People write software. The pieces they write have to work together. So the people have to work together. Sounds simple? Obvious? Take a look.

Yep. Leadership is tricky because (among other things) it requires fitting diametrically opposed approaches to the situation at hand: sometimes directive, sometimes coaching; sometimes compassionate connection, sometimes detached authority. And so on. A good reminder.

The “zipper effect” is a manager’s (founder’s) nightmare. A good article about why it happens and how to avoid it.

Interesting post. Action, movement feels great and tends to get people excited, even if it’s wrong. Contrarily, sitting around thinking feels safe. The post kind of wanders between the two. Which is your pattern? When is it right? When is it wrong?

I liked this because it’s heavily biased towards practical action to change culture, rather than a ton of interior-thinking-heavy offsite stuff. Culture changes, in the end, because people start doing different stuff. So why not start by having them start doing different stuff? (Some of the post may seem kind of corny, but bear with it).

As always, some terrific stuff. Details about Amazon’s business, of course, but also some clear, insightful musings on running a business. Like this:

“Wandering is an essential counter-balance to efficiency. You need to employ both. The outsized discoveries – the “non-linear” ones – are highly likely to require wandering”

Good, detailed advice on digging into career conversations. A great place to start if you’re wondering how to get going, and some excellent material if you’re already doing them.

There’s actually no mystery about how people change - it’s just hard to do! This is a terrific, practical introduction personal change, by Ed Batista, a coach of long-standing here in SF. A longish, but easy, read and thorough.

An interesting and useful description of moving from overwhelm to a productive balance. I like this post because it doesn’t recommend some magic bullet, but describes a personal mix and match that works for the author. You might pick up some pieces you can add to your mix.

Nice. Clear, concise and useful: the ways you are, right now, influencing culture whether you are conscious of it or not. Well worth a read.

Bit of a click-bait title for a short piece, but does point out the need to spend deliberate time developing relationships - having time to connect with remote people for reasons other than checkins and meetings.

Some good, simple direction on how to think about managing a two-level organization. Useful.

Nice, simple story-telling tips: beginning/middle/end, focus on details, tell the story through characters. These things work (and have worked since humans first started gathering around the fire) - use them!

Success narratives are interesting. Was the company super successful for the reasons we think? Or was it random timing, a couple of terrific pieces of insight, one great hire? There’s some cool, insider stuff in here about AirBnB which, from my limited experience, is, in fact, a terrific company. But it’s also interesting to read critically - what really made the difference? All of it? Any of it? What’s really making the difference to your company right now?

Most failure narratives are humble-brags: “I failed at X and Y and then, well sure, I sold my company for $X00M”. This is no exception, but there’s a lot of good stuff here about the need to really be vulnerable in examining failure, founder relationships, how a good coach can help (yes, sure, I’m biased…).

This one isn’t a humble-brag. It’s a genuine small meditation on what failure feels like, and how to be curious about, reframe and accept those feelings.

“Focusing so much on discrete, publicly visible accomplishments made it harder for me to see the small, gradual pieces of progress that matter more to me at this point in my career – and life”

Loved this. It’s about letting go of the desire to get things right as you move into management (a similar process happens on each further step up, by the way). It’s about knowing that you have to sacrifice a smaller task to have the team as a whole work well.

An old post from Rands on expecting, and handling, freak outs. Good to be reminded a) freak outs happen everywhere and b) there are ways to handle them and c) if you’re at any level of management, sorry, it’s part of your job to deal.

Also, this excellent comment on the Rands Slack community from Ashby Winch: “By emoting at someone in an unfiltered way you are effectively taking the work of managing your emotions and dumping that work on another person”. Voted this week’s most useful truth.

Conflict Debt! What a great concept! The conflicts you’re not having pile up and warp things. See also technical debt and organizational debt (the people issues you’re not dealing with…). Kind of a bag of stuff in this post, choose what you take from it. Some nuggets though: “normalize tension”, “Make productive conflict a habit”. Well worth a read.

Coincidentally, another article on conflict debt and how to reduce it. Interesting.