The Tech Exec Podcast with Aviv Ben-Yosef: Recent Episodes
Aviv Ben-Yosef
A short discussion of leadership improvements you can start using in your startup today as a technical executive, whether you are a CTO, CIO, VP Engineering, VP R&D, and so on.
Your best people are often those who get the least attention. Thus, you're effectively directing them to out grow the organization and bail on you. Instead, you can be proactive and ensure these precious force-multipliers get the coaching and guiding they need.
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Ever noticed how some executives unintentionally turn their managers into "sock puppets," overriding their decisions and limiting their autonomy? In this episode, I delve into a dangerous phenomenon that many leaders may not even realize they're perpetuating. Let's understand how this stifling behavior can cripple your team's growth and innovation. Want to discover how to empower your managers and transform them from mere placeholders to real leaders? Join me, and let's unpack this eye-opening concept together!
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Ever felt like your team's motivation is in reverse? In this episode, I explore a counterintuitive concept of backward motivation. It's all about understanding the underlying forces that drive your team and how conventional wisdom might be leading you in the wrong direction. Curious to discover a fresh perspective that could transform the way you lead? Tune in!
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Are you guilty of using "proxy leadership" in your team? In this episode, we dive into a common but potentially damaging leadership practice that might be undermining your authority without you even realizing it. Through real-world examples, I'll uncover how this habit can send mixed signals to your team and how to avoid it. Want to become the kind of leader people genuinely look up to and follow? Create career highlights? Then this episode is a must-listen. Join me, and let's grow that leadership muscle together!
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For any questions or comments, reach out to me directly: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
To be an effective leader, you have to choose where you are focusing your efforts. Instead of letting your days be decided by your calendar, happenstance, or merely following the path of least resistance, let's take a couple of minutes to find out the lever that will provide you with the most leverage.
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It's no coincidence that some of the companies most known for their ability to move fast have writing things down deeply ingrained in their cultures. In an era where the concept of writing down a six-pager feels like composing War and Peace, those precious few leaders who take the time to get better at articulating their thoughts become dramatic force-multipliers. Learn how to take your first step towards this superpower in this week's episode!
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There's a simple habit that helps you make sure you are actively forming a team that will be impactful instead of letting things be shaped by happenstance. By doing so, you won't suffer from the dreaded patchy org charts that make little sense or have to combat a flood of requests from your team. Check out this week's episode to learn how to treat your organization as a chessboard.
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For any questions or comments, reach out to me directly: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
Sometimes, your best improvement engine is being aware of the things you've already done. You can also learn to move much more quickly when you can assess whether something is genuinely a crisis or just the fire du jour. Check out this week's quick episode to learn how to reassess your mess.
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is out! Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35.
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When we fail to consider things correctly, we just might end up like those cliché characters in movies that waste time and let opportunities slip by as they keep waiting for something that'll never happen. Are you aligned with what really matters when making important decisions?
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is out! Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35.
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Sometimes, the burden of all you've accomplished can hold you back from what you have to do next. What got you here won't get you there, and being vulnerable is required. This week's episode is about freeing yourself to improve yourself.
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is out! Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35.
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It's sometimes hard to realize that things have to change just to keep going, but that's actually a sign of healthy progress. Nothing in life is static, and in the long term you're either getting better or worse. The lesson of the pool principle in this week's episode will help you strike the right balance.
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is available for preorder. Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35.
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Sometimes, you don't need to do anything grand. You just need to do something small but consistently and well. Before you know it, you'll be positioned ahead and others will be left wondering what happened. This week's episode is about consistency and a couple of celebrations.
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is available for preorder. Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35. After you purchase one, LMK and you'll be entitled to a free webinar about the principles of the book. More info here: capitalizing.tech
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A classic sign of success at startups is when the business growth goes "up and to the right." However, we seem to have gotten confused and many tech teams are scaling the same. This was always important, but is currently more relevant than ever: you should drive for profitable R&D growth. Are you there? How can you unlock it? Find out more about it in this week's episode.
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is available for preorder. Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35. After you purchase one, LMK and you'll be entitled to a free webinar about the principles of the book. More info here: capitalizing.tech
Join the Leading Edge Club!
Subscribe to the best newsletter for tech executives.
For any questions or comments, reach out to me directly: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
Welcome to the easy-money tech industry where roles are made up and org charts don't matter. Oh, what was that? We're no longer in easy-money mode? Then it's about time you learn how to judge when a new role is justified and when it's just a sign of your own laziness. Check out this week's episode for more!
My new book, Capitalizing Your Technology to Disrupt and Dominate Your Markets, is available for preorder. Check out Amazon (currently 45% off for Kindle version!!), or get 20% off at the Routledge site directly with code SMA35. After you purchase one, LMK and you'll be entitled to a free webinar about the principles of the book. More info here: capitalizing.tech
Join the Leading Edge Club!
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For any questions or comments, reach out to me directly: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
Take it or leave it? Nope, life's more analog than that. If you learn to find the spectrum of options, you can help your entire organization find new solutions and uncover win-win situations. More in this week's episode.
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What you think actually matters. Probably even more than you think. Today's short episode is about unleashing your expertise.
Join me for on a free live session about my upcoming book, including Q&A. Sign up here.
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Where has a decade of advancements gotten you? Are you now leading a team that's that much better, or have you gotten too cozy and comfy where you're at?
