Knowledge shared by our community

Growing Leadership With Iterative Company Principles

At Samsara, the rapid growth has forced the author to learn how to quickly build up the team and train second-level managers. To do this, the author has identified and documented company principles and problem-solving frameworks to measure them by. The author has also enforced these principles to the people that report to them, and has found that continual listening and reading are important to gain new perspectives. The author has also learned that it is important to explicitly train on set principles in order to ensure company consistency.

Using OKR Based Leadership to Empower Teams

In the past, teams have felt disempowered due to a confined matrix that limited their ability to make decisions. To combat this, the author implemented OKR-based leadership, which allowed teams to define their objectives as an impact and measure their success. This approach has empowered teams to make decisions and challenge each other in a respectful way. It has also allowed for a better appreciation of each other's skill sets.

Bouncing Back From a Derailed Re-Platform

The author was hired at Docusign to re-platform their major money-making product, the ‘sending experience’, from an old asb.net tech stack to a modern one. However, the project became riddled with roadblocks due to unclear expectations and the need to add new features. The author eventually overcame these roadblocks by bringing clarity to the project, understanding the customer's pain points, and focusing on the 'what' and 'why' of the project.

Hiring Rapidly and Time Efficiently

This article outlines the steps taken to rapidly hire engineers while maintaining quality. The author front-loaded the design, coordination, and preparation of the hiring funnel, set up hiring teams, and treated the hiring process as a product. Three metrics were used to measure success: percentage of hires from referrals, time taken to make a decision, and face-to-face interviews to hire ratio. The author also reduced the interviewing process to four hours and in one session. Lessons learned include the importance of treating the hiring process as a product, not letting quality fall to the wayside, and understanding that every hiring process is unique.

The "Management Hat" That Suits Me

This article discusses the 15-year learning path of a tech leader who has grown from a software engineer to a tech leader and then a manager. It outlines key principles for managers, such as defining and spreading the vision, giving trust, autonomy, and ownership, hiring the right people, helping teams manage priorities, and increasing the level of requirement. It also emphasizes the importance of communication in order to perform these principles.

Reviving Our Company's Culture

A company's culture is an essential element of its performance, and the management team of this company identified a need to develop people's engagement, create an attractive environment, and focus on team efficiency. To do this, they created a culture analysis framework to align everyone on the same language, put the lever in their context, and define the improvement area. They also created a prioritization framework and feedback system to measure the evolution of their action plan.

Does The Work Have To Make Sense?

This article discusses the two concepts of "sense of accomplishment" and "sense of purpose" in the workplace. It suggests that the sense of accomplishment is related to the day-to-day work and the sense of purpose is related to the company's mission and values. The article also poses the question of whether one would be proud of their achievements when they are 70 years old. It suggests that it is important to understand what matters to employees to make them feel engaged and connected to the purpose of their work.

Company Culture That Strives for Diversity and Inclusion

The narrator had worked for a company for many years, during which time the company had gone through several leadership changes. The changes had initially been beneficial, but in the last couple of years had become increasingly negative, resulting in a toxic “bro” culture and people, especially women and people of color, leaving the company. The narrator decided to leave and found a startup with a culture of inclusion and diversity. They have been able to contribute to the company culture by increasing the number of women, especially women of color, and making sure that those who work for the company are happy and getting the opportunities they deserve. The narrator has learned that company culture is more important than the product, and that being an ally requires taking action when something feels wrong or oppressive.

Psychology and Communication as Complementary Skills for Manager

This engineering manager took a psychology course to better understand how to communicate with people. Through the course, they learned how to adjust their communication style based on the personality of the person they were speaking to, as well as how to ask for things and build relationships. These lessons were put to use in their work, helping them to better manage their peers and build relationships with their interim manager.

Identifying and Developing Complementary Skills for a Leadership Position

This article discusses how engineering managers and team leads can identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a clear personal development plan. It suggests using a 2x2 skill matrix to identify which skills are strengths and which are in high demand in the current organization. It also suggests delegating current tasks to someone eager to learn and taking on more responsibilities in order to grow into new roles. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of developing multiple skills over a three to five year timeline in order to build a strong career path.

Improving Product Discovery

In order to improve product discovery, our teams implemented a faster peer review, test and release system, feature toggles, user research program, and online data analytics. They also released smaller chunks of code more frequently, which allowed them to check them more quickly. However, dealing with 40 different feature toggles in production created miscommunications that had to be solved on the fly.

Improving Product Delivery

A team was experiencing delays in value delivery due to an organizational structure based on function. To address this, they switched to cross-functional and cross-module teams with a clear purpose from a product point of view. They dedicated a product manager and two or three developers to each team, and hired more testers, designers, and user researchers. It took a few months to get the team functioning, but by eliminating outside distractions, they were able to become more focused on the value and its delivery.

Embracing and Growing Into the Role of an Amazing Leader

A programmer in a startup was asked to take on the role of engineering manager due to the lack of structure in the organization. Despite having no experience managing people, they accepted the role and eventually embraced it. They learned how to be a leader through attending courses and conferences, and eventually developed an approach of intent-based leadership, pushing leadership down through the team. They learned that the biggest measure of success is getting the team to the point where they don't need them anymore, and that this can be an opportunity to assess their own career ladder and strive for something else.

Being In Two Minds On Becoming a Manager

This article tells the story of an engineer who was unsure of whether to pursue a career in management. After being flagged by leaders as a potential manager, they were exposed to different versions of what a management position could look like and decided to take the plunge. To prepare, they found a mentor, attended classes, and interviewed other managers to gain insight into the job. Ultimately, they learned that it is important to be clear about what you want, document a plan, and look for mentors to help you reach your goals.

Handling Parental Leave

This article discusses the steps taken by an individual when they learned they were expecting a child while working at a company. The individual went to Human Resources to learn the company's policies, had conversations with their manager and direct reports, created a 90-day plan and a return-to-work plan, and arranged backfill coverage for their role. The article also discusses the lessons learned from the experience, such as the importance of having empathy for employees who are expecting and the need to clearly communicate expectations when returning to work.

