organization needed. This allowed them to identify potential opportunities that could fit the employee, but in the end, the employee decided to pursue a different role. The manager learned that it is important to give people space to reflect on what they want and to be realistic and honest when discussing potential opportunities.

How Clarity Can Help Retention

A person with exceptional competencies was hired at a previous company, but he felt like he was not the right fit. Through a series of open and transparent conversations, the person was able to make a decisive contribution and become one of the highest performers on the team. The conversations allowed for a candid exchange of views and opinions, and the person was able to express his views and take ownership of the key problems and challenges. The lessons learned from this experience include not writing people off who don't feel like the right fit, the power of vulnerability and transparency, and the importance of listening to people who are troubled by a particular challenge.

Architecture Council: An Idea for Advancing Organizational Strategic Orientation

When the author joined their previous organization, they noticed a lack of strategic thinking within technical leadership. To address this, they established the Architecture Council, an advisory body to provide strategic orientation to day-to-day engineering decisions. The Council was made up of key technology people from various teams and ran two types of meetings: regular strategic discussions and on-demand technology or product reviews. As a result, the organization was able to move from a localized, fragmented and short-term level to a strategic, long-term level. The author also learned lessons about the size of the Council, its advisory nature, and the importance of writing a charter.

Changing Responsibilities In an Organization Undergoing Change

When the author's company began to grow, they had to shift their focus from hands-on coding to VP work. After consulting with other leaders, they realized that their primary job was to focus on architecture and team building, rather than coding. They kept notes and reflected on the changes, but eventually left the company because their role had become too distant from the engineering work. They learned that the primary job of an engineering leader changes a lot as a company grows.

Hiring En Masse

When hiring a large number of people, it is beneficial to look for existing teams that are looking for a new opportunity, such as those from companies that are going out of business or pivoting to a different sector. Keeping an eye on these opportunities, acting fast, and having an informal meeting with the whole group can help to build relationships and create a unified team. Communication and honest feedback are key to success, and it is important to remember that hiring a group of technically gifted people does not automatically make a good team.

Don’t Let Yourself Be Held Hostage by Estimates

Stakeholders and PMs often blame engineering teams for not meeting deadlines, but the problem is usually not inaccurate estimates. To fix this, PMs and tech leads should have a clear insight into the type of work a team is completing, and product and engineering should have an opportunity to design things together. Additionally, engineers should update stakeholders promptly if work is under-estimated. The focus should be on prioritization, not estimates.

Outcomes Before Outputs: Measuring Engineering Performance

The text discusses the problem faced by engineering managers (EMs) in effectively monitoring the performance of their teams. The author suggests that instead of measuring activities such as closed tickets or lines of code, EMs should focus on measuring outcomes, specifically the number of epics and features delivered. The author also proposes the creation of a system that allows engineers to track their performance and provides a solid argument against complaints about poor team performance. The author implemented a system that measures five key team performance indicators based on real-time data, including the number of epics completed, the number of epics in progress, the lead time of features, and the roadmap contribution ratio. The author faced initial pushback from engineers but explained that the system serves as guardrails to streamline focus and stay on track. The system also improved transparency and allowed others in the company to have insight into the engineering team's work.

How Early Engagement Can Help Improve Cross-Team Communication

This article discusses a situation where a development team and customer success team had to go back and forth multiple times to implement a feature. To prevent this from happening in the future, the author suggests establishing a Product Council to ensure early engagement of all stakeholders and to prioritize activities. The author also outlines six key principles to ensure smooth communication and alignment between different teams. These include being clear on why, exercising empathy and understanding, owning responsibility, acknowledging frustration, establishing a common ground, and moving into a solution.

How to Motivate Distracted or Disengaged Team Members

As a leader, I have taken various actions to help my engineers with their demotivation and disengagement, such as encouraging time-management techniques, blocking calendars for professional development, handing over areas of work, switching work context, and journaling. I have also been inspired by Lara Hogan's book, Resilient Management, to better understand my employees' needs. I have learned that different people need different things to stay motivated and that it is important to nurture and encourage motivation and engagement.