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How can you tell if you're suffering from high turnover, and how do you address it? Given how expensive it is to recruit talented tech people, ensuring you keep turnover at a healthy level is vital, just like any SaaS keeps track of its churn rate.
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How can you tell if you're suffering from high turnover, and how do you address it? Given how expensive it is to recruit talented tech people, ensuring you keep turnover at a healthy level is vital, just like any SaaS keeps track of its churn rate.
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For any questions or comments, reach out to me directly: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
When a team seems to be busy doing things that don't make sense, you cannot just blame that team. What is your role in their impact drift? Why do people rarely realize they're straying off the right path? That and more in this week's podcast.
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Companies operating as if it's the Wild West are bad, and so are those with big, cumbersome processes. But you know what's worse? Merely going through the motions. And too many companies are doing just that. Find out more in this week's short episode.
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Sometimes, you have to stand outside of arm's reach. Otherwise, your team is always going to use you as a crutch. Learn how to help them make a leap of faith to unlock their potential and autonomy in this week's seven-minute episode!
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Expanding a mind is a one-way street. Use that to your advantage! It means that every step towards making your employees more "well rounded" is a gain that will never be lost. More details on this mindset in this week's short episode.
Join me for a free live session with Q&A: You Don’t Need a “Tech Strategy”. Register here.
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Ding! Another quarter is gone. How is annoying my wife on vacation connected to teams with a sense of urgency? You're going to have to listen to this one to find out!
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Are you moving out of your comfort zone or just digging in deeper? There are two parts to realizing and improving that across your organization, and I share both in this week's episode in under eight minutes.
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Are you moving out of your comfort zone or just digging in deeper? There are two parts to realizing and improving that across your organization, and I share both in this week's episode in under eight minutes.
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Many aren't simply given roles and responsibilities. Does that mean you should spend your career floating with a wraith? No, you can take your personal growth into your own hands. Find out more in this week's episode!
- Peter Pan Employees
- Stop Being a Floating Leader
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Many aren't simply given roles and responsibilities. Does that mean you should spend your career floating with a wraith? No, you can take your personal growth into your own hands. Find out more in this week's episode!
- Peter Pan Employees
- Stop Being a Floating Leader
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For any questions or comments, reach out to me directly: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
Do you have enough people who speak up in your organization? Nostradamus might have been a bit of a party pooper, but you can create more yestradamuses that make your entire company better and call you out on your baloney. More about that in this week's episode.
If you enjoy these, you'll love my short weekly videos. Check them out!
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Are you one to automatically deject any incoming changes? In this episode, I share three tips for becoming more of a cheese mover, as well as why you should care.
If you enjoy these, you'll love my short weekly videos. Check them out!
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What can we learn from tapas restaurants about innovation in our business? This week's episode is about sustainable disruption and lessons from Barcelona's garlic shrimp 🧄🦐 tapas!
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Start standing behind your principles. The easy route is to agree to everything, but the only path to success requires managing up if necessary, to ensure that the organization you lead is one you are accountable for. Find out more in this week's episode about claiming your turf.
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Are you waiting too long? Are you actively spoiling what you have?
In this episode, we'll quickly recap a surefire way to accelerate the burnout in your team. Is that what you're doing? Now you can recognize it and stop. Stop turning good wine into vinegar. Cheers!
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Action items are a dime a dozen. How about actually doing the action?
When your word doesn't mean much, you can't get anything substantial done. More on crafting cultures of execution in this week's episode!
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For effective meetings, you should go in with an agenda. For an effective leadership role, you should have an agenda, too!
Do you know what 2-4 problems are top of mind for you? And I'm not talking about delivering the roadmap…
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Customer Success success. That's not a glitch in the matrix—that's what you should be telling your R&D team. This week's episode is about
creating a win-win-win that gives you short-term benefits as well as tremendous long-term improvements on your road to triple-impact-per-
engineer. That's all in five minutes. Surely that's better than scrolling Linkedln?
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When there's an issue with an unhappy employee, many leaders succumb to external motivation tricks. A pay raise, titles, that sort of stuff. Too bad it simply doesn't work. How can you help your team align intrinsic motivation with your company's direction? Tune in to this week's episode!
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When we cross the line from managing debt to stealing time from the company! Has your team settled on a setup that feels nice but actually means you're avoiding some of the most critical conversations? And who said they've got too much time on their hands? All that and more in this week's episode.
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2022 is 50% over. Are you on track to make this a fantastic year? I share a handful of retrospective prompts I use with my clients in this quick episode.
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At least until we get neural links in all conference rooms, you can't expect to get things if you don't ask for them. This week's three-minute episode is all about asking and why I prefer teams where people state their "asks" as opposed to being "polite."
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Do you really have autonomy, or are you, in fact, just playing by yourself at the little kids' table? Sometimes we have a Lord of the Flies situation going on and we fail to realize that. That's not how you create a team aligned for impact. More on that in this week's episode!
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Are you an order taker or a leader? If you want to have a tangible impact on the business, you have to think business. More on that and upgrading yourself in this week's episode.
Last call this week: Join me at the London Leadership Leap!
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Let's talk about what's happening around us. Are you back out yet? Are you getting things done in the real world? This week's six-minute episode is about the three ways you should be considering meatspace and how it can help you.
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Everyone makes mistakes. I made at least five so far today. What are you doing about it? This short episode is about admitting to mistakes and how we treat others that make mistakes.
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Coding lore says we shouldn't repeat ourselves. Sometimes we should. Sometimes we should! This week's episode is all about effectively repeating messages. Wouldn't you like meetings to have checksums, so you knew everyone got the message?