Discovering and Mapping Your Career Path

This article discusses the importance of breaking down and evaluating one's career path based on five particular fields, The Five P's: Purpose, Productivity, People, Presence, and Plan. It suggests reflecting on what is important to you, what excites you, and what your passions are, as well as determining what type of lifestyle you want and who you want to have around you. It also emphasizes the importance of thinking about your presence holistically and mapping out a plan that blends together your career and personal life. Finally, it suggests creating a design statement and design principles for yourself, as well as assessing your situation annually and quarterly to ensure that your plan is on track.

Hyper-Learning: The Key to Career Differentiation

This technique of hyper-learning allows individuals to rapidly research and apply what they have learned to their job. This technique involves researching resources, scanning content, and going deep into books to pull out frameworks for application. It also involves creating a teachable point of view and teaching it to others. This technique has been the key to the success of the individual, allowing them to make more effective decisions and be seen as a leader in the room. It can be applied quickly and will result in dramatic and positive changes.

Super Performer

This article outlines a framework for creating the highest performing individuals and teams in a fortune 6 company. It includes shifting the mindset, moving from a fixed to a growth mindset, taking extreme ownership, practicing radical candor, creating a differentiated strategy, edge strategy, ten types of innovation, long-range planning, accelerated execution, first mile, and 12-week year. After a year of intense practice, the team has seen dramatic results and has begun applying the framework to other teams within the company.

Building Features Doesn’t Always Solve the Customer Problem

This article outlines the steps taken by a product manager to build a technical feature for an existing customer. The product manager first took the time to understand the core problem and then prioritized the current commitment. They then aligned the feature with the product vision and strategy, validated the value of the feature with existing and potential customers, and conducted customer validation demos. Finally, they provided a timeline schedule for both internal and external stakeholders. The article also highlights the importance of understanding the customer problem before jumping into a solution, as well as the importance of managing both internal and external expectations.

Underperformance vs. Unidentified ADHD in the Workplace

A new manager inherited an underperforming employee, and upon further investigation, discovered that the employee had ADHD. After discussing the issue with his manager, the manager switched the employee to short-term projects, which resulted in an increase in performance. This experience taught the manager to investigate underperformance issues when the facts don't add up.

Growing Leadership With Iterative Company Principles

At Samsara, the rapid growth has forced the author to learn how to quickly build up the team and train second-level managers. To do this, the author has identified and documented company principles and problem-solving frameworks to measure them by. The author has also enforced these principles to the people that report to them, and has found that continual listening and reading are important to gain new perspectives. The author has also learned that it is important to explicitly train on set principles in order to ensure company consistency.

Using OKR Based Leadership to Empower Teams

In the past, teams have felt disempowered due to a confined matrix that limited their ability to make decisions. To combat this, the author implemented OKR-based leadership, which allowed teams to define their objectives as an impact and measure their success. This approach has empowered teams to make decisions and challenge each other in a respectful way. It has also allowed for a better appreciation of each other's skill sets.

Bouncing Back From a Derailed Re-Platform

The author was hired at Docusign to re-platform their major money-making product, the ‘sending experience’, from an old asb.net tech stack to a modern one. However, the project became riddled with roadblocks due to unclear expectations and the need to add new features. The author eventually overcame these roadblocks by bringing clarity to the project, understanding the customer's pain points, and focusing on the 'what' and 'why' of the project.

Hiring Rapidly and Time Efficiently

This article outlines the steps taken to rapidly hire engineers while maintaining quality. The author front-loaded the design, coordination, and preparation of the hiring funnel, set up hiring teams, and treated the hiring process as a product. Three metrics were used to measure success: percentage of hires from referrals, time taken to make a decision, and face-to-face interviews to hire ratio. The author also reduced the interviewing process to four hours and in one session. Lessons learned include the importance of treating the hiring process as a product, not letting quality fall to the wayside, and understanding that every hiring process is unique.

The "Management Hat" That Suits Me

This article discusses the 15-year learning path of a tech leader who has grown from a software engineer to a tech leader and then a manager. It outlines key principles for managers, such as defining and spreading the vision, giving trust, autonomy, and ownership, hiring the right people, helping teams manage priorities, and increasing the level of requirement. It also emphasizes the importance of communication in order to perform these principles.

Reviving Our Company's Culture

A company's culture is an essential element of its performance, and the management team of this company identified a need to develop people's engagement, create an attractive environment, and focus on team efficiency. To do this, they created a culture analysis framework to align everyone on the same language, put the lever in their context, and define the improvement area. They also created a prioritization framework and feedback system to measure the evolution of their action plan.

Does The Work Have To Make Sense?

This article discusses the two concepts of "sense of accomplishment" and "sense of purpose" in the workplace. It suggests that the sense of accomplishment is related to the day-to-day work and the sense of purpose is related to the company's mission and values. The article also poses the question of whether one would be proud of their achievements when they are 70 years old. It suggests that it is important to understand what matters to employees to make them feel engaged and connected to the purpose of their work.

Company Culture That Strives for Diversity and Inclusion

The narrator had worked for a company for many years, during which time the company had gone through several leadership changes. The changes had initially been beneficial, but in the last couple of years had become increasingly negative, resulting in a toxic “bro” culture and people, especially women and people of color, leaving the company. The narrator decided to leave and found a startup with a culture of inclusion and diversity. They have been able to contribute to the company culture by increasing the number of women, especially women of color, and making sure that those who work for the company are happy and getting the opportunities they deserve. The narrator has learned that company culture is more important than the product, and that being an ally requires taking action when something feels wrong or oppressive.

Psychology and Communication as Complementary Skills for Manager

This engineering manager took a psychology course to better understand how to communicate with people. Through the course, they learned how to adjust their communication style based on the personality of the person they were speaking to, as well as how to ask for things and build relationships. These lessons were put to use in their work, helping them to better manage their peers and build relationships with their interim manager.

Identifying and Developing Complementary Skills for a Leadership Position

This article discusses how engineering managers and team leads can identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a clear personal development plan. It suggests using a 2x2 skill matrix to identify which skills are strengths and which are in high demand in the current organization. It also suggests delegating current tasks to someone eager to learn and taking on more responsibilities in order to grow into new roles. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of developing multiple skills over a three to five year timeline in order to build a strong career path.