Merging a Web and Mobile Team: A Tale of Two Cultures

When tasked with merging the mobile and web teams at Zynga Poker, the engineering leader had to solve the challenge of resolving both the technical and cultural divides. To do this, they co-located the teams, made the mobile team first-class citizens, encouraged social interaction, and mixed them around spatially and functionally. However, they did not address the architectural differences in the platform, which caused issues later. Ultimately, the teams were successfully merged.

Drive Accountability and Ownership by Embracing Mistakes

This article discusses how introducing "failure forums" and a peer-nominated contest to highlight excellence helped to create a safe culture and boost morale in a dysfunctional team. It also helped to drive ownership for improvements, increase engagement, and build loyalty. It taught people how to interact with leadership and accept mistakes, which was especially beneficial for younger people.

Get More Done by Working Less

When faced with an overwhelming amount of responsibilities, it is necessary to carefully decide where to reduce involvement. To succeed, managers must find a balance between distancing themselves too much from the details and staying stuck firmly in them. This is a challenge that every manager will have to face. One manager, faced with managing three teams, decided to prioritize his time and develop levers inside his organization, quickly setting up leaders for all his teams, and reflecting on his work at the end of the week.

4 Key Tips for First-Time Managers Growing into Their Role

Aspiring ICs who want to become managers face many challenges, such as maintaining technical competency, developing people skills, understanding project management, and improving prioritization skills. To stay technical, ICs should do code reviews, QA, and side projects. People skills include empathy, candor, and being comfortable giving directions and taking feedback. Project management involves organizing, planning, and seeing the big picture. Prioritization skills involve understanding the difference between important and urgent tasks and assigning value to each. Finally, aspiring managers should be honest with themselves and patient with the transition.

Managing Managers: A Lesson in a Mindset Shift

When a first-line manager is promoted to a senior manager or director, they must learn to adjust their mindset and focus on new responsibilities while giving their team room to grow. The author took an inventory of tasks a manager must do, identified what they were personally accountable for, and figured out how to do status checks and which ceremonies they had to attend. They also learned the importance of managing up, articulating why tasks are important, and the difference between managing ICs and managers.

How To Create a Successful Onboarding Plan for New Hires

When the author joined their company, they saw the onboarding process as an opportunity to make new hires effective contributors to the engineering organization. They developed a structured onboarding plan, which included sections on business strategy, competition, financial analysis, marketecture, technical architecture, project management, software management, and support. The plan was iterative and the author collected feedback from peers, HR, and their boss. The plan was eventually adopted as a standard and a new role was created to upkeep the document. The author learned to be iterative, take on tasks independently, and not take feedback personally.

When Shared Ownership No Longer Works

A problem arose when multiple product teams were working on the same technical and data foundation, resulting in a lack of attention to shared systems. To address this, a new team was created to focus on platform investments and shared systems, resulting in a dramatic reduction of build breakage and improved testing. The lessons learned from this experience were to listen to people's pain points, assign ownership of shared code, and share ownership of tech debt.

Managing a Manager for the First Time: Things I Learned the Hard Way

After promoting his best engineer to a manager, the team started to perform poorly. In hindsight, the manager realized he had been unclear about his expectations and had not been transparent about what he cared about. He created an expectation template to ensure alignment and transparency between himself and his managers. This experience taught him the importance of being explicit about expectations and what he cares about.

Benefits of Organizational Transparency

This article discusses the problem of achieving full visibility in a company with multiple locations and shifts. The author developed an operational software to solve this problem, which was decentralized, web-based, and cost-effective. The software was incrementally integrated into the process and included 10-11 functional areas, such as account management and marketing. The software enabled visibility, coordination, and collaboration, and was hugely successful. The author advises other companies to build a team to write operational software to be used in-house and create a culture that requires everyone to use the same tool.

