End of Dictator Boss?, Hiring A-Team, Ask before taking remote job
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This weekly newsletter is mostly about the article, books, videos etc. I read or watch or my views on different topics which revolves around my head during the week. Now, let us dive into this week’s reads.
1. End of Dictator Boss?
This week Wall Street Journal did an article titled with ‘Your next boss may be more of a coach than a dictator’, For sure good read. I am sharing only title, as WSJ is paid site to read articles, so search with the title on your own if it interests you. At high level, this is an old truth surfacing again and again, that toxic bosses who are with attitude of ‘I Said So’ are being whistle blown since multiple decades and we still see them existing very much at workplace, grow up in career ladder and very few are shown exit door. This trend where workplace will see fewer managers, more status reports, less administrative work have been kick started during 2008 recession itself. At the client place we have seen this trend already, but we still have this culture in larger teams, Consultant teams who are providing team services for client. So, the future we may see a case where Client is only the boss and rest all in the team does not matter employees from client or from vendor will be working team members, not additional bosses, or managers. From Article, Boss will be a coach, not a dictator; a "social-emotional expert" who wants to help you navigate company culture and excel in a workplace characterized by rapid, relentless change.
I really do not think the manager jobs are going away anytime soon. Only the companies who has talent density, does not need a manager to see work is completed on time, the agile teams if planned well for their sprints are well organized enough to keep the bowl rolling on their own. This still does not work for the companies who do not have talent density, the teams which has different skill level resource for same skill still need a boss to be around to see. Every organization plans to build A-Team or higher talent density, but we all know that A-team comes with huge price tag, so organizations for whom pricing is not an issue, they get all A players, whereas the organizations where they must balance or work within budget, they end up picking non-A Players. Many of us struggle with this and we clearly see that Leads, Managers are not going to be less rather getting add up or being burnt out in many cases I have seen. Do note, I am talking about the delivery leads and managers, not administrative leads, and managers.
Do we need coach or mentor type of boss? Yes, Coaches are required when we train the resource fresh out of a college, where one would need initial training to get on boarded into working teams. Once part of working teams, we will not need a person with title as coaches or mentors in the team. This is something organically grows within the team, where team members need to act as coaches or mentors. Everyone should learn these type of soft skills when working in teams.
Let me know your thoughts and this topic will kick start our topic #2.
2. Hiring A-Team
Building A-team, Steve Jobs mentioned in one of his interviews that why his team achieves so best is because everyone of his team members are exceptionally highly talented people. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings mentioned in his latest book No Rules Rules calls his team as a sports team, only top performers who can make the team win has a position for themselves. This is called Talent density, when we have star performers in team, they select likewise top performers to join their team and they perform way way better complementing each other.
Not every company can shell such high compensations like how Apple or Netflix pays to their employees. For rest of the organizations building A-team is bigger task on day-to-day basis. There will be here and there star performer in the team, who performs beyond his 2-3 other teammates and they run the show. This is the truth; however, you agree or not. With all budget constraints, time to fill position early for not losing billing, need someone asap as work getting increased more and more, time window to hire a new teammate gets smaller and smaller. Let me share what I look during the hiring process. I have been on interview panels since more than a decade now in my career and my recruitment team hates me (saying from 10+ years of experience in hiring resources for my team). For them, I reject too many candidates and I have even pulled into cases where my interview audios were checked or questionnaire has been discussed widely, what I have asked and what the other person has responded. After little drama, they all come back on same page with me, that my action for rejection has always been right and they go back and share new profiles again. So, my advice to anyone out there reading this or hearing my podcast is to look for below few things when you hire someone to your team.
* Ensure they have strong skill set to perform project tasks.
Not all fingers on your hand are same, in family all are to treated equal. We carry the same sentiment to workplace as well. Organizations have shown idiotic bell curve to rate their employees and gives hikes as per the curve where they will fall in. However, your project tasks are, do not divide your team into strong and basic skill resource, so one person is working on bigger ticket items and other is working on small items, we must maintain balance etc. leave this aside. At the time of hiring, look for person who has all required skills to perform project tasks however the basic task it is or how hard it might be. The person you select to part of your team, should be able to perform all your team tasks with greater efficiency. However, the pressure you have to close the position, do not compromise at this step. Get your A Player.
* They should be able to work independently.