Check out the London Leadership Leap: An exclusive masterclass for tech executives who want to propel themselves to newer heights, dramatically improve their performance, and start on the path to triple impact-per-engineer.
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If you're trying to ensure that everything is bolted down before starting your journey, you'll eventually realize you never really get going. I'm here to share what I see in hundreds of teams and help you put aside some insecurities or unattainable standards. This six-minute episode covers an issue that often ruins teams' momentum.
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You are likely optimizing your team's time incorrectly. Sometimes giving things more time will create better results. When? Tune in to this week's six-minute episode to find out.
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Are you acting with a foot out the door? We might unconsciously be avoiding all sorts of difficult decisions or not thinking big enough. Ideally, this shouldn't be an issue. But we don't live in an ideal world. What should you do? Three guidelines in this week's episode, along with a special announcement!
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For changes to stick, your people really have to own them. There's only so much that you can push by yourself, and there's also a ceiling when it comes to how quickly an organization can grow and learn without buy-in. This week's short episode is about cultivating ownership in your organization, be it for sprint tasks or bigger cultural changes.
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Hey, it's just a startup, right? You're not supposed to have a vision a year into the future! Or should you?
This short episode covers what a vision can look like, why it's essential for innovation and empowerment, and how you should work toward it.
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Someone made a mistake, and you're all wound up. Whatcha gonna do? If your knee-jerk reaction is to jump to conclusions and spot all the mistakes others have made in their stupidity, perhaps you need to cool off. In this seven-minute episode we talk about a simple technique that has helped me since my army days and that's used by coaches worldwide that will help you provide better feedback.
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As I work more with CEOs and CPOs, I see that we tend to view our counterparts in black and white. How about some color? If you want to create a culture where real collaboration happens, we have to drop the adversarial mindset. Find out more in this week's seven-minute episode!
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Let's talk about things like adults. Your team can discuss code structure or tabs vs. spaces for ages, not to mention politics or sports. Why don't we expect at least the same when it comes to meaningful culture-shaping discussions?
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Your team's doing good, but how about you? If you fail to grow as fast as your team, you're going to be left behind. Find out more in this week's six minute episode!
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Sometimes, going with the momentum is bad, especially for you, personally. In this week, I share advice about a problem I've seen spiking recently, along with diagnostics for telling whether it applies to you and if you are suffering from momentum keeping you where you are.
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You're not afraid of your own accountability, but are you holding your team accountable? Or are you overprotecting and coddling them needlessly? Life's too short to be little, and there's only one route to triple impact-per-engineer. More in this week's six-minute episode!
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Pop It's time that you go outside of your little cocoon and see what is going on around you. Too often, executives are isolating themselves from their ability to receive candid feedback, or get enough data points to tell how well they and their team really are doing. Let's fix that.
We're never really gonna be done. I know we talk a lot about the definition of done, but there's no doneness in our line of work. Can you accept that? Do you realize how short your life is? There is a possible life and career-altering message in this week's episode, which is only six minutes!
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It is counterintuitive for many leaders to realize that they have to prioritize themselves for the rest of the team to be effective. Don't be so humble that you undermine your own growth and therefore, your capability to help the team around you perform at its best. This week's episode is all about learning where you need to put your ego aside, stop considering what others might think, and choose your own growth first.
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As you gain more altitude in your role, you should use the better vision that comes with it. Some things that looked like impassable obstacles previously are, in fact, a lot more flexible. Learn how to spot these to increase your own efficacy and remain impact-focused.
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If you're feeling like all the wind has been knocked out of you as you're approaching another challenge, consider finding the bright spots first. Doing that means that you can easily get three advantages on your way to achieving your goals and empower other people as you're doing it. Check out this week's episode for more, and get a chance to win a signed copy of The Tech Executive Operating System!
- Switch
- Leveling the Bar
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Sometimes we've got to grow up. Leadership requires a sober perspective in order to be able to choose your fights correctly. All of that in this week's episode, along with a way to win a signed copy of The Tech Executive Operating System!
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Hiring people is probably taking up a significant portion of your and your managers' time. Are you doing it correctly? Setting the right priorities is crucial to create a culture that optimizes for impact-per-engineer as opposed to just having more butts in seats. Check out this week's episode for more.
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This week's episode is a quick coaching session to help you achieve more. Are you overwhelmed facing never-ending to-do lists and trying to juggle many balls in the air? Sometimes, all you need is permission to drop a few things. Let's do that together.
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Immutability is all the rage in tech, but that's where it should be left. Leaders who don't translate their learnings into real changes let their organizations slowly grind to a halt. How can you stop that? Lucky you, I covered that in less than eight minutes in this week's episode.
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Some critical aspects make the difference between a glorified manager and a genuine executive. One of them is realizing how you can kick off company-wide initiatives. Tune in to this week's episode and learn in six minutes about a skill that can set you apart and help you make 2022 ridiculously successful.
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Are you leading your people, or are you more of a driving instructor? Everyone nowadays seems afraid of doing too much thinking, where I can testify most of you aren't thinking enough! Check out this week's episode to learn about the right planning balance for your team.
- Myopic Leadership
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They say that when you don't know where you're heading, no wind is a good wind. Are you a directionless CTO? It can be the course of technical cofounders to realize that they are no longer providing as much impact on the company as they used to. How can you tell whether you're in such a spot, and what should you do about it? Tune in to this week's episode!
