It Depends / Nimble Autonomy

It Depends / Nimble Autonomy focuses on technology leadership, career development, and agile management practices. It covers flexible career paths, innovation within large companies, agile coaching, distributed team challenges, performance review practices, diversity in hiring, and lessons from failures. Practical strategies for effective management and fostering innovation are emphasized.

Technology Leadership Career Development Agile Practices Performance Management Innovation in Large Companies Diversity and Inclusion Team Management Failure and Learning

The hottest Substack posts of It Depends / Nimble Autonomy

And their main takeaways

When, why, and how to stop coding as your day job

11 HN points • 22 Sep 24
🕹 Technology Software Development Management Career growth Leadership Technical Skills
  1. Stepping away from coding allows you to focus on being a more effective manager. When you stop coding, you can better support and lead your team.
  2. Many technical leaders struggle to balance coding and management, often feeling they must still code to stay relevant. However, shifting your focus to team leadership is essential for growth.
  3. To remain connected to technology, take an interest in your team's work and continue learning. You can still engage with technology without it being the main part of your job.

Things We Learned Creating Technology Career Steps

19 implied HN points • 08 Sep 24
🕹 Technology Career development Leadership Organizational Culture Performance Management
  1. Clear connections between career steps and salary are important. When those links are vague, it can create misunderstandings and worries for employees.
  2. Career advancement should focus on behaviors and personal growth, not just achievements. While some people prefer clear advancement criteria, ambiguity can encourage conversations about development.
  3. Ongoing support and communication are essential after launching a new framework. Failing to keep it active can lead to confusion and make the effort feel unimportant over time.

Spotify Technology Career Steps

19 implied HN points • 25 Aug 24
🕹 Technology Career development Work Culture Human Resources Professional Growth Corporate Structure
  1. At Spotify, career growth is flexible and based on your interests. You can explore different roles and skills without being stuck on a strict path.
  2. Career steps at Spotify focus on teamwork and impact. Employees are encouraged to prioritize team success and think about how their work affects the business.
  3. Promotions at Spotify depend on consistently showing a higher level of impact and behavior. They aren't tied to a specific timeline, so discussions with managers are key.

Building a technical career path at Spotify

19 implied HN points • 11 Aug 24
🕹 Technology Career development Engineering Company Culture Leadership
  1. Spotify emphasizes that career paths should fit the company's culture. Using a framework from another company often doesn't work well.
  2. Creating a career path framework should happen after seeing a real need for it, rather than forcing it too early in a company's growth.
  3. The Spotify model focuses on team success and personal growth, not just climbing a ladder. It encourages diverse development without penalizing role changes.

Hiring Agile Coaches

19 implied HN points • 30 Jun 24
💼 Business Management Leadership Human Resources Coaching Agile development
  1. Agile coaches play an important role in helping teams improve their processes. A good coach can guide teams to recognize their own mistakes and improve without directly fixing their problems.
  2. When hiring agile coaches, it's essential to look for candidates with a solid background in product development and broad knowledge of agile methods. This experience helps them understand the 'why' behind agile practices.
  3. Building a successful agile coaching practice should start small, hiring one coach at a time. This allows the coach to establish what the role means in the organization before adding more coaches.
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The Myth of the Startup in a Large Company

19 implied HN points • 19 Jun 24
💼 Business Corporate culture Innovation Startups Management Leadership
  1. Large companies often struggle to create a true startup culture. Their existing systems usually stifle the innovation and energy that startups thrive on.
  2. In big companies, the lack of risk and the security of a paycheck can actually kill motivation. Employees may feel less ownership of their projects, which can make them less engaged.
  3. One way to encourage innovation is to create actual independent startups within the company. This allows employees to take risks and have more stake in the outcome, which can lead to better results.

Writing better performance reviews: assembling the data

19 implied HN points • 05 May 24
💼 Business Management Human Resources Performance reviews Leadership Employee Development
  1. Start collecting data for performance reviews early in the year. This will help you avoid last-minute stress and ensure you remember important information.
  2. Use various sources for your review data, like meeting notes, emails, and feedback from peers. This way, you gather a well-rounded view of the employee's performance.
  3. Make performance reviews a meaningful summary of ongoing feedback. They should reflect the whole year and not just recent events, helping both the employee and the company.

