Keeping a “WoW” List for Your Team
Surprise and delight. It’s a common phrase in startupland. How often are you surprised and delighted from your own startup team?
I came across a First Round Capital blog post recapping advice from CTOs at their recent conference.
One bullet point was particularly striking to me, because it has some stupid simple, practical advice for managers to keep track of the times your employee surprises you — both good and bad:
Track how often your engineers surprise you. Most managers monitor milestones, such as if a product shipped on time. But also keep track of how often your people surprise you — in both a good and bad way. For example, when was the last time one of your engineers came up with a solution that was novel to you? Or have they missed a deadline without giving you a heads up? Both these moments are easily-tracked data points on communication — good and bad — that many managers leave on the table. Keep a tally with a few words of context. It’ll be fodder to celebrate or coach your people — and indication you’re paying attention.
Warning: I’m not a CTO. I’m going to extend this point beyond engineering teams, beyond being wowed by a technical solution. For example:
- When a person went about solving a business problem in a way you wouldn’t have considered
- When that person took an unexpectedly extraordinary effort or sacrifice to move something forward (and succeed)
- When that person took a set of directions, executed against it, and then produced way more than what you could have guessed they would do with it
- Or how quickly that person developed a new skill-set on their own
Those are great moments when they happen. They fill you with pride for that person. It feels good to give praise to someone because they truly exceeded your expectations. Selfishly, they also provide you with validation that you’re bringing great people onto your team.
When those happen, write it down. Not figuratively. But actually. Take note of the number of times someone on your team wows you. I like using Evernote for this. I have a particular note in Evernote that keeps the following:
Name > Date > Positive/Negative > 1-Sentence Description
These data points will help over the long run on evaluating your team.
The cumulative benefit of those “wow” moments are the extra fuel that propel a company faster. Furthermore, the lasting impact of having people on your team who consistently “wow” you is a huge factor in what drives sustained success.