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Tech debt doesn't have to be something we're afraid of. Let's tackle an issue that is often a point of contention between R&D teams and the executive team. Can you create the right alignment here in order to add a new capability to your arsenal and enable the company to achieve clarity faster? Tune in to this week's episode to find out.
Last call to join my new workshop: Are We Doing Good?
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Is your common sense filter too sensitive? Are you listening to that little nagging voice in your too often? This week's episode is all about embracing the simplicities of life and how we tend to miss out on opportunities to do things the straightforward way. Tune in for a couple of takeaways that will make you a better leader and save your team valuable time.
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It's OKR season, but are you doing it right? In this week's episode, I go through the most common OKR pitfalls that I'm seeing around and how to address them. I also have a special offer for you to make sure that you use them properly next year and learn how to measure your team for effectiveness and impact. Tune in to find out more.
Early bird tickets for my new workshop, “Are We Doing Good? Measuring yourself and your organization,” are still available.
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How much is an hour of your time really worth? If you want to get more meaningful work done, you have to think about how you spend your days. We all have just 24 hours a day, yet some get more impactful work done every week. Tune in to this week's episode to hear why.
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Sometimes your team's definition of success might be setting them up to fail. The way we think about our roles and our tasks can be a hindrance, or it can be a catalyst. It's up to you to ensure the right alignment. Tune in to this week's episode to find out more.
- Failing Spectacularly
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When you don't know where you're headed, no wind is a good wind. In this episode, we tackle the main archetypes of the tech executive role, how to choose where you should be aiming your focus, and why it affects the team around you as well.
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Being responsible with your budget doesn't mean that you cannot use the same creativity you'd use when tackling any other problem. As we're in budgeting season, make sure to avoid these three common pitfalls and set yourself up for success in 2022.
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Your leverage relies on your ability to ensure you're not getting sucked into day-to-day minutiae. Many executives need to reevaluate where their time is being invested as they grow with their organizations. Here's an exercise my clients have found useful in the past for spotting the best opportunities to delegate some more.
- Guidelines, Not Solutions
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Why do you even bother with a big rewrite? Is there a customer that will pay you more for having happier engineers? In this episode, I cover the difference in thinking about the same problem when I ask the CTO as opposed to the CEO. Tune in and learn why it matters and how to align your mindset better—in seven minutes.
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If you build it but no one knows, will they come? This week's podcast episode is about the common issues that arise when we're playing it humble and fails to make our work visible and public. Making sure people know what you're doing doesn't mean that you're just trying to get credit! Tune in and let me know what you think.
- The Micromanagement Flywheel
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Sometimes doubling down on the way you thought things should work is just throwing good money after bad. How is a missed PCR test similar to executives falling down a rabbit hole? Check out this week's quick episode to learn how to spot tunnel vision even when you don't have a coach to help you notice it.
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Phil Karlton said, "There are only two hard things in Computer Science: cache invalidation and naming things." In this episode, I'm not going to be talking about cache invalidation, but about the art of naming parts of your organization correctly. How can names rob teams of agency? Or be used as a weapon by others in the company? And is Galadriel a good name for a team? Tune in to find out.
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Does being an executive necessarily mean that you have to manage a sizable organization in your company? In this episode, I share examples of the LEAP responsibilities that define tech executives and how a different mixture of them can help you go down the right career path. And that's all in six minutes!
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Too often, we're treating work planning the wrong way around. Rather than letting the effort estimates control the conversation, we should use time to our advantage. Check out the concept of value boxing and how it can improve your R&D ROI in this week's episode.
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At different points in time, every engineer tends more towards the tech or the product ends of the spectrum. In this episode, I cover this concept from The Tech Executive Operating System and talk about the healthy composition for your organization.
- Product Mastery
- Growing Growth Mindsets
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Summer's here. Let's use it to flesh out some patches and hacks in your organization. In this episode, I discuss the vacation test and the hall test, which I regularly use with my clients to evaluate whether they are operating as genuine executives. Two tests in seven minutes. Let's get to it!
- Default responses and guidelines
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I say at the beginning of episodes that I'm helping you triple impact-per-engineer. What does it mean, actually? Let's break down the holy grail of the 10x engineer and picture together what you should be after.
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Sprucing up your organization's innovation quotient and lubricating your serendipity by introducing some entropy. This week on the Tech Exec Podcast, we cover a hiring crutch that you might not be aware of and the adverse effects it can have on your team in the long term.
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Here's an impactful tactic with an incredible ROI to make your management team better: Let's take what works well for other professions and do it for management as well! This week, I share an example of "leveling the bar" across your leadership staff.
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Let's talk about your personal role in what is going on around you. Our gut instinct is to distance ourselves from issues and problems. "The CEO is capricious," "Product is unprofessional," and "the team is burned out." I pity people who go through entire careers like this, sitting there and pointing fingers. In pretty much every company I've worked with, people had more agency than they realized and used. Let's make it personal and help you change things up.
- Episode 100: 100 Leadership Lessons
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Celebrating the 100th episode with 100 lessons picked from the previous episodes. Thank you to the tens of thousands of listeners worldwide for your support. Let me know which of these lessons is your favorite!
A lot of these lessons are covered at length in my book, The Tech Executive Operating System.
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Join me to hear the story about the VP that knew it all, except for how to use his knowledge. This short episode is about researching ourselves out needlessly. I believe it's the first episode where I ask you to unsubscribe!