How to Differentiate Yourself

Differentiating yourself from other directors is not about your individual skills, but rather what the company needs. To do this, focus on the gaps in the company and what you can do to help fill them. Invest time in learning the necessary skills and show initiative by coming up with your own mini-project and team. This is a great way to create a mini career path and build confidence while adding value to the company.

From Corporate to Entrepreneur: A Personal Journey

After feeling like he was getting further and further from technology and having to manage a demanding work-life balance in Silicon Valley, the VP of Engineering decided to start his own company. He and his partner took a risk and started a business in healthcare, learning the process themselves and being able to provide the service as much as possible. After five or six years, their endeavor paid off and they were able to expand to 12 and then 20 locations. The mindset shift from being an executive to wearing many hats and being responsible for every detail brought him joy and he was immensely enjoying it.

Being the Right Fit in Face of the Reorganization

A senior employee was not motivated by their current role and was facing resentment and frustration. To address this, the manager had an open conversation with the employee to identify what they wanted to do and what the organization needed. This allowed them to identify potential opportunities that could fit the employee, but in the end, the employee decided to pursue a different role. The manager learned that it is important to give people space to reflect on what they want and to be realistic and honest when discussing potential opportunities.

How Clarity Can Help Retention

A person with exceptional competencies was hired at a previous company, but he felt like he was not the right fit. Through a series of open and transparent conversations, the person was able to make a decisive contribution and become one of the highest performers on the team. The conversations allowed for a candid exchange of views and opinions, and the person was able to express his views and take ownership of the key problems and challenges. The lessons learned from this experience include not writing people off who don't feel like the right fit, the power of vulnerability and transparency, and the importance of listening to people who are troubled by a particular challenge.

Architecture Council: An Idea for Advancing Organizational Strategic Orientation

When the author joined their previous organization, they noticed a lack of strategic thinking within technical leadership. To address this, they established the Architecture Council, an advisory body to provide strategic orientation to day-to-day engineering decisions. The Council was made up of key technology people from various teams and ran two types of meetings: regular strategic discussions and on-demand technology or product reviews. As a result, the organization was able to move from a localized, fragmented and short-term level to a strategic, long-term level. The author also learned lessons about the size of the Council, its advisory nature, and the importance of writing a charter.

Changing Responsibilities In an Organization Undergoing Change

When the author's company began to grow, they had to shift their focus from hands-on coding to VP work. After consulting with other leaders, they realized that their primary job was to focus on architecture and team building, rather than coding. They kept notes and reflected on the changes, but eventually left the company because their role had become too distant from the engineering work. They learned that the primary job of an engineering leader changes a lot as a company grows.

Hiring En Masse

When hiring a large number of people, it is beneficial to look for existing teams that are looking for a new opportunity, such as those from companies that are going out of business or pivoting to a different sector. Keeping an eye on these opportunities, acting fast, and having an informal meeting with the whole group can help to build relationships and create a unified team. Communication and honest feedback are key to success, and it is important to remember that hiring a group of technically gifted people does not automatically make a good team.

Don’t Let Yourself Be Held Hostage by Estimates

Stakeholders and PMs often blame engineering teams for not meeting deadlines, but the problem is usually not inaccurate estimates. To fix this, PMs and tech leads should have a clear insight into the type of work a team is completing, and product and engineering should have an opportunity to design things together. Additionally, engineers should update stakeholders promptly if work is under-estimated. The focus should be on prioritization, not estimates.

Outcomes Before Outputs: Measuring Engineering Performance

The text discusses the problem faced by engineering managers (EMs) in effectively monitoring the performance of their teams. The author suggests that instead of measuring activities such as closed tickets or lines of code, EMs should focus on measuring outcomes, specifically the number of epics and features delivered. The author also proposes the creation of a system that allows engineers to track their performance and provides a solid argument against complaints about poor team performance. The author implemented a system that measures five key team performance indicators based on real-time data, including the number of epics completed, the number of epics in progress, the lead time of features, and the roadmap contribution ratio. The author faced initial pushback from engineers but explained that the system serves as guardrails to streamline focus and stay on track. The system also improved transparency and allowed others in the company to have insight into the engineering team's work.

