Designing the culture for chemistry
In 2018, I made my transition from a designer to a manager. To my good fortune, I got to work with a great bunch of young designers who have shaped me as a manager.
Our new manager, Supriyo Roy was tasked with setting up a new design team. In the first week itself, I realised that he was very easy to get along with and I could be myself around him. We were hiring fast and a lot of young designers were joining our team. As we grew past 10, I was asked to be a manager for the young team. I was leading the whole shopping funnel, and if I focused only on delivering designs, I would not be able to deliver projects and strategy. I would fail to help a new team succeed. It was important for me to help them hit the ground running (which the company wanted them to do), but also settle well in their new job (which they needed the company’s help in doing).
I did not have any management experience then. But when I spoke to one of the designers, Amandeep Duhan recently, he reminded me how our team had an easygoing vibe. He said that it didn’t feel hierarchical, and everyone could speak their mind. It was very heartening to hear this, and I wanted to introspect why my team may have had that feeling. So here’s what I think helped me build that camaraderie.
You made it!
When you are a fast-growing team, it’s easy to forget about a good onboarding experience. Most managers depend on HR teams to do their bit and assume everyone will be ready to work on our team. Usually many people get onboarded together, so they may understand the macro context but it’s their first week on the job. Many may just get through the day quietly, without understanding much or asking a lot of questions. Designers especially may feel lost in the onboarding decks that are inclined towards operations, business, and engineering. And it’s difficult to do the older the team and company gets, because of the baggage and internal jargon and abbreviations. Even something trivial as the quarters could be named differently in different teams or companies. Like Q2 or AMJ. When they joined the team at the workspace, in our first meeting, I helped them form the micro view of what the team on ground is working on.
New hires need assurance that they are in the right place. I ask them why they joined and what they wish to do at Flipkart. I tell them about how our work at Flipkart is changing India and the world. I talk about how I’m passionate to know more about the big machinery it takes to deliver one product to our customers at this scale.
Tell new team members what you love about the place. Don’t lie, as they will know very soon.
I respected my team a lot and tried not to have a patronising tone. I emphasised on how their job is not only being the designer, but being the owner of the experience and then the metric. That they should not follow the current design, and challenge everything, and try to create something better. Even if this is their first job, I aligned them to the bigger goal of helping customers.
Even now, I communicate my ways of working but also hear out their ideas. I let them ask the most basic of questions. In fact, I insist that they do in a public forum like Slack. They can understand the working culture in the org which documentation may not be able to explain very well. If they do this diligently in the first few projects, it’s easy to make them deliver predictably in the longer run.
Come together
I feel really happy as I write this. I was fortunate to be in this team that valued high collaboration and open feedback. This was driven by some of us just walking up to the desk of the new designer and asking about their projects. That is an icebreaker like no other.
The one thing that all designers bond over is design! This bonding happened at Flipkart when the existing designers, especially seniors, started soliciting feedback from the newer members of the team. Sujit Jare and Adit Gupta were instrumental in making this happen. Their genuine curiosity and supportive nature complemented their honest feedback. Approaching each other at one’s desk became very easy thereafter. Folks like Rahul Chakraborty, Neel and Sanket Chaudhari set a fun informal tone to the conversations. This encouraged the other designers and researchers to assume this was the culture and take it forward with the new roster. All of us just looked forward to coming to work everyday.
In companies with a weak documentation culture, this environment is also ideal to have frequent chats about why things are the way they are. Designers with context can also talk about design debt, and get newer perspectives on the same.
But if you are in a team that is shy in this aspect, a regular cadence may help where everyone presents even their WIP projects. As the designers settle, lead by example to create a candid environment where they help and collaborate with each other.
😇 One of the rituals that I learned from Mangala Naveen Kumar (an extraordinary manager I am lucky to have on my team) was that of shout-outs. The team expresses gratitude to everyone who helped or inspired them that week. They are so infectious — the thanks as well as the smiles! The chemistry and culture is brilliant when everyone feels like a team. Even without the leader, the team members gel and acknowledge each other.
Build Confidence
Usually, people who have just joined your team are highly motivated. They are looking for visibility, validation, and chances. Managers (and seniors on the team) must help them get small but early wins. If they perform the way you want them to, call it out. This will help them identify good traits. Guide them when they’re being too cautious and are not able to take decisions (as this is likely to happen in their first few projects.)
Telling new designers the importance of the projects they are working on is highly recommended. Who wouldn’t want to know the impact they are going to have with their first project?!
While everyone wants new designers to “hit the ground running”, for most new designers, I allow the first few months to be the honeymoon period. I want them to ask a lot of questions and try a lot of things in the projects, not really rushing on the timeline, but understanding the teams, the metrics, the processes. For designers, it’s important to feel equal to other stakeholders so that they don’t think of themselves as an execution team only. Many designers like to show off their pixel prowess. But giving them the courage and confidence to question PRDs and brainstorm with PMs helps them approach design in the right way for a product organisation.
I had been called a “Design Lead” for over 3 years and I was delivering projects as an individual contributor since the team was still growing. As most managers do, I had withdrawal symptoms. I would be lingering around different Sketch files. But I knew that I should focus more on commenting on Invision instead. It was not ideal for me, the veteran and the manager, shouldering every responsibility right from the strategy to the execution. Hence, I nudged the designers to sit with their PMs more so that they can develop a deeper understanding of the domain first hand. They would hence become more accountable for their design decisions.
Allow designers to make mistakes. Just iron out the things that may hurt them in the long run. For example, if a designer is not able to defend their designs, help them build research acumen and a good design vocabulary. In the weekly 1:1s, focus on these instead of project updates.
There will of course be some individuals who may not be performing at the level that you expected. A lot of behaviours do not get surfaced in the interviews. Clearly give that feedback to the designer if it seems to be a bad pattern. If one knows, they can actively work on rectifying them. They may reach out to others on the team or in their network for help. Managers must invest in improving some of these with training and mentorship. If these are core personality issues, then it is easier to part than be in an unhappy situation.
Team culture is driven not by executive leadership but the immediate next level — the leads or the managers. Good managers must support good culture. This culture complemented by the manager’s active involvement in one’s career and success, helps a team thrive. Truly believing in the people you have hired and building their confidence over time helps them succeed in their careers.
Empathy and involvement in others’ growth and success may manifest in different ways at different times and a good setup can help make the journey much easier.
Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it! ❤️
All credit to Sujit Jare, Rahul Chakraborty, Adit Gupta, Pranita Sanjiv Jagtap, Sanket Chaudhari, Neel, Ruchil kothari, Amandeep Duhan, Varun Dhanda, Nuvena Rajendran, Supriyo Roy for helping me build that culture back in 2018 and setting the stage for the wonderful team we have now.
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