Sam walked up, teary-eyed and with a look of distress across his face. My mind flashed to every possibility. I knew it wasn’t good… but I had no idea what it could be. As we sat down with one another, alone in the conference room, he looked down, took a deep breath, and in a […]
What is the value in having regular one on ones? Are they useful for remote teams? And what can you do if you’re a remote employee who feels like your manager doesn’t really engage with you enough? What can you do jump-start your own one on ones and stay in the loop? Recently, I was […]
Boss: “You’re doing a great job with your team!” You: “Thanks!” Boss: “You don’t mind if we go ahead and put a few more people on your team, right?” You: “Umm….” Whether this is a conversation you have in your head or one that’s happened to you in talking to your boss, you know the […]
Do you know what your weaknesses are? How are your personal weaknesses reflected in your team? And what do you need to do to start working through those weaknesses to become a better leader? I sat down with Brian Wang, a Silicon Valley based executive coach at Dashing Leadership, to talk about overcoming weaknesses, how […]
“Do you have good, leading indicators of culture?” I was emailing with an investor recently discussing how so many have written about the value of culture, yet it often goes un-discussed by boards until there are Uber-level problems. They told me the only indicator they had was to watch for turnover. Unfortunately, by the time […]
Do you know what you’re talking about in your next 1-on-1 with each of your team members? What about next week? Next month? How do you change your 1-on-1s for different team membership? What if they’re on a leadership track vs. being an individual contributor? Every 1-on-1 is different. There are no hard-line rules for […]
When you’re managing a new team, there’s a lot of uncertainty. What do they think of you? Will everyone get along? How was their last manager? Are they a talented team? Starting anything new is always hard, and when you involve multiple other people, personalities, and habits, it ups the difficulty level significantly. As a […]
When something goes wrong, where do you look? If you’re a good manager, you start by looking in the mirror. You ask yourself how you contributed to the problem, no matter what. As a leader, you’re accountable for everything that happens with your team: This is an essential lesson for founders, as well as any […]
If you’ve ever had a frustrating boss, you know how true it is: People leave managers, not companies. … but that doesn’t mean the responsibility lies entirely on your boss to make you love your job. You play a part in managing the relationship between you and your manager. Put another way, this is what […]
In their “The State of the American Manager” study, Gallup found that half (50%) of all Americans have left a job to “get away from their manager at some point in their career.” We’ve said it before, but it begs repeating: employees leave managers, not companies. And a bad manager can make employees leave in […]
