Podcast appearances and mentions of Christina Wodtke

Dans cet épisode, 2ème de la série des 3 épisodes pour vous aider à préparer 2025, nous explorons une méthode reconnue et largement utilisée dans le monde des entreprises pour atteindre des objectifs ambitieux : la méthode des OKR (Objectifs et Résultats Clés). Conçue pour aider les entreprises à rester alignées, cette méthode vous permet de définir des objectifs inspirants et mesurables, qui permettent à chaque membre d'une organisation de contribuer à la réussite collective.Jean-Luc Koning, expert en OKR, nous éclaire sur la manière dont cette méthode, qu'il considère comme "un véritable levier pour la stratégie et l'exécution", peut transformer votre manière de travailler en 2025.Jean-Luc a récemment traduit l'ouvrage Radical Focus de Christina Wodtke, un bestseller mondial qui a popularisé l'utilisation des OKR. Ce livre vous éclaire sur la manière de concentrer vos efforts sur l'essentiel, de mesurer vos progrès, et d'ajuster votre trajectoire pour maximiser votre impact.Dans cet épisode, vous apprendrez :Comment fixer des objectifs ambitieux pour 2025 qui vous guideront tout au long de l'année.Pourquoi les OKR sont la clé pour transformer vos ambitions en actions concrètes et mesurables.Comment suivre vos résultats clés et ajuster vos stratégies pour garantir l'impact de vos actions.Vous découvrirez pourquoi les OKR sont aujourd'hui considérés comme une méthode éprouvée, largement utilisée par des entreprises innovantes et performantes, pour rester alignées et atteindre leurs objectifs de manière agile et mesurable. Bonne écoute !_____________Mon livre « 100 Jours pour révéler votre leadership » est en précommande ! Liens pour la précommande : Fnac : https://tidd.ly/4flSgSGAmazon : https://amzn.to/49zYbCiPour fêter cela, je vous invite à un événement spécial : le 21 janvier à 12h, un premier webinar où je vous dévoilerai les coulisses de ce livre, les clés essentielles pour révéler votre leadership et comment préparer votre parcours.Ce sera une occasion unique de vivre ce projet en avant-première, et de poser vos premières pierres pour transformer votre expérience de manager.Voici ce que vous devez savoir :Quand : 21 janvier de 12h à 13h30Où : en ligne, directement accessible après votre inscription.Comment participer : pour y assister, il vous suffit de précommander votre exemplaire du livre 100 jours pour révéler votre leadership. Une fois votre commande effectuée, envoyez la preuve d'achat à bonjour@lentreprisededemain.com. Vous recevrez alors le lien pour accéder à cet événement exclusif.

Today's guest is the one and only Christina Wodtke - Professor at Stanford and author of several bestsellers, including the famous book on OKRs “Radical Focus”.We covered:* Foundations and misconceptions about OKRs* Prerequisites for successfully use OKR* Why OKRs might not be for you* The importance of psychological safety and strategic context* Outcome-based key results vs. output-based results* Cross-functional team collaboration and shared objectives* Cadences and Principles* Exploratory OKRs* Challenges in large organizations with complex dependencies* And moreChristina is a legend and one of my biggest references.I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did!_References:Article: Why context and culture matter in leading with objectivesAligned: Stakeholder Management for Product LeadersTeam Topologies: Organizing Business and Technology Teams for Fast FlowThe Crux: How Leaders Become Strategists This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit afonsofranco.substack.com

Christina Wodtke and Danielle Barnes join me to talk about their new book "Present Yourself" and their work with Women Talk Design, an organisation aimed at increasing diversity in public speaking. We went deep on public speaking, the importance of authenticity, storytelling, and finding your unique voice as a speaker. We also talked about the value of diverse perspectives in public speaking and the power of sharing personal stories to connect with audiences. Key takeaways:   1. It's important to embrace your unique voice Don't try to fit a stereotypical mould of a "good speaker" - authenticity resonates more with audiences. 2. Before you start speaking, make sure you know your "why" Everyone has their own motivation for public speaking, and anyone can fall in love with it if they're doing it for a reason they care about. 3. Share your unique perspective with the world Even if you feel that other people are already talking about your topic, or that it's all been said before, go and say it anyway. You're the only you. 4. Humans are hardwired to respond to stories You can make your presentations more engaging and memorable by incorporating stories, even in stuffy business settings. Your audience will thank you for it. 5. It doesn't matter if you're talking to a big crowd, as long as you're talking to the right crowd You don't need to be a big name to make a big impact. You just need to find the people who need to hear what you have to say. You can still make a difference. 6. Everyone has a bad talk but this is fine as long as you learn from the experience Every speaking opportunity is a learning experience. Some of them will go great, some of them will go terribly, but you can learn something from all of them. Check out "Present Yourself" "Present Yourself is for everyone who has ever fought for an equal shot at the spotlight. Christina Wodtke, Danielle Barnes, and a diverse group of accomplished speakers share stories that will inspire you to communicate with authority. This self-guided, step-by-step framework features practical, actionable advice for authentic and effective public speaking." Check it out on Amazon or the book website. Contact Danielle & Christina Catch up with Danielle on LinkedIn or check out Women Talk Design. Catch up with Christina on LinkedIn or check out Elegant Hack for details of all the other books she's written. Related episodes you should like: Diving into the Deep End as a Woman in Product (Darby Maloney, Product Manager @ Divvy & Occasional Swimming Pool User) Closing the Gender Pay Gap and Hiring Diverse Product Teams (Chris Mason, Co-Founder @ Intelligent People) Standing Up for Diversity & Inclusion When No One Looks Like You (Merina Khanom, Product Manager @ BBC iPlayer) Maintaining a Collaborative & Inclusive Product Culture at Scale (Anna Curzon, CPO @ Xero) Defeating Bias, Prejudice and Bullying in the Workplace (Kim Scott, Author "Radical Candor" & "Just Work") Building Your Product Muscles & Developing Strong Product Teams (Petra Wille, Product Leadership Coach) Product Management in Africa & Dreams of an African Silicon Valley (Layo Ogunbanwo, Founder @ Practical Product) Building Data Driven Products & Dodging Unsolicited Advice (Emily Reid, Product Manager @ FCT)

Join us for an insightful episode featuring Christina Wodtke, a renowned author and expert in team dynamics and goal setting. Known for her influential book, "Radical Focus," Christina shares her journey and what sparked her passion for helping teams achieve remarkable objectives. Discover what being a "curious human" means to her and get ready to delve into the art of tackling big goals, team motivation, and the pivotal role of Objectives and Key Results (OKRs).RELATED LINKSFollow Christina here!Check out these YouTube videos detailing BrainSell's consulting work.Follow BrainSell on Twitter and LinkedIn!

How To Not Lose Yourself In A Relationship - By Tash Doherty“Look into his angeleyes, one look and you're hypnotized.” – ABBAIntroductionI've been doing the “dating” thing recently, and a subtle but terrifying thing keeps happening. When I'm seeing a guy I like, I start reorienting my life around him in tiny ways. I leave my late evenings open in case he wants to message me. I only make tentative plans with my friends because he might ask me out. Soon, I find myself sleeping over at his house in the middle of the week, leaving sleep-deprived and with a poor performance at work the next day. This seems harmless at first, but soon it snowballs. Within a couple of weeks, I've become a clingy, needy mess, a shell of my former independent self. And unsurprisingly, the relationship doesn't work out because of this.Strangely, when I have just myself to contend with, one could say that I'm a “responsible adult” (big words). I exercise regularly. I live in a cute, clean apartment where I feel safe. I put food on my table. But things have changed since I've decided I want to have children and am now looking for a more serious, long-term partner. Once I start dating someone, my entire life routine goes out the window.It's a painful and annoying trap to fall into again and again. So, in this piece, I explore what this is and share everything I've learned on how to avoid it. I hope that by reading this you can somehow sidestep this shitstorm altogether.Why does this happen?On one extreme, I sound lonely and desperate for this guy to fall in love with me. This is partly cultural. In our culture, we are obsessed with love, fairytales, and happily-ever-after. This leaves women totally screwed. Even though I'm a feminist, I was raised on a diet of Disney princess movies like Snow White and Cinderella. At some level, I've probably internalized the toxic narrative that I've been bombarded with since my childhood: men rescue women.On the other extreme, we have modern feminist ideals where women are throwing the idea of babies out with the bathwater. It's projected that 1 in 4 young women today wish to remain childless, and almost 40% of young single people are not interested in dating. This is great for them because, as Cindy Gallop says:  “The moment you decide you don't want to be in love, that just takes a whole layer of crap out of your life.”Life for single, childless people is simpler and easier, and they're probably happier for it. But some of us want to have kids someday. Some of us are dating to find the father of our future offspring. We can bang on the drum of being an independent career woman all day. That is, until our life goals suddenly suggest a man's presence might be helpful. So we let the guy sleep over at our house, even if we have a lot of important s**t to do the next day, because we want him to like us. Ultimately, it's like Cindy Gallop said,“[As women, we] are taught to undervalue ourselves from the moment we are born.”How can we get out of this? How can we learn to value ourselves, our routines, and our lives? Not just as some feminist theory, but in practice? Here is my non-exhaustive list of tips.Please comment or reach out to me if you have additional ideas.Tips* Remember that it's your hormones. This guy does not have a magic dick.Besides culture, biology is not helping us either. The physical desire I regularly feel to want to get pregnant is intense. Especially around the time of my period, I can feel myself trying to finagle ways to keep this man around for at least another week or two before I ovulate. I'm not even kidding.The solution here is to remember that any one guy, whoever he is, does not have a magic dick. If you can pause for a moment and hold onto your horses, you'll remember that you are still young and fertile enough, and you probably live in a major metropolitan city where you could go on dates every night if you wanted to. You can meet someone else. This is not your only chance ever to f**k. This man is probably not exceptional. Your hormones are fashioning this fake mirage to get you to attach to him.Here's what my grandmother had to say about this:“It's part of a woman's base of understanding that you have this romantic streak. Because that's what gets you pregnant, and it keeps the race going.”So, before you deprive yourself of a good night's sleep for an average dude, remember that this is Mother Nature trying to f**k with you. She's trying to get you to reproduce. You can take a deep breath and pat yourself on the back before you cancel your entire day tomorrow. This man is not in love with you. This is just a spark set alight by your hormones. Hormones that have been designed to hook you, just like they've hooked every single one of your ancestors over the last billion years.You must resist Mother Nature at all costs or perish.* Do A Reality CheckIt can be fun to fantasize about our partners and our future lives together. But as we're drawn out of our reality, eventually it will hurt a lot when we come back to Earth. As my grandmother said:“It's part of our nature to have this fantasy. You assume that the other party is going along with it, but they aren't.”For my entire relationship with Luís, I fantasized about him whisking me away to his family's second home in Valle de Bravo (the Mexican equivalent of the Hamptons). Instead, he smoked too much weed and couldn't plan more than lunch one day in advance. Another boyfriend I had spoke multiple languages and taught kids how to code. It took me months to realize he was not the future Amal Clooney on international peace-keeping missions. Instead, he was a software engineer with no idea what he wanted to do with his life.So, let's run a reality check on the person you are dating right now. Next time you have a moment away from your partner, ask yourself:* Am I excited about dating this person as they are right now?* What are they doing with their life right now? This is who they are.* Am I happy with how they treat me and are they meeting my needs right now? (very important question)This is hard. It means paying attention to the red flags. If this person has red flags, like a substance abuse issue of any kind, it means that no matter how you might feel about them, they're probably not a healthy person for you to be with. Whoever this person is right now, that is who you are dating, not some idealized version of them.* Stick To Your Routine“You have a life. You have other priorities, some of which come before him.” – Sherry ArgovWhen I'm dating a guy, being with him feels more fun and exciting than anything I do alone. But in her book, “Why Men Love B*****s”, Sherry Argov warns us not to get swept up in this. Her book is a relationship guide for women who are “too nice”, where “b*****s” is more about her humorous tone than about men liking women who are cruel or mean.Here is her advice for when you're starting a relationship:* “Don't stop eating, sleeping, or exercising.”* “If he wants to spend more time with you than you can comfortably do, invite him to join you in one of your activities.”* “Force yourself to keep the routine you had before you met him. Once you lose your rhythm, you lose your psychological equilibrium, and you become needy.”As much as possible, we must try to remember who we were before we met our partners.  So, take a look at your calendar when you were last single. Do you have music, dance, or craft lessons scheduled in there? Do you have a favorite exercise class or friend activity that you do every week? Do you like to spend quality time with your dog, or at museums? These are the things that you like. They make you happy.Even when we are in a relationship, we must keep doing these things.  * Have Some Self-Respect“The nice girl treats her interests as “little things” or secondary. The b***h doesn't treat her interests as minor or little things. They are her things.” – Sherry Argov“People value you at the value you are seen to put in yourself.” – Cindy GallopThis is a tough pill for me to swallow. In my single life, I do whatever I want and have my own life that I'm excited about. And yet, when I'm dating, I have found myself shimmying across the city late at night in an Uber because a guy invited me over late to his house after he finished band practice with his friends. The guy did make time to see me…sometimes. But I was way more likely than him to drop everything and see him when, in hindsight, it was inconvenient for me. This is all because I thought I had to be a sacrificial lamb in order to make our relationship work.When we value ourselves more highly, people will value us that way, too. We're only as valuable to our companies as the salary or financial worth that we've negotiated for ourselves. We're only as respectable as what we say no to. Writing this piece is making it even more clear to me that female pleasure and the orgasm gap in heterosexual relationships is not the only aspect of our lives where we are subordinating ourselves in service of male contentment. We must learn to value our interests, priorities, and what we like in many aspects of our lives. And we should value them just as much, if not more, than the guy we are dating and what he likes.Instead, being a doormat makes us unhappy and does not make men like us or respect us more. If anything, when we're better at standing up for ourselves and prioritizing our health and sanity, the guy will respect us more for it. As Argov says,“Suppose a woman says to a guy she can't go on a date with him that night because of her weekly pottery class. He scratches his head and thinks, “She'd rather go to a pottery class than be with me?” It not only attracts him; it blows his mind.”Realizing this, I feel frustrated because I've been throwing myself under the bus and cancelling all my plans in each relationship for all this time. My only solace is that if the problem starts and ends with me, it's pretty clear who needs to change.* Set Boundaries, Even If It Feels Foreign And You Don't Want To“Power is the control you have over yourself.” – Sherry ArgovWhen it comes to seeing a guy, I can get very impulsive. “Love” feels fantastic. Why would I let “real life” get in the way when I'm forming an intense connection with someone so quickly? F**k it, I think to myself. Who cares about work? Being a responsible adult is boring! I want excitement, adventure, and fun.But when I talk about this with my therapist, she has another theory: I'm letting the feelings in my body take over without thinking logically about what I need. In my head, I know the importance of a decent night's sleep. But when my heart is all wrapped up in the attention I'm getting from my partner in the moment, I immediately neglect every other need I have. Sounds fucked up? That's because it is.To avoid this happening to you, when you're having some alone time and thinking clearly,  list all the things that you need in any given day. Then, follow that list as a set of your boundaries, and try to enforce them (even if you do not want to!) when you are with your partner.For example, on any given day, I need:* Eight hours of uninterrupted sleep* Three meals of relatively healthy food with no white bread* A shower with warm water and a clean towel in the morning* Time to work, meet with friends and follow my weekly scheduleIf you're like me and you struggle to know what you need, ask your close friends about it. They probably have some of your answers. Are you really into cleanliness, so you need your special shampoo and soap? Are you vegan, so you need to go to a restaurant with appropriate options? I recently ended things with Luís because he'd never message me in the evenings when I wanted to check in at the end of the day. Did I need him to message me? Kind of. It would have helped me to feel that he was interested in me and willing to put effort into our relationship.* Stay At The Center Of Your Own OrbitIn my last relationship, I spent many weekday nights hanging by my phone in desperate purgatory, waiting for this guy to text me. Then, I'd complain about it to my therapist later about how abandoned I felt by him.This week, after a month of torture, I had a breakthrough about this when I was journaling. This is what I discovered:“Just because you meet a guy, you are still you. That's what you need to realize. It's not that these men are abandoning you. It is that you are abandoning yourself. So keep a hold on who you are. If you need sex, have sex. If you need physical touch, have physical touch. But do not change the orbit of your world to fit this other person. Your world is amazing. The world you are building for yourself is amazing. If the man is the Earth, well, then you are the Sun.”Now I'm seeing that the work I need to do in a relationship starts way before the point where I feel abandoned by this guy. I need to go back to those tiny, seemingly insignificant ways that I am giving up myself and my time at the beginning of the relationship and stick to my priorities in my everyday life. This is how I will stop the cycle of abandoning myself.Conclusion: Keep Learning From Your Mistakes“Don't look too deep into those angeleyes” – ABBAFor complex reasons that could take up many Ph.D. theses, as women, we may be subordinating ourselves in unhealthy ways when we get into relationships with men. So, if you can put even one of the tips I've mentioned here into practice, that's something you can be proud of.Finally, remember to be kind to yourself. You are learning. If you skip work calls because you had a late one with your lover last night, forgive yourself. Be compassionate towards yourself because it can be excruciating to learn these things while you're dating someone and then the relationship doesn't work out for whatever reason.Because we have so few examples in our culture about what a healthy heterosexual partnership looks like, and because our hormones are so freaking persuasive, this is going to be hard. We're bound to keep making mistakes. But there is one thing we can try to do. As one of my favorite business leaders, Christina Wodtke puts it:"Make new mistakes."  This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit misseducated.substack.com/subscribe