Improving Product Discovery

In order to improve product discovery, our teams implemented a faster peer review, test and release system, feature toggles, user research program, and online data analytics. They also released smaller chunks of code more frequently, which allowed them to check them more quickly. However, dealing with 40 different feature toggles in production created miscommunications that had to be solved on the fly.

Improving Product Delivery

A team was experiencing delays in value delivery due to an organizational structure based on function. To address this, they switched to cross-functional and cross-module teams with a clear purpose from a product point of view. They dedicated a product manager and two or three developers to each team, and hired more testers, designers, and user researchers. It took a few months to get the team functioning, but by eliminating outside distractions, they were able to become more focused on the value and its delivery.

Embracing and Growing Into the Role of an Amazing Leader

A programmer in a startup was asked to take on the role of engineering manager due to the lack of structure in the organization. Despite having no experience managing people, they accepted the role and eventually embraced it. They learned how to be a leader through attending courses and conferences, and eventually developed an approach of intent-based leadership, pushing leadership down through the team. They learned that the biggest measure of success is getting the team to the point where they don't need them anymore, and that this can be an opportunity to assess their own career ladder and strive for something else.

Being In Two Minds On Becoming a Manager

This article tells the story of an engineer who was unsure of whether to pursue a career in management. After being flagged by leaders as a potential manager, they were exposed to different versions of what a management position could look like and decided to take the plunge. To prepare, they found a mentor, attended classes, and interviewed other managers to gain insight into the job. Ultimately, they learned that it is important to be clear about what you want, document a plan, and look for mentors to help you reach your goals.

Handling Parental Leave

This article discusses the steps taken by an individual when they learned they were expecting a child while working at a company. The individual went to Human Resources to learn the company's policies, had conversations with their manager and direct reports, created a 90-day plan and a return-to-work plan, and arranged backfill coverage for their role. The article also discusses the lessons learned from the experience, such as the importance of having empathy for employees who are expecting and the need to clearly communicate expectations when returning to work.

Discovering and Mapping Your Career Path

This article discusses the importance of breaking down and evaluating one's career path based on five particular fields, The Five P's: Purpose, Productivity, People, Presence, and Plan. It suggests reflecting on what is important to you, what excites you, and what your passions are, as well as determining what type of lifestyle you want and who you want to have around you. It also emphasizes the importance of thinking about your presence holistically and mapping out a plan that blends together your career and personal life. Finally, it suggests creating a design statement and design principles for yourself, as well as assessing your situation annually and quarterly to ensure that your plan is on track.

Hyper-Learning: The Key to Career Differentiation

This technique of hyper-learning allows individuals to rapidly research and apply what they have learned to their job. This technique involves researching resources, scanning content, and going deep into books to pull out frameworks for application. It also involves creating a teachable point of view and teaching it to others. This technique has been the key to the success of the individual, allowing them to make more effective decisions and be seen as a leader in the room. It can be applied quickly and will result in dramatic and positive changes.

Super Performer

This article outlines a framework for creating the highest performing individuals and teams in a fortune 6 company. It includes shifting the mindset, moving from a fixed to a growth mindset, taking extreme ownership, practicing radical candor, creating a differentiated strategy, edge strategy, ten types of innovation, long-range planning, accelerated execution, first mile, and 12-week year. After a year of intense practice, the team has seen dramatic results and has begun applying the framework to other teams within the company.

Building Features Doesn’t Always Solve the Customer Problem

This article outlines the steps taken by a product manager to build a technical feature for an existing customer. The product manager first took the time to understand the core problem and then prioritized the current commitment. They then aligned the feature with the product vision and strategy, validated the value of the feature with existing and potential customers, and conducted customer validation demos. Finally, they provided a timeline schedule for both internal and external stakeholders. The article also highlights the importance of understanding the customer problem before jumping into a solution, as well as the importance of managing both internal and external expectations.

Underperformance vs. Unidentified ADHD in the Workplace

A new manager inherited an underperforming employee, and upon further investigation, discovered that the employee had ADHD. After discussing the issue with his manager, the manager switched the employee to short-term projects, which resulted in an increase in performance. This experience taught the manager to investigate underperformance issues when the facts don't add up.

Growing Leadership With Iterative Company Principles

At Samsara, the rapid growth has forced the author to learn how to quickly build up the team and train second-level managers. To do this, the author has identified and documented company principles and problem-solving frameworks to measure them by. The author has also enforced these principles to the people that report to them, and has found that continual listening and reading are important to gain new perspectives. The author has also learned that it is important to explicitly train on set principles in order to ensure company consistency.

Using OKR Based Leadership to Empower Teams

In the past, teams have felt disempowered due to a confined matrix that limited their ability to make decisions. To combat this, the author implemented OKR-based leadership, which allowed teams to define their objectives as an impact and measure their success. This approach has empowered teams to make decisions and challenge each other in a respectful way. It has also allowed for a better appreciation of each other's skill sets.

Bouncing Back From a Derailed Re-Platform

The author was hired at Docusign to re-platform their major money-making product, the ‘sending experience’, from an old asb.net tech stack to a modern one. However, the project became riddled with roadblocks due to unclear expectations and the need to add new features. The author eventually overcame these roadblocks by bringing clarity to the project, understanding the customer's pain points, and focusing on the 'what' and 'why' of the project.

Hiring Rapidly and Time Efficiently

This article outlines the steps taken to rapidly hire engineers while maintaining quality. The author front-loaded the design, coordination, and preparation of the hiring funnel, set up hiring teams, and treated the hiring process as a product. Three metrics were used to measure success: percentage of hires from referrals, time taken to make a decision, and face-to-face interviews to hire ratio. The author also reduced the interviewing process to four hours and in one session. Lessons learned include the importance of treating the hiring process as a product, not letting quality fall to the wayside, and understanding that every hiring process is unique.

The "Management Hat" That Suits Me

This article discusses the 15-year learning path of a tech leader who has grown from a software engineer to a tech leader and then a manager. It outlines key principles for managers, such as defining and spreading the vision, giving trust, autonomy, and ownership, hiring the right people, helping teams manage priorities, and increasing the level of requirement. It also emphasizes the importance of communication in order to perform these principles.

