November 18, 2020
Not the Trigger. But the Cue. The Cue is different from the trigger. The trigger gets us angry, gets us mad, makes us unfocused and frustrated. It pushes us to places we don’t need to be going to. But the Cue? The cue is our internal notification that we are needed, that it’s time to step up, that someone needs our help, that it’s time to jump in, help and grow the team. Take the cue, ignore the trigger.
November 14, 2020
This is the question that many of us can’t answer. What do we actually want? We look at user stories and features, what is in the backlog, what was discussed in a meeting and we assume that is “what the user wants”. But it really isn’t. How many times have you built something, thinking it was the right thing to build only to have an end user go – “that’s not what I was looking for.” It’s not until that you ask someone – “What do you want?” – that you get the answer you need, unencumbered by technology, domain
November 13, 2020
The word alone raises images of bureaucracy, slowed down deliverables, and processes that seek to create more processes. Let’s not even get into committees that report to commitees. The thing with committees, is they are safe. But change that membership name to a group and it becomes something different. The people involved are engaged, eager to work with each other and they have a common goal in mind. Change it to a team and it becomes something even stronger – the members have worked with each other before, they know who does what on the team and where they need
November 11, 2020
It sucks. Yes it sucks. It’s not easy (I don’t think it was ever meant to be). A fantastic interview with Heather Caudill on how she has navigated the last year of leading teams remotely and not shying away from the hard conversations that need to happen for her team to succeed. Full episode is here.
November 9, 2020
If you want the members of your team to grow and become more than they are, you’re going to need to change your tactics. Placating them with platitudes of how great the work they are doing is, how well they are doing, how awesome they are, how you wish you had fifteen of them, how they should be doing your job, etc, etc, etc – is not going to help them grow. It’s going to help them leave. Because they are going to realize that if they want to grow they need to find someone else who can help them