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Wondering what an algorithm I read about as a teenager has to do with your day-to-day as an executive? This week I enlighten you with how feedback might get lost in the way and how that can lead to chafing away at the trust that is core to the work relationships in your organization.
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Are you making your team's creativity muscles slow atrophy? Are you genuinely proud of the fact you had a two-day hackathon this year? In this week's episode, I talk about what my clients call "the bonanza"—the concept of regular intermissions that turn creativity from buzzword to habit.
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- Hackathons are a Hack
- Intermissions blog post
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Let's take someone with no experience and put them in charge of mission-critical systems. Did I make you cringe? Then this episode's the one for you. The experience pressure cooker allows us to accelerate the team's growth dramatically, and it just so happens that you likely have all that it takes to implement it.
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The Tech Executive Operating System
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Do you have a team of managers focusing on success, or do you have a zoo exhibiting all different types of management possible? Successfully bringing your team to the next level requires a management team that you can rely on. That rarely happens without the effort to define the role of management in your company or with the typical hodgepodge types of "leadership" in startups. In this episode, I help you take control of your menagerie!
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- Peter Pan Employees
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Is your organization just one big happy family? You know it isn't. Unfortunately, however, more and more leaders are using this false language, which ends up being treated as lip service and eroding trust or making people misaligned. In this episode, I talk about establishing organizational debt and trying to work around it.
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Are you playing find the loophole whenever you are presented with a new idea? Executives often default to the patterns of thinking that served them well in their hands-on days but have become a burden. How should you adjust your thinking to enable an abundance mindset? Check out this week's short episode.
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Life's too short for average. Yet, it seems like we're letting ourselves get out of bed every day to lead an average team and get average results. Let's stop it.
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Principal and staff engineers are so 2020. Are you cultivating product engineers? To forge a world-class engineering team, you should help your best people become attuned with what really matters. In this quick episode, I share three tips to set you off on the right path.
- Product Mastery episode
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Are you idly waiting for little issues to become emergencies, or are you striking preemptively where needed? Leadership involves the art of assessing and taking the right sorts of risks. Nevertheless, effective risk management sometimes involves ensuring the risk doesn't manifest. In this episode, I cover the art of counterstrikes.
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Let's make a bias we're all suffering from more explicit. We tend to hold others to different standards. That can cause some work relationships to suffer needlessly, and it can also harm personal growth. By understanding the theory of relativity (no equations in this episode), you can unlock better accountability and cooperation. All that in a short episode!
- Developer First Tech Leadership Conference
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What lessons can you learn from the onboarding Best Buy's CEO arranged for himself? And how does that connect your personal operating system when leading an engineering org to excellence? That's what this week's episode is all about.
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Time is a crucial part of making fine wine. But also in running your organization. The theory of relativity has taught us that we can experience time differently. That can happen in your org even without approaching the speed of light, and you should be aware of its effect. That and more in this week's episode!
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Do you know that awkward feeling when there's silence? Do you often rush to fill it? Stop it. Shut up!
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🎉 A special celebratory episode: The Tech Executive Operating System is coming out this week! In this quick episode, I answer a frequently asked question: why did I write it?? Also, I share how you can get free videos, webinars, workshops, and even coaching with me by purchasing the book.
- The Tech Executive Operating System early purchase benefits
- Amazon pre-order link
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What 20% of your default knee-jerk reactions are in charge of 80% of the day-to-day issues you're seeing? How can you improve yourself in a manner that helps those around you become better as well? Hear about that and more in less than 10 minutes in this week's episode!
- Why Didn't the Dogs Bark? episode
- The Tech Executive Operating System—coming in a couple of weeks!
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Because I have to learn the ropes with new teams regularly, understand their machinations, and discern where are the problematic areas, I have developed my own heuristics. One of those is finding too many "slam dunks" as an organizational smell. In this episode, I talk about feeling less warm, fuzzy, and comfortable and actually failing the shot once in a while.
- Developer First Tech Leadership Conference
- My YouTube channel
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Learning from past mistakes and continuously improving is a prerequisite for a high-performing team. However, even if you hold effective post-mortems and find the root causes, you might be stopping yourself short of all the issues. Do you regularly consider why weren't the dogs barking, and who are the dogs here anyway? That's what we're talking about in this week's episode!
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Are you walking the walk or merely talking the talk? How have you invested in your personal growth in the last three months? Today's podcast episode is about the huge ROI from self-improvement and ideas to do that today.
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Are you sitting on your hands, waiting for the perfect moment to appear? No one is going to knock on your day and say, "Hey, this looks like a perfect day for a reorg!" This week's episode is all about holding your breath for too long.
- Speed of Change episode
The Tech Executive Operating System coming in April!
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Another approach that you should adopt as a tech executive is taking the lead. Continuing the sneak peeks series to my upcoming book, The Tech Executive Operating System, I discuss the importance of being proactive and making plans—even if they might change—for yourself and your team. Do you want to be a leader, or are you content to continue being merely a glorified manager?
- Letting Go episode
- Floating Leaders episode
- The Executive Mindset
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Your executive toolkit should comprise a few specific approaches, processes, and models. In today's episode, I'm sharing one from my upcoming book, The Tech Executive Operating System: how to let go. To do your best work, you should aim to outgrow the pace your company is growing, or the company will outgrow you. Tune in to find out more.