Reviving Our Company's Culture

A company's culture is an essential element of its performance, and the management team of this company identified a need to develop people's engagement, create an attractive environment, and focus on team efficiency. To do this, they created a culture analysis framework to align everyone on the same language, put the lever in their context, and define the improvement area. They also created a prioritization framework and feedback system to measure the evolution of their action plan.

Does The Work Have To Make Sense?

This article discusses the two concepts of "sense of accomplishment" and "sense of purpose" in the workplace. It suggests that the sense of accomplishment is related to the day-to-day work and the sense of purpose is related to the company's mission and values. The article also poses the question of whether one would be proud of their achievements when they are 70 years old. It suggests that it is important to understand what matters to employees to make them feel engaged and connected to the purpose of their work.

Company Culture That Strives for Diversity and Inclusion

The narrator had worked for a company for many years, during which time the company had gone through several leadership changes. The changes had initially been beneficial, but in the last couple of years had become increasingly negative, resulting in a toxic “bro” culture and people, especially women and people of color, leaving the company. The narrator decided to leave and found a startup with a culture of inclusion and diversity. They have been able to contribute to the company culture by increasing the number of women, especially women of color, and making sure that those who work for the company are happy and getting the opportunities they deserve. The narrator has learned that company culture is more important than the product, and that being an ally requires taking action when something feels wrong or oppressive.

Psychology and Communication as Complementary Skills for Manager

This engineering manager took a psychology course to better understand how to communicate with people. Through the course, they learned how to adjust their communication style based on the personality of the person they were speaking to, as well as how to ask for things and build relationships. These lessons were put to use in their work, helping them to better manage their peers and build relationships with their interim manager.

Identifying and Developing Complementary Skills for a Leadership Position

This article discusses how engineering managers and team leads can identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a clear personal development plan. It suggests using a 2x2 skill matrix to identify which skills are strengths and which are in high demand in the current organization. It also suggests delegating current tasks to someone eager to learn and taking on more responsibilities in order to grow into new roles. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of developing multiple skills over a three to five year timeline in order to build a strong career path.

Improving Product Discovery

In order to improve product discovery, our teams implemented a faster peer review, test and release system, feature toggles, user research program, and online data analytics. They also released smaller chunks of code more frequently, which allowed them to check them more quickly. However, dealing with 40 different feature toggles in production created miscommunications that had to be solved on the fly.

Improving Product Delivery

A team was experiencing delays in value delivery due to an organizational structure based on function. To address this, they switched to cross-functional and cross-module teams with a clear purpose from a product point of view. They dedicated a product manager and two or three developers to each team, and hired more testers, designers, and user researchers. It took a few months to get the team functioning, but by eliminating outside distractions, they were able to become more focused on the value and its delivery.

Embracing and Growing Into the Role of an Amazing Leader

A programmer in a startup was asked to take on the role of engineering manager due to the lack of structure in the organization. Despite having no experience managing people, they accepted the role and eventually embraced it. They learned how to be a leader through attending courses and conferences, and eventually developed an approach of intent-based leadership, pushing leadership down through the team. They learned that the biggest measure of success is getting the team to the point where they don't need them anymore, and that this can be an opportunity to assess their own career ladder and strive for something else.

Being In Two Minds On Becoming a Manager

This article tells the story of an engineer who was unsure of whether to pursue a career in management. After being flagged by leaders as a potential manager, they were exposed to different versions of what a management position could look like and decided to take the plunge. To prepare, they found a mentor, attended classes, and interviewed other managers to gain insight into the job. Ultimately, they learned that it is important to be clear about what you want, document a plan, and look for mentors to help you reach your goals.

Handling Parental Leave

This article discusses the steps taken by an individual when they learned they were expecting a child while working at a company. The individual went to Human Resources to learn the company's policies, had conversations with their manager and direct reports, created a 90-day plan and a return-to-work plan, and arranged backfill coverage for their role. The article also discusses the lessons learned from the experience, such as the importance of having empathy for employees who are expecting and the need to clearly communicate expectations when returning to work.

Discovering and Mapping Your Career Path

This article discusses the importance of breaking down and evaluating one's career path based on five particular fields, The Five P's: Purpose, Productivity, People, Presence, and Plan. It suggests reflecting on what is important to you, what excites you, and what your passions are, as well as determining what type of lifestyle you want and who you want to have around you. It also emphasizes the importance of thinking about your presence holistically and mapping out a plan that blends together your career and personal life. Finally, it suggests creating a design statement and design principles for yourself, as well as assessing your situation annually and quarterly to ensure that your plan is on track.

Hyper-Learning: The Key to Career Differentiation

This technique of hyper-learning allows individuals to rapidly research and apply what they have learned to their job. This technique involves researching resources, scanning content, and going deep into books to pull out frameworks for application. It also involves creating a teachable point of view and teaching it to others. This technique has been the key to the success of the individual, allowing them to make more effective decisions and be seen as a leader in the room. It can be applied quickly and will result in dramatic and positive changes.

Super Performer

This article outlines a framework for creating the highest performing individuals and teams in a fortune 6 company. It includes shifting the mindset, moving from a fixed to a growth mindset, taking extreme ownership, practicing radical candor, creating a differentiated strategy, edge strategy, ten types of innovation, long-range planning, accelerated execution, first mile, and 12-week year. After a year of intense practice, the team has seen dramatic results and has begun applying the framework to other teams within the company.

Building Features Doesn’t Always Solve the Customer Problem

This article outlines the steps taken by a product manager to build a technical feature for an existing customer. The product manager first took the time to understand the core problem and then prioritized the current commitment. They then aligned the feature with the product vision and strategy, validated the value of the feature with existing and potential customers, and conducted customer validation demos. Finally, they provided a timeline schedule for both internal and external stakeholders. The article also highlights the importance of understanding the customer problem before jumping into a solution, as well as the importance of managing both internal and external expectations.

Underperformance vs. Unidentified ADHD in the Workplace

A new manager inherited an underperforming employee, and upon further investigation, discovered that the employee had ADHD. After discussing the issue with his manager, the manager switched the employee to short-term projects, which resulted in an increase in performance. This experience taught the manager to investigate underperformance issues when the facts don't add up.