Do not make a mistake of hiring someone in assumption that they meet your basic skill set and you can ramp them up with day-to-day little push. You already have enough on your plate, and you can coach your existing team members to upskill. When you got the chance of hiring someone new, make sure get that A player and ensure they can work independently. In the world of Agile or even the case for waterfalls projects, if you are spending time on day-to-day basis in spoon feeding your teammates to get work done. Then you will be the first person to exit the team with high burnout. As you are neither working to your full potential on your own tasks, as you are making sure teammates also complete their tasks. I am not saying that do not help teammates, my point is do not spoon feed on every task. If you have such a team member, it is a time to lose one. So, get the team member who can work independently. Yes, you cannot simply dump work on someone to get it done. Make sure you share all the information so they can march towards their tasks on their own. When I say independent, you can count on them making your team win. You should not be worried about over all team status, as everyone of your team are here to make the team win. The key skill needs to have here is Growth Mindset, Curious to learn new skills or improvise existing skills, give their 100% before they raise their hand for help.
* Person is easy to talk to
Yes, Communication is very important. We do not need an arrogant star performer; we would need a person who is easier to talk to. It is very important to not overlook this skill when hiring. Even you get a resource who is very strong in his skills, able to finish their tasks well, but not a team player or not working in best interest of team. I am a straightforward person myself and it shows in workplace as well. This is what I am, and I cannot hide it easily. To work in teams, I need to adapt my feedback sharing little different so other person can take it well and act on it as well. This is only possible, when two people are easier to talk to. So, if you are hiring someone, in that 60-minute window, do check for this skill sure. Else it will be hard to talk to one day to day basis if you differ on your project work. you will need to have clear communications with everyone on your team, so look out for this skill as well.
Let me know in comment below, what are your Top 3 lookouts when hiring new.
3. Things to ask while taking up Remote Job
I was taking interviews for job openings in my team. As we are in Covid-19 situation, anyhow the current requirements are to be remote itself, But I still need to know once we are back to normal will they be comfortable to report onsite. For my job, location is not a constraint, but it is in my checklist to be asked. Normally you hear a regular reason such as, want to be remote as they have house in specific location or kids’ education or life partner working location. This week, one person asked me, how much time will be spent in meetings vs work. I asked why such specific ask, we will all have project specific meetings for sure not too many meetings, do they have any experience based on which they are asking. Person mentioned, their current work location, where since 10 months being remote, their team is bugging with too many meetings and calls and less room for work and feeling burnt out. That is the specific reason for them to look out for new job and wanted remote. For sure the reason is not really for the remote, they wanted to have remote job ensure time is not spent on meetings as will be silo in work as there will be no teammate sitting next to them, so one need room to concentrate on performing the assigned tasks. Seen one more who requested remote and shared his timings as 10 am EST to 7 PM EST. This is not the topic I want to talk here, just sharing that people are asking few things which are not truly the case for remote, but more of burnout due to working from home and struggling to handle home and works chores simultaneously. We all are in same boat on this.
I got once opportunity to either work at client location going to client office day to day or work from internal office location which is more of remote job, can be at internal office or can work from home. I selected a position at client location, reporting to work every day at office. Let me share few things which one need to ask when applying for a remote job, so you can make a judgement.
* As you will work remote, ask how your quarterly, semi or annual reviews will be done by your manager. Looking at what metrics will they decide your success in the role.
Know what your career growth path in this position would. As being remote, many will face a situation as left out in team and struggles to get the team attention and will start feeling as no growth for them as they are fully remote, does not know anyone face to face, to know will there be a long-term future for them at all or not. So do ask.
* Do check what will be the communication tools for day-to-day work. Employer offering remote job, should enable you to work with messenger tools for chat, audio/video callings, Bridge call to join with multiple people over multiple geographical locations etc. You should not be spending say mobile bill for joining into teamwork calls.
* For the issue we discussed, instead of asking will there be too many meetings. rephrase it to ask, how team/project meetings, daily stand ups and what percentage will one need to be in calls to have details enough to perform the tasks for the rest of the day.
* Get to know, how will you navigate to socialize with other team members? Will there be any team meetups or online hangouts, as we are not robots to just talk business and carry on with our day. Teams achieves bigger things when they work well with each other, complement each other in their work.
* When there is a need to be at worksite. Say one-week workshops are going on and all want to assemble at one location. At that time as it is team workshop, will they take care of one-week arrangements for you to be in separate location other than your home location.
* What would be the working hours? If you all work in specific location same time zone, then no worries. But if you are in different time zones, which say differ in U.S few hours apart based on where one is situated. Your 6AM might be 9AM for others. For such time zone country, you are in, sure check about your work timings ahead. Do not be surprised later if you are finding out, then it will lead to another burnout easily.
Let me know in comments, what additionally you would like to know before accepting a remote job. As we will be remote for sure even more and returning to normal just looks to be beyond end of 2021 as well. Many of you might have taken remote jobs in last 10 months, so do share your experience in comment or reply to my email or in twitter to help others in taking a right call while accepting a remote job.
That is all for this week. See you again.
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