How Early Engagement Can Help Improve Cross-Team Communication

This article discusses a situation where a development team and customer success team had to go back and forth multiple times to implement a feature. To prevent this from happening in the future, the author suggests establishing a Product Council to ensure early engagement of all stakeholders and to prioritize activities. The author also outlines six key principles to ensure smooth communication and alignment between different teams. These include being clear on why, exercising empathy and understanding, owning responsibility, acknowledging frustration, establishing a common ground, and moving into a solution.

How to Motivate Distracted or Disengaged Team Members

As a leader, I have taken various actions to help my engineers with their demotivation and disengagement, such as encouraging time-management techniques, blocking calendars for professional development, handing over areas of work, switching work context, and journaling. I have also been inspired by Lara Hogan's book, Resilient Management, to better understand my employees' needs. I have learned that different people need different things to stay motivated and that it is important to nurture and encourage motivation and engagement.

Merging a Web and Mobile Team: A Tale of Two Cultures

When tasked with merging the mobile and web teams at Zynga Poker, the engineering leader had to solve the challenge of resolving both the technical and cultural divides. To do this, they co-located the teams, made the mobile team first-class citizens, encouraged social interaction, and mixed them around spatially and functionally. However, they did not address the architectural differences in the platform, which caused issues later. Ultimately, the teams were successfully merged.

Drive Accountability and Ownership by Embracing Mistakes

This article discusses how introducing "failure forums" and a peer-nominated contest to highlight excellence helped to create a safe culture and boost morale in a dysfunctional team. It also helped to drive ownership for improvements, increase engagement, and build loyalty. It taught people how to interact with leadership and accept mistakes, which was especially beneficial for younger people.

Get More Done by Working Less

When faced with an overwhelming amount of responsibilities, it is necessary to carefully decide where to reduce involvement. To succeed, managers must find a balance between distancing themselves too much from the details and staying stuck firmly in them. This is a challenge that every manager will have to face. One manager, faced with managing three teams, decided to prioritize his time and develop levers inside his organization, quickly setting up leaders for all his teams, and reflecting on his work at the end of the week.

4 Key Tips for First-Time Managers Growing into Their Role

Aspiring ICs who want to become managers face many challenges, such as maintaining technical competency, developing people skills, understanding project management, and improving prioritization skills. To stay technical, ICs should do code reviews, QA, and side projects. People skills include empathy, candor, and being comfortable giving directions and taking feedback. Project management involves organizing, planning, and seeing the big picture. Prioritization skills involve understanding the difference between important and urgent tasks and assigning value to each. Finally, aspiring managers should be honest with themselves and patient with the transition.

Managing Managers: A Lesson in a Mindset Shift

When a first-line manager is promoted to a senior manager or director, they must learn to adjust their mindset and focus on new responsibilities while giving their team room to grow. The author took an inventory of tasks a manager must do, identified what they were personally accountable for, and figured out how to do status checks and which ceremonies they had to attend. They also learned the importance of managing up, articulating why tasks are important, and the difference between managing ICs and managers.

How To Create a Successful Onboarding Plan for New Hires

When the author joined their company, they saw the onboarding process as an opportunity to make new hires effective contributors to the engineering organization. They developed a structured onboarding plan, which included sections on business strategy, competition, financial analysis, marketecture, technical architecture, project management, software management, and support. The plan was iterative and the author collected feedback from peers, HR, and their boss. The plan was eventually adopted as a standard and a new role was created to upkeep the document. The author learned to be iterative, take on tasks independently, and not take feedback personally.

When Shared Ownership No Longer Works

A problem arose when multiple product teams were working on the same technical and data foundation, resulting in a lack of attention to shared systems. To address this, a new team was created to focus on platform investments and shared systems, resulting in a dramatic reduction of build breakage and improved testing. The lessons learned from this experience were to listen to people's pain points, assign ownership of shared code, and share ownership of tech debt.