- Developer First Tech Leadership Conference
- Million Dollar Consulting® Hall of Fame
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Sometimes, all we need in order to have a breakthrough is not to have the ability to do whatever we'd like. Surprisingly, having or settings constraints on the possible solutions can induce a big spur of creativity. In this episode, I discuss the art of setting boundaries to accelerate your organization's Speed of Change: if Intel could pivot the business in two weeks, why do you need a month to decide on a service for sending out emails?
- Speed of Change episode
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An epidemic for managers and leaders all around is busywork. If your default answer to "what's up?" is "busy busy busy,"—this episode's for you. We delve into reluctant delegation, the lazy tradeoff that you're making right now to the dismay of your future self, and how to make time to think. Stop serving the calendar.
- The Calendar Reset episode
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You want to amass technical assets rather than be consumed with handling your tech debt. One key element in achieving that is fostering a culture of Coders Without Borders—one of the axioms of leadership from my upcoming book, The Tech Executive Operating System. In this episode, I break down what this means, provide you with real examples from my clients for how this looks, and list out a couple of first steps to start working toward achieving this.
- Engineering Force Multipliers
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Are your views and ideas constantly challenged, or are you surrounded by people who cannot help but think the same or are afraid of speaking up? Burst out of your bubble. Learn how bubbles are formed, how it hurts your organization in the long run, and how to fix it. Plus, I've got a very exciting announcement! Tune in to this week's episode.
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What can you do to increase the chances of serendipity happening and increase your executive leverage? If you sit in your room thinking, "I wish they would have consulted me about that,"—nothing will change. Create the basis for luck and opportunities by using the meeting you already have on your calendar correctly.
- The Calendar Reset
What voids are being formed around you, why your team is sometimes like sponges, why your management team is on the catwalk, and what's the law of culture accumulation? All that in this week's spiffy and short episode.
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No one would argue against innovation, novelty, and creativity being employed in your team. Nevertheless, it can be used in a way that provides no value or even hurts your customers. Sometimes, we're just being clever because it strokes our ego. In some situations, you're better off being boring. That is the topic of this week's episode.
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If you've been following me, surely you've noticed a recurring motif: tech executives do not hold enough sway. This episode's about shuffling things a bit. Sometimes, R&D holds too much power in the organization, even without realizing it. And that power, if not used properly, can burden every planning discussion and stifle any attempt at innovating or trying new things.
- The Executive Mindset
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What can a group of strangers who speak different languages teach us about collaboratively accelerating learning? We all know the saying about standing on the shoulders of giants. However, we can improve and learn together as a team, no giants required. This week's episode uses a tale from a long-forgotten universe to teach a lesson you can use with your team today.
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If you're taking ownership over an existing organization or want to find the right areas to spend your leadership attention on during 2021, organizational smells help uncover underlying issues. In this episode, I discuss my "org chart debugging" to assess your team's health quickly.
- Cowardly management and shying away
- No Perfect Reorg
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My definition of seniority for engineers sometimes surprises people. To build a highly capable team that stays effective as it grows, your senior people can not focus solely on their technical proficiency. Seniority means that they should become force multipliers. More on that on this week's episode.
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Executives, especially the best ones who genuinely care about their companies and are involved in many decisions, often have to live with all kinds of decisions being made around them. Frequently, some decisions will not be the right ones in their mind. How do you know where you should stand your ground? How do you pick your battles? This episode is all about that.
- Self-fulfilling prophecies episode
- Moving upstream
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There's a big difference between risk management and a pessimistic "expect the worst" overview. One is the responsible thing to do, while the other will set your team up to fail. More on the importance of your Executive Mindset in this episode.
- Executive Mindset
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Coaching your people vital for your team's growth and long term success. Doing it properly also has a cascading effect that helps you establish what I call a Feedback Culture. In this episode, I discuss a common pitfall to coaching that many executives have.
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It might be Covid taking its toll on me, but I'm through with seeing executives going into personal lockdown and quarantining themselves from the rest of their organization. You can be involved without being a micro-manager—that and more on this week's episode.
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Are you content with your once a quarter hackathon that you post on social media? You shouldn't be. Hackathons too often end up stifling innovation, exactly the opposite of what we are trying to do. In this week's episode, I describe the power of better, more frequent innovation practices, so that you can start creating Tech Capital regularly.
For reading further, check out my series of articles, starting from this one.
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If your team eventually learns that whatever you've committed to might change, like commits in your Git history, you'll lose their commitment as well. In this week's episode, we tackle the issue of nagging questions looping in the back of your head, and the ability to complete actions in a way that builds momentum and trust.
- Fixing Your Decision Waffling
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You cannot keep waiting and equivocating till the thing that's "just right" falls in your lap. Great leaders create their reality and don't twiddle their thumbs, hoping the right opportunity will present itself. That and more in this week's episode!
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Surely you have a definition of done for your team's objectives. What about yourself? Don't sell yourself short and make sure that you use your leverage. All that in this week's super-short episode.
- Peter Pan Count
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Do you ever find yourself saying, "our engineers just don't care about the users" or other things along those lines? In this episode, I tackle the engineering-business connection and help you see your part in fostering the right kind of attitude.
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With great responsibility should come great power. Too often, though, tech executives clam up rather than speak and leverage their position to the fullest. If you want to an effective leader, you have to learn to talk well among your peers. More on this week's episode.
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A question I routinely get is what defines the best executives I work with. The trick is that each executive is different, and still, the best tend to start thinking about the result first—more on that on this week's episode.
