Category: Teams
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Allow projects to have exploration time
We’ve been working on some terrific discovery stage projects in my team. We are all super pumped about it. Team has come up with some fresh ideas and a vision to execute on. However, we are very much seasoned in working within fixed structured, mature projects. Usually, we either work on small pieces or large…
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Thinking beyond your team
Recently, couple of my teams decided to combine their codebases. It was essentially the same application, written twice over to do the UI for a wizard that went down 2 paths. Their backends do very different things. However, the customer sees a very similar interface. After having done the migration, there have been some gripes.…
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Car crashes and sticking to your lane
My team recently made the decision to not have QA role as part of experience engineering. There were a lot of complains on increased workload and not wanting to do testing, including some valid reasoning around testing not being an area of expertise. I’ve heard similar complaints when we spoke about creating dashboards and alerts…
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The Bear and shows about teamwork
I love TV shows that show great teamwork. They aren’t always easy to find. Most shows tend to focus on an individual character and their story arc. I’ve been watching The Bear recently and it is one of those. The Bear is about a restaurant that is in the brink of falling over. Most characters…
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Building trust at work
Today I met a friend who has left his job only months after joining. His team lead had huge trust issues. Everything had to flow through him. He made all the decisions. There was a lot of frustration when people were proactive. I’m surprised he spent that long in this environment at all. However, it…
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Questions for Engineering Manager interviews
These are some questions I’ve had written down as we looked for a manager a while ago. Not an exhaustive list or the top 10. Just some questions worth thinking about. Hope this helps. Motivation Maker Mindset Feedback Conflict Resolution Mentorship Technology Morale Prioritisation
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Wise words from a tall man: playing the long game
Vithun with some words of wisdom: vithun.com/posts/playing-the-long-game …the longer the game one is in, the more they have got to be able to let something go. And not just let it go, but take it off their mind and start from blank for the next thing coming their way. Reacting to everything is something one…
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How do you communicate effectively in an asynchronously setting?
This post is part 2 of a series: Part 1: How to make remote work successful at your workplace? Write everything down. For an asynchronous setting, communication can’t happen live. Obvious — I know. However, we have such strong affinity towards live communication methods. Live chats tend to be “high resolution” in nature. We get…
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Some of my favourite books (non-fiction)
Some of these changed the way I approach work/job altogether. They sparked something in me that I continue to explore: how do we create the best products and teams that build them. My “makers” reading list on Goodreads Currently reading: Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed. Fascinating.
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How to make remote work successful at your workplace?
You have to fully commit. The whole world is going “remote”. But, it is hard to tell if imany places are finding success in a more distributed working model. It is a tough transition. Much of it is because most workplaces continue to operate with the same way they’ve always had. Somethings need to change.…