Articles for category: Leadership

August 18, 2016

Greg Thomas

When you need a Mentor

Instead of seeking out a relationship where you are the mentee and someone else is the mentor.  Someone who has been put on a pedestal as being unbelievably innovative, creative and execution driven. Seek out a co-mentor – someone you can give as much to as they can give to you – so not only do you grow, but they do as well. And better yet, find someone from a completely different walk of life and field of interest.  It’s the different perspectives that give us the ideas for what and how we can modify our problem-solving behaviours. And don’t

August 5, 2016

Greg Thomas

Sports and Leaders

If I had the time during the interview process to take someone out and play 21 with them, shoot 9 holes of golf or insert favourite quick game of sport here, I would do that. You learn so much in watching people play sports when they don’t feel like they have anything holding them back.  In addition, you learn how they approach all those questions that you are really asking and whether it is for show or how they really behave. Are they really fair? Do they play with heart? Good loser/bad winner? What about the banter between the physical

July 27, 2016

Greg Thomas

The Airplane Test

From time to time, I do the Airplane test. It’s not a difficult one, there is no written exam, and the results are rarely ever shared with anyone. If anything, it is a level-set on where I am and what needs to be done. The Airplane Test Step 1: Take every person in your team/organization that you work with. Step 2: Thing of how you would do in building a plane. What kind of plane would you build?  Would it be technically sound, would it fly at sub-sonic speeds, would it have landing gear on it. The easy part is

July 21, 2016

Greg Thomas

The Aftermath of Breaking the Mold

Take a bowl, the mold if you will and drop it on the floor. Congratulations you just broke the mold. Now, start picking up all the pieces that no longer fit together because of cracks here and there and pieces that are so small they cannot be added back into creating the mold. Now, take all those pieces and create the new mold from what you have gathered. It’s not perfect is it?   It has jagged little edges that will need to be smoothed out, it has bumps and crevices where the good ideas used to roll down.  You

June 28, 2016

Greg Thomas

The Role of the Team Lead

Continuing on from The Road to Team Lead it’s amazing to see all the different job descriptions out there for a Software Team Lead – some ranging from “Super Coder that leads the coding” to “Full Blown Manager”. With so many confusing descriptions that differ from organization to organization, it makes it a little tricky to understand what you are getting into. My thoughts on what the role of Team Lead encompasses; 50% coding – the team still needs you to be contributing to code and let’s be honest, you still want to be contributing to code Team Onboarding – this

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