Growing Leadership With Iterative Company Principles

At Samsara, the rapid growth has forced the author to learn how to quickly build up the team and train second-level managers. To do this, the author has identified and documented company principles and problem-solving frameworks to measure them by. The author has also enforced these principles to the people that report to them, and has found that continual listening and reading are important to gain new perspectives. The author has also learned that it is important to explicitly train on set principles in order to ensure company consistency.

Using OKR Based Leadership to Empower Teams

In the past, teams have felt disempowered due to a confined matrix that limited their ability to make decisions. To combat this, the author implemented OKR-based leadership, which allowed teams to define their objectives as an impact and measure their success. This approach has empowered teams to make decisions and challenge each other in a respectful way. It has also allowed for a better appreciation of each other's skill sets.

Bouncing Back From a Derailed Re-Platform

The author was hired at Docusign to re-platform their major money-making product, the ‘sending experience’, from an old asb.net tech stack to a modern one. However, the project became riddled with roadblocks due to unclear expectations and the need to add new features. The author eventually overcame these roadblocks by bringing clarity to the project, understanding the customer's pain points, and focusing on the 'what' and 'why' of the project.

Hiring Rapidly and Time Efficiently

This article outlines the steps taken to rapidly hire engineers while maintaining quality. The author front-loaded the design, coordination, and preparation of the hiring funnel, set up hiring teams, and treated the hiring process as a product. Three metrics were used to measure success: percentage of hires from referrals, time taken to make a decision, and face-to-face interviews to hire ratio. The author also reduced the interviewing process to four hours and in one session. Lessons learned include the importance of treating the hiring process as a product, not letting quality fall to the wayside, and understanding that every hiring process is unique.

The "Management Hat" That Suits Me

This article discusses the 15-year learning path of a tech leader who has grown from a software engineer to a tech leader and then a manager. It outlines key principles for managers, such as defining and spreading the vision, giving trust, autonomy, and ownership, hiring the right people, helping teams manage priorities, and increasing the level of requirement. It also emphasizes the importance of communication in order to perform these principles.

Reviving Our Company's Culture

A company's culture is an essential element of its performance, and the management team of this company identified a need to develop people's engagement, create an attractive environment, and focus on team efficiency. To do this, they created a culture analysis framework to align everyone on the same language, put the lever in their context, and define the improvement area. They also created a prioritization framework and feedback system to measure the evolution of their action plan.

Does The Work Have To Make Sense?

This article discusses the two concepts of "sense of accomplishment" and "sense of purpose" in the workplace. It suggests that the sense of accomplishment is related to the day-to-day work and the sense of purpose is related to the company's mission and values. The article also poses the question of whether one would be proud of their achievements when they are 70 years old. It suggests that it is important to understand what matters to employees to make them feel engaged and connected to the purpose of their work.

Company Culture That Strives for Diversity and Inclusion

The narrator had worked for a company for many years, during which time the company had gone through several leadership changes. The changes had initially been beneficial, but in the last couple of years had become increasingly negative, resulting in a toxic “bro” culture and people, especially women and people of color, leaving the company. The narrator decided to leave and found a startup with a culture of inclusion and diversity. They have been able to contribute to the company culture by increasing the number of women, especially women of color, and making sure that those who work for the company are happy and getting the opportunities they deserve. The narrator has learned that company culture is more important than the product, and that being an ally requires taking action when something feels wrong or oppressive.

Psychology and Communication as Complementary Skills for Manager

This engineering manager took a psychology course to better understand how to communicate with people. Through the course, they learned how to adjust their communication style based on the personality of the person they were speaking to, as well as how to ask for things and build relationships. These lessons were put to use in their work, helping them to better manage their peers and build relationships with their interim manager.

Identifying and Developing Complementary Skills for a Leadership Position

This article discusses how engineering managers and team leads can identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a clear personal development plan. It suggests using a 2x2 skill matrix to identify which skills are strengths and which are in high demand in the current organization. It also suggests delegating current tasks to someone eager to learn and taking on more responsibilities in order to grow into new roles. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of developing multiple skills over a three to five year timeline in order to build a strong career path.

Improving Product Discovery

In order to improve product discovery, our teams implemented a faster peer review, test and release system, feature toggles, user research program, and online data analytics. They also released smaller chunks of code more frequently, which allowed them to check them more quickly. However, dealing with 40 different feature toggles in production created miscommunications that had to be solved on the fly.

Improving Product Delivery

A team was experiencing delays in value delivery due to an organizational structure based on function. To address this, they switched to cross-functional and cross-module teams with a clear purpose from a product point of view. They dedicated a product manager and two or three developers to each team, and hired more testers, designers, and user researchers. It took a few months to get the team functioning, but by eliminating outside distractions, they were able to become more focused on the value and its delivery.

Embracing and Growing Into the Role of an Amazing Leader

A programmer in a startup was asked to take on the role of engineering manager due to the lack of structure in the organization. Despite having no experience managing people, they accepted the role and eventually embraced it. They learned how to be a leader through attending courses and conferences, and eventually developed an approach of intent-based leadership, pushing leadership down through the team. They learned that the biggest measure of success is getting the team to the point where they don't need them anymore, and that this can be an opportunity to assess their own career ladder and strive for something else.

Being In Two Minds On Becoming a Manager

This article tells the story of an engineer who was unsure of whether to pursue a career in management. After being flagged by leaders as a potential manager, they were exposed to different versions of what a management position could look like and decided to take the plunge. To prepare, they found a mentor, attended classes, and interviewed other managers to gain insight into the job. Ultimately, they learned that it is important to be clear about what you want, document a plan, and look for mentors to help you reach your goals.

Handling Parental Leave

This article discusses the steps taken by an individual when they learned they were expecting a child while working at a company. The individual went to Human Resources to learn the company's policies, had conversations with their manager and direct reports, created a 90-day plan and a return-to-work plan, and arranged backfill coverage for their role. The article also discusses the lessons learned from the experience, such as the importance of having empathy for employees who are expecting and the need to clearly communicate expectations when returning to work.

