Leading with…Paul McAleer

In the first of our series of interviews with leaders, we spoke to Paul McAleer, content strategy director at Bounteous, about the path to leadership, and the super-powers that helped along the way

Over the next few months we’ll be hearing from Tempo’s amazing members — they’ll share their highs and lows of leadership, their tips and resources, and much, much more. Who better to kick us off than Paul — an accomplished content and design leader from Denver, Colorado…

Hi Paul, firstly, can you tell me a bit about your path to leadership?

It was, as you might expect, a bit uneven. My very first leadership role was a decade ago when I was on a user interface team — suddenly I was responsible for 6 people, their careers, and their work. A big change, and I was thrust into that position before I was ready. But I stayed with it, learning very quickly what does and doesn’t work when you’ve got a team you’re responsible for. I did hang back to an individual contributor (IC) role or two afterwards, but advocated for myself to be in a leadership role because I found the appeal in helping others succeed.

I had the opportunity to create a team from scratch in one of my prior roles, and in my current role I’ve been able to grow a team from 2 to 7 people in under a year. I think it’s safe to say I learned that leadership isn’t just about the people you manage — it’s about managing upwards and sideways, and being the face and voice of a discipline too. I’m always still learning, and things get fuzzier the more senior you get, but I love that challenge.

What was the biggest shock for you when you moved from IC into leadership?

By far it was that people were looking to me to set the direction of a project and what they were working on. I’d been used to having that strategic view of things a bit, but having the ability to define it? Whew, that was a huge change.

Have you found any great resources to help you so far in your leadership career?

When I first moved into a leadership role a colleague gifted me the book Managing Humans by Michael Lopp — while it was about software engineer team leads, I found a number of good takeaways.

Much more recently I’ve found a lot of value in broader books such as Dare to Lead by Brene Brown and Creative Quest by Questlove. I love hearing and reading about others’ leadership styles and processes, and picking up good ideas that I can steal. Beyond that, being active in conference communities like the IA Conference in the 2010s was a huge help for me; connecting with others who dealt with similar questions and challenges was validating.

What made you join the Tempo community?

The connection, for sure. While content strategy and content design aren’t completely new, I feel some parallels to where UX seemed to be fifteen or so years ago. So I’m seeking out to listen and learn from other people — particularly around scaling teams quickly, globally — and share what I’ve learned too. Until we can collectively do more things in person, communities like Tempo are a lifeline.

Who would you like to see speak at a conference that you’ve never seen before?

I somehow haven’t seen David Dylan Thomas speak yet, which seems like a real oversight on my part.

What superpower do you have that helps you most in your work?

I would never consider myself a project manager, but I absolutely have tendencies in that direction — I live by my to-do lists (and can even namedrop things like GTD), and at one point in my career I was even a Scrum Master! I would never want to do that for a full-time gig again, and treasure the people who do, but just having those backgrounds helps me and my teams organize what we need to do and how we get to the outcomes we really need.

What would you tell your younger self knowing what you know now about your career?

Gosh, two big things, really. First: be patient. Be really patient. I was impulsive when I was in my 20s — I mean, lots of people are — but the moment there was any kind of frustrating situation at work, I’d start to imagine a greener pasture of another job. That’s not a way I would handle that now.

The other thing I’d say is to really be yourself. It took me years to do things like bring in my outside interests and sense of humor to work, but once I did, I found I could blossom and explore things — like, hey, yes, I really do like to do presentations and talks! And I love those 1x1 sessions with my team! And I really enjoy contributing and shaping our culture! Those are all things I wouldn’t have touched if I didn’t just work on and head directly towards being my true, whole self.

Thanks Paul!

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