This is a special archived episode of Brave UX. Christina Wodtke reminds us to stop carrying the weight of the world, to start giving others the benefit of the doubt, and to make the most of the gift that is feedback. Highlights include: What did you learn about collaboration from swing dancing? Why do we need to give other people the benefit of the doubt? What was it like being an executive in big tech? Where can people start to develop more confidence? What is important to remember when giving feedback? ====== Who is Christina Wodtke? Christina is one of the most impactful, established, and original thought leaders in Silicon Valley. There won't be many of you listening who haven't at least heard of her groundbreaking and bestselling book on OKRs, Radical Focus - now in its second edition! A self-described “curious human” with a serious big-tech resume, her work in design and product has included redesigns and IPOs at companies such as LinkedIn, MySpace, Zynga, and Yahoo! But those big names only scratch the surface of Christina's professional story. She has co-founded a tech startup, co-founded the Information Architecture Institute, founded and was the original publisher of Boxes and Arrows, and is the founder Women Talk Design. Christina is currently preparing the next generation of product and game designers, as a full-time lecturer at Stanford University. Previously, Christina was an Associate Professor at California College of the Arts, where she taught creative entrepreneurship. ====== Find Christina here: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/cwodtke Website: https://cwodtke.com/ Blog: https://eleganthack.com/ Christina's books: Radical Focus (Second Edition) - Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results:  https://amzn.to/3Sc82o4 Information Architecture - Blueprints for the Web:  https://amzn.to/3UknzUL Pencil Me In - The Business Drawing Book for People Who Can't Draw: https://amzn.to/2WOBNP7  The Team That Managed Itself - A Story of Leadership: https://amzn.to/3QRyXo6 Women Talk Design: Website: https://womentalkdesign.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/womentalkdesign LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-talk-design/ ====== Liked what you heard and want to hear more? Subscribe and support the show by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts (or wherever you listen). Follow us on our other social channels for more great Brave UX content! YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/TheSpaceInBetween/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-space-in-between/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thespaceinbetw__n/  ====== Hosted by Brendan Jarvis: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanjarvis/ Website: https://thespaceinbetween.co.nz/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/brendanjarvis/

In this episode of Dreams With Deadlines, host Jenny Herald interviews Tim Herbig, a seasoned expert on Objectives and Key Results (OKRs). They unpack the deeper facets of this management tool that's taking the corporate world by storm:Key Things Discussed: Journey with Tim as he retraces his formative years with OKRs, shedding light on the challenges of top-down implementations. Emphasizing utility over form, he makes a case for the importance of day-to-day applicability of OKRs in organizations. Delve into the resistance faced by product teams towards OKRs, especially when established strategies are in place. Tim's pragmatic approach champions the integration of OKRs with current team practices, ensuring they bring tangible value to daily operations. Navigate the intricate relationship between OKRs and product strategy. With a spotlight on the essence of strategy, Tim guides listeners on making strategic choices that can be tracked effectively with OKRs, bridging the gap between grand visions and actionable metrics. Show Notes [00:00:31] Discovering OKRs: A Personal and Professional Evolution. Tim Herbig's journey with OKRs began at XING, evolving through challenges and insights. He underlines the issue of top-down OKRs without clarity and stresses their day-to-day utility. [00:02:37] Bridging the Gap: Ensuring OKRs Reflect Everyday Utility and Purpose. Tim Herbig dissects the outcomes vs. outputs debate, emphasizing OKRs' bridge role between mission and daily tasks. OKRs should be flexible tools, reflecting real team tasks and challenges. [00:05:44] Marrying OKRs with Established Practices: Pragmatism Over Dogma. Jenny and Tim explore why product teams resist OKRs. Tim advocates for intertwining OKRs with current practices like sprint planning, emphasizing their practical day-to-day value. [00:08:56] Making Pragmatic Choices: How OKRs Bridge Product Strategy to Everyday Work. The dialogue between Jenny Herald and Tim Herbig delves deep into the intersection of OKRs and product strategy. Tim highlights recognizing strategy's essence, making impactful choices, and then tracking progress with OKRs. [00:14:06] Marrying OKRs with Product Discovery: From Outcomes to Behaviors. Jenny and Tim discuss tracking team/user behaviors and predicting product success using OKRs. [00:20:54] Embracing 'Better' Practices in OKRs Over 'Best' Practices. Jenny Herald and Tim Herbig delve into the nuances of better practices (adaptive and relative methods) as opposed to rigid best practices, highlighting five critical 'better practices' for effective and practical application of OKRs. [00:24:11] Aligning OKRs with Organizational Capabilities and Structures. Jenny Herald prompts Tim Herbig to share insights on the challenges faced by organizations when their desired objectives do not align with their current capabilities or structures. Tim elaborates with stories that exemplify the discrepancies between organizational structures and the application of OKRs. [00:28:52] Aligning the Cadence of Product Delivery with Outcomes. Jenny Herald and Tim Herbig discuss the challenge of synchronizing the cadence of product delivery with the desired outcomes. They ponder on the nuances of how teams should approach measuring meaningful progress, especially when direct results may not be immediately evident. [00:30:07] The Art of Developing Leading Indicators in Product Delivery. Jenny Herald and Tim Herbig delve deeper into the concept of leading and lagging indicators in relation to key results. They discuss the challenges, conceptual considerations, and the dynamism of creating proxies and leading indicators. [00:35:37] Quick-Fire Questions for Tim: What is your dream with a deadline? Tim's dream with a deadline is to do a solo travel to Tel Aviv in the next two years. When someone says they failed with OKRs previously and want to try again, what's your advice? Tim advises them to first clarify why they want to use OKRs in the first place. What's a good reason for using OKRs? The ideal reason is to enable team autonomy and outcome thinking. A more pragmatic reason is to ensure people work on the right things and maintain strategic focus. Which book largely shaped how you think? Both in general and related to OKRs. For general thinking, "Radical Acceptance" by Tara Brach influenced him the most. Regarding OKRs, he credits "Radical Focus" by Christina Wodtke and "OKRs at the Center" co-written by Natalija and Sonja. Relevant links: “Radical Acceptance,” book by Tara Brach “The Courage to Be Disliked: How to Free Yourself, Change your Life and Achieve Real Happiness,” book by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga “Radical Focus,” book by Christina Wodtke, American businessperson and specialist in the area of design thinking, information architecture and Management Science (specializing in objectives and key results (OKR) and team productivity.) “OKRs At The Center: How to use goals to drive ongoing change and create the organization you want,” by Natalija Hellesoe and Sonja Mewes Linked Better Practices over Stacked Best Practices About the Guest:Tim Herbig is a seasoned Product Management Coach and Consultant. He is passionate about helping product teams develop better practices to measure the progress of their decisions. Tim masterfully connects Strategy, OKRs, and Product Discovery. Tim has worked on solving hard business problems and driving user behaviors in diverse product contexts.Follow Our Guest:Website | LinkedIn | YouTubeFollow Dreams With Deadlines:Host | Company Website | Blog | Instagram | Twitter

I dagens episode stiller vi skarpt på OKR sammen vores kollega Kresten Banke. Kresten er produktdreng i verdensfirmaet og har arbejdet med OKR i mange år. Sammen gennemgår vi hvad OKR egentlig er, hvad det kan og ikke kan, og hvad det kræver at få succes med OKR. Spoiler alert: Det er ikke organisatorisk trylledrik men kræver sund produkttænkning, disciplin og hårdt arbejde. Kresten har samtidigt et skønt horn i siden på agile og især Scrum. Så lyt med.