Managing a Manager for the First Time: Things I Learned the Hard Way

After promoting his best engineer to a manager, the team started to perform poorly. In hindsight, the manager realized he had been unclear about his expectations and had not been transparent about what he cared about. He created an expectation template to ensure alignment and transparency between himself and his managers. This experience taught him the importance of being explicit about expectations and what he cares about.

Benefits of Organizational Transparency

This article discusses the problem of achieving full visibility in a company with multiple locations and shifts. The author developed an operational software to solve this problem, which was decentralized, web-based, and cost-effective. The software was incrementally integrated into the process and included 10-11 functional areas, such as account management and marketing. The software enabled visibility, coordination, and collaboration, and was hugely successful. The author advises other companies to build a team to write operational software to be used in-house and create a culture that requires everyone to use the same tool.

How to Differentiate Yourself

Differentiating yourself from other directors is not about your individual skills, but rather what the company needs. To do this, focus on the gaps in the company and what you can do to help fill them. Invest time in learning the necessary skills and show initiative by coming up with your own mini-project and team. This is a great way to create a mini career path and build confidence while adding value to the company.

From Corporate to Entrepreneur: A Personal Journey

After feeling like he was getting further and further from technology and having to manage a demanding work-life balance in Silicon Valley, the VP of Engineering decided to start his own company. He and his partner took a risk and started a business in healthcare, learning the process themselves and being able to provide the service as much as possible. After five or six years, their endeavor paid off and they were able to expand to 12 and then 20 locations. The mindset shift from being an executive to wearing many hats and being responsible for every detail brought him joy and he was immensely enjoying it.

Being the Right Fit in Face of the Reorganization

A senior employee was not motivated by their current role and was facing resentment and frustration. To address this, the manager had an open conversation with the employee to identify what they wanted to do and what the organization needed. This allowed them to identify potential opportunities that could fit the employee, but in the end, the employee decided to pursue a different role. The manager learned that it is important to give people space to reflect on what they want and to be realistic and honest when discussing potential opportunities.

How Clarity Can Help Retention

A person with exceptional competencies was hired at a previous company, but he felt like he was not the right fit. Through a series of open and transparent conversations, the person was able to make a decisive contribution and become one of the highest performers on the team. The conversations allowed for a candid exchange of views and opinions, and the person was able to express his views and take ownership of the key problems and challenges. The lessons learned from this experience include not writing people off who don't feel like the right fit, the power of vulnerability and transparency, and the importance of listening to people who are troubled by a particular challenge.

Architecture Council: An Idea for Advancing Organizational Strategic Orientation

When the author joined their previous organization, they noticed a lack of strategic thinking within technical leadership. To address this, they established the Architecture Council, an advisory body to provide strategic orientation to day-to-day engineering decisions. The Council was made up of key technology people from various teams and ran two types of meetings: regular strategic discussions and on-demand technology or product reviews. As a result, the organization was able to move from a localized, fragmented and short-term level to a strategic, long-term level. The author also learned lessons about the size of the Council, its advisory nature, and the importance of writing a charter.

Changing Responsibilities In an Organization Undergoing Change

When the author's company began to grow, they had to shift their focus from hands-on coding to VP work. After consulting with other leaders, they realized that their primary job was to focus on architecture and team building, rather than coding. They kept notes and reflected on the changes, but eventually left the company because their role had become too distant from the engineering work. They learned that the primary job of an engineering leader changes a lot as a company grows.

Hiring En Masse

When hiring a large number of people, it is beneficial to look for existing teams that are looking for a new opportunity, such as those from companies that are going out of business or pivoting to a different sector. Keeping an eye on these opportunities, acting fast, and having an informal meeting with the whole group can help to build relationships and create a unified team. Communication and honest feedback are key to success, and it is important to remember that hiring a group of technically gifted people does not automatically make a good team.