Addressing the challenges of partially distributed engineering teams

19 implied HN points • 07 Apr 24
💼 Business Management Team Dynamics Remote work Leadership Communication
  1. Partially distributed teams face communication issues because some team members are in the office while others are remote. This can lead to misunderstandings and feelings of isolation for those not present.
  2. Visibility is important in a team; if members are not seen often, their work may be overlooked during reviews and recognition. It's crucial for managers to be aware of everyone's contributions, regardless of where they work.
  3. Creating clear expectations around availability and encouraging informal conversations can help build better relationships within the team. Taking time to connect as people makes working together easier.

Fail Safe, Fail Smart… Succeed! (Part 2 of 3)

0 implied HN points • 29 Jul 24
🕹 Technology Software Development Project management Innovation Team Dynamics User Research
  1. Learning from failure is important. When things go wrong, take the time to understand what happened so you can do better next time.
  2. Project retrospectives help teams reflect on their work. These meetings let everyone share what went well and what didn't without placing blame.
  3. To reduce the risks of failure, use a step-by-step approach to launching new features. Start small, gather feedback, and make improvements before a full release.

The Myth of the Startup in a Large Company

0 implied HN points • 14 Jul 24
💼 Business Startup Culture Product Development Team Dynamics
  1. Big companies struggle to act like startups because they lack the same urgency and risk. In a startup, everyone fights for success, but large companies often prioritize their existing products and structures.
  2. When trying to innovate within a big company, resource competition can kill new ideas. Other teams might take over successful projects or disrupt new developments just to claim resources.
  3. To truly foster innovation, companies could create independent startups using their employees. This way, the employees have ownership and a real stake in success, which drives real innovation.

Writing Useful Performance Reviews: Making A Raise Recommendation

0 implied HN points • 02 Jun 24
💼 Business Management Human Resources Leadership Compensation
  1. Performance reviews are really important for discussing raises. Managers need to be fair and thoughtful about how they recommend salary increases.
  2. Salary decisions usually have to fit within a company's budget. Managers should understand how their recommendations affect the overall budget and be realistic.
  3. Different companies have various systems for raising salaries. Some use fixed models to reduce bias, while others have more flexibility based on performance.

Writing Useful Performance Reviews: Evaluating the data and writing the review

0 implied HN points • 19 May 24
💼 Business Management Performance Leadership Human Resources Data Analysis
  1. Collect all relevant data before writing a performance review. This includes past reviews, feedback, and notes so you have a complete view of the person's performance.
  2. Be clear and honest when writing the review. Avoid vague language or trying to balance out negatives with positives; it’s important for the person to understand their true performance.
  3. After writing the reviews, check for patterns or biases. Make sure each review makes sense and supports your conclusions about each person's performance.

Building a Management Training Curriculum at Avvo

0 implied HN points • 10 Mar 24
💼 Business Management Training Leadership Corporate culture Organizational development
  1. Involving everyone in the management training process makes them feel included and valued. It's better to gather ideas from the team instead of simply giving them a top-down list.
  2. The group can identify essential leadership qualities through discussion and voting. This opens up conversations and helps everyone agree on what qualities are most important for their roles.
  3. After deciding on key qualities, self-assessment can help managers identify their strengths and areas for improvement. This shared understanding can guide the future training curriculum.

Big day today!

0 implied HN points • 04 Mar 24
📚 Literature Books Authors Publishing Writing Reading
  1. The book is now available globally in different formats like e-book, hardcover, and softcover.
  2. An audiobook version will be released soon.
  3. If people enjoy the newsletter and podcast content, they are encouraged to buy a copy of the book.

Delivering Performance Reviews

0 implied HN points • 22 Jan 24
💼 Business Management Leadership Human Resources Workplace culture
  1. Performance reviews are crucial conversations in a person's career, so it's important to deliver them effectively. The way feedback is given can deeply affect how the employee feels and reacts.
  2. Prepare for the review by having all relevant data and allowing the employee time to read their review beforehand. This helps reduce stress and makes the conversation more meaningful.
  3. After the review, follow up with a note summarizing key points and agreed-upon growth plans. Regular check-ins can help maintain focus on goals and improvements.