Transcript: Joe Krebs 0:20 Welcome back to another episode of Agile FM, my first recording of 2023. I'm going into my second decade of agile FM. And I'm super, super happy to have Jeff Gothelf back to Agile FM, author doesn't really need an introduction, but he's the author of Lean UX, Sense and Respond and Forever Employable and Lean vs Agile versus Design Thinking. And maybe there is another one in the making, we can talk about. First and foremost, Jeff, welcome to the podcast again. Jeff Gothelf 0:53 It's a pleasure to see you. We were just talking before you hit record how long we've known each other. And it's fun, it's fun to keep chatting all these years and seeing where these conversations go. Because because they do get interesting. Like they don't they don't get stale. And it all evolves, you know, Joe Krebs 1:08 thank you. Yes, and we go all the way back, I mean, to today's we're agile are very, very different. You wrote several books in between. I've been active not only here on the podcast, but also through work. And so our paths constantly cross. And obviously, you always have interesting content to share. Today, we want to talk a little bit about our OKR's. On social media, I see you a lot of responses and material you're releasing on OKR's. And you are obviously very, very interested in this topic. And it's not brand new. So there are some people that are talking about OKRs. What is OKRs? But I did some research on it. It's It's It's old, but obviously it hasn't really taken off at that time. So it really started like, way before, but Google really started introducing OKRs as far as that's my understanding, but even at that time, it wasn't really popularized. What's what's attracted you to OKRs? Jeff Gothelf 2:11 Yeah, super interesting, right? So it's a technique, it's been around for more than 40 years, Andy Grove at Intel. And for him, you know, managing by walking, management by objective, sorry, management by objective was kind of the first name for it. And then Google popularized it. What's interesting to me about it, and it's kind of like the same thing that happened with with sort of Lean and Agile and Lean startup and all these different things is that I think the reason why objectives and key results are having their moment in the sun right now. And everybody's interested, is because the technology that we use to deliver products and services, and build businesses on top of today is continuous. And it allows us to learn continuously, and at the pace of the market. So whereas if you think about, you know, when I started working professionally, in the late 90s, I worked in America Online, you know, it was far from continuous, right? We, it was very much not continuous, we worked for nine months to build software, and then print 15 million CDs, and then send them out, and then wait to see what happens, right? I think OKRs would have failed, because it would take too long to get feedback on whether or not you had a meaningful impact on the people who used your, your product or your service. And so as a goal setting framework, it would have been too bad. But today, you can get feedback instantaneously, if you've got enough of an audience size, and certainly very quickly in in a in the majority of cases. And so this is why this is an interesting topic. For me. Number one, I think this is why it's getting a lot of attention. The interesting thing here is that, in my opinion, and I can explain this in a minute, I think objectives and key results are the gateway to agility. Right? So if we can keep capital A agile out of it for just a second, right? And we talk about the the noun agility. I think that objectives and key results, when done correctly, demand that an organization behaves in an agile way that they increase their agility, we can explain why. But to me, that's why I'm so passionate about it these days, is because for all the organizations that have implemented some version of agile some version of Lean UX for Lean startup or design thinking, and I've struggled with it. I believe that if now if they if they kind of give it another shot and they start with OKR's as their goals, they stand a better chance of succeeding.Joe Krebs 5:02 Goal setting. And I actually like your your comment about the entry point or the the access point for for agility. That aside, I've been in my career I've been goal setting and goal and strategies and etc. I've been listening to this for a long, long time in organizations since I can think of in my professional career. Why is it so difficult? There? What do you think why, from a leadership perspective? Why does it seem so, so hard? The goal setting piece, I think, and I don't want to speak for everybody, but it feels like we're pretty good whether, you know, agile on the team level, building a product, maybe scaling, things like that. So there's a lot of things we have, but it's like the goal setting piece seems to be like, struggling, why do you think that is? Jeff Gothelf 5:52 Yeah, look, I think leadership has been trained on 100 years of management, Canon that's based heavily in production, right. And we've I know, we've talked about this in the past, but their managers are trained to optimize production even today, which doesn't make sense in a software based world as, as you know. And so you've got the, the staff of a team of an enterprise or an organization trying to work in an agile way. And they have demands being put on them that are very linear, that are production oriented, that are very prescriptive, go build me this thing, make sure it does these three things, doesn't mean this way, and just try to get it done by Friday, if you can, and that grinds the gears grind there, right? You got agile sort of turned teams trying to go one way, and the organizational and leadership demands going the other way. And but but it's first of all, management's comfortable with that way of setting goals. It's super easy to measure. It's binary. Right? But it's it's you know, did you make the thing? Yeah, here's the thing. I made it, right. Yeah. So if you made the thing, then you did a good job, and I should reward you and I can, and it's easy to measure, right? I didn't make the thing that didn't make the thing, easy to measure, easy to manage, easy to reward. When we change the goal. And this is what OKR's does, right? This is OKR's. At its core, when done correctly, and why it's powerful is the goal changes from output to outcome, it changes from making a thing to positively impact the behavior of the person using the thing, right. Now, the interesting thing about that is that that is not binary. So for example, let's talk, you know, you could say, an output goal could be build a mobile app. Okay, maybe we built the mobile app, okay. And outcome version of that said, we'd like to get at least 50% of our revenue to come through the mobile channel. Like we'd like people to spend at least 50% of the money that they spend with us through the mobile channel, right? That's a behavior change. Right? The goal is not deliver a mobile app, the goal is get folks to spend at least half of their of their, you know, lifetime value, whatever you want to call it. Through the mobile channel. Yeah. Now, let's say, let's say that you give that goal to a team. And at the end of a quarter, six months, they come back and say, look, we got you know, about 27% of the revenues coming through the mobile channel. What do you do with that team? Did they do a good job? They do a bad job? Did you fire them? Like they didn't they didn't hit 50%. And that becomes really difficult. That's one of the ways why this becomes difficult, right? Is this sense of... Well, I don't know what to do with that. Because like, what if they hit 42%? Or 27? May be right. But if they got to 42%, or 43%? What do you do with that as a manager? Right. And I don't think that leadership is the folks who are in leadership positions are necessarily equipped to deal with that today. And I think that's, that's one of the main reasons why this goal setting is challenging. The other reason why this is challenging is because I think leaders are used to telling people what to do. Go make this thing, build it this way and ship it by Friday, when you change that when you change from output to outcome, or build me the mobile app. Clear, super clear in the sense that like, okay, and I want the mobile app to enable online commerce and search and make sure everybody's got a profile. Okay. Right. Drive 50% of revenue through the mobile channel, does not tell the team what to do. And that is really scary for people in a leadership position. Because all of a sudden, they don't really have an answer to the question. Well, what is the team doing right now? What's the team working on? And that's terrifying, because they feel like they should know that and a certain degree they should. And they also feel like they should be telling them that. So there's that there's a trust that they have to have in a team that the team is making good decisions. Joe Krebs 10:14 Seems to be like a cultural changes is needed, not only for OKR, but also for everything that follows the OKR. Right? Because it's the it's not only the framework of understanding how to set goals differently, but it's also how to work differently, right, to your point like 42%. I mean, is that a negative result? You know, in 50%, we are on you know, if that was a lengthy process, let's say, of building a product, there could be many things could happen, that could be still a success, right? So it's an interesting thing. In terms of leadership, there is another tool for for leaders to acquire. Right? That's, I think that's what I'm hearing. Like, it's not only you understand OKR, but also to understand the Agile piece entirely working with teams. Jeff Gothelf 11:00 It's, it's highly complementary to Agile or Agility. Number one, and we'll talk about that in a second. But the it's such a simple concept. And yet it is so difficult to implement simply by switching from managing the output to managing outcome, right? So overall, if we just I can define it for you in 30 seconds, right? The objective is qualitative, aspirational, inspirational and time bound. The reason we get out of bed every morning, right? We want to be the go to destination for online furniture sales in Europe by the end of the year. Right? That's a qualitative aspiration. Why are we doing this? Because we're trying to be the go to destination for online furniture sales in Europe by the end of the year. Okay, easy enough? How do we know we've done that the key results are measures of human behavior, right, they are the things that people will do differently, that tell us that we are the go to destination for online furniture sales in Europe. Right? That is that, that that's critical. And it's things like, it could be average order value, could be repeat customer, the percentage of repeat customers, it could be referrals as plus lots of different behaviors that we could measure. They're super easy concept. But as you start to implement it, this is where it gets difficult. So we talked about measurement, right? We talked about the fact that you're not telling teams, what to build, and then and then on top, but the compatibility here with agile ways of working and agility is, is it's nearly an overlapping circle. Because essentially, what you're saying is team, I need you to go out and discover continuous learning and improvement and iteration, the best combination of code, copy, design, value proposition, business model, that will affect behavior change in this way. So the team conceives hypotheses, begins to do discovery work and discovery work is design thinking, Lean UX, lean startup research, etc. And then based on that evidence, they start to invest in the hypotheses that deliver the behavior change that they're looking for. And they remove effort or or pivot or kill the hypotheses that don't deliver the behavior change that we're looking for. And to be clear, changing course, based on evidence is being agile. So it's highly, highly compatible. But it takes this tremendous, to your point, cultural and organizational shift in understanding how, how work has to shift to to account for this new goal.Joe Krebs 14:00 We got the leadership, there's definitely a different kind of engagement and involvement is needed, right? Coming in, you know, using OKR's. And working with agile teams, if we're going on to the agile team level. So what I hear is, the teams are focusing on outcomes rather than output. Right. And but you also and this is very interesting, because I think that brings out the self-organization, part of an often team really clearly is the team's should not be focused on the features. So we shouldn't be focusing on features we should be focusing on the on the outcome. How do we have to see that that's an interesting piece. I came across one of your LinkedIn in posts recently, and it was it was quite interesting why so not to focus on the features but to focus on the outcomes that really drives a total behavioral change on a team level? Jeff Gothelf 14:53 Yeah.Joe Krebs 14:56 And so let's explore a little bit. Jeff Gothelf 15:00 Go back 20 years in time, the delivery of software to production 20 years ago, even 10 years ago, for the majority of organizations out there was an event. Right? It was a thing. Like, I mean, honestly, we had parties. Literally, we literally threw parties when we delivered software to production, because it took nine months to get there. Right. Right. And, and you know, and we get a t-shirt with the name of the project on and we celebrate the delivery of software, right? Today, you can ship software to production, if you choose to as an organization as fast as you want. There's literally no limit on it, Amazon's doing it once every second. That's, that's kind of the speed. And so the delivery of software is a non event at this point, right? Our ability to get ideas into the hands of customers, to learn whether or not it positively impacted their behavior in ways that we expect it or not. And then to react to that to ship sense and respond if you'll indulge me a little promotion of our second book, right. Is is it's in everybody's fingertips. Right. And so this, this idea that we're focusing on a feature doesn't really matter, of course, we have to ship the features. But we can ship anything we want as quickly as we want. And so the sooner at end, any of our assumptions or hypotheses are going to be wrong to some extent. And so the sooner that we can find out where we're wrong, and where we're right, allows us to change course, and to adjust more quickly, right, that's the agility that we're looking for. And so that begins. And because the delivery of software is is a non event, the focus isn't on, did we get the thing out the door? It's getting the thing out the door, shift the behavior in the right way? And if it didn't? Let's find out why. And if it did, let's find out why. And do more of that. To me, that's, it's a really difficult conversation for everybody involved in the management and the delivery of products, digital products and services. Because it's really easy to think about features. It's a concrete thing.Joe Krebs 17:20 Well, Jeff, you have so far published 4 books, right, if I counted correctly. And this is not the big reveal, I would assume and in the world of agile books, but there is a book 5 in the making. Jeff Gothelf 17:33 There is there is and I'm super excited to be co-writing with Josh Seidenn again, I've continued to work with Josh Seiden and continuously for 15 years at this point, we wrote Lean UX together, we wrote Sense and Respond together, we've built a couple of businesses together and we continue to deliver work together on a regular basis. And he had a tremendously successful that continue to be successful called Outcomes over Output. And so we decided to join forces again on a book and put out an OKR book, we're still working on a title, but the goal is to get it out in October of this year. And it's designed to be the practical, tactical guide for justifying OKR's and then writing them and kind of what happens next and how to implement them and what what to watch out for in a large organization. So if you think about sort of "Measure What Matters" John Doerr's book, sort of as the kind of the big, lofty introduction to OKRs, which has a few things in it that I don't necessarily agree with. Anything about Christina Wodtke's book, "Radical Focus", and if it was 2.0 is being fantastic. generally focused on a single team, though so it's kind of where's the sort of the practical guide for larger teams and teams at scale? That's what we are going for with this book. Super. Joe Krebs 17:33 Yeah, super exciting right. And you also have a course like a self paced course about OKRs when you do a JeffGothelf.com if you if you had to, you know have like a thread through like in terms of topics and how they are like intertwined and you know, linked together out of those books do you see like, like lean UX obviously was a that was a big book coming out in the beginning of not your career, but authors career, right. And then obviously, now there is a book about OKR how does this all connect with each other? If you had to say like, okay, I wrote Lean UX I wrote sense and respond then lean versus agile versus design thinking and now there comes the other one, maybe even the one from Josh, that book that somehow also topic-wise fits in. But what is the theme here? What is what is it? Jeff Gothelf 19:51 Yeah, it's a good question. And no one's ever asked me that question. So I liked this question. So lean UX was a sharing back of ways that we had figured out through trial and error for practicing design, user experience and design in Agile software development environments. That's kind of where it started in its first edition. And it's third edition. Now, it's a bit more broad about kind of how to how to teams design and build great products in an agile environment. The feedback from Lean UX since the day it came out was generally speaking. "I love the book", would love to work this way. My boss doesn't want let me my company doesn't work this way. And so to Josh and I, that was a clear call a sent a signal from the market that said, there's there's something to be done here. People want to work this way. But their bosses don't understand why or how. And so sense and respond was literally a response to the feedback that we sent from Lean UX. It was it was a business book, designed for leaders, I think we've met I think we may be used the word agile in there twice, in 50,000 words, and that was by design, right? It wasn't it was to try to build to write an evergreen book. And that that worked out well. And what's interesting is that, then folks began to take that advice to heart. And they started getting their team's training. And so we're hearing from our clients while we're in their training with with maybe with lean, lean UX, product discovery, design thinking. You know, there's a lot of agile training going on. And the feedback from organizations was looking for training everybody in lean startup and and Lean thinking and design thinking and lean UX and, and Agile and Scrum, and the magic isn't happening. Right? Why isn't the magic happening? And it's interesting, because I felt like we were pretty successful, like, convincing folks that stuff in Lean UX was good stuff in sense and respond was accurate. And now they were trying to make it all happen. But they were kind of buying sort of ad hoc training and trying to make it all together, make it all work together. So that's where Lean versus agile versus Design Thinking came from. And in hindsight, I regret not calling it lean and agile and design thinking, right? Like, that's the only the only change I would make, because fundamentally the the philosophies is the same in my opinion underneath those, those ideas. And so that would have helped people kind of get a better sense of how to unite those processes and build those environments. And then finally, kind of coming full circle to this OKR book today. It feels like, well, it's what we talked about before, right? It feels like the product development parts of an organization get it, right, they get, you know, lean agile and design thinking. But the leadership part of the organization is still making demands on them, that reflect reflect old ways of thinking and old ways of working. So, an OKR book, if it can convince an organization to set goals in this new way, paves the way for the product development teams to be successful with everything else. We've provided them over the last decade. So that's the thread between it all. And it's almost like we should have been done the OKR book first and come his way. But you know, here we are. Joe Krebs 23:26 Yeah, no, it's it's awesome is many of those readers out there listeners, when we have read your material, they will know that not only will you write about it, it was going to be a great book away and as the other ones too. But it's also going to probably going to create a bigger interest in in that topic. So I'm excited about that. Because OKR's from what I understand is also creating a higher level of experimentation. Inspires is something I'm personally very interested about. Right. Soleaders, obviously, as we already pointed out, is is something that that would need to be coming on board with that kind of concept. And I think holistically drive this. This is super interesting. Yeah, that is, so if material out you have you you have training about this topic, you're writing a book about OKRs. And the title is still unknown. We don't know that yet. Jeff Gothelf 24:26 It's TBD. I've been asking Chad GPT to help me and it's done. Okay, it's generated some decent site overall, at least at least. Something has sparked the brainstorm.Joe Krebs 24:39 Yeah. Two quick questions at the at the end here. Before we before we depart. So if some leaders out there it's like is first time I really hear OKRs maybe something's like I've heard about it, but I really have no idea about OKR, what what's your recommendation for Leaders how to get started with that or possibly get warmed up to the topic. And also for maybe the other side, we have touched on in this podcast the teams, right? Like let's say there's a Scrum team. Let's just make it very specific. Right. And let's say there's a scrum team. How does Scrum and OKRs? How does that all link together? In your opinion? Jeff Gothelf 25:21 Yeah. So, look, I think, I think there's a challenge. I wouldn't recommend Measure What Matters any more than what's on every executive desk, just because there's some things in there. Fundamentally, he's okay with, with outputs as key results, and I'm not. So so I have to disagree with that, I'm sorry. But otherwise, and I think like Christina's Wodtk's books are amazing, Christina Wodtke's Radical Focus is amazing. I just, you know, it's generally focused on startups and single teams. And so if you're looking for for sort of a quick primer, there is, first of all, is endless content on my blog, but the OKR course, which is, which is super, in my opinion, super affordable. It's 68 minutes of video. And I think that that's a fair ask, if you're looking for a very short distillation of that. I did a, I did a kind of a video podcast about two years ago, with a show called product beats. Swedish. Okay, folks, I think, and it was like 18 minutes long. And all I did was talk about OKRs for 18 minutes. And so if you just want to invest 18 minutes, that's a great, that's a great little podcast to get into. And that would really kind of break it down very, very clearly as to the what, how the why some of the, the traps and the things to watch out for. So those are good places to start. All those are good places to start. Joe Krebs 26:52 Yeah, maybe people will later refer to this 25 minute podcast of Agile FM and say like that might be the starting point of the starting points, right?Jeff Gothelf 27:00 I hope so.Joe Krebs 27:02 What about teams? What are the changes on a scrum team? For example, if somebody says, Hey, we're going to introduce OKR's into our organization, what's the impact on the scrum team, for example? Jeff Gothelf 27:11 So this is where it gets it. This is where it gets interesting, right? Because again, like, if you don't, if you don't tell the team what to make, they've got to go discover there, they've got to go figure it out. If they don't know how to do discovery, or if they're not allowed to do discovery, then they're just going to retrofit their existing backlog into the goals that you've set for them. And that gets us nowhere, right? Doesn't we've changed nothing at that point, right. And so what changes at the team level is you have to start doing discovery, and then building that into your sprints. So dual track agile, we know that term for a long time, by discovering delivery, with the same team doing both types of work, writing hypotheses, testing them changing things based on evidence, that's key. So if you don't know how to do that, you have to get training for it. If your company won't allow you to do that, but they're setting OKRs as goals, you have to raise your hand, you have to say, look, I appreciate you going down this path. But if we can't go and talk to customers, if we can't run experiments, if you won't allow us to carve time out of every sprint for learning, then we've changed nothing. You're not going anywhere. Joe Krebs 28:21 Oh, that's cool. That's great advice, Jeff. This is, this is awesome. So we learned a lot. Jeff is working on a new book, it's gonna be about OKR's or related content. We heard a little bit about leaders, teams. We got a little bit of advice, and it's all packed into 25 minutes. There's only one sad piece about this podcast, and that is that I heard that we are not having any kind of launch parties anymore, no more printed T shirts those days are over. So for everybody releasing software today, you're missing out. But other than that, we're gonna see great improvements. That's awesome.Jeff Gothelf 29:03 It is sad. I mean, I miss my projects diamond T-Shirt. Project emerald. That was the one after diamond. That was amazing. Joe Krebs 29:13 It's awesome. Thanks, Jeff, for joining me on this podcast. Jeff Gothelf 29:17 My pleasure. Thanks so much for having me. It's great chatting with us. Good to see you again.Joe Krebs 29:23 Thank you for listening to Agile FM, the radio for the Agile community. I'm your host Joe Krebs. If you're interested in more programming and additional podcasts, please go to www agile.fm. Talk to you soon.

Brought to you by Miro—A collaborative visual platform where your best work comes to life | Dovetail—Bring your customer into every decision | Writer—Generative AI for the enterprise—Christina Wodtke is an author, Stanford University professor, and speaker who teaches strategies for building high-performing teams. She's also the author of Radical Focus, which some consider the de facto guide to OKRs. In today's episode, we dive into OKRs and how they can be used to help your team achieve better results. Christina shares her expertise on crafting OKRs, how she uses them in her personal life, and common mistakes you should avoid when you sit down to write your own. She discusses effective goal setting and outlines a systematic approach to achieving key results. Finally, Christina gives some specific tips on how to improve your storytelling and drawing skills and explains why it's smart to set ambitious goals.Find the full transcript here: https://www.lennyspodcast.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-okrs-christina-wodtke-stanford/Where to find Christina Wodtke:• Twitter: https://twitter.com/cwodtke• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/• Website: https://eleganthack.com/Where to find Lenny:• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com• Twitter: https://twitter.com/lennysan• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/Referenced:• Yahoo's peanut butter memo: https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB116379821933826657• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable: https://www.amazon.com/Five-Dysfunctions-Team-Leadership-Fable/dp/0787960756/• Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results: https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Focus-Achieving-Important-Objectives/dp/0996006087• Pencil Me In: https://www.amazon.com/Pencil-Me-Christina-Wodtke-ebook/dp/B075Z8J35G?• The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures: https://www.amazon.com/Back-Napkin-Expanded-Problems-Pictures/dp/1591842697/ref=sr_1_1• The Minto Pyramid Principle: https://www.barbaraminto.com/• Lane Shackleton's guest post on Lenny's Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-coda-builds-product• The Product Trio by Teresa Torres: https://www.producttalk.org/2021/05/product-trio/• Ken Norton's website: https://www.bringthedonuts.com/about/• The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation, and Growth: https://www.amazon.com/Fearless-Organization-Psychological-Workplace-Innovation/dp/1119477247• The Overstory: https://www.amazon.com/Overstory-Novel-Richard-Powers/dp/039335668X/• Cloud Atlas: https://www.amazon.com/Cloud-Atlas-Novel-David-Mitchell/dp/0375507256• Black Panther: Wakanda Forever: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9114286/• The Team That Managed Itself: A Story of Leadership: https://www.amazon.com/Team-that-Managed-Itself-Leadership-ebook/dp/B07ZG5Y689In this episode, we cover:(00:00) Christina's background(04:54) How Christina uses OKRs to manage her personal life(07:42) The purpose of OKRs(16:15) Mission, vision, roadmaps, and OKRs(20:57) How strategy ties in(22:39) Why OKRs should be kept simple, and the ideal way to express key results(23:45) The importance of customer satisfaction and why you need a qualitative researcher(24:58) Common mistakes people make when writing OKRs(26:14) An example of writing OKRs for an online magazine about interior design(29:28) The importance of repetition(33:17) The 5 whys(36:40) Why you should start OKRs with your best multi-disciplinary team(38:44) Christina's book, Radical Focus(40:26) The importance of storytelling and drawing (even badly!)(43:21) Tips to become a better storyteller(44:29) Using the Minto method for storytelling(46:02) The cadence of OKRs and the importance of celebrations(51:09) A different kind of approval process to get OKRs done more efficiently(53:01) Why the focus on learning is more important than grading(54:29) Why you should set ambitious goals(57:47) Where to start(1:00:48) The overemphasis of UX in product management education and the importance of business sense(1:03:01) Advice for people seeking a career in product management(1:05:44) Lightning roundProduction and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

From earliest stage start-up to coveted unicorns status, few people have had more of a front-row seat on helping grow businesses than Jenny Herald's guest on this episode of Dreams With Deadlines. Luca Cipriani, who is Head of Architecture and OKR Coach at Jimdo, knows intimately the strategic elements that make scaling ventures fly or fail – and he's sharing his rules of the road. It all starts, he says, with building nimbleness and psychological safety into the blueprint from your start-up's earliest days while keeping goals flexible without losing sight of the core North Star mission.Key things discussed How integrating OKRs into processes from the outset ensures they are foundational at every stage of execution. What the goals should be in building a framework for your start-up journey. Why it's important not to tie key initiatives too closely to key results. Which ingredients successful start-up cultures tend to share in common. What are some predictable barriers to building a healthy workplace – and how to head then off at the pass. The show wraps up with Luca's thoughts on the importance of keeping OKRs simple and giving teams the room to evolve, experiment, iterate and surprise. How integrating OKRs into processes from the outset ensures they are foundational at every stage of execution. What the goals should be at the outset of a start-up journey. Why it's important not to tie initiatives too closely to key results. Which ingredients successful start-up cultures tend to share in common. What constitute the most predictable barriers to building a healthy workplace – and how to head them off at the pass. Show Notes [00:03:13] Getting Started on the Journey: About at what point in scaling Luca Introduces OKRs and other optimization solutions. [00:04:33] What are the goals when implementing OKRs at an early stage: Creating strong alignment from the outset. Instituting systems to measure as much as possible any relevant KPIs. Introducing rational metrics that can anchor young founders as they navigate the high-stakes, high-stress start-up phase. Establishing a framework for what success looks like and means. [00:06:23] Balancing Quality and Quantity: Luca recalls how he has helped start-ups create sustainable objectives through systematic, evolving feedback. [00:09:08] It's a process: Why Luca believes OKR processes must necessarily be iterative and have built into them an assumption that there will be missteps as well as the need for reflections and adjustments along the way. [00:11:13] What it looks like to help founders or teams, at whatever stage, assess on an ongoing basis and roll those learnings into go-forward plans. [00:13:08] Luca explains how he deploys OKRs – and parses outcomes versus outputs and inputs – with early-stage start-ups that don't yet have a well-established baseline. Companies must have a clear North Star. Putting initial metrics in place can be a way to get started getting started putting measurable processes in place. [00:15:12] How Luca helps start-ups move into a scaling phase, deploying OKR processes that keep companies on track with their vision and strategy: Top-up as well as bottom-down collaboration. Intentionally aligned KPIs understood across teams. Cross-department communication to promote consistent global goals. [00:18:33] Why it's important not to tie specific initiatives to key results: It can yoke people to fruitless busy work. It reduces nimbleness. It thwarts creative problem-solving. It discourages experimentation. [00:20:38] Luca shares examples of unconventional wins and success stories worth millions of dollars saved through out-of-the-box flexibility with OKRs. [00:23:36] Going off the Rails: Illustrations (both real-world and in film) of how communication gaps, micromanagement and relentless pressure can take companies off course and away from core values by pursuing the extraction of value at any cost. [00:30:15] About mastery, purpose, autonomy and how flexible OKRs can be leveraged to motivate teams. [00:30:54] Taking a closer look at workplace cultures and the attributes Luca has seen in the unicorns with which he has worked: Maintaining a unity of purpose. Creating an environment in which all team members feel they're contributing. Preserving inter-departmental intimacy and removing barriers to communication. Cultivating agency among teams to be autonomous and work autonomously (i.e. minimize micromanagement). Delegating judiciously – enough but not too much. Emphasizing unity of purpose. Fostering psychologically safety so that teams feel free to seek help and admit failure. [00:36:05] About the concept of aligning around the perfect number of OKR objectives. And that number is? One! Not because there aren't other goals, but because the overarching focus needs to stay on the business's true North Star. [00:37:09] What Luca sees as the most common barriers to building healthy, effective workplace teams: Lack of communication. Toxic behaviors that squelch authenticity and honesty. Siloed teams. Lack of direct interaction and feedback. Lack of autonomy or agency to self-organize, act independently and surprise. [00:40:28] A Round of Quick-Fire Questions for Luca: What's your Dream with a Deadline? To have fewer things to do and to do them faster! What management techniques and practices do you believe have most helped the teams with which you've worked? Attention to detail, staying open-minded, helping people figure out how to raise the bar on quality. What advice would you give to keep teams focused while scaling up and incorporating OKRs? Set and communicate expectations clearly! Relevant links: https://lab.okrbusiness.com More about Monsters, Inc. More about The Lego Movie. "Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us," by Daniel Pink. More about the views of OKR coach Christina Wodtke. About Our Guest:Luca Cipriani is an OKR Coach and Engineering Manager with great expertise in SaaS products and companies. A strong contributor to Open Source software, he also has a proven record in managing developers and other managers, scaling teams and SaaS businesses and making them successful.Follow Our Guest:Website | LinkedInFollow Dreams With Deadlines:Host | Company Website | Blog | Instagram | Twitter