Don’t Let Yourself Be Held Hostage by Estimates

Stakeholders and PMs often blame engineering teams for not meeting deadlines, but the problem is usually not inaccurate estimates. To fix this, PMs and tech leads should have a clear insight into the type of work a team is completing, and product and engineering should have an opportunity to design things together. Additionally, engineers should update stakeholders promptly if work is under-estimated. The focus should be on prioritization, not estimates.

Outcomes Before Outputs: Measuring Engineering Performance

The text discusses the problem faced by engineering managers (EMs) in effectively monitoring the performance of their teams. The author suggests that instead of measuring activities such as closed tickets or lines of code, EMs should focus on measuring outcomes, specifically the number of epics and features delivered. The author also proposes the creation of a system that allows engineers to track their performance and provides a solid argument against complaints about poor team performance. The author implemented a system that measures five key team performance indicators based on real-time data, including the number of epics completed, the number of epics in progress, the lead time of features, and the roadmap contribution ratio. The author faced initial pushback from engineers but explained that the system serves as guardrails to streamline focus and stay on track. The system also improved transparency and allowed others in the company to have insight into the engineering team's work.

How Early Engagement Can Help Improve Cross-Team Communication

This article discusses a situation where a development team and customer success team had to go back and forth multiple times to implement a feature. To prevent this from happening in the future, the author suggests establishing a Product Council to ensure early engagement of all stakeholders and to prioritize activities. The author also outlines six key principles to ensure smooth communication and alignment between different teams. These include being clear on why, exercising empathy and understanding, owning responsibility, acknowledging frustration, establishing a common ground, and moving into a solution.

How to Motivate Distracted or Disengaged Team Members

As a leader, I have taken various actions to help my engineers with their demotivation and disengagement, such as encouraging time-management techniques, blocking calendars for professional development, handing over areas of work, switching work context, and journaling. I have also been inspired by Lara Hogan's book, Resilient Management, to better understand my employees' needs. I have learned that different people need different things to stay motivated and that it is important to nurture and encourage motivation and engagement.

Merging a Web and Mobile Team: A Tale of Two Cultures

When tasked with merging the mobile and web teams at Zynga Poker, the engineering leader had to solve the challenge of resolving both the technical and cultural divides. To do this, they co-located the teams, made the mobile team first-class citizens, encouraged social interaction, and mixed them around spatially and functionally. However, they did not address the architectural differences in the platform, which caused issues later. Ultimately, the teams were successfully merged.

Drive Accountability and Ownership by Embracing Mistakes

This article discusses how introducing "failure forums" and a peer-nominated contest to highlight excellence helped to create a safe culture and boost morale in a dysfunctional team. It also helped to drive ownership for improvements, increase engagement, and build loyalty. It taught people how to interact with leadership and accept mistakes, which was especially beneficial for younger people.

Get More Done by Working Less

When faced with an overwhelming amount of responsibilities, it is necessary to carefully decide where to reduce involvement. To succeed, managers must find a balance between distancing themselves too much from the details and staying stuck firmly in them. This is a challenge that every manager will have to face. One manager, faced with managing three teams, decided to prioritize his time and develop levers inside his organization, quickly setting up leaders for all his teams, and reflecting on his work at the end of the week.

4 Key Tips for First-Time Managers Growing into Their Role

Aspiring ICs who want to become managers face many challenges, such as maintaining technical competency, developing people skills, understanding project management, and improving prioritization skills. To stay technical, ICs should do code reviews, QA, and side projects. People skills include empathy, candor, and being comfortable giving directions and taking feedback. Project management involves organizing, planning, and seeing the big picture. Prioritization skills involve understanding the difference between important and urgent tasks and assigning value to each. Finally, aspiring managers should be honest with themselves and patient with the transition.

Managing Managers: A Lesson in a Mindset Shift

When a first-line manager is promoted to a senior manager or director, they must learn to adjust their mindset and focus on new responsibilities while giving their team room to grow. The author took an inventory of tasks a manager must do, identified what they were personally accountable for, and figured out how to do status checks and which ceremonies they had to attend. They also learned the importance of managing up, articulating why tasks are important, and the difference between managing ICs and managers.

