🥯 Cloud Nativity, Structure vs Process, Improving Remote Work, Coaching, OKRs, Project Risks: TMW #273 by CTO Craft
Howdy everyone!
It's a bumper issue this week, so just a short intro. Don't forget to join our Slack community if you'd like to be the first to hear about all the other free activities and resources CTO Craft has to offer!
Until next time
Andy @ CTO Craft
For CTOs, the Total Cost of Ownership Sits at the Heart of Strategy - Part 2
We delve further into the total cost of ownership, how and why CTOs will approach it differently, hidden costs and how to prepare for it.
CTO Craft Bytes
Migrate and Modernise with Cloud Native on AWS, Fri 8 Jul 2022 at 12:30 BST
This panel discussion is brought to you by CTO Craft. You will hear strategies and customer stories that can help you learn how to modernise your people, processes, and applications to take full advantage of cloud native architectures on AWS.
Reads of the Week
The Structure and Process Fallacy
What’s your feeling when reading that quote? Are you strongly in agreement, generally in agreement, or perhaps you’re shaking your head in disagreement? The quote reflects a sentiment I notice from leaders in top-down, hierarchical organizations.
Operating Well: What I Learned at Stripe
Over the last few years, I’ve grown from a fine to a good operator. Some of these lessons I learned by watching some great operators during my time at Stripe, and some I learned the hard way. Operating well is a state, not an outcome.
About our Sponsors
Thanks as always to the amazing sponsors helping CTO Craft bring you resources like this newsletter, our events, community and more:
AWS, CircleCI, Code Climate, O’Reilly, Pentalog, Skiller Whale, The Software House, iTechArt, LinearB, Lohika, Albany Partners, 101 Ways, PGS Software, YLD, Steamhaus, Swarmia
Culture & People
Being a great remote manager
On this page, we're detailing considerations for being an excellent remote manager. Many traits found in superb remote managers are also found in managers of colocated teams, though there are nuances to serving, leading, and guiding when managing teams that you do not see in-person each day.
The Platform and Program Split at Uber
In the spring of 2014, Uber’s Chief Product Officer, Jeff Holden, sent an email to the tech team. The changes outlined in this email would change how engineering operated and shape the culture for years to come.
A 5-Step Response to Employee Concerns About Work-Life Balance
Experienced leaders are coming to grips with a younger workforce that wants more out of life than working long stressful hours. Stressed employees want to minimize pressure. Leaders feel pressure to do more with less.
Celebrate Learning From Failures (With Champagne!)
We recently held a brainstorming session at our office for the newest on-demand course for the Academy—one about the concept of Psychological Safety. During the session, we discussed how one of the things you can do to create psychological safety is to embrace failure instead of avoiding it.
How to Transform Your Remote Communication with Images and Videos
We were going to our offices. In-person meetings were the norm, you could quickly pop into someone’s office for a chat, and “working from home” was something you only did out of necessity. Now, it’s not just me working from home. It’s not even just our company.
Leadership & Self-management
Is one-minute management still relevant in 2022?
Can today’s overwhelmed managers be effective leaders with management theories from 40 years ago? They certainly can. It’s all about communication.
Can this ownership exercise improve how you work with others?
When you’re working in a group, you need to know how to coordinate. Coordination requires a shared understanding of how everyone will work together. Most human groups define Roles. Roles help clarify boundaries and expectations for people working together.
Leadership Advice From a Shy Kid
On a bright summer day, six-year-old me jumped on a trampoline under a vast, blue sky as my mom stood by. Suddenly, I stopped jumping. When my mom asked me why I pointed to a stranger standing close by. I wanted nothing to do with strangers. I wanted to hide.
3 common myths of coaching (and what’s true instead)
Coaching is a leadership superpower. Coaching saves you time. It helps you delegate. It improves performance, builds capability and helps tap into everyone’s creative process. It’s also pretty good for organisational performance.
Agile, Engineering & Product
Video: Lean Roadmapping and OKRs — Janna Bastow
Janna’s talk looks at modern roadmapping best practices, including where lean roadmapping came from and how to put it to use in your organization. It covers practical tips on how to move away from old school feature and date driven roadmaps, and how to move your team on to a leaner, more objective-focused track of product management using OKRs (Objectives and Key Results).
Some thoughts on “5 Whys”
When faced with a problem, there’s a general tendency for people to only consider the immediate contributing factors. The “5” in “5 Whys” is a reminder to go beyond shallow attribution and keep exploring underlying causes.
Why an Agile Delivery Model Isn’t Always Enough
An Agile Delivery Model will only take you so far. Many organizations simply go through the motions of Scrum. The teams are diligently having their daily standups, rigorously writing user stories, and dutifully performing a retro at the end of every sprint. Yet, they still fail to improve.
Video: How To Identify and Manage Risks In Software Projects
The 8th Light University Archives Series features engaging, innovative talks featuring 8th Light designers and developers sharing their insights and knowledge. Join as we cultivate a culture of continuous learning. Every software project worth doing comes with risks.
That’s it!
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Have an amazing week!
Andy