In this week's episode, Melissa Perri and Christina Wodtke, author of Radical Focus, get into all things OKRs. Christina shares how she discovered the power of OKRs, why she sees OKRs as a “vitamin, not a medicine,” why OKRs aren't synonymous with product strategy, what it looks like to apply key results in the wrong way, how to use OKRs to create “super employees,” and so much more.  Here are some key points Christina and Melissa talk about: Christina talks about her professional background and what led her to write the first and second editions of her book, Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results. Christina believes that OKRs are ideally set and implemented at a team level, but they not a safety net that provides your team with product strategy. Christina highlights the differences between an OKR, product strategy, and business strategy and how they work together in the business ecosystem. An excellent product strategy and good annual OKRs can help execute an ambitious five-year plan. Christina and Melissa explore the really difficult question, “When do we stop?” and talk about how checking back in with your OKRs quarter after quarter can help answer it.  Resources: Christina Wodtke on LinkedIn | Twitter  Radical Focus

In this week's episode, Melissa Perri and Christina Wodtke, author of Radical Focus, get into all things OKRs. Christina shares how she discovered the power of OKRs, why she sees OKRs as a “vitamin, not a medicine,” why OKRs aren't synonymous with product strategy, what it looks like to apply key results in the wrong way, how to use OKRs to create “super employees,” and so much more.  Here are some key points Christina and Melissa talk about: Christina talks about her professional background and what led her to write the first and second editions of her book, Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results. Christina believes that OKRs are ideally set and implemented at a team level, but they not a safety net that provides your team with product strategy. Christina highlights the differences between an OKR, product strategy, and business strategy and how they work together in the business ecosystem. An excellent product strategy and good annual OKRs can help execute an ambitious five-year plan. Christina and Melissa explore the really difficult question, “When do we stop?” and talk about how checking back in with your OKRs quarter after quarter can help answer it.  Resources: Christina Wodtke on LinkedIn | Twitter  Radical Focus

John Cutler writes the popular and beloved product newsletter The Beautiful Mess. For many years, he was a Product Evangelist at Amplitude, which led him to meeting and working with a large number of product teams around the world. Through this role, he gained unique insight into how the best product teams operate. In today's episode, John reflects on leaving his role at Amplitude, and explains the attributes that the top 1% of product teams share. We also go deep into some of his favorite frameworks and discuss the best way to apply these frameworks to your work. We also unpack skills like product sense and product mindset, and what he's planning in his new role at Toast.—Find the full transcript here: https://www.lennyspodcast.com/what-differentiates-the-highest-performing-product-teams-john-cutler-amplitude-the-beautiful-mess/#transcript—Thank you to our wonderful sponsors for supporting this podcast:• Merge—A single API to add hundreds of integrations into your app: http://merge.dev/lenny• Eppo—Run reliable, impactful experiments: https://www.geteppo.com/• Vanta—Automate compliance. Simplify security: https://vanta.com/lenny—Where to find John Cutler:• Twitter: https://twitter.com/johncutlefish• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnpcutler/• Newsletter: https://cutlefish.substack.com/—Where to find Lenny:• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com• Twitter: https://twitter.com/lennysan• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/—Referenced:• Amplitude: https://amplitude.com/• The North Star Playbook: https://info.amplitude.com/north-star-playbook• Craig Daniel on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/craigmdaniel/• Working Backwards: Insights, Stories, and Secrets from Inside Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Working-Backwards-Insights-Stories-Secrets/dp/1250267595• AppFolio: https://www.appfolio.com/• High Leverage Product Evangelism: https://cutlefish.substack.com/p/high-leverage-product-evangelism• Satya Nadella on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/satyanadella/• The Culture Map: Breaking Through the Invisible Boundaries of Global Business: https://www.amazon.com/Culture-Map-Breaking-Invisible-Boundaries/dp/1610392507• Innovation Labs: https://innovationlabs.com/• BEES: https://mybeesapp.com/• Marty Cagan on Lenny's Podcast: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-nature-of-product-marty-cagan#details• Sooner Safer Happier: Antipatterns and Patterns for Business Agility: https://www.amazon.com/Sooner-Safer-Happier-Patterns-Antipatterns/dp/1942788916• Teresa Torres on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/teresatorres/• Andrew Huberman on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hubermanlab/?hl=en• TBM 49/52: Pyramid of Leadership Self/Other Awareness: https://cutlefish.substack.com/p/tbm-4952-pyramid-of-leadership-selfother• ChatGPT: https://chat.openai.com/chat• How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business: https://www.amazon.com/How-Measure-Anything-Intangibles-Business-ebook/dp/B00INUYS2U• Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software and DevOps: Building and Scaling High Performing Technology Organizations: https://www.amazon.com/Accelerate-Software-Performing-Technology-Organizations/dp/1942788339• User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product: https://www.amazon.com/User-Story-Mapping-Discover-Product/dp/B08TZGKKF2• Build with Maggie Crowley podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/build-with-maggie-crowley/id1445050691• One Knight in Product podcast: https://www.oneknightinproduct.com/index.html#page-top• Sunny Bunnies on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81286920• Booba on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81011059• Toast: https://pos.toasttab.com/• Drift: https://www.drift.com/John's list of high-performing people worth following:• Dr. Cat Hicks (@grimalkina) https://www.linkedin.com/in/drcathicks/ • Stephanie Leue https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephanie-leue/• Amy Edmondson (@AmyCEdmondson) https://www.linkedin.com/in/amedmondson/• Dominica DeGrandis (@dominicad) https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominicadeg/• Courtney Kissler https://www.linkedin.com/in/courtney-kissler-0930681/• Christina Wodtke (@cwodtke) https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/• Matthew Skelton https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewskelton/• Heidi Helfand (@heidihelfand): https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidihelfand/—In this episode, we cover:(00:00) What is a product evangelist? John's unique role at Amplitude(05:50) John's reflections and feelings on leaving Amplitude(17:28) What John's doing next(18:52) John's newsletter: The Beautiful Mess(27:49) What do the top 1% of product teams have in common?(40:08) Different ways companies are successful, and why anyone can improve(45:55) Investing in people vs. investing in processes(48:49) The importance of culture and values(49:59) Global company cultures: the individualist vs. the collectivist  (55:55) Why it's hard to make changes in large companies(58:49) How to view frameworks(1:01:02) The spectrum of performance in big and small companies(1:05:27) Examples of high-performing people who work outside of Silicon Valley(1:09:02) The skill of product management(1:11:35) The value of learning a bit about everything(1:13:46) Why do people often underestimate the loops available at their company(1:16:20) Chronic vs. acute issues at companies(1:18:07) Unpacking the skills behind product sense and product mindset(1:20:44) A place for people without the traditional meritocracy mindset(1:22:38) John's writing process and what he plans on writing about next(1:27:52) How to use ChatGPT for learning and levity(1:31:56) Lightning Round—Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

Key Things Discussed A variety of initiatives that Mike and his team have introduced and the how they've brought stakeholders along for the ride. The difference between Outcomes and Outputs, as well as creative strategic visioning versus analytical, project-based planning. Key ingredients to highlight in the pursuit of cross-functional buy-in. Two major indicators for successful OKR adoption. The power of an aspirational mindset shift from “committed” to “stretch” goals. Why discovery, time, transparency and collaboration will advance your OKR framework every time – no matter how complex or tradition-bound the enterprise. Show Notes [02:34] Mike walks us through his career trajectory, from digital publishing to e-commerce, mobile computing to a longer-term shift into IT consulting and coaching. [03:54] A look at KeyBank's decision to acquire Hello Wallet, an app to support customer loyalty, financial health and smarter decision-making. The young team brought fresh energy. The integration has served as a model for other fintech acquisitions. [05:41] About 200-year-old KeyBank – the 20th largest in the U.S. with assets of about $180 billion – and the role that Mike's team plays in moving the institution from analog to digital, from on-prem to cloud and all the mindsets that go along with change. [06:52] Mike highlights initiatives and strategy development at KeyBank: Infrastructure improvements to create the runway for innovation. Fintech acquisitions. Hack-a-thons to test resiliency.   [08:29] Outcome versus Outputs: Outcomes are strategy-focused, enabling a different future and new capabilities. Outputs are more analytical and project-based. [09:32] About OKRs and cross-functional development, reaching across silos to enable restructuring and transformational initiatives through outcome-oriented teams. [13:39] Mike explains why initiatives like his at KeyBank succeed by offering recurring value, embracing system shifts and integrating clearly defined OKRs from the outset – then staying grounded and aligned with the original vision. [17:23] How an Agile Transformation initiative launched discussions within KeyBank – including its coaching team and a global consultant, resulting in an OKR framework. [18:06] Challenges that arose out of KeyBank's transition to a new OKR orientation: Not simply substituting OKR measures for a previous KPI approach. They are different animals. Shifting away old systems and the Project Management Orientation that is especially common among legacy companies. [19:42] “Stretch” versus “Committed” Goals: Part of Mike's mandate is to help KeyBank stretch beyond setting easily achievable goals – a comfort zone for established organizations – to become more nimble, swing for the stands and accept that failure is part of the process. [21:38] How Mike evangelizes for sufficient time for implementation and a leadership orientation towards aspirational goals. Cross-functional, structural change takes patience and persistence. [24:03] Two Major Factors for OKR Adoption Success: Creative, strategy-led focus (rather than an analytical, planning approach). A substantial discovery process built on teams digging deep and creating a collective vision for how to work cross-functionally over the long haul. [24:58] What “discovery” looks like at KeyBank, which includes working collaboratively with both the business and technology sides of the house and using an outcomes- and value-based framework. [26:41] Velocity and efficiency are great, but effectiveness is the goal. Using continuous discovery – with small, nimble assays – accelerates desired measurable outcomes. [28:54] What happens to all those measures? Do teams throw them out? Story points and velocity can be helpful, but outcomes-based, empowered collaboration and creativity are king. [31:29] Are OKRs just a burden? Not when teams work together to strengthen and evolve existing processes that aren't stymied by planning and task-based systems. Solid leadership, transparency, communication and coaching enable success! [35:27] Quick Fire Questions for Mike: What's your Dream With a Deadline? Step by step, over the coming year or two, Mike would like to see KeyBank leadership and teams working collaboratively across the enterprise. Each chapter of that journey may be a chapter for a book! What do you appreciate about your team? They are caring, thoughtful and extremely committed to agile coaching with a range and depth of skills to offer. What execution challenge has KeyBank faced? As a legacy organization, it has been a process for the CEO and leadership team to execute over time on digital transformation and migrate to a more nimble mode of operations. What nuggets of advice do you have for a business just starting out with OKRs?Linking client-centricity with creative strategy is critical – and then hiring good people and putting in place a program that's effective in setting goals and effectively delivering against them.  What's top of mind for you these days at KeyBank?Continuing to do the hard work to make transformational breakthroughs and move together as a team to best serve our customers every day. Relevant links Hello Wallet, the financial fitness app. Christina Wodtke's book about OKRs: "Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results." Mike's recent article about "Why You'll Miss Your OKRs Again This Cycle." Teresa Torres and her opportunity solution tree's role in Continuous Discovery. Reflections by Roger Martin on Strategy versus Planning. About Our GuestMichael Goitein, enterprise agile and OKRs coach at KeyBank, is a global technology leader, innovator, author and certified Agile transformer who strategically directs and delivers multi-million-dollar, enterprise-level digital, mobile, big data, and high-tech solutions for Fortune 200 clients. He leads local and globally-distributed teams coaching, innovating, executing, and delivering end-to-end mobile and digital projects.Follow Our GuestWebsite | LinkedInFollow Dreams With DeadlinesHost | Company Website | Blog | Instagram | Twitter

Janna Bastow is a former product manager, and currently the CEO and co-founder of ProdPad. She also co-founded Mind the Product, a community for PMs, which has grown to 300,000 members across the world. In today's podcast, Janna discusses the limitations of timeline-based Gantt charts and her “Now/Next/Later” framework. She also shares stories about hosting conferences and gives some great tips on how to improve your presentation skills and cope with performance anxiety.—Where to find Janna Bastow:• Twitter: https://twitter.com/simplybastow• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jannabastow• The ProdPad newsletter: https://www.prodpad.com/newsletter/—Where to find Lenny:• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com• Twitter: https://twitter.com/lennysan• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/—Thank you to our wonderful sponsors for making this episode possible:• Formsort: https://formsort.com/lenny• Coda: http://coda.io/lenny• Amplitude: https://amplitude.com/—Referenced:• Mind the Product: https://www.mindtheproduct.com/• The Trouble with Traditional Roadmaps: https://www.prodpad.com/resources/guides/ditch-the-timeline-roadmap/the-trouble-with-traditional-timeline-roadmaps/• ProdPad's Sandbox: https://www.prodpad.com/sandbox/• Geoffrey Moore's product vision template: https://www.prodpad.com/blog/product-vision-template/• The Art of Profitability: https://www.amazon.com/Art-Profitability-Adrian-Slywotzky/dp/0446692271• The Sandman on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81150303• Startups for the Rest of Us podcast: https://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/• Christina Wodtke on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cwodtke—In this episode, we cover:(01:10) Janna's background(05:28) How the community evolved at Mind the Product(08:22) The tricky logistics of putting together a conference(10:48) Are conferences profitable?(13:00) How Janna developed her storytelling and presentation skills(16:44) How to fight performance anxiety(19:25) Mistakes are humanizing—how to power through and deliver your presentation(22:11) The limitations of traditional timeline roadmaps(25:00) Janna's Now/Next/Later framework(28:08) How to work without the structure of dated timelines, and why soft launches are important(32:57) What great product teams are doing well(35:05) The importance of retrospectives(36:45) How to shift the culture at larger companies(39:43) How ProdPad creates better product management practices(42:04) How to learn the Now/Next/Later framework(46:59) Geoffrey Moore's product vision template(48:36) Lessons for PMs interested in becoming founders(50:48) Lightning round—Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

Every organization strives to have teams that perform well. However, the process of designing such high-performing teams and creating an environment in which people can thrive, is often an overlooked process. Why is that the case? Aren't people your most important resource after all?  So, what are high-performing, empowered teams? And, how can you create such a work environment with the help of OKR? We spoke to https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/ (Christina Wodtke), ex-OKR consultant, and author of https://www.google.com/search?q=Radical+Focus:+Achieving+Your+Most+Important+Goals+with+Objectives+and+Key+Results&stick=H4sIAAAAAAAAABXGsQrCMBAA0EEEHVwcnQ5Hl7SgHbK5KCIidHMqaRra2CSnuUslv-OXim96i9l6Kbwo9sU7--1K9KIstT9wbKpmtxm1FC3iKFTiAaP8nwCDy995XavOauXghDqRhKMerJls6OGBKcINieHiXxhZBYYzKkfwsTzAvX0azXYyBCp0cDUZakPJMf0AcePzN40AAAA&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwis0qy4m7r6AhUdXvEDHR86ARgQ9OUBegQIDxAD&biw=1440&bih=694&dpr=2 (Radical Focus) and https://www.google.com/search?sa=X&biw=1440&bih=694&si=AC1wQDAXKblb4YtxZaDquKpQ5Js55CVph8NS1FIwBhgs6qyyHmENkHLZ_1sb5Wt8uN15b61o6gE5XQBmKooUtVyvHhTtyjearrOKHPPzr9xjYS1nGwtqv3UbsPozUGekkE30xqD8tcUxkqtXKSALJtVqPdWWgh9YTczHdy6FVTPrtP8pO58sTB3oZF3hvckZlhHv_XV973WcQod6TKcEygEEax3jnn3f3Kw_iDSbUXV4uuTo6Yx52qJrP8RG3SrrJfvInbZ1VtHA&q=The+Team+That+Managed+Itself:+A+Story+of+Leadership&lei=EKw1Y9fbIcmHxc8Ps4m0-AM (The team that managed itself), about: What the meaning of an empowered team is? What does it mean to consciously design and maintain a high-performing empowered team?  How do you design such a team? What do organizations get wrong when designing their teams? What role do goals (eg. OKRs) play in the empowerment of teams? And what is the process of goal grading in such teams?  Tune in to learn more! - Want to track your OKRs (and KPIs)? Head over to Perdoo and https://www.perdoo.com/#get-started (create a FREE account). Learn more about strategy, goals (OKRs & KPIs) & growth — visit the https://www.perdoo.com/resources (Perdoo Resources Hub). Copyright 2022 Perdoo