Welcome to the It Depends / Nimble Autonomy newsletter

0 implied HN points • 02 Jan 24
💼 Business Leadership Management Strategy Career development Startups
  1. Taking time for personal strategy is important. Setting a day aside to think and plan can help you focus on your goals without distractions.
  2. Reflect on your past experiences and what you’ve learned to create effective plans. This means considering what worked well and what didn’t in your team and work before and during any big changes.
  3. Building a regular practice of strategic thinking helps you stay adaptable. It’s good to revisit your plans regularly and adjust them based on new insights or changes in your situation.

Fail Safe, Fail Smart… Succeed! (Part 3 of 3)

0 implied HN points • 30 Jul 24
🕹 Technology Software Development Cloud Computing Microservices Product Management DevOps
  1. It's important to expect failure in technology work. Today, we design systems with the understanding that things can go wrong at any moment.
  2. Building small, separate services helps manage problems better. If one part fails, it doesn't ruin the whole system, making the user experience smoother.
  3. Learning from failures is key to improvement. When mistakes happen, analyzing them without blame leads to better results in the future.

Taking A Thoughtful Approach To The Job Search Process

0 implied HN points • 21 Apr 24
💼 Business Job search Career development Leadership Recruitment Self-assessment
  1. When searching for a job, it's important to know what you want. Take time to think about the qualities and values that matter to you in a workplace.
  2. Creating a structured process can help you evaluate job opportunities better. Write down your priorities and use them to ask smart questions during interviews.
  3. Having clear criteria lets you make confident decisions. It helps you say no to jobs that aren't a good fit and accept offers that meet your needs.

The Spotify Model

0 implied HN points • 11 Feb 24
💼 Business Management Leadership Organizational Culture Team Dynamics Innovation
  1. The Spotify model allows teams to be created, dissolved, and mixed to stay flexible and innovative. This helps companies quickly respond to new opportunities without major disruptions.
  2. Chapter Leads manage individuals across different teams instead of managing teams directly. This allows for better skill matching and helps team members grow by working on various projects.
  3. Failing is part of learning. In the Spotify model, teams celebrate when they realize their mission isn't needed, as it teaches valuable lessons and encourages experimentation.

Fail Safe, Fail Smart… Succeed! (Part 1 of 3)

0 implied HN points • 28 Jul 24
💼 Business Leadership Innovation Failure Culture Technology
  1. Failure is a normal part of innovation and can actually lead to success. When you fail, you learn important lessons that can help you do better next time.
  2. To succeed, it's not about avoiding failure but about how you manage it. Creating an environment where small failures happen safely can help your team grow.
  3. Don't punish people for failing. Instead, encourage them to learn from their mistakes. Rewarding risk-taking can lead to more innovation and creativity.

Changing Hiring Practices to Build a More Diverse Technology Organization

0 implied HN points • 25 Feb 24
💼 Business Diversity Hiring Technology Leadership Inclusion
  1. It's important to change hiring practices to increase diversity in technology. This can be done by removing bias from candidate tracking and focusing on diverse hiring strategies.
  2. Improving the interview process helps attract a wider range of candidates. Making adjustment, like removing coding challenges, can make it easier for diverse candidates to participate.
  3. Building partnerships with organizations that support underrepresented groups can help companies become more visible and credible in their diversity efforts. Regular community engagement also builds trust and awareness.

Building a vernacular with your engineering team

0 implied HN points • 24 Mar 24
🕹 Technology Engineering Communication Team Building Leadership Culture
  1. Team members often use unique words and phrases that create a special language called vernacular. This helps communicate quickly and effectively within the group.
  2. Different interpretations of the same words can cause confusion and slow down teamwork, so it's important to clarify meanings and have a shared understanding.
  3. Creating a glossary of team-specific terms can help everyone stay on the same page. Updating this as new terms come in keeps the team united and aligned.

Protecting your team from layoffs

0 implied HN points • 29 Jan 24
💼 Business Management Leadership Human Resources Workplace culture Employee Relations
  1. Focus on what's important for the company. Always align your team's work with company priorities to stay relevant.
  2. Make sure your top performers get recognized. Highlight their achievements to boost visibility and keep your team strong.
  3. Don't hesitate to let go of low performers. It benefits both the team and the individual, and helps to maintain a positive environment.