Discovering and Mapping Your Career Path

This article discusses the importance of breaking down and evaluating one's career path based on five particular fields, The Five P's: Purpose, Productivity, People, Presence, and Plan. It suggests reflecting on what is important to you, what excites you, and what your passions are, as well as determining what type of lifestyle you want and who you want to have around you. It also emphasizes the importance of thinking about your presence holistically and mapping out a plan that blends together your career and personal life. Finally, it suggests creating a design statement and design principles for yourself, as well as assessing your situation annually and quarterly to ensure that your plan is on track.

Hyper-Learning: The Key to Career Differentiation

This technique of hyper-learning allows individuals to rapidly research and apply what they have learned to their job. This technique involves researching resources, scanning content, and going deep into books to pull out frameworks for application. It also involves creating a teachable point of view and teaching it to others. This technique has been the key to the success of the individual, allowing them to make more effective decisions and be seen as a leader in the room. It can be applied quickly and will result in dramatic and positive changes.

Super Performer

This article outlines a framework for creating the highest performing individuals and teams in a fortune 6 company. It includes shifting the mindset, moving from a fixed to a growth mindset, taking extreme ownership, practicing radical candor, creating a differentiated strategy, edge strategy, ten types of innovation, long-range planning, accelerated execution, first mile, and 12-week year. After a year of intense practice, the team has seen dramatic results and has begun applying the framework to other teams within the company.

Building Features Doesn’t Always Solve the Customer Problem

This article outlines the steps taken by a product manager to build a technical feature for an existing customer. The product manager first took the time to understand the core problem and then prioritized the current commitment. They then aligned the feature with the product vision and strategy, validated the value of the feature with existing and potential customers, and conducted customer validation demos. Finally, they provided a timeline schedule for both internal and external stakeholders. The article also highlights the importance of understanding the customer problem before jumping into a solution, as well as the importance of managing both internal and external expectations.

Underperformance vs. Unidentified ADHD in the Workplace

A new manager inherited an underperforming employee, and upon further investigation, discovered that the employee had ADHD. After discussing the issue with his manager, the manager switched the employee to short-term projects, which resulted in an increase in performance. This experience taught the manager to investigate underperformance issues when the facts don't add up.

Growing Leadership With Iterative Company Principles

At Samsara, the rapid growth has forced the author to learn how to quickly build up the team and train second-level managers. To do this, the author has identified and documented company principles and problem-solving frameworks to measure them by. The author has also enforced these principles to the people that report to them, and has found that continual listening and reading are important to gain new perspectives. The author has also learned that it is important to explicitly train on set principles in order to ensure company consistency.

Using OKR Based Leadership to Empower Teams

In the past, teams have felt disempowered due to a confined matrix that limited their ability to make decisions. To combat this, the author implemented OKR-based leadership, which allowed teams to define their objectives as an impact and measure their success. This approach has empowered teams to make decisions and challenge each other in a respectful way. It has also allowed for a better appreciation of each other's skill sets.

Bouncing Back From a Derailed Re-Platform

The author was hired at Docusign to re-platform their major money-making product, the ‘sending experience’, from an old asb.net tech stack to a modern one. However, the project became riddled with roadblocks due to unclear expectations and the need to add new features. The author eventually overcame these roadblocks by bringing clarity to the project, understanding the customer's pain points, and focusing on the 'what' and 'why' of the project.

Hiring Rapidly and Time Efficiently

This article outlines the steps taken to rapidly hire engineers while maintaining quality. The author front-loaded the design, coordination, and preparation of the hiring funnel, set up hiring teams, and treated the hiring process as a product. Three metrics were used to measure success: percentage of hires from referrals, time taken to make a decision, and face-to-face interviews to hire ratio. The author also reduced the interviewing process to four hours and in one session. Lessons learned include the importance of treating the hiring process as a product, not letting quality fall to the wayside, and understanding that every hiring process is unique.

The "Management Hat" That Suits Me

This article discusses the 15-year learning path of a tech leader who has grown from a software engineer to a tech leader and then a manager. It outlines key principles for managers, such as defining and spreading the vision, giving trust, autonomy, and ownership, hiring the right people, helping teams manage priorities, and increasing the level of requirement. It also emphasizes the importance of communication in order to perform these principles.

Reviving Our Company's Culture

A company's culture is an essential element of its performance, and the management team of this company identified a need to develop people's engagement, create an attractive environment, and focus on team efficiency. To do this, they created a culture analysis framework to align everyone on the same language, put the lever in their context, and define the improvement area. They also created a prioritization framework and feedback system to measure the evolution of their action plan.

Does The Work Have To Make Sense?

This article discusses the two concepts of "sense of accomplishment" and "sense of purpose" in the workplace. It suggests that the sense of accomplishment is related to the day-to-day work and the sense of purpose is related to the company's mission and values. The article also poses the question of whether one would be proud of their achievements when they are 70 years old. It suggests that it is important to understand what matters to employees to make them feel engaged and connected to the purpose of their work.

Company Culture That Strives for Diversity and Inclusion

The narrator had worked for a company for many years, during which time the company had gone through several leadership changes. The changes had initially been beneficial, but in the last couple of years had become increasingly negative, resulting in a toxic “bro” culture and people, especially women and people of color, leaving the company. The narrator decided to leave and found a startup with a culture of inclusion and diversity. They have been able to contribute to the company culture by increasing the number of women, especially women of color, and making sure that those who work for the company are happy and getting the opportunities they deserve. The narrator has learned that company culture is more important than the product, and that being an ally requires taking action when something feels wrong or oppressive.

Psychology and Communication as Complementary Skills for Manager

This engineering manager took a psychology course to better understand how to communicate with people. Through the course, they learned how to adjust their communication style based on the personality of the person they were speaking to, as well as how to ask for things and build relationships. These lessons were put to use in their work, helping them to better manage their peers and build relationships with their interim manager.

Identifying and Developing Complementary Skills for a Leadership Position

This article discusses how engineering managers and team leads can identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a clear personal development plan. It suggests using a 2x2 skill matrix to identify which skills are strengths and which are in high demand in the current organization. It also suggests delegating current tasks to someone eager to learn and taking on more responsibilities in order to grow into new roles. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of developing multiple skills over a three to five year timeline in order to build a strong career path.