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Right now, too many engineers are slowly drifting more towards Tech on the Tech-Product Continuum. You might think that's a good thing to do, due to COVID and all. You'd be wrong. Don't ruin your team. Listen to this week's episode to hear why.
- Intermissions
- Company Generations episode
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Following a question on twitter, I am expanding on why motivation is one of the most important things to look for when hiring or selecting people to invest in. Intrinsic motivation acts as a catalyst that those gifted individuals then use to propel the company forward. More on this week's episode!
- Relevant tweet
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What are the actual differences between managers and executives? Is there anything more to it than the title? What differentiates the best tech executives from the rest? Tune in to this week's episode to find out.
- Moving Upstream
- Managing Non-Feature Work—Part 1
- Floating Leaders episode
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Companies have internal generations that change every 18-36 months. Each generation comes with its own mindset and beliefs. Some companies have to face the generational gap or a lost generation. In this episode, we delve into these definitions and how they can help you lead your team better.
- Getting Rid of Heroes episode
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Creating and cultivating the right culture in your company is an active and purposeful endeavor. It is also not a one-off activity. In this episode, we'll cover the importance of cultivating culture, and the first steps you can make to start creating a resilient culture that will keep serving you as the company matures and changes.
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Leaving your comfort zones, and pushing your team out of them occasionally, is key for the success and growth of a remarkable team. In this episode, we cover some simple examples to start stretching yourself and the rest of the team.
- Product Mastery episode
- Calendar Reset episode
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A floating leader is a leader that's going along aimlessly, wherever the tides go. In this episode, I start with a real story and move on to provide the principles and a self-assessment to help you realize whether you are enough of a driving force in your organization—and how to fix it if you're not.
- Moving Upstream
- Product Mastery
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As a leader, it is worthwhile to consciously realize where your pick-a-fight dial is located by default and decide where it should be. Fighting too much—what I often am brought to help with—is not as problematic as the real issue: they gave up and no longer fight. More about picking your fight in this week's episode!
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Deadlines have burnt many leaders in the past. Then, they give up the use of one of the best tools available to them to propel their teams forward. In this episode, we cover the mistakes on using deadlines, why they are important, and how you can incorporate them today to cultivate growth and push people out of their comfort zones.
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Us techies tend to be opinionated. It gets interesting, though, when we have to make a decision in an area where we do not know a lot and have to solicit input from people around us. That's where you should actively be thinking about the firmness of the opinion you are forming.
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Coaching clients often describe a sensation of overwhelm or drowning: they walk down a corridor and get bombarded with questions. This short episode provides tactics to take control of your day and lead.
- The Calendar Reset/Refresh episode
- Getting Rid of Heroes episode
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When we need to make a decision regarding tech, too often, we just go into basic research mode. Checking the latest Medium posts or looking at what's topping Hacker News is not the way to go. Get advice tailored to your needs.
- My system for choosing tech
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Hiring your first engineer or manager is easier if you have experience as an engineer or a manager. However, no one is an expert at every position they will eventually need to hire for. The default for many executives is to go on a month-long research expedition to learn how to interview. Here's a better way.
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Many teams might have a "strategy," but it is never something that has a practical effect on the work. By working to create such strategic alignment, you can enable rapid growth and improvement. In this episode, we discuss the steps to create strategic alignment and your responsibility as the leader to create it.
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Having heroes in your team might feel nice but it is an unhealthy crutch. It harms ownership and autonomy of other people around and can be a cover for a lack of coaching skills. In this episode, we cover these issues and lay out the path to change things up.
Engineering Force Multipliers episode.
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Two months later, are you still sitting on your hands? Seeing a drop in performance due to remote work, but hoping "it will blow off soon"? Now is not the time to be dilatory. Here's the evidence you needed to understand remote works, now let's move on and fast.
My previous episode about hybrid organizations is available here.
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Every effective leader has to be able to execute change initiatives quickly. That requires talking about the issue from the right perspective, gathering strategic alignment, and doing your homework. All that and more on this week's episode!
Join me and hear my talk on the Dev First Tech Leadership Conference!
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A product vacuum means that R&D might be stepping up to compensate for an issue and trying to fill the void. Since many engineers have their product gauges not calibrated in alignment with business needs, you need to learn how to spot these and provide them with the right framework to work with. That and more in this week's episode!
- Product Mastery episode
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When the crisis shelter-in-place situation started, you might have been worried about effectively working from home. Right now, companies globally are transitioning into a hybrid model which is tougher to manage. Start planning now.
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When I hear someone claim their team is doing great and needs no help, I ask these questions to quickly realize whether that's truly the case or whether leadership has stopped pushing for better. Follow along.
- Engineering Force Multipliers episode
- Product Mastery episode
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Engineering force multipliers exist on several levels: you, as the executive, your management team, and the individual contributors. Cultivating these requires different measures for each group, which we delve into in this episode.
Notes:
- Failing Spectacularly episode
- Peter Pan Employees
- Product Mastery episode
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Managing up is the big kids game, where you get to have sway that will allow you to gain leverage and have a more impactful organization. How do you position yourself to get there?
- Replay of my Creating Leverage webinar from last week
- Managing Politics episode
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Tech people turned leaders too often shy away from politics in a way that harms their team. Let's fix that.
- Premature Optimization episode
- Failing Spectacularly episode
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Failure is a necessity if you are trying to do anything novel. Learn how to cultivate a culture where placing bets is safe and a learning opportunity.