Christina Wodtke reminds us to stop carrying the weight of the world, to start giving others the benefit of the doubt, and to make the most of the gift that is feedback. Highlights include: ⭐ What did you learn about collaboration from swing dancing? ⭐ Why do we need to give other people the benefit of the doubt? ⭐ What was it like being an executive in big tech? ⭐ Where can people start to develop more confidence? ⭐ What is important to remember when giving feedback? ====== Who is Christina Wodtke? Christina is one of the most impactful, established, and original thought leaders in Silicon Valley. There won't be many of you listening who haven't at least heard of her groundbreaking and bestselling book on OKRs, Radical Focus - now in its second edition! A self-described “curious human” with a serious big-tech resume, her work in design and product has included redesigns and IPOs at companies such as LinkedIn, MySpace, Zynga, and Yahoo! But those big names only scratch the surface of Christina's professional story. She has co-founded a tech startup, co-founded the Information Architecture Institute, founded and was the original publisher of Boxes and Arrows, and is the founder Women Talk Design. Christina is currently preparing the next generation of product and game designers, as a full-time lecturer at Stanford University. Previously, Christina was an Associate Professor at California College of the Arts, where she taught creative entrepreneurship. ====== Find Christina here: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/cwodtke Website: https://cwodtke.com/ Blog: https://eleganthack.com/ Christina's books: Radical Focus (Second Edition) - Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results:  https://amzn.to/3Sc82o4 Information Architecture - Blueprints for the Web:  https://amzn.to/3UknzUL Pencil Me In - The Business Drawing Book for People Who Can't Draw: https://amzn.to/2WOBNP7  The Team That Managed Itself - A Story of Leadership: https://amzn.to/3QRyXo6 Women Talk Design: Website: https://womentalkdesign.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/womentalkdesign LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-talk-design/ ====== Liked what you heard and want to hear more? Subscribe and support the show by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts (or wherever you listen). Follow us on our other social channels for more great Brave UX content! YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/TheSpaceInBetween/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-space-in-between/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thespaceinbetw__n/  ====== Hosted by Brendan Jarvis: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanjarvis/ Website: https://thespaceinbetween.co.nz/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/brendanjarvis/

015 - We're kicking off Season 2 with Design Director of IBM Consulting, Founder of the Quiet Achiever and proud introvert, Tim Yeo. In this episode, Tim shares his personal journey in his career as an introverted designer and design leader and the learnings he picked up along the way to be comfortable with his introversion and do the things that don't come naturally to him as an introvert. Tim now helps other introverts like himself have impact and influence without pretending to be extroverts in a world that desires the extroverted ideal.In this episode:We're all ducks, calm on the surface, paddling furiously underneath and that's okEmbracing your introversion rather than pretending to be an extrovertHow experience helps you recognise repeatable patterns and increases your confidenceWhy our definition of what a successful leader looks like is flawedWhy you don't have to wait to speak up till you think you're 100% rightBuilding a strong design team remotelyAnd much more!Links and resourcesThe Quiet Achieverwww.thequietachievr.comTim Yeo on Twitterhttps://twitter.com/timyeoTim Yeo on LinkedInhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/timyeo/Susan Cain's Book ‘Quiet'https://susancain.net/book/quiet/Scott Berkun's Book ‘Confessions of a Public Speaker'https://scottberkun.com/the-books/confessions-of-a-public-speaker/Christina Wodtke's books ‘Radical Focus' and ‘The Team that Managed Itself'https://cwodtke.com/writing-2/Patrick Lencioni's Book ‘The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable'https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21343.The_Five_Dysfunctions_of_a_TeamSituational Leadership® Modelhttps://situational.com/situational-leadership/Oliver Burkeman's Book ‘Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortal'https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54785515-four-thousand-weeksShow creditsIllustrations by Isa Vicentehttps://www.instagram.com/isadezgz/Music by Brad Porterhttps://prtr.co/

Today, I am excited to share a conversation with Christina Wodtke, a celebrity in agile leadership and team dynamics. Christina is the author of popular books like The Team that Managed Itself and Radical Focus.   Christina brings a wealth of agile knowledge in the agile space, having worked with tech companies like LinkedIn, Zynga, and Yahoo!, not to mention having founded three startups.   Christina is an executive leadership coach who teaches techniques to create high-performing teams at the prestigious Stanford University.   I am excited to share that Christina will share her new thoughts and ideas concerning nimble and stable teams.   In this conversation, you will hear Christina talk about the importance of Psychological Safety. If you are unfamiliar with the topic, I suggest you locate the podcast just before the one you are listening to now. It is titled Building a Culture of Psychological Safety and contains a fantastic conversation with Alla Weinberg as an introduction to the topic. Christina will also talk frequently about OKRs -- or objectives and key results. If you are unfamiliar with the topic, you can listen to my conversation with Christina's friend and colleague, Jeff Gothelf. You can find that conversation in the Agile in Action podcast titled "Introducing Objectives and Key Results." Psychological Safety Episode Objectives and Key Results Episode The team that managed itself Radical focus Twitter Website    

Episode 072 of Underserved features Brian Durkin, Sr. Group Manager & Head of User Experience, Data & Analytics at BNY Mellon. Brian leveraged his art degree into some web design work but found his true passion was in information architecture. He came to this realization in the middle of an interview, which he politely asked to terminate. Instead, he was offered a new IA job the next day! Also covered: World IA Day, getting fintech to understand IA, and the fun parts of working for Nickelodeon.     Charles Zicari, Brian's first real IA mentor: https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-zicari-90798/   IxDA: https://ixda.org/   UXPA Boston: http://uxpaboston.org/    World IA Day, Brian started the one for Boston: https://worldiaday.org/    Some of the past speakers of World IA Day Boston:  Peter Morville - https://www.linkedin.com/in/morville    Steve Portigal - https://www.linkedin.com/in/steveportigal/  Josh Seiden - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jseiden/  Abby Covert - https://www.linkedin.com/in/abbytheia/  Aaron Irizarry - https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaroni/  Todd Zaki-Warfel - https://www.linkedin.com/in/zakiwarfel/  Dana Chisnell - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dana-chisnell/  Christina Wodtke - https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinawodtke/ 

Austin Govella is a user experience design lead at Avanade, a global professional services company. He's the author of Collaborative Product Design and co-author of the second edition of Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web. In this conversation, we focus on Austin's note-taking system and its relation to his work in UX design and information architecture.Show notesAustin GovellaAvanadeCollaborative Product Design by Austin GovellaInformation Architecture: Blueprints for the Web by Christina Wodtke and Austin GovellaMicrosoft SharePointAdobe Experience ManagerSalesforcePhilip JohnsonObsidianZettelkastenMediumPersonal knowledge management (PKM)Work and Meta-work by Jorge ArangoRoam ResearchNotionVisual Studio CodeMacromedia HomeSiteLogseqReflect appSubconsciousDEVONthinkOneNoteShow notes include Amazon affiliate links. I get a small commission for purchases made through these links.

Today, I'm joined by author, Stanford professor, and speaker Christina Wodtke. Christina's book, “Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results” breaks down the OKR Process when beginning your entrepreneurial journey. Radical Focus spoke to me and the challenge that comes with bringing a venture to life, and I hope this episode educates and inspires you. Be sure to subscribe to the Transition Newsletter on Substack here: https://bit.ly/37Bb8Ne Connect with Christina on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cwodtke

"This week on the OKRs Q&A Podcast, we are rereleasing an incredible episode with a major industry thought leader and the author of Radical Focus & Radical Focus 2.0 - Christina Wodtke. Tim and Christina discuss the simplicity of OKRs, how to launch a pilot program that works and where to begin with an OKR implementation. Tim and Christina do a deep dive into some of the most complex OKR issues in the world today.An established thought leader in Silicon Valley, Christina is a “curious human” with a serious resume. Her past work includes re-design and initial product offerings with LinkedIn, MySpace, Zynga, Yahoo! and others, as well as founding three startups, an online design magazine called Boxes and Arrows, and co-founding the Information Architecture Institute. She is currently a Lecturer at Stanford in the HCI group in the Computer Science department.Christina teaches worldwide on the intersection of human innovation and high-performing teams. She uses the power of story to connect with audiences and readers through speaking and her Amazon category-bestselling books. Christina's work is personable, insightful, knowledgeable, and engaging.Her books include Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web, Pencil Me In, and The Team that Managed Itself. Her bestselling book is a business fable called Radical Focus, which tackles the OKR movement through the powerful story of Hanna and Jack's struggling tea startup. When the two receive an ultimatum from their only investor, they must learn how to employ OKRs and radical focus to get the right things done.To connect with Christina or to get more information on how to become a whole-mind, high performing team, visit http://cwodtke.com/ or Eleganthack.To purchase Radical Focus - https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Focus-Achieving-Important-Objectives-ebook/dp/B01BFKJA0YIf you interested in working with the Atruity team or downloading our free e-book The Seven C's To OKR Success - click this link: https://linktr.ee/atruity

Radical Focus - we need to talk about it? and the lovely Christina Wodktke joined the programme to do that.

In today's episode of the Idea to Value podcast, we speak with Christina Wodtke, author and lecturer at Stanford. Her resume includes re-design and initial product offerings with LinkedIn, MySpace, Zynga, Yahoo! and others, as well as founding three startups. See the full episode at https://wp.me/p6pllj-1Bj #OKR #focus #productivity #creativity We speak about the value of Radical Focus and Objectives and Key Results (OKRs). Topics covered in today's episode: 00:02:30 - How she began using OKRs and discovered their value 00:04:30 - When and how to use OKRs 00:09:00 - The challenges of setting OKRs, and how important Psychological Safety is 00:13:00 - What prevents people from meeting their goals 00:17:30 - The similarities of creativity in an Arts School and Startups 00:20:30 - Real creative people are productive Links mentioned in today's episode: Book: Radical Focus: https://amzn.to/3wzClud Christina's website: https://cwodtke.com/ Elegant Hack: https://eleganthack.com/ Bonus: This episode was made possible by our premium innovation and creativity training. Take your innovation and creativity capabilities to the next level by investing in yourself now, at https://www.ideatovalue.com/all-access-pass-insider-secrets/ * Subscribe on iTunes to the Idea to Value Podcast: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/idea-to-value-creativity-innovation/id1199964981?mt=2 * Subscribe on Spotify to the Idea to Value Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/4x1kANUSv7UJoCJ8GavUrN  * Subscribe on Stitcher to the Idea to Value Podcast: http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=129437&refid=stpr * Subscribe on Google Podcasts to the Idea to Value Podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9pZGVhdG92YWx1ZS5saWJzeW4uY29tL3Jzcw  Want to rapidly validate new ideas and innovative products and GROW your online business? These are the tools I actually use to run my online businesses (and you can too): * The best email management and campaigns system: ActiveCampaign (Free Trial) http://www.activecampaign.com/?_r=M17NLG2X  * Best value web hosting: BlueHost WordPress http://www.activecampaign.com/?_r=M17NLG2X  * Landing pages, Sales Pages and Lead collection: LeadPages (Free Trial) http://leadpages.pxf.io/c/1385771/390538/5673  * Sharing & List building: Sumo (Free) https://sumo.com/?src=partner_ideatovalue  * Payments, Shopping Cart, affiliate management and Upsell generator: ThriveCart https://improvides--checkout.thrivecart.com/thrivecart-standard-account/  * Video Webinars for sales: WebinarJam and Everwebinar ($1 Trial) https://nickskillicorn.krtra.com/t/lwIBaKzMP1oQ  * Membership for protecting content: Membermouse (Free Trial) http://affiliates.membermouse.com/idevaffiliate.php?id=735  * eLearning System for students: WP Courseware https://flyplugins.com/?fly=293  * Video Editing: Techsmith Camtasia http://techsmith.z6rjha.net/vvGPv  I have used all of the above products myself to build IdeatoValue and Improvides, which is why I can confidently recommend them. I may also receive affiliate payments for any business I bring to them using the links above. Copyright https://www.ideatovalue.com

Christina Wodtke is a professor, speaker, and author of "Radical Focus" and "The Team That Managed Itself". In this episode, she walks us through her product career, the power of communication, how to empower teams through continuous feedback and setting effective OKRs.Get the FREE Product Book and check out our curated list of free Product Management resources here

My favorite book about OKRs is Radical Focus by Christina Wodtke. Christina recently updated her book with a second edition which is the topic in this episode. We also talk about her dream job at Stanford University, why OKRs are not for every business, why some CEOs go wrong with OKRs, and why having a healthy culture is the starting point for implementing OKRs of any scale.

Global Product Management Talk is pleased to bring you the next episode of... The Everyday Innovator with host Chad McAllister, PhD. The podcast is all about helping people involved in innovation and managing products become more successful, grow their careers, and STANDOUT from their peers. About the Episode:  Product improvements and product innovation too frequently suffer from accomplishing less than we want. The urgent is often in the way of the important. If you want to get the important work done more of the time, you'll find OKRs (objectives and key results) helpful. Also, if you've tried OKRs and didn't like them, this discussion will help you too. We need an OKR expert to learn more about this, and joining us is the woman who wrote the bestselling book, Radical Focus, that tackles the use of OKRs and startup culture with an eye to getting the right things done. Her name is Christina Wodtke, and she is a lecturer at Stanford, sharing insight into human innovation and high-performing teams. She has designed products with LinkedIn, Zynga, Yahoo! and many others, as well as founding three startups, and the online design magazine Boxes and Arrows.

A tool to help product managers accomplish more Product improvements and product innovation too frequently suffer from accomplishing less than we want. The urgent is often in the way of the important. If you want to get the important work done more of the time, you'll find OKRs (objectives and key results) helpful. Also, if […]

An interview with Christina Wodtke. Christina is the award-winning author of a variety of seminal books, including "The Team That Managed Itself" and "Radical Focus". Christina is passionate about creating empowered, high-performing organisations and helping them to focus on their most important strategic goals using OKRs (Objectives & Key Results). We talk about a lot, including: How "Radical Focus" came about in the first place, and why now is the time for the Second Edition How her book differs from "Measure What Matters", whether John Doerr is riding on her coat tails and whether they talk at parties How she set out to write a practical OKR playbook rather than a theoretical document, and why she felt the need to put tons and tons of examples in the second edition The circumstances that led her to realise that OKRs were the way forward and why she became so passionate about teaching them Why you shouldn't use OKRs to manage everything but use them as a strategic tool to focus on what's most important, and deciding what not to do Why companies shouldn't just jump straight to OKRs without having some of the prerequisites and a culture to support them The importance of empowered teams, letting go of micromanagement and thinking that your job is to tell people what to do Why setting a good OKR review cadence is often more important than agonising over setting perfect OKRs How the concept of a fixed mindset applies not to just people but companies too, and how companies have to be comfortable with failure Where you shouldn't use OKRs, the types of team or companies where it just doesn't make sense, and why OKRs aren't just rebadged task lists And much more! Buy Radical Focus (2nd Edition) "The award-winning author of The Team That Managed Itself and Pencil Me In returns with a new and expanded edition of her landmark book on OKRs. Struggling to adopt Objectives and Key Results? Radical Focus teaches you everything you need."   Visit the book website or check it out on Amazon or Goodreads. Contact Christina If you want to catch up with Christina, you can reach her on Twitter or her website wodtke.com.