Improving Product Discovery

In order to improve product discovery, our teams implemented a faster peer review, test and release system, feature toggles, user research program, and online data analytics. They also released smaller chunks of code more frequently, which allowed them to check them more quickly. However, dealing with 40 different feature toggles in production created miscommunications that had to be solved on the fly.

Improving Product Delivery

A team was experiencing delays in value delivery due to an organizational structure based on function. To address this, they switched to cross-functional and cross-module teams with a clear purpose from a product point of view. They dedicated a product manager and two or three developers to each team, and hired more testers, designers, and user researchers. It took a few months to get the team functioning, but by eliminating outside distractions, they were able to become more focused on the value and its delivery.

Embracing and Growing Into the Role of an Amazing Leader

A programmer in a startup was asked to take on the role of engineering manager due to the lack of structure in the organization. Despite having no experience managing people, they accepted the role and eventually embraced it. They learned how to be a leader through attending courses and conferences, and eventually developed an approach of intent-based leadership, pushing leadership down through the team. They learned that the biggest measure of success is getting the team to the point where they don't need them anymore, and that this can be an opportunity to assess their own career ladder and strive for something else.

Being In Two Minds On Becoming a Manager

This article tells the story of an engineer who was unsure of whether to pursue a career in management. After being flagged by leaders as a potential manager, they were exposed to different versions of what a management position could look like and decided to take the plunge. To prepare, they found a mentor, attended classes, and interviewed other managers to gain insight into the job. Ultimately, they learned that it is important to be clear about what you want, document a plan, and look for mentors to help you reach your goals.

Handling Parental Leave

This article discusses the steps taken by an individual when they learned they were expecting a child while working at a company. The individual went to Human Resources to learn the company's policies, had conversations with their manager and direct reports, created a 90-day plan and a return-to-work plan, and arranged backfill coverage for their role. The article also discusses the lessons learned from the experience, such as the importance of having empathy for employees who are expecting and the need to clearly communicate expectations when returning to work.

Discovering and Mapping Your Career Path

This article discusses the importance of breaking down and evaluating one's career path based on five particular fields, The Five P's: Purpose, Productivity, People, Presence, and Plan. It suggests reflecting on what is important to you, what excites you, and what your passions are, as well as determining what type of lifestyle you want and who you want to have around you. It also emphasizes the importance of thinking about your presence holistically and mapping out a plan that blends together your career and personal life. Finally, it suggests creating a design statement and design principles for yourself, as well as assessing your situation annually and quarterly to ensure that your plan is on track.

Hyper-Learning: The Key to Career Differentiation

This technique of hyper-learning allows individuals to rapidly research and apply what they have learned to their job. This technique involves researching resources, scanning content, and going deep into books to pull out frameworks for application. It also involves creating a teachable point of view and teaching it to others. This technique has been the key to the success of the individual, allowing them to make more effective decisions and be seen as a leader in the room. It can be applied quickly and will result in dramatic and positive changes.

Super Performer

This article outlines a framework for creating the highest performing individuals and teams in a fortune 6 company. It includes shifting the mindset, moving from a fixed to a growth mindset, taking extreme ownership, practicing radical candor, creating a differentiated strategy, edge strategy, ten types of innovation, long-range planning, accelerated execution, first mile, and 12-week year. After a year of intense practice, the team has seen dramatic results and has begun applying the framework to other teams within the company.

Building Features Doesn’t Always Solve the Customer Problem

This article outlines the steps taken by a product manager to build a technical feature for an existing customer. The product manager first took the time to understand the core problem and then prioritized the current commitment. They then aligned the feature with the product vision and strategy, validated the value of the feature with existing and potential customers, and conducted customer validation demos. Finally, they provided a timeline schedule for both internal and external stakeholders. The article also highlights the importance of understanding the customer problem before jumping into a solution, as well as the importance of managing both internal and external expectations.

Underperformance vs. Unidentified ADHD in the Workplace

A new manager inherited an underperforming employee, and upon further investigation, discovered that the employee had ADHD. After discussing the issue with his manager, the manager switched the employee to short-term projects, which resulted in an increase in performance. This experience taught the manager to investigate underperformance issues when the facts don't add up.

Growing Leadership With Iterative Company Principles

At Samsara, the rapid growth has forced the author to learn how to quickly build up the team and train second-level managers. To do this, the author has identified and documented company principles and problem-solving frameworks to measure them by. The author has also enforced these principles to the people that report to them, and has found that continual listening and reading are important to gain new perspectives. The author has also learned that it is important to explicitly train on set principles in order to ensure company consistency.

Using OKR Based Leadership to Empower Teams

In the past, teams have felt disempowered due to a confined matrix that limited their ability to make decisions. To combat this, the author implemented OKR-based leadership, which allowed teams to define their objectives as an impact and measure their success. This approach has empowered teams to make decisions and challenge each other in a respectful way. It has also allowed for a better appreciation of each other's skill sets.

Bouncing Back From a Derailed Re-Platform

The author was hired at Docusign to re-platform their major money-making product, the ‘sending experience’, from an old asb.net tech stack to a modern one. However, the project became riddled with roadblocks due to unclear expectations and the need to add new features. The author eventually overcame these roadblocks by bringing clarity to the project, understanding the customer's pain points, and focusing on the 'what' and 'why' of the project.

Hiring Rapidly and Time Efficiently

This article outlines the steps taken to rapidly hire engineers while maintaining quality. The author front-loaded the design, coordination, and preparation of the hiring funnel, set up hiring teams, and treated the hiring process as a product. Three metrics were used to measure success: percentage of hires from referrals, time taken to make a decision, and face-to-face interviews to hire ratio. The author also reduced the interviewing process to four hours and in one session. Lessons learned include the importance of treating the hiring process as a product, not letting quality fall to the wayside, and understanding that every hiring process is unique.

The "Management Hat" That Suits Me

This article discusses the 15-year learning path of a tech leader who has grown from a software engineer to a tech leader and then a manager. It outlines key principles for managers, such as defining and spreading the vision, giving trust, autonomy, and ownership, hiring the right people, helping teams manage priorities, and increasing the level of requirement. It also emphasizes the importance of communication in order to perform these principles.

