🐄 Interim CTOs, a Safety Ecosystem, Viable Systems Models, Mediation, Managing Up, a Fence? TMW #287 by CTO Craft
Hi there, welcome to the week!
A reminder that we'll be back in London this week for our first Bytes London event in nearly 5 years. It's going to be a great event, and if you've toyed with the idea of taking interim or fractional CTO roles, you won't want to miss it. The session will be recorded, so don't worry if you're not able to attend or aren't in London - you'll be able to catch up. A huge thanks to Albany Partners and all the amazing panelists.
Don't forget we're always starting new Circles - there are now nearly 200 Circle members, in Europe, Africa and America. If you'd like to have a chat, just drop me a reply here!
Until we meet again
Andy @ CTO Craft
CTO Craft Bytes
Bytes London: Plotting The Interim CTO Path, Thu 8 Sep 2022 at 18:00 in Holborn, London
We’re thrilled to be hosting our first in person event after a long hiatus.
Alongside Albany Partners, we’ll be hosting a panel discussion featuring Meri Williams - legendary CTO and NED, Alfonso Ferrandez - fractional CTO and co-founder at UREGO, and David Mackey - Director of Interim at Albany Partners.
Reads of the Week
Building Your Team’s Safety Ecosystem
Five experiments for establishing team psychological safety. Odds are you’ve heard the term “psychological safety” before and know it’s an important component of a functioning team.
What Distinguishes Great Software Engineers?
This week I read What Distinguishes Great Software Engineers?, a paper by Microsoft researchers Paul Luo Li, Amy J. Ko, and Andrew Begel. This research study sought to identify the most important attributes that distinguish great engineers.
From our Sponsors
Women in Web3 and Blockchain Webinar - from Lohika
The Lohika Re:think event series features experts and leading thinkers in technology and innovation. The latest event features a panel of women leaders who will discuss current and future trends in Web3 and blockchain technology.
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, Albany Partners, Code Climate, Google Cloud, iTechArt, Jellyfish, LinearB, Lohika, 101 Ways, O’Reilly, PGS Software, Pentalog, Skiller Whale, Steamhaus, Swarmia, YLD
Culture & People
The Viable Systems Model, and where my team fits
A viable system continues to function in a changing environment. We want our companies—and some teams—to be sustainable this way. How does your team contribute? Does your team have all the components of a viable system… and should it?
Improving Trust to Enable Fast Flow
Discussions of how to deliver software faster are ubiquitous in our communities. There’s a lot of noise around processes and organizational structures, but not much around improving trust as an enabler for fast flow.
How I structure my teams for growth
Having worked in a number of scale-ups in the last 10 years, there are a few principles I have adopted for scaling Tech and Product teams. The first one, is to organize teams to be cross-functional.
Why Employee Mediations Fail — and How to Get Them Back on Track
Here’s a hypothetical scenario. Maybe you can relate. Two department heads are leading a project for a tech startup on the cusp of exponential growth. They don’t get along. In fact, they have never gotten along. And working in close contact has exacerbated their problems.
Leadership & Self-management
Expert Advice for Managing Up at Work from Great Leaders
How can I look good to my boss? How do I stay on the same page as them?
How to Help Your Team’s Performance Stand Out For Better Recognition
You care about your team and the work they’re doing. They’re working hard. And if they’re like so many teams we work with, they yearn for better recognition. They want to know their work matters and that you (and your boss) appreciate all they do.
Planning for Project Deadlines so You Can Sleep at Night
I’ve led many projects with deadlines over my career, but one stands out from how much I learned about planning. My team needed to redesign all five applications within three months. The problem was the sheer amount of work.
How to Give Bad News
If you run teams for long enough, you’re going to need to give people bad news. No matter the situation, there are some universal steps on how to give bad news.
Agile, Engineering & Product
What do the British writer and his fence have to do with Software Architecture?
Gilbert Keith Chesterton was a British writer from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. As for his times, we would call him an influencer or a maven. He had a lot of opinions and did not hesitate to share them.
Ask HN: Location based pay is killing my motivation, how do others handle it?
I've raised this issue with my manager and they've told me that I can transfer if i want those pay scales but that's not a possibility for me. If the company is willing to pay me that amount in a different location, why can't it pay me the same here?
That’s it!
If you’d like to be considered for the free CTO Craft Community, fill in your details here, and we’ll be in touch!
https://ctocraft.com/community
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Have an amazing week!
Andy