In this episode, we're talking with Christina Wodtke. Christina wrote a book that's called Radical Focus, and it's all about OKR objectives and key results. So we're going to be digging into the strategic accountability for your company and how you can do better with goal setting. Christina has helped grow numerous companies in Silicon Valley, like LinkedIn and Yahoo, Zynga, and the New York Times. And through that, she's learned a lot about this management system called OKRs. In addition to Radical Focus, she wrote a couple of others books including The Team That Managed Itself and Pencil Me In. She also teaches over at Stanford. What I loved about this episode is that we get really tactical about how you can start OKRs is for the first time, what makes a good objective from a bad objective, how you can have key results that are actually measurable and quantitative, and then how to build this into the culture of your company so that you're not just setting goals and forgetting about them. Find the show notes for this episode here! Watch this episode on Youtube here. Host: Chris Ronzio

Christina Wodtke worked in the product development space in companies such as Zynga, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Yahoo. She is also a Stanford professor and author of several books, most notably The Team That Managed Itself and Radical Focus. Her experience in developing teams is precious - we talked about empowered teams, OKRs, and the 2nd edition of her bestseller Radical Focus.Subscribe to 0800-DEVOPS newsletter here.Show notes:This interview is featured in 0800-DEVOPS #24 - Empowered teams with Christina Wodtke.The 2nd edition of Radical Focus went public on April 20th, 2021

In this episode of the OKRs Q&A Podcast, Tim Meinhardt interviews Christina Wodtke, author of the legendary OKR best seller - Radical Focus. Tim and Christina discuss the simplicity of OKRs, how to launch a pilot program that works and where to begin with an OKR implementation. Tim and Christina do a deep dive into some of the most complex OKR issues in the world today.An established thought leader in Silicon Valley, Christina is a “curious human” with a serious resume. Her past work includes re-design and initial product offerings with LinkedIn, MySpace, Zynga, Yahoo! and others, as well as founding three startups, an online design magazine called Boxes and Arrows, and co-founding the Information Architecture Institute. She is currently a Lecturer at Stanford in the HCI group in the Computer Science department.Christina teaches worldwide on the intersection of human innovation and high-performing teams. She uses the power of story to connect with audiences and readers through speaking and her Amazon category-bestselling books. Christina's work is personable, insightful, knowledgeable, and engaging.Her books include Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web, Pencil Me In, and The Team that Managed Itself. Her bestselling book is a business fable called Radical Focus, which tackles the OKR movement through the powerful story of Hanna and Jack's struggling tea startup. When the two receive an ultimatum from their only investor, they must learn how to employ OKRs and radical focus to get the right things done.To connect with Christina or to get more information on how to become a whole-mind, high performing team, visit http://cwodtke.com/ or Eleganthack.To purchase Radical Focus - https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Focus-Achieving-Important-Objectives-ebook/dp/B01BFKJA0YIf you interested in working with the Atruity team or downloading our free e-book The Seven C's To OKR Success - click this link: https://linktr.ee/atruity

Planning is key to the success of any business. But how do you actually put a good plan in place? Today’s guest, Tim Meinhardt, is an expert on a goal-setting management system: OKRs. It stands for Objectives and Key Results. It’s something that I’ve implemented in the past, and I can’t wait to find out what you can do today. Tim leads a team of OKR experts at Atruity. They provide OKR Consulting to numerous organisations ranging from publicly traded companies to start ups. Through their proven methodology and numerous OKR Programs, they ensure effective implementation and management of OKR journeys. In this discussion we explore how OKRs have been helping businesses thrive during the pandemic. Tune in as we discuss why plans fail, striving for simplicity, remote working trends and business epiphany moments. This year is giving us the opportunity to reset, so let's start implementing some OKR strategies. Links: Atruity1.com: https://atruity1.com/ (https://atruity1.com/)  ‘Measure What Matters’ by John Doerr: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Measure-What-Matters-Simple-Drives/dp/024134848X/r (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Measure-What-Matters-Simple-Drives/dp/024134848X/r)  The UN’s 17 Goals: https://sdgs.un.org/goals (https://sdgs.un.org/goals)  ‘Radical Focus’ by Christina Wodtke: https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Focus-Achieving-Important-Objectives-ebook/dp/B01BFKJA0Y (https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Focus-Achieving-Important-Objectives-ebook/dp/B01BFKJA0Y) OKRs Q&A Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/okrs-q-a/id1526358254#:~:text=The%20OKRs%20 (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/okrs-q-a/id1526358254) ‘The Service Profit Chain’ by James L. Heskett, W. Earl Sasser, Leonard Schlesinger: https://www.amazon.com/Service-Profit-Chain-James-Heskett/dp/0684832569 (https://www.amazon.com/Service-Profit-Chain-James-Heskett/dp/0684832569)  Atruity’s resources: https://atruity1.com/resources/ (https://atruity1.com/resources/) ‘Good To Great’ by Jim Collins: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Good-Great-Jim-Collins/dp/0712676090/ (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Good-Great-Jim-Collins/dp/0712676090/) Ep. 1: Going from Manager to Leader using OKRs | Leif Ulstru‪p‬: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-1-going-from-manager-to-leader-using-okrs-leif-ulstrup/id1526358254?i=1000487106945 (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-1-going-from-manager-to-leader-using-okrs-leif-ulstrup/id1526358254?i=1000487106945) tim@atruity1.com  #60 Join The Dots with Martin Johnson, Founder of YourBigPic: https://hospitality-mavericks.captivate.fm/episode/60-join-the-dots-with-martin-johnson (https://hospitality-mavericks.captivate.fm/episode/60-join-the-dots-with-martin-johnson) Connect with the podcast: https://colossal-designer-2784.ck.page/40ada1483a (Join the Hospitality Mavericks newsletter): https://rb.gy/5rqyeq (https://rb.gy/5rqyeq)   https://www.facebook.com/groups/hospitalitygamechangers (Join the GameChanger Facebook Group): https://www.facebook.com/groups/hospitalitygamechangers (https://bit.ly/2GAvr2W) Please help us getting better by filling out the feedback survey on the podcast show here: https://bit.ly/37aIm5n (https://bit.ly/37aIm5n)  A big thank you to our sponsor Bizimply who are helping progressive leaders and operators making every shift run like clockwork. Head to our website at https://www.bizimply.com/?utm_source=partner&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=mavericks (www.bizimply.com) or email them directly at advice@bizimply.com. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Podcorn - https://podcorn.com/privacy Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy Support this podcast

Did you realize the first book written on OKRs was Radical Focus by Christina Wodtke? She's our guest along with Ben Lamorte who joins us for his second appearance on the show. We talk about when and when to never use OKRs.

“What we need to figure out though, is what is our relationship to these boxes on our computer that we're locked into for so many hours a day. I think it's time for us to just acknowledge that no human being should be in front of a screen for eight to 10 hours a day, that's just not healthy.”   Christina Wodtke is the author of the best-seller Radical Focus, which uses the power of story to build a new approach to OKRs, as well as The Team that Managed Itself and Pencil Me In. Christina currently teaches at Stanford in the HCI program in Computer Science. She speaks worldwide about humanity, teamwork, and the journey to excellence.   I had the pleasure of having Christina as a guest on this episode of the Control the Room podcast. We speak about influencing the influencers, psychological safety online, and re-evaluating our relationship with our computers. Listen in to find out why it’s okay to miss your OKR’s.

Radical Focus tackles the OKR movement and better goal setting through the powerful story of Hanna and Jack's struggling tea startup. When the two receive an ultimatum from their only investor, they must learn how to employ Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) with radical focus to get the right things done. Will they be able to accomplish the few critical actions that will save their startup? Or will they end up mired in distractions and choices as their time runs out?

In that episode of Le Podcast, I had the great pleasure to receive Christina Wodtke. Christina is an author, lecturer at Stanford, and speaker who teaches techniques to create high performing teams. Christina is the author of four books, including Radical Focus and The Team that manages itself. Find all the references in the companion blog post.

Teaching something is hard – to do it well, you need both an incredible command of the subject and great communication skills. Teaching in the form of a narrative story? That’s another level of difficulty and in her new book, The Team That Managed Itself: A Story Of Leadership, Christina Wodtke does just that. Drawing [...] Read more » The post Leading Teams to Success – Christina Wodtke on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

EP 692 Review หนังสือ 5 เล่มเกี่ยวกับ OKRs ตอนที่ 2 สำหรับตอนนี้เป็นการ Review หนังสือเล่มที่ 5 ที่ชื่อว่า The Team that Managed Itself เขียนโดย Christina Wodtke ได้ข้อคิดที่น่าสนใจเกี่ยวกับ OKRs หลายข้อ ลองติดตามฟังกันดูนะครับ

EP 692 Review หนังสือ 5 เล่มเกี่ยวกับ OKRs ตอนที่ 2 สำหรับตอนนี้เป็นการ Review หนังสือเล่มที่ 5 ที่ชื่อว่า The Team that Managed Itself เขียนโดย Christina Wodtke ได้ข้อคิดที่น่าสนใจเกี่ยวกับ OKRs หลายข้อ ลองติดตามฟังกันดูนะครับ

Welcome to the Process Hacker News, your weekly roundup of useful news and updates from Process Hackers who have been guests on Hack the Process with M. David Green. This week we’ve got cool coding, good grades, a cup of tea, and more. For all the links, check out the show notes: https://www.hacktheprocess.com/cool-coding-good-grades-a-cup-of-tea-and-more-in-process-hacker-news/ Enjoy! Events Spend the holidays with new friends by joining Tea With Strangers, created by Ankit Shah to help himself and everyone else get together and connect with new folks. MarTech, the marketing technology conference, is set to happen from April 15 to 17 in San Jose, and will feature Brian Solis and Nancy Duarte as the keynote speakers. Media You can dominate in sales and business with an “Always Forward” mindset. Hear it straight from Bill Wooditch on The Brand Domination Show. Find out who Kimberly Wiefling is and how she uses organizational culture to turn groups into teams in her interview for Heart at Work Podcast. The Anatomy of a Strategy Podcast, hosted Tara Hunt and Carlos Pacheco, shines the spotlight on Alex Hillman, who shares the history of Indy Hall, Stacking the Bricks, and making a product. Writing Read It Forward wants to help you make your community a better place with this list of great reads to uplift and inspire, includingRhonda Magee’s newest book, The Inner Work of Racial Justice. Ricky Yean put together a newsletter experiment, and in his latest blog post he reveals the reflections and results he found. Coding is cool according to Sasha Ariel Alston, who is featured on The Renewal Project with her message to little girls, encouraging them to enter the world of tech. On Michelle Kim’s latest blog article, she compares and contrasts the terms allyship and accomplice, and discusses what it truly means to be an ally. Contrary to the common wisdom that it’s rarely a good idea to lower your prices, Mark Silver lists a few reasons why it might be okay to lower prices sometimes in his new blog post. Recommended Resources Lauren Kunze appeared at TEDxSanFrancisco for a talk on deprogramming homicidal sex robots. Lauren was highly recommended by Loic Le Meur during his Hack the Process interview. The Lesson to Unlearn is a new essay by Paul Graham, whose work influenced Christina Wodtke, Ankit Shah, and Ricky Yean. In it he shares his thoughts about the contradictory relationship between learning and good grades. Thanks for checking out this Process Hacker News update from Hack the Process. If you liked what you saw, please leave a comment to let us know what processes you’re hacking.

Many companies such as Zynga and Google use OKR to track progress and achieve objectives and many more are trying to introduce the metrics. Why people normally fail to achieve their goal and how OKRs can help focus on their objectives? I'll review this book and explain what is OKR, how to set and run it, and the common mistakes.

Welcome to the Process Hacker News, your weekly roundup of useful news and updates from Process Hackers who have been guests on Hack the Process with M. David Green. This week we’ve got magic, evolution, transformation, and more. For all the links, check out the show notes: https://www.hacktheprocess.com/magic-evolution-transformation-and-more-in-process-hacker-news/ Enjoy! Events Join Velocity Squared from January 29 to 30 in London to learn how to maintain and manage business growth. April Dunford will attend as a speaker. Media In an interview on the WorkTrends Podcast, Steve Farber shares the wisdom of bringing love to work and explains why love is good business. Ron Carucci pays a visit to the Net Worth It Podcast and discusses how to reignite your dreams when you’ve quit. Loic Le Meurhas a new shamanic outlook and a new Transformation podcast to go with it. WAKR News featured David Weinberger to have him share his thoughts on artificial intelligence. The Product Collective published Rich Mironov’s talk, Intro to Product Leadership, from the recently concluded INDUSTRY The Product Conference 2019. Writing Our latest Hack the Process guest, Christina Wodtke has recently published a book called The Team that Managed Itself. Congratulations, Christina! The London International Development Network’s 34th Weekly Roundup has published their overview of Ann Mei Chang’s book, Lean Impact. Alistair Clay says the best email signatures can convert customers as part of an orchestrated PR plan. Learn how from his blog post. Recommended Resources Capitalism is coming to an end — or perhaps capitalism is evolving. Geoffrey Moore, whose books Zvi Band gathered inspiration from, thinks back to the beginning of capitalism and how it’s been changing continuously to this day. Mindvalley is presenting a new parenting masterclass to teach parents how to be less reactive so they can bring up confident and authentic kids. Dr. Shefali Tsabary, referenced by Heather Chauvin, and Vishen Lakhiani, mentioned by Michelle Dale will be leading the class. Nathan Barry, mentioned by Justin McGill shares his excitement about a house he built and the magic of creating. Thanks for checking out this Process Hacker News update from Hack the Process. If you liked what you saw, please leave a comment to let us know what processes you’re hacking.

Primeiro episódio do Knowledge Cast o podcast da K21. Nesse episódio falamos com a Andressa Chiara, Magno de Santana e Mariana Graf sobre OKRs a nível estratégico em uma empresa. Referências: OKR no Blog da K21: www.knowledge21.com.br/blog/como-aco…krs-checkins/ www.knowledge21.com.br/blog/disfuncoes-okrs/ Christina Wodtke: medium.com/@cwodtke/one-object…em-all-1058e973bfc5 eleganthack.com/category/high-per…ing-teams/okrs-2/ medium.com/@cwodtke/using-okrs…arning-9fc0742f0262

In this episode, I spoke with Martina Gobec, she is a strategic design manager at vertical in Copenhagen. We talked about her journey from Visual design to experience design to ending up being a design manager. Martina shared her learning on this journey and how to think more strategically within the design process. She shared her vision about the role of design in the future. We also talked about the importance of ethics and sustainability in our future design process. Find Martina Gobec: Medium: https://medium.com/@martinagobec Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martinagobec/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/frecklem Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/freckle_m/ Her resources McKInsey Business Value of Design report, Bud Cadell and his company Nobl, focusing on organisational design, Stop designing for yesterday(sdfy), Jane Fulton Suri, John Maeda, Benedict Evans, Jessica Walsh, Jon Kolko, UK Design Council, Nathan Shedroff, Christina Wodtke, Julie Zhuo, Leisa Reichelt, Mike Monteiro

Contact Christina:Her websiteTwitterLinkedInChristina's books:The Team That Managed Itself (consider leaving a review here if you enjoy it)Radical FocusPencil Me InPeople, articles, resources mentioned:Reboot your teamDesigning the team you needThe dreaded weekly status emailRich Mironov lessons on people and systemsENLIVEN ep with Rich Mironov on creating a thriving product orgNicky Case - parable of the polygons on diverse neighborhoods"I drink your milkshake"Stanford GSB's most popular class: Interpersonal DynamicsGoogle's findings on psychological safety"The Executioner's Tale" — Radical Focus book MVPBOOKSThe Wisdom of TeamsThe Culture Map - Erin MeyerThanks for the FeedbackThe Fearless OrganizationA Theory of Everything (Integral Theory) - Ken WilberFlourish - Martin SeligmanThe Inner Game of Tennis & The Inner Game of StressTurn the Ship AroundThe Five Dysfunctions of a TeamQUOTES"I am sneakily trying to bring more humanity to it""There's no such thing as 'those people,' there's just people."" 'I'm not in charge' is just an excuse, an excuse for being afraid...somebody's got to go first"SHOW NOTESComing to California [0:03:23]Christina's start in tech [0:06:39]How did Christina get here? [0:07:36]How do older & younger students affect each other in Christina's classes? [0:11:11]What is Christina learning from her students lately? [0:12:41]Christina's "unfortunate" personal quality [0:16:48]Managing and teaching — do you need answers? [0:18:58]What had Christina write THIS book? [0:20:16]Treating your life like a startup & finding Product-Market Fit in your life [0:20:37]How to validate a book idea, lean startup style [0:21:15]Christina's big realization - what made OKRs work? [0:24:03]The 3 things teams actually need [0:24:41]What types of teams are there? [0:26:37]Moving from a workgroup to a team [0:28:05]What makes a team into a learning team? [0:28:49]What makes a mindful, autonomous team? [0:30:16]Radical Focus vs OKRs [0:32:56]Trust & psychological safety [0:33:25]The kinds of trust [0:34:25]How trust is built differently across cultures [0:36:17]In America, do we act like everyone is a robot? [0:37:11]How can I chip away at cultural constructs? [0:38:50]When is each type of team/group the right choice? [0:40:50]What does it take to be a mindful team? [0:45:02]How should people approach implementing these ideas? Giving feedback? [0:49:29]Christina's "GASP" feedback framework [0:50:31]Integral theory: I-We-It [0:57:51]How long is this going to take? [0:59:50]Where to start turning around a culture: compensation [1:02:20]How does this team-level model integrate with the surruonding company environment? [1:05:48]Can you make a healthy team in a dysfunctional company? [1:06:38]Which team to start with [1:09:39]Team health red flags to look out for [1:13:09]GASP vs GROW? [1:16:15]Your job as a leader [1:19:58]The 9X process [1:22:30]Goals, roles, and norms — and what people miss [1:23:41]Isn't this too many meetings? [1:27:07]How to create a lightweight meeting structure [1:29:28]The thing that really makes the difference in goals [1:31:51]Isn't this stuff all too "touchy feely"? [1:38:12]Engineers are humans too [1:40:32]The reality of work: nobody is in charge [1:41:59]How to make a mindful team happen [1:42:47]What impact does Christina want this book to have? [1:44:00]

Objectives come in all shapes and sizes, and understanding how to measure our movement toward them can be the key to making them add value to our lives. Christina Wodtke has been using objectives and key results (OKRs) to maintain an incredible level of productivity as her interests have led her from corporate Design to academia to publishing, including her new book, a business fable called "The Team That Managed Itself." In this episode of Hack the Process, Christina will tell us how she applies her techniques to improve work satisfaction in the classroom and the office, what people get wrong about gamification when it comes to game design, and why accountability is as important as regularity if you want to make progress on your goals. For all the links check out the show notes: https://www.hacktheprocess.com/christina-wodtke-can-help-your-team-manage-itself-on-hack-the-process-podcast/ Enjoy!