Reviving Our Company's Culture

A company's culture is an essential element of its performance, and the management team of this company identified a need to develop people's engagement, create an attractive environment, and focus on team efficiency. To do this, they created a culture analysis framework to align everyone on the same language, put the lever in their context, and define the improvement area. They also created a prioritization framework and feedback system to measure the evolution of their action plan.

Does The Work Have To Make Sense?

This article discusses the two concepts of "sense of accomplishment" and "sense of purpose" in the workplace. It suggests that the sense of accomplishment is related to the day-to-day work and the sense of purpose is related to the company's mission and values. The article also poses the question of whether one would be proud of their achievements when they are 70 years old. It suggests that it is important to understand what matters to employees to make them feel engaged and connected to the purpose of their work.

Company Culture That Strives for Diversity and Inclusion

The narrator had worked for a company for many years, during which time the company had gone through several leadership changes. The changes had initially been beneficial, but in the last couple of years had become increasingly negative, resulting in a toxic “bro” culture and people, especially women and people of color, leaving the company. The narrator decided to leave and found a startup with a culture of inclusion and diversity. They have been able to contribute to the company culture by increasing the number of women, especially women of color, and making sure that those who work for the company are happy and getting the opportunities they deserve. The narrator has learned that company culture is more important than the product, and that being an ally requires taking action when something feels wrong or oppressive.

Psychology and Communication as Complementary Skills for Manager

This engineering manager took a psychology course to better understand how to communicate with people. Through the course, they learned how to adjust their communication style based on the personality of the person they were speaking to, as well as how to ask for things and build relationships. These lessons were put to use in their work, helping them to better manage their peers and build relationships with their interim manager.

Identifying and Developing Complementary Skills for a Leadership Position

This article discusses how engineering managers and team leads can identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a clear personal development plan. It suggests using a 2x2 skill matrix to identify which skills are strengths and which are in high demand in the current organization. It also suggests delegating current tasks to someone eager to learn and taking on more responsibilities in order to grow into new roles. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of developing multiple skills over a three to five year timeline in order to build a strong career path.

Improving Product Discovery

In order to improve product discovery, our teams implemented a faster peer review, test and release system, feature toggles, user research program, and online data analytics. They also released smaller chunks of code more frequently, which allowed them to check them more quickly. However, dealing with 40 different feature toggles in production created miscommunications that had to be solved on the fly.

Improving Product Delivery

A team was experiencing delays in value delivery due to an organizational structure based on function. To address this, they switched to cross-functional and cross-module teams with a clear purpose from a product point of view. They dedicated a product manager and two or three developers to each team, and hired more testers, designers, and user researchers. It took a few months to get the team functioning, but by eliminating outside distractions, they were able to become more focused on the value and its delivery.

Embracing and Growing Into the Role of an Amazing Leader

A programmer in a startup was asked to take on the role of engineering manager due to the lack of structure in the organization. Despite having no experience managing people, they accepted the role and eventually embraced it. They learned how to be a leader through attending courses and conferences, and eventually developed an approach of intent-based leadership, pushing leadership down through the team. They learned that the biggest measure of success is getting the team to the point where they don't need them anymore, and that this can be an opportunity to assess their own career ladder and strive for something else.

Being In Two Minds On Becoming a Manager

This article tells the story of an engineer who was unsure of whether to pursue a career in management. After being flagged by leaders as a potential manager, they were exposed to different versions of what a management position could look like and decided to take the plunge. To prepare, they found a mentor, attended classes, and interviewed other managers to gain insight into the job. Ultimately, they learned that it is important to be clear about what you want, document a plan, and look for mentors to help you reach your goals.

Handling Parental Leave

This article discusses the steps taken by an individual when they learned they were expecting a child while working at a company. The individual went to Human Resources to learn the company's policies, had conversations with their manager and direct reports, created a 90-day plan and a return-to-work plan, and arranged backfill coverage for their role. The article also discusses the lessons learned from the experience, such as the importance of having empathy for employees who are expecting and the need to clearly communicate expectations when returning to work.

Discovering and Mapping Your Career Path

This article discusses the importance of breaking down and evaluating one's career path based on five particular fields, The Five P's: Purpose, Productivity, People, Presence, and Plan. It suggests reflecting on what is important to you, what excites you, and what your passions are, as well as determining what type of lifestyle you want and who you want to have around you. It also emphasizes the importance of thinking about your presence holistically and mapping out a plan that blends together your career and personal life. Finally, it suggests creating a design statement and design principles for yourself, as well as assessing your situation annually and quarterly to ensure that your plan is on track.

Hyper-Learning: The Key to Career Differentiation

This technique of hyper-learning allows individuals to rapidly research and apply what they have learned to their job. This technique involves researching resources, scanning content, and going deep into books to pull out frameworks for application. It also involves creating a teachable point of view and teaching it to others. This technique has been the key to the success of the individual, allowing them to make more effective decisions and be seen as a leader in the room. It can be applied quickly and will result in dramatic and positive changes.

Super Performer

This article outlines a framework for creating the highest performing individuals and teams in a fortune 6 company. It includes shifting the mindset, moving from a fixed to a growth mindset, taking extreme ownership, practicing radical candor, creating a differentiated strategy, edge strategy, ten types of innovation, long-range planning, accelerated execution, first mile, and 12-week year. After a year of intense practice, the team has seen dramatic results and has begun applying the framework to other teams within the company.

Building Features Doesn’t Always Solve the Customer Problem

This article outlines the steps taken by a product manager to build a technical feature for an existing customer. The product manager first took the time to understand the core problem and then prioritized the current commitment. They then aligned the feature with the product vision and strategy, validated the value of the feature with existing and potential customers, and conducted customer validation demos. Finally, they provided a timeline schedule for both internal and external stakeholders. The article also highlights the importance of understanding the customer problem before jumping into a solution, as well as the importance of managing both internal and external expectations.

Underperformance vs. Unidentified ADHD in the Workplace

A new manager inherited an underperforming employee, and upon further investigation, discovered that the employee had ADHD. After discussing the issue with his manager, the manager switched the employee to short-term projects, which resulted in an increase in performance. This experience taught the manager to investigate underperformance issues when the facts don't add up.