Free webinar: Creating Leverage: Leadership Operating System for Growth in Crisis and Instilling Lasting Productivity Through Focus
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Tough conversations are a vehicle to drive progress in your organization. Without exercising your candor muscle, you'll cultivate a culture of stagnation and low standards. This episode covers how to do these well.
This podcast was selected on top ten lists for CTOs:
https://blog.feedspot.com/cto_podcasts/
https://leocode.com/development/our-favorite-11-podcasts-for-ctos/
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As more and more companies are moving to work from home, here are a few tips to get the process started and become productive faster. If you have any specific questions, feel free to contact me: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
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Debugging code is a no brainer when compared to debugging processes that span over dozens of engineers, and pinpointing where exactly the bottlenecks are. In this episode, I cover how you can add "debug prints" and step through phases of your organization's processes in order to spot issues and address them effectively.
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Join me for a quick thought experiment–can you suddenly free up hundreds of hours and heaps of allocated budget and get more impact?
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Should you, as the person in charge of R&D, default to saying "yes" or "no?" How much should you pushback on ideas? This episode covers that and more.
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Research shows that people can learn to become helpless and pessimistic, just as they can learn to become optimistic. Those who are inculcated with helplessness then get into a vicious, negative cycle. These things are even shown to work across groups and teams. There are common patterns in startups that cause these. In this episode, we learn how to notice these, how to stop it, and what you should do.
Executive Mindset
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As your team grows, its operating system needs to update to accommodate for the change in hardware. The speed with which the upgrades are done is your speed of change. In this episode, I list out the three components to start seeing improvements in your Speed of Change immediately.
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First times are inflection points, or can be used as such. How many first times are there in your organization every week? Are you making good use of them?
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In an environment with so many different people, from diverse backgrounds and cultures, you can't hear only one side of the story. Gather the evidence!
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A few quick assessments to see whether you're growing fast enough along with your team, and how to decide what you should change.
- The Executive Mindset
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In the current state of the industry, small startups might feel a feudal society. You have to give lordships (titles) and lands (teams) to each person that's been there for a couple of months for them to feel like they're progressing. Stop it.
A big chunk of running a tight engineering organization consists of keeping a handle of your feedback loops and tightening them as needed.
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Was being a tech exec in 2010 that different than it is today? What are the core themes behind the changes in the day-to-day?
Following up on my latest article exploding on Hacker News, this week we dig into the mechanics of providing negative feedback.
- Reminder to join the newsletter!
- Feedback Timeliness
- Question of the week: Give me your best feedback stories!
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How adding some slack time to your organization can make things drastically better, and the approaches you can take to start trying it out.
My email is aviv@avivbenyosef.com - send me your answers to the question of the week!
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How your typical week should look.
- Previous episode about making time
- Plan for about 35 hours a week
- 1:1s - 3 hours
- 1:1s with skips - 1-2 hours
- Thinking time - 5 hours
- Hiring - 3 hours
- Syncs - 8 hours
- Shaping - 6-7 hours
Question of the week: What’s one thing you’ve done weekly that you find helps with getting more done?Send me a 5-word email with your answer: aviv@avivbenyosef.com
We spend so much effort into hiring, only to fumble it in ridiculous ways sometimes. Here are a few common pitfalls I regularly see with consulting clients so you can learn to avoid them.
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What do you, as a leader, should do to be able to get more done across the organization, and how does that empower everyone else?
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Product Mastery is a key tenant of highly productive organizations. Why are you lacking in it, and how can you establish it in your existing culture?
This episode discusses a starter technique to drive change within your organization, and quickly gain momentum.
For further resources on the subject, I recommend the book Switch.
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Long term thinking is also a mindset you should provide your team. A culture of patience and endurance is key.
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Talking about common issues in organizations, and how to treat them. Stop doing faux-Agile.
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Are you a one trick pony manager that can only floor the gas pedal whenever you need things done? Is blitzing your only way forward? Stop it.
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How to handle the promotion of a newly minted manager to their first management position. Why hiring across is preferred, and how to prepare for the transition to achieve the best execution.
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Too often leaders become servants of their calendars. The master dings with a new notification and off they go from one room to the next. We must not enrage the schedule. You end up with no actual time to lead and think. This is a quick tactic I do with clients to free up more time, and make their calendars shift a bit more towards a maker schedule, even though it cannot completely be so.
Candor is crucial in leadership, no matter how uncomfortable it makes you. Striving for efficacy, not just being liked, will mean that you have to tell people the hard truth sometimes. Where are you likely missing it?
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One of the three tenants of a well-balanced R&D organization, here's our first dive into Autonomy, how to measure it at your organization and how to start working on it.
For more information, check my previews articles about autonomy at https://avivbenyosef.com/blog
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Management by walking around is one of the easiest ways to keep your finger on the pulse and not become disconnected. For any feedback or questions, reach out aviv@avivbenyosef.com
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You've obviously heard, and likely talked, too much about tech debt. Let's try and do things differently. Running a successful R&D operation means that you shouldn't only consider your organization as a cost center. Instead, you should be providing constant innovation to the business. This is what it means.
It's crucial to get to know an organization if you intend to help it. This is, of course, important for me as a consultant, but I am surprised whenever I see a new VP/CTO/Director in an organization that didn't make sure to do a similar background check before taking on the work. This list of quick hacks can uncover a lot of issues quickly, so listen along and think what these mean about your own organization!
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