#39 - Intentional Technical Leadership

Good morning my friend!

Happy Saturday! 🎉

Welcome to another issue of the Intentional Technical Leadership newsletter.

This week I've not been well so had to take a day off. I'm not the best patient as I sometimes struggle to relax and take time out but it really helped my physical and mental health.

One thing I really appreciate was that my manager told me that they were worried about me. It's great to know that my manager cares about me and my well-being and that I work at a company that cares about its employees.

This week's newsletter is filled with captivating content, be sure to check them out!

🔖 Interesting Reading

10 Leadership Lessons from 10 Years Working in a Fully-Distributed and Remote Company

Although I've been working remote-first since 2015, I love learning from people who have worked 100% remotely.

This blog post form Sara Ross, Director of Product Marketing at Hubspot and early hire at Automattic, shares some helpful insights into remote leadership from the past 10 years.

It's a long article but I particularly liked the focus on psychological safety and the importance of building trust whilst not being able to see your team face-to-face.

I'm trying to rethink how we have meetings with my team so there are plenty of interesting ideas in this article to help me do that.

Servant Leadership lessons from Climbers

This is a great post from Duncan Skelton, a keen climber and engineering leader.

He's a great writer and in this article he shares some great insights into leadership from his experience of climbing.

Leadership is all about serving others' success. Holding the ropes for others, catching their falls, working in service of their goals, and cheering them on.

It's about offering perspective, generating options, and modelling humility.

It's about partnering with people stronger than yourself and giving them the spotlight.

And, of course, it's about giving feedback, course-correcting, and caring personally while challenging directly.

So the next time you're tempted to think that leadership is all about being the star of the show, remember that true leadership is about holding the ropes for others and helping them reach new heights.

Such great analogies from Duncan, I love it!

On Managing Your Workload

I've been thinking a lot about all of the priorities my team and I have for the coming quarter and how we're going to manage them. I was glad I found this article by Kelly Vaughn, a Director of Engineering at Spot AI.

Instead of starting the week assuming you'll not get everything done, she shares a great way of reframing your workload in a positive way to help you manage your workload.

Ask yourself what you can get done this week instead of what tasks you'll drop.

To keep your work load manageable, try using the 1-2-3 method:

• pick one thing you absolutely must do
• two things you'd like to get done
• and three backup items to fill your time.

Focus on one task at a time and take breaks as needed. And don't forget to write down what you won't be doing this week, so everyone knows what to expect.

I hope it helps you as much as it helped me to rethink my week.

I hope you enjoyed this week's selection of intentional technical leadership articles.

Hit reply and let me know what you think.

Feel free to send me any interesting articles or podcasts you've found as I love hearing from my readers.

Have an amazing week and be excellent to each other!

Speak to you soon,
Marc

Senior Engineering Manager @ Netlify

👓 Read more of my technical leadership articles on my website.