In our Season 2 premier, Larry King and Roman Bercot discuss why Industrial age design practices don’t hold up in the cloud era. Modern product design and development teams must adopt an iterative, experiment-driven approach. Inspired by thoughts from Christina Wodtke and Dan Brown here: https://twitter.com/brownorama/status/1170847783705858048?s=21. Photo by Martim Braz via Unsplash: https://unsplash.com/photos/LrZb1PQeC3o --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/uxlikeus/message

> Sign Up For Our Newsletter: http://www.firsthuman.com/being-human-newsletter/In this week's episode, I talk with Christina Wodtke, the world's number one evangelist for Objectives and Key Results - the powerful goal-setting technique loved by Google. With Christina, I explore her breakthrough book on OKRs, 'Radical Focus' and her forthcoming title 'The Team That Managed Itself' on supercharging team performance. We talk:- The power of having "one objective per business model"- Her radical approach for team feedback- Why explicitly agreeing on team norms upfront accelerates team cohesion- The difference between low-context and high-context cultures and why it matters- The importance of using language that touches people's hearts and gives meaning to their workLinks:Christina's blog: http://eleganthack.com/'Radical Focus': http://tiny.cc/cvy88y

> Sign Up For Our Newsletter: http://www.firsthuman.com/being-human-newsletter/In this week's episode, I talk with Christina Wodtke, the world's number one evangelist for Objectives and Key Results - the powerful goal-setting technique loved by Google. With Christina, I explore her breakthrough book on OKRs, 'Radical Focus' and her forthcoming title 'The Team That Managed Itself' on supercharging team performance. We talk:- The power of having "one objective per business model"- Her radical approach for team feedback- Why explicitly agreeing on team norms upfront accelerates team cohesion- The difference between low-context and high-context cultures and why it matters- The importance of using language that touches people's hearts and gives meaning to their workLinks:Christina's blog: http://eleganthack.com/'Radical Focus': http://tiny.cc/cvy88y

> Sign Up For Our Newsletter: http://www.firsthuman.com/being-human-newsletter/In this week's episode, I talk with Christina Wodtke, the world's number one evangelist for Objectives and Key Results - the powerful goal-setting technique loved by Google. With Christina, I explore her breakthrough book on OKRs, 'Radical Focus' and her forthcoming title 'The Team That Managed Itself' on supercharging team performance. We talk:- The power of having "one objective per business model"- Her radical approach for team feedback- Why explicitly agreeing on team norms upfront accelerates team cohesion- The difference between low-context and high-context cultures and why it matters- The importance of using language that touches people's hearts and gives meaning to their workLinks:Christina's blog: http://eleganthack.com/'Radical Focus': http://tiny.cc/cvy88y

Episode 3 of Learning on the Job was a discussion with Stanford Professor Christina Wodke. Her latest book Radical Focus shows how to set better goals and create a rhythm of execution in order to achieve great things. She keynotes and runs workshops on: Design Thinking for Product Innovation, Team Dynamics and Excellence, Objectives and Key Results, and Story for Product Strategy and Persuation. Host: Kaila Lim and Aksum Turner Guest: Christina Wodke Music: Stylo-Vera

Today episode is different. If you been following what I am tweeting/writing recently you would notice I am spending a lot of time learning about sketching. Long story short, I was reading “pencil me in” Christina Wodtke and one of the people who was featured in the book was Eva-Lotta Lamm where she was explaining “how to take your illustration to the next level” – her work and advice stood out for me. I started to follow Eva-lotta on Instagram and day after day I discover how awesome she is. So who's Eva-lotta? Eva-Lotta Lamm is a User Experience Designer, illustrator, and visual thinker. She grew up in Germany, worked in Paris and London for a few years before packing up her backpack and go traveling the world for 14 months. She has over 12 years of experience working on digital products as an in-house designer for Google, Skype, and Yahoo! as well as freelancing and consulting for various agencies and her own clients. After being a (semi-)nomad for 2 years, she is now based in Berlin, helping her clients to make complex problems visual so they can ‘see' them from a fresh perspective and work on solving them more efficiently. We talk about how she got into art, and how she moved to Paris and then London. How one day she packed her bags to travel around the world. We chat about working for corporates vs freelancing and then we stumble upon note-taking and how she recorded her reflections through sketch noting and finally how she feels about paper vs. digital. Not just that, we talked about improv and some deep stuff like bringing awareness in the learning process which Eva-lotta call the intentional practice. Really deep stuff. I think you guys gonna enjoy this episode. So .. get a notebook ready and please enjoy my conversation with Eva-Lotta. Links: Eva-lotta website (blog, newsletter and links to social media accounts) Instagram Secrets from the road Abdul twitter

My guest today is Donna Lichaw. After a long career that included documentary film-making and tech, Donna discovered her calling: helping people hone the stories they tell about themselves. Now she coaches designers, technologists, entrepreneurs, and leaders who want to make a difference. In this episode we talk about how she helps her clients visualize their stories. Listen to the full conversation https://theinformeddotlife.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/the-informed-life-episode-7-donna-lichaw.mp3   Show notes Donna Lichaw iPad Pro Apple Pencil Evernote Zoom iOS screen sharing with the Zoom desktop client Paper app Dave Gray Christina Wodtke IPEVO products Donna on Twitter Donna on LinkedIn Read the full transcript Jorge: Donna, welcome to the show. Donna: Thank you, Jorge. It's great to be here. Jorge: Well, tell us about yourself. Donna: I am a leadership coach. I've been working in tech for 20 years now. Actually, I've been saying 20 years for a while since the mid-90s, which is kind of crazy, and I've spent years on the design and product side of things and have moved over to the people development side of things over the last couple of years. Jorge: What led you to make that change? Donna: Well, I was working the last card handful of years as a consultant, and what I had developed over time was a way… Actually, I have a film background. And so, I've always thought about things as stories. And what I realized over time helping companies develop products and services was that the products that we were building the most successful ones had a compelling story at their foundation and they were a story that was really about the customer and how the customer was going to be a hero while using any given product or service. And so what I started doing with the teams that I was leading was actually teaching them how to think and work like filmmakers so that they could deliberately architect that story, so that we could build more compelling products and also measure success and have different markers. It was a very scientific endeavor, the way that I approached it. And so, I was doing that over years and over time was working with bigger and bigger companies and more and more people in leadership positions where they would have me come to their company and teach their team how to think and work like storytellers. And what I would find over time as I was working with people is that once I'd be onsite with a team, I'd realize that they didn't — and I hate to say this — they didn't really care about their products as much as you would expect. What people really cared about was themselves; they cared about being more effective at work, making an impact, getting people to listen to them, getting promoted, getting that project approved, getting people to love the results, and all these other things that we deal with on a daily basis at work. And more and more I would get people pulling me aside and workshops and on projects and they would literally say things like, you know, yeah the story of our customer that's great. But like, what's my story? And how am I going to be awesome? Because I can't even get my engineer to take me seriously. Or morale is low in my team, how do I get people to you know get more excited? And so essentially over time, what I started doing was working more and more directly with people to help them find their own stories and help them develop themselves as effective leaders at work. It turns out I love doing it so much that now for the last couple years that's all I've been doing, is just leadership coaching and no more. I love telling people, “I won't help you develop your products, but I will help you develop yourselves.” And it's been really fun. Jorge: That sounds really interesting, this idea that somehow rediscovering — or discovering for the first time — their story could make people more effective. When you're talking about story, are you talking about individual story or their story as a team? Donna: So when I talk about story it could be stories on any different level. So one way story might present itself at work is saying something like, “people don't listen to me.” It's like, okay, you know the question I would ask you is like, is that true? What data do you have that tells me that really people don't listen to you? And what other stories might be true or can you make true? And so it could be, “oh, people don't listen to me while,” and you go out and you find out, “no, I don't share my successes as much at work. So it's not that people aren't listening to me. It's just that I haven't been presenting myself in a certain way.” And so we can then re-architect the story of your work life in whatever way shape or form you want so that you can go start doing the things that you want to do and start really architecting and authoring your own endings, if that makes sense. So it could be stories that hold you back or stories that move you forward. And so they play out like that. And it also works on the team level. I hear all the time from people, “oh, no one takes our team seriously.” Well, that's a story. And so my question is, what else could that story be? And how could we go make that new story happen? Jorge: I don't know too much about storytelling in the film medium and I'm curious. I'll tell you what my understanding is of how it works… First of all, it's a linear medium, right? You are telling the story one step at a time. And usually there's some kind of structure, usually this three-act structure, right? Where there's context- setting and introduction to characters, that sort of thing. These characters are then somehow thrust into a conundrum and then there is the development of that and eventually resolution. Is that is that what you mean b y storytelling like a filmmaker? Donna: Yeah, that's the gist of it. And throw in some conflict along the way and tension and that's the makings of a really good story. It's fairly simple in the end. Jorge: So given that, I would imagine that filmmakers work very carefully to set things up in such a way that you can create for example, the maximum tension or clarify the conflict so that you can then have the resolution of that at the end. Given that a career is something that is evolving, emergent, you're going to be intervening, I would imagine, to help these folks do something different about how they're working. You don't have the same kind of linear control that you would have as a filmmaker, would you? Donna: Right, you don't have control and that's part of the fun of it. Because what happens — and there's actually been a lot of work done on this by psychologists and neuroscientists — and so what happens in life is that our brains are trying to comprehend all day, every day and trying to make sense of what we're experiencing. And so let's say you're walking down the street. That journey walking down the street is made up of moments in time. But all those moments are fleeting, and if your brain had to just make sense of all of the moments in time that you experience and all of the data that you take in your brain would go crazy. And so what scientists have found is that your brain uses story and story structure to make sense of real-time experiences so that you understand what's happening, what has happened in the past, and what might happen in the future. So essentially your brain is a storytelling organ. And in the same way that we tell stories to other people or we might write a story and turn it into a film or a book, your brain is constantly telling yourself stories. It's actually the primary way that you have to make sense of the world. And if you couldn't do it, it would be debilitating. You just wouldn't be able to function as a human. And so that ability to turn anything into a story is so strong that you're bringing it into every aspect of your life and it then attaches itself to certain things like your desire to survive and stay safe and not get out of your comfort zone, or it attaches yourself to wanting to always explain other things. Like there's someone at work that drives you crazy. Well, you've got stories that you're creating about that person, but they may or may not be true. Now, when you figure out your own stories and use them to move forward, what I found is that — and this is where it gets squishy and it's hard to… I can't believe I'm going to say this out loud, but… It becomes an energy thing, which is when you know your own story and when you own your own story, and it's one that fills your heart with joy and energy and it's one that you feel confident in and it's one that fuels you and moves you forward, people see that in you, and you're more likely to make the impact that you want to make. I'll use myself as an example if it helps. I know for a while when I was first starting out in coaching, for a while I thought, “man, do I have to play the the corporate game? Because all of the coaches I know do a lot of corporate work and you know, they come in through HR and this and that. And just like a lot of stuff that isn't me at all.” And I tried playing that game and it didn't fill me with joy — didn't excite me –but also it didn't it didn't feel right and so conversations with HR people and Learning and Development just weren't working the way I wanted them to anyway. And when I finally came to terms with what I love doing, which is working with individual clients — I love when people contact me and say, “Hey, I need help. Come, can I work with you?” Work might pay or not — I don't care who pays — but it changed the conversation. Suddenly, I was apparently acting acting differently with people. I was presenting myself differently when I was giving talks or you know online or hanging out with friends or hanging out with colleagues or even my clients. And you know, that's when people started recognizing me not as some Fancy Pants corporate coach that wears like suits and pearls and fancy shoes, but as someone who's got tattoos and wears jeans and hoodies and is going to help them be awesome at work. S o if it makes sense at all, I had to know my own story before I could successfully build the business in the way that I wanted to do. And it's the same thing for my clients. They're all trying to pave paths at work and do it in a way that's authentic to them. And once they figure out what that is and that's their story, they're able to make ripples and headway and get things done, and it feels good, and people notice it. And they're able to run experiments and measure results as well. So a lot of this — that's a whole other thread, but this is data driven and it's something that you can constantly measure and make sure you're on the right track with. Jorge: The way I'm understanding this is that the story that you're helping your clients craft is the story that they're telling themselves about what's going on in the world. Is that right? Donna: It's the story that they're telling themselves about what's going on in the world and how… What's going on in the world and their role in making that reality what it is so that they can figure out how to change it. Jorge: I am curious how people who need your help know to find you. You said that most folks contact you. How do they know that they have a story problem? Donna: That's a great question. So I would say most of my clients don't know that they have a story problem and they come to me more for leadership stuff. So it's you know, “I want to make more of an impact at work.” Typically they've been at their job for let's say three to twelve months and they're kind of new and they were brought in as experts do all this stuff and they're just hitting all these walls and they're just like, “I want help. But I don't just want any help. I want someone who I feel like I could hang out with and who I would like to spend time with and who gets the world that I'm coming from.” And so usually they come to me through referrals; a friend or a former client or someone who knows my work more broadly. It's rarely a story problem people come to me with. But sometimes people come to me where they know that there's a story aspect. Probably about twenty percent of my clients come to me before they're about to take a new job. And so they're you know, they're already doing the job thing. They've been looking they have a couple of opportunities and what they want to make sure is that their story is spot-on so that the right employer hires them, but also so that they're going to the right employer where they can make the most impact and do the things that they want to do. And so for them they realize there is sometimes a storytelling aspect of like, “all right, I'm sitting in interviews and I'm talking all the time and I want to make sure that I'm saying the right things.” So we'll work on that a little bit and then once they get that job — because they're doing all the job stuff themselves — but once they start, then I work with them, too. Be a better leader and make sure they hit the ground running. You know a couple times people come to me for marketing help and I just say that I can't help him because I honestly am not a marketing person and I don't do that. Jorge: It's not a marketing challenge per se, but in a way it is a positioning challenge, this idea of trying to identify where your affinities lie. Where you can be authentic and who you can align with requires bouncing off other people. I'm going to speak for myself: it's not something that I'm good at doing myself, for example. I can have all sorts of notions about what it is that I do in the world, but when it comes to describing that to other folks, it helps to have someone to work it out with. Donna: Yes, and I think it's a marketing thing in the very classical sense. So in the the Peter Drucker business school classical sense of marketing as in the work that we've done or that I was doing over the years which is user experience work, where it's marketing in the sense that you're finding your market fit in in the world and your place in the world and where you can be most effective and make the biggest impact. And so yeah, it doesn't end up being as much of a sales thing. It's more just like this is who I am. This is why I'm awesome. And this is how I can make the biggest impact at work and then they just start doing it and it works. Jorge: Sounds to me like it's about alignment and finding affinities somehow. Donna: Yeah, it's all about alignment. I've had clients were they realized, “Hmm. Actually, I'm not ​in the right division of my company and I think I'd be a better fit here or if I asked for this or if I slightly tweaked my job description or job duties.” And so that's where yes, alignment. You can architect your story in that sense by starting to go to your manager and ask for things or going to your team and asking for things and then you're actually writing your story. But it's also an alignment thing of just making sure you're at the right place at the right time. And if not, then you go create your new future wherever else that needs to be. Jorge: To bring it back to this notion of information and the role it plays in all of this. There's several things that you've said that I want to dig into. One is you mentioned that there is data that allows you to keep track of whether these things are working or not. Would you elaborate on that? Donna: Yes. So what I practice is, I think the fancy term for it is evidence-based coaching. Although I think all coaching is evidence-based. What I do is, anything that you think is true, I show you how it's just a story and invite you to get data. So using the example of the client who realized that she was being very quiet in meetings and people wanted her to speak up more. I'll step back a little bit in terms of data gathering. The first version she said, ” I'm not participating enough in meetings.” The question I would ask there is like, “what data do you have that says that that's the case?” And once we were able to collect enough data and re-architect that story that's when we found a new piece of data, which was her saying, “oh, I'm afraid of making my team feel stupid.” Once we had that we had a clearer picture based on more data of what story was. And so when she came up with a new version of what the story could be which is, “oh well, I could still run the meeting, I can still speak a lot. I can be really damn smart and maybe I can still run effective meetings by inviting my team to participate and making them feel heard.” That was a hypothesis. It sounded great. But she had to go test it to find out if it was true, because otherwise we wouldn't know if it was true. It's honestly a design project. It's an architecture project. So what she did was what we would do if we were building a prototype for a digital product or an app or website and she went out and she ran the smallest, fastest test that she could to test out her new hypothesis. And she did that and got data immediately which is, “oh, yeah, that worked really well.” Sometimes my clients run and experiments and they come back and they say,” wow, that was a disaster. Here's what I learned.” And then we reconfigure accordingly. The idea is that anything that you think or want to do in life, it's a hypothesis until you test it and until you get data to know that you're on the right track. Jorge: Do you have ways of keeping track of these things? L et's say that I'm your client. Are you somehow keeping track of my hypotheses, my small tests; how they turned out? Donna: Yes. So that's when this turns into a big information project as well. And so what I do is with some clients — not all — if at the beginning of our engagement, if story feels like it's a big part of what's holding you back or big part of your questions, then what we do is… I'm a visual person and a visual note taker. And so I sketch on my iPad and that way I can keep things digital and automatically send them to Evernote, and then have files on my clients. So it's sort of a file for each client where I have their whole history and that's how I keep track of stuff. So it's sort of a digital version of what therapists do with their little notebook after a meeting, that kind of a thing. In a first session, for example, if I feel like your story map is also a value to you, I'll send you a copy so that you have it and that way you can look it over. So literally I'm mapping out everyone's story while we're working together, which is what I did for digital products as well with teams. And so yeah might send it to you and say, “is this what you told me? Is there anything you want to change, anything you want to update?” And sometimes those stories might look like a cliffhanger. So one client, for example, when we first started working together his big question was, “am I a leader or am I a craftsperson?” And he wasn't sure. He was at a crossroads. He was a design director and he wasn't sure if he should really step up and be more of a leader or if he should just become an expert in some design thing and just say, “screw leadership!” Because he felt like he was he was being a little bit scattered and split too thin. And so his initial story map looked like a cliffhanger with questions and paths and I thought it was really valuable to send to him early on so he could visually see this is where he's at, and that we were going to spend the next few months figuring out his next steps. And that was really helpful because every couple months we would use that map to check in and say, “how are you doing? And where are you at now?” In his case he realized he was a leader. He didn't want to be like a 3D expert or whatever he could go learn or go back to school. He wanted to be a leader and that's what he's pursuing right now. So in his case the visual artifact was really helpful. Sometimes when I map stories with a client and it's something that I think is helpful for them to see in the moment. My clients are all over… Europe… I guess not technically Europe anymore… So the UK. Whatever that is now. UK and East Coast in the U.S., West Coast typically, a little Canada. And so they're all over the place, and if I could whiteboard I would but I can't really do that effectively. So sometimes what I'll do is I'll hook up my iPad and I'll plug it into my computer and broadcast it using Zoom. So that's what I use for all my calls. And so my clients will see a screen share of me live sketching their story. And like the client I mentioned earlier, the one who felt like she was not speaking up in meetings enough, that we live sketched that story. So she visually saw what the problem was, and once she visually saw the problem and the data she needed to collect, then she knew what her plan was. It depends on the client, it depends on the circumstance, and it depends on if the clients is visual person or not. Sometimes they're not it doesn't really help them. So sometimes I just keep notes for myself to keep myself in order and sometimes I share them with clients. One thing I would add to that is whether I share things digitally with them or not, one thing I do to keep us all on track as I constantly every couple months invite my clients to check in and reflect on how they're doing and how far they've come. And so when I do that, it's just a simple email that I send them with three questions, like what did you want to accomplish? What have you accomplished? And how are you going to celebrate? And that's it. And it's very old school. Just email, that's it. Jorge: I love the idea of live-sketching the map. Are you using any particular apps? It sounds like you're connecting the iPad to the Mac to do that. You're broadcasting from the Mac, is that right? Donna: Yeah, so I've tried it a bunch of different ways. I use Paper, the iPad sketching app, and I love that app. I've tried all of the sketching apps, the fancy ones and just, all of them, and I always come back to that one because I find that during meetings, it's really easy to use and it's super simple to just switch pens and colors. The other ones are just way more complicated and it was slowing me down during meetings. And so I use the paper app and then I plug using… The way that I found most effective is I'll plug the laptop into my MacBook Air via USB cable.Now, I don't know if in the new MacBooks it would be as easy. But then… Jorge: You mean the iPad, yes? Donna: Sorry, yeah the iPad with the cable into the MacBook. And then when I go to screen share in Zoom, it recognizes the iPad and it'll just stream it live. When I haven't had a cable to plug it in, what I've done is I've joined a Zoom meeting on my iPad and on my desktop and then the iPad will screen share. So it says if there are three participants in the meeting, but it's actually me my client and my iPad. And so that's another way to do that when I don't have wires. But the Wi-Fi in my office is pretty bad, so I find that that doesn't work as well. So I just go with wires instead. Jorge: Well, I want to be super clear on this because this is a problem that I've been trying to solve for a long time and it sounds like you've cracked it. So you're plugging the iPad into the MacBook using a USB cable. Donna: Yep. Jorge: And then somehow Zoom recognizes the iPad? Donna: Yeah, you have to go to screen share. So go to Zoom, there's a screen share button I can never find. But go to share my screen and then when it asks you which screen you want to share it'll it'll show you like your browser windows and any apps that are open and then if you look closely you'll notice, “oh, my iPads there as well!” And so you can just share your iPad and it'll do it live. There might be a setting that you have to turn on your iPad first to make sure that it's sharing. And for that I would Google, because I'm pretty sure if I had to do that again, I would not know how to do it, but it may be in this in settings or sharing or something like that. Jorge: Well, I'll do the homework and put it in the show notes. This idea of drawing live while sharing is super powerful, right? I mean you get immediate feedback from people. Donna: It's huge. This has changed my life because I used to… And this was okay, but I just never kept up with it. But what I used to do — this is something I learned from Dave Gray and Christina Wodtke as well — which is I had an IPEVO camera and that's a document camera. So I used to have a desk that had a white lacquer table top. And so I would just use it as a whiteboard. And so I would just point the document camera down and whiteboard on my desk while I was in meetings and I would broadcast the camera and people would see that. And that was great, but it was kind of cumbersome and the camera was clunky and I didn't keep up with it. But what's so great about having the iPad is just the iPad's always there. It's flat. I throw it on my desk and I draw with it. I use an Apple pen. And and then once I'm done, I have a digital record and so it's saved in the Paper app and it goes — I think it's saved to the cloud in Paper, although I don't remember. I think I have a paid account with them. And then I export it immediately to Evernote so I have a copy of it. And so that's the best part. I don't need to do much extra work to make it happen. But yeah, it's changed my life. You know when I was doing my coach training, I remember during a practice session once there was a whiteboard behind me and I got up in the middle of a session and I started whiteboarding something. And my instructor yelled at me. He was like, “We don't whiteboard! Coaches don't do that. What are you doing? You're acting like a consultant!” And when he said that I knew right away like oh, I'm gonna always do this. Yeah. There was something like.. Just something… I hit some kind of button and it made me so happy. And so yeah, I do with all my clients and as long as they're telling me things and I'm just recording, I love it. Jorge: That's great Donna. I'm so excited about this. Thank you for sharing your setup with us. Now. I'm hoping that folks are as excited as I am by everything that you've been describing from the way that you work to the purpose that you're putting these tools to. If they want to follow up with you, where do they find you? Donna: So the best way to find me is actually two places. One, on my website donnalichaw.com. You can have like a ton of worksheets and downloads, and so a lot of what we talked about today, you could try on your own. And then otherwise, Twitter is a really good place to reach me; sometimes LinkedIn as well. Jorge: Fantastic Donna, thank you so much for your time. Donna: Of course Jorge, this is great. Thank you so much.