How To Create a Successful Onboarding Plan for New Hires

When the author joined their company, they saw the onboarding process as an opportunity to make new hires effective contributors to the engineering organization. They developed a structured onboarding plan, which included sections on business strategy, competition, financial analysis, marketecture, technical architecture, project management, software management, and support. The plan was iterative and the author collected feedback from peers, HR, and their boss. The plan was eventually adopted as a standard and a new role was created to upkeep the document. The author learned to be iterative, take on tasks independently, and not take feedback personally.

When Shared Ownership No Longer Works

A problem arose when multiple product teams were working on the same technical and data foundation, resulting in a lack of attention to shared systems. To address this, a new team was created to focus on platform investments and shared systems, resulting in a dramatic reduction of build breakage and improved testing. The lessons learned from this experience were to listen to people's pain points, assign ownership of shared code, and share ownership of tech debt.

Managing a Manager for the First Time: Things I Learned the Hard Way

After promoting his best engineer to a manager, the team started to perform poorly. In hindsight, the manager realized he had been unclear about his expectations and had not been transparent about what he cared about. He created an expectation template to ensure alignment and transparency between himself and his managers. This experience taught him the importance of being explicit about expectations and what he cares about.

Benefits of Organizational Transparency

This article discusses the problem of achieving full visibility in a company with multiple locations and shifts. The author developed an operational software to solve this problem, which was decentralized, web-based, and cost-effective. The software was incrementally integrated into the process and included 10-11 functional areas, such as account management and marketing. The software enabled visibility, coordination, and collaboration, and was hugely successful. The author advises other companies to build a team to write operational software to be used in-house and create a culture that requires everyone to use the same tool.

How to Differentiate Yourself

Differentiating yourself from other directors is not about your individual skills, but rather what the company needs. To do this, focus on the gaps in the company and what you can do to help fill them. Invest time in learning the necessary skills and show initiative by coming up with your own mini-project and team. This is a great way to create a mini career path and build confidence while adding value to the company.

From Corporate to Entrepreneur: A Personal Journey

After feeling like he was getting further and further from technology and having to manage a demanding work-life balance in Silicon Valley, the VP of Engineering decided to start his own company. He and his partner took a risk and started a business in healthcare, learning the process themselves and being able to provide the service as much as possible. After five or six years, their endeavor paid off and they were able to expand to 12 and then 20 locations. The mindset shift from being an executive to wearing many hats and being responsible for every detail brought him joy and he was immensely enjoying it.

Being the Right Fit in Face of the Reorganization

A senior employee was not motivated by their current role and was facing resentment and frustration. To address this, the manager had an open conversation with the employee to identify what they wanted to do and what the organization needed. This allowed them to identify potential opportunities that could fit the employee, but in the end, the employee decided to pursue a different role. The manager learned that it is important to give people space to reflect on what they want and to be realistic and honest when discussing potential opportunities.

How Clarity Can Help Retention

A person with exceptional competencies was hired at a previous company, but he felt like he was not the right fit. Through a series of open and transparent conversations, the person was able to make a decisive contribution and become one of the highest performers on the team. The conversations allowed for a candid exchange of views and opinions, and the person was able to express his views and take ownership of the key problems and challenges. The lessons learned from this experience include not writing people off who don't feel like the right fit, the power of vulnerability and transparency, and the importance of listening to people who are troubled by a particular challenge.

Architecture Council: An Idea for Advancing Organizational Strategic Orientation

When the author joined their previous organization, they noticed a lack of strategic thinking within technical leadership. To address this, they established the Architecture Council, an advisory body to provide strategic orientation to day-to-day engineering decisions. The Council was made up of key technology people from various teams and ran two types of meetings: regular strategic discussions and on-demand technology or product reviews. As a result, the organization was able to move from a localized, fragmented and short-term level to a strategic, long-term level. The author also learned lessons about the size of the Council, its advisory nature, and the importance of writing a charter.