This week we covered several more sections of Chapter 6 (guidance).
Management “Fix-It” Weeks
- “…a system was created where people could log annoying management issues. If, for example, it took too long to get expense reports approved, you could file a management ‘bug.'”
- The group thought it would be great to work in an environment like this.
- Jameson said the warning here is using these “fix it” weeks for tech debt, because it slowly becomes the only time tech debt can be fixed (instead of on a regular sprint basis). On the technical side you should always be paying down tech debt. On the management side, we should do the same thing — address issues, hold people accountable –e.g., “Here are the ten things management is fixing this week and who’s doing it.”
- Houston asked how often management should do this? Probably quarterly.
Giving Impromptu Advice
- Be humble
- “A huge part of what makes giving guidance so valuable is that misperceptions on both sides of the equation get corrected.”
- Situation, behavior, impact
- “This helps you avoid making judgments about the person’s intelligence, common sense, innate goodness, or other personal attributes.”
- Jamie thought this was a helpful framework for him.
- Left-hand column (write what you said on the right column, what you thought on the left column)
- Geoff said this is the beauty of asymmetric information. We think what we say will be immediately translated by the other person as we would want it translated.
- Jamie liked the idea of having humility to question what others are thinking.
- “…when adults confuse subjective taste with objective reality, it’s arrogant.” Jamie said this happens in tech quite a bit; people say that you should use some tool, type of language, or some technique as “the way” to solve a problem. Most of the comparisons are anecdotal and are difficult if not impossible to quantify. Ex: You can’t write code without SOLID, yet we put a man on the moon without it. COBOL and procedural languages are worthless, yet most banks run on them.
- Be helpful
- Stating your intention to be helpful can lower defenses
- “For example, in your own words, say something like, ‘I’m going to describe a problem I see; I may be wrong, and if I am I hope you’ll tell me; if I’m not I hope my bringing it up will help you fix it.'”
- Show, don’t tell
- “Don’t say, ‘She’s really smart.'” This is another way of stating “address the behaviors, not attributes.” Geoff and Jamie have heard this for developmental praise as well: “It looks like you worked hard on that!” versus “You’re so talented!”
- Houston said there’s a time and place for showing and telling. You should tell people what’s expected of them, but sometimes showing is more impactful. You have both tools in your toolbox; they are not mutually exclusive.
- Finding help is better than offering it yourself
- Guidance is a gift, not a whip or carrot
- “It took me a long time to learn that sometimes the only help I had to offer was the conversation itself.”
- Stating your intention to be helpful can lower defenses
- Give feedback immediately
- Say it in 2-3 minutes between meetings
- Geoff likes this “get in there and get it over” approach.
- Keep slack time in your calendar, or be willing to be late
- Don’t “save up” guidance for a 1:1 or a performance review
- “If you have a beef with somebody in your personal life, it would never occur to you to wait for a formally scheduled meeting to tell them.” Geoff wondered how many people would have such a scheduled meeting in their personal life anyway.
- Guidance has a short half-life
- Unspoken criticism explodes like a dirty bomb
- Avoid black holes (i.e., no feedback)
- Say it in 2-3 minutes between meetings
- In person (if possible)
- Immediate vs. in person
- Hierarchy of modes
- Multiple modes
- Houston said it’s useful to care personally if the person receiving praise wants to be praised in front of a large group.
- Jameson said there’s more than one way to praise someone publicly (e.g., Slack channel kudos vs. company all-hands).
- Reply All do’s and don’ts
- Jamie said he’s gone against the advice in the book and replied-all to correct misinformation. Another technique is to ask the original person to correct their mistake via another email. At the foundation we need a healthy culture of admitting to mistakes.
- Being in a remote office is hard
- “He had operations in Africa in the 1970s and had learned the importance of frequent communication to pick up on emotional cues from people in far-flung locations.”
- Praise in public, criticize in private
- Corrections, factual observations, disagreements, and debates are different from criticism
- “‘When you give several important presentations that are all riddled with typos that a simple spell-checker would catch, I start to wonder what’s going on. Can you explain?’ That sort of thing needs to be a private conversation.”
- Adapt to an individual’s preferences
- Group learning
- Corrections, factual observations, disagreements, and debates are different from criticism
- Don’t personalize
- The “fundamental attribution error” will harm the effectiveness of your guidance
- Say “that’s wrong” not “you’re wrong”
- The phrase “don’t take it personally” is worse than useless
- How not to personalize even when it really is personal
Gauge Your Impromptu Guidance, Get a Baseline, Track Your Improvements
- Houston liked the idea of getting feedback on your Radical Candor via stickers on a poster outside your office. This is probably hard to keep going, but a worthwhile effort.
Being Radically Candid with Your Boss
- “If you find you cannot be Radically Candid with your new boss, I recommend that you consider finding a new job with a new boss.” Houston said Kim has this correct, but maybe you have the wrong boss. Maybe instead of quitting, try to do something about it.
- “Next — and here is a slight modification if you’re talking to your boss instead of your employee — ask permission to give advice.”
- “One of the most difficult things about being a middle manager — and, since most CEOs report to a Board of Directors, pretty much all managers are middle managers — is that you often wind up responsible for executing decisions that you disagree with. This can feel like a Catch-22. If you tell your team you do agree with the decisions, you feel like a liar — or at the very least, inauthentic. If you tell your team that you don’t agree with the decisions, you look weak, insubordinate, or both.”