Mike Cottmeyer on Leading Agile, Daniel Goleman on Coaching For Leaders, Christina Wodtke on Build by Drift, Joe Vallone on Agile Amped, and Cindy Alvarez on Product Love. I'd love for you to email me with any comments about the show or any suggestions for podcasts I might want to feature. Email podcast@thekguy.com. This episode covers the five podcast episodes I found most interesting and wanted to share links to during the two week period starting February 4, 2019. These podcast episodes may have been released much earlier, but this was the week when I started sharing links to them to my social network followers. MIKE COTTMEYER ON LEADING AGILE The Leading Agile podcast featured Mike Cottmeyer with host Dave Prior. To kickoff 2019, Dave and Mike got together to talk about the year ahead. What I liked most about this conversation is how it got into a discussion of how to introduce Agile to an organization that is just beginning to move away from traditional waterfall methods. Mike talked about how meal prep services got his wife interested in cooking for the first time and contrasted this with the way Agile is often introduced to enterprises: exclusively showing the end state and leaving out details about what Agile looks like when you’re just starting. Just as the meal prep services show more respect for people beginning to take up cooking, Mike says that the Agile community needs to show more respect for people beginning their Agile journey. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/kicking-off-2019-w-mike-cottmeyer/id995790407?i=1000427423678&mt=2 Website link: https://www.leadingagile.com/podcast/kicking-off-2019-with-mike-cottmeyer/ DANIEL GOLEMAN ON COACHING FOR LEADERS The Coaching For Leaders podcast featured Daniel Goleman with host Dave Stachowiak. As a fan of Daniel’s work on Emotional Intelligence, I was eager to hear this interview. Daniel talked about three different kinds of empathy: cognitive empathy, emotional empathy, and empathic concern and compared and contrasted them. I loved what Daniel had to say about distinguishing between a healthy and an unhealthy showing of vulnerability, especially since I read so much advice telling leaders they need to be vulnerable. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/391-getting-better-at-empathy-with-daniel-goleman/id458827716?i=1000428075330&mt=2 Website link: https://coachingforleaders.com/podcast/391/ CHRISTINA WODTKE ON BUILD BY DRIFT The Build by Drift podcast featured Christina Wodtke with host Maggie Crowley. Christina’s book, Radical Focus, has been showing up on the recommended lists of most of the people I follow, with some saying that it was the first book they read that really showed how to apply Objectives and Key Results or OKRs, so I was quick to hit play on this new-to-me podcast. What I heard was a great conversation on high-performing teams, avoiding traps in setting OKRs, and most importantly, the fact that OKRs are supposed to be stretch goals. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/build-15-christina-wodtke-on-radical-focus-living-your/id1445050691?i=1000426996091&mt=2 Website link: https://www.drift.com/blog/christina-wodtke-okrs/ JOE VALLONE ON AGILE AMPED The Agile Amped podcast featured Joe Vallone with host Adam Mattis. While there was a lot of talk about the Scaled Agile Framework in this conversation and I’m still working out how I feel about that, there was also a great conversation about lean startup ideas, particularly innovation accounting and Joe provided concrete examples from the SR21 Blackbird to self-driving cars to make his point. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/innovation-accounting/id992128516?i=1000427846817&mt=2 Website link: https://solutionsiq.podbean.com/e/innovation-accounting/ CINDY ALVAREZ ON PRODUCT LOVE The Product Love podcast featured Cindy Alvarez with host Eric Boduch. Cindy Alvarez is the author of a book in Eric Ries’ Lean series: Lean Customer Development. I loved how Cindy took the old saw about Henry Ford and the faster horse and talked about how maybe Ford should have rephrased the question to get the customers to talk about problems instead of solutions. I also loved her emphasis on good listening techniques and how this can mean having to tolerate an uncomfortable amount of silence. iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/cindy-alvarez-joins-product-love-to-talk-about-customer/id1343610309?i=1000428744289&mt=2 Website link: https://productcraft.com/podcast/product-love-podcast-cindy-alvarez-product-manager-at-microsoft-and-author-of-lean-customer-development/ FEEDBACK Ask questions, make comments, and let your voice be heard by emailing podcast@thekguy.com. Twitter: https://twitter.com/thekguy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keithmmcdonald/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thekguypage Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the_k_guy/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCysPayr8nXwJJ8-hqnzMFjw Website:

In this episode of Seeking Wisdom, DC, DG and special guest Maggie Crowley are talking about one of their all-time favorite topics – books – about leadership. We’ll give you an inside look at the books that have made a difference to us – from experts like Christina Wodtke, Kim Scott, Bernadette Jiwa, and Patty McCord. So, if you’re looking to up your leadership game in 2019, this episode is for you!

Today on Build, host Maggie Crowley sits down with Christina Wodtke, author of the legendary book Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results, which Maggie describes as the best book on goal setting – ever.In the episode, Maggie and Christina, dive deep into Christina’s experience in product roles at MySpace, Zynga and Linkedin, her transition out of industry and into academia as a lecturer at Standford, and of course using Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) as a framework for achieving your team and company-wide goals.So if you’re looking to start 2019 off on the right foot, this episode is for you.Before you go leave a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review and share the pod with your friends! Be sure to check out more insights on the Drift blog at drift.com/blog and find us on Twitter @maggiecrowley, @drift, @seekingwisdomio and @cwodtke.

Book review of Radical Focus by Christina Wodtke which introduces the concept of OKRs - Objectives and Key Results

In Episode 9, we talk inclusion riders, the importance of pronouns, and how all of us can better support folks from marginalized communities. If there’s one thing we’re sure of, it’s that we’ve got to stick together—and that means supporting and centering the voices of folks with less opportunity and privilege than us. In this episode, we talk with designer and educator Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen about how listening, and finding community, can help us do just that. They also share how parenting shaped their career path, what it was like to come out at work, and why they see allyship as something we practice, not something we have. Listen up. > If I show up at work as myself, then I’m in a state of being in my greatest power. And I think if you can find a workplace where they want you to be there in your greatest power, then like, yeah, show up. This is how you do it. > > —Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen, designer and educator Here’s what we get into—and of course, there’s a full transcript, too. Show notes If you didn’t catch the Oscars, don’t worry—we start the show by filling you in on our favorite parts. Of note: (Ahem) Janelle Monáe’s pantsuit (photo) Jordan Peele’s win for Get Out and the amazing fan art he posts on Instagram Frances McDormand’s acceptance speech mentioning inclusion riders (hell yeah)… …which we go on to explore: Did you know Justin Bieber requires that his dressing room be filled with carnations? Riders can be wild. More important: Nicole Sanchez writes about taking inclusion riders beyond Hollywood and into fields like tech—and apply them to everything from speaking gigs to job offers. Yep. We also touch on Lara Hogan’s wonderful piece about applying inclusiveness to your hiring process, the Enterprise UX Conference’s journey through inclusive programming, how the Design & Content Conference put together a diverse conference production team, and Women Talk Design’s mission to empower organizers to create more diverse events. Interview: Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen It’s not hyperbole to say it was an honor and a pleasure to talk with UX designer and educator Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen. Stevie tells us about the causes that drive them, establishing a career in design, navigating coming out as queer, and what it really means to practice allyship. We talk about: Where Stevie lives in Vancouver, which is the unceded land of the Coast Salish people, particularly the Squamish, the Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Stevie’s work with Out in Schools, a program that engages students on issues of homophobia, transphobia, and bullying. How having a child while establishing a career—and then making choices about your career and your future—become intertwined in a way you never expected. What it means to realize you’re queer at 27—and what happens next. How we can better support marginalized people by practicing ongoing allyship, and provide safer spaces for those communities. (More on the idea of practicing allyship from Mariame Kaba.) Demystifying and sharing pronouns—and deconstructing the hard-coded way we think about each other. FYOTW We end the show with a little self-love and high-five because, fuck yeah!—we made the New & Noteworthy list on Apple Podcasts! AND it reminds us of all the amazing women-hosted podcasts we listen to and love—including a show you should definitely check out, called Good As Hell hosted by Lizzo. Sponsors This episode of NYG is brought to you by: Shopify, a leading global commerce platform that’s building a diverse, intelligent, and motivated team—and they  want to apply to you. Visit shopify.com/careers to see what they’re talking about. _WordPress—the place to build your personal blog, business site, or anything else you want on the web. WordPress helps others find you, remember you, and connect with you. _   Transcript Katel LeDû This episode of No, You Go is brought to you by Shopify, the leading global commerce platform for entrepreneurs. And did you know they’re growing? If you want to work with a diverse, passionate team that likes to get shit done, then you should talk to Shopify. The best part: they don’t just want you to apply to them, they want to apply to you. So visit shopify.com/careers to see what they’re all about. Jenn Lukas Hey! And welcome to No, You Go, the show about being ambitious—and sticking together. I’m Jenn Lukas. KL I’m Katel LeDû. Sara Wachter-Boettcher And I’m Sara Wachter-Boettcher. SWB I’m so excited today to talk about one of my favorite topics: inclusion. And, more specifically, we’re going to talk about how people like me, like all of us, can step up and make an impact for underrepresented groups in any field. To help us out, we sat down with a friend of mine, Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen, to learn more about what real inclusion can look like. But, first up, did you all watch the Oscars last week? JL Nope! KL Uh, I did, and I have a few favorite things I kind of want to share because, first of all — you didn’t have to watch it just to see all the pictures that come out of it but Janelle Monáe’s fire red, like military-inspired pant suit was phenomenal. SWB She looked amazing. KL She looked amazing. I also would really like to make a very genuine request to Tiffany Haddish and Maya Rudolph to run for presidents ASAP. SWB Like, co-presidents? KL Like, yeah, absolutely and then, I mean, to top it all off: Jordan Peele won for best screenplay for Get Out, which is just fucking so awesome. I saw that movie and I was so obsessed, I loved it so much that I started following Jordan Peele on Instagram, and he posts a lot of Get Out fan art, it is absolutely worth following. It’s magical. JL I loved that movie. KL It was so good. [2:02] JL Yeah. Um, also, I love this pantsuit. I just Googled it. SWB Get on the internet right now! “Janelle Monáe Oscars pantsuit.” The cape portion of it or whatever that kind of swoopy back is is amazing! So I loved that she really made it her own. Like it was not the kind of look that not just other women were wearing but that, like, anybody was wearing. But it also felt so completely Oscars. Right? Like it felt like she had the whole vibe — fantastic. Ok. So we can keep talking about the Oscars which I also did not actually watch. Uh I like to look at outfit photos later. But, instead, what I was hoping we could talk a little bit about was the story that came out about Frances McDormand and what she said at the end of her speech. She said something about how she wanted to leave the audience with two words and those words were “inclusion rider” So Nicole Sanchez wrote this piece that Jenn actually sent around to all of us, that was about what inclusion rider means in tech or what they could mean in tech. So Nicole is awesome. She is a diversity consultant who runs a company called Vaya Consulting. So she spent a long time looking at diversity and inclusion in the tech industry. And she wrote this piece where she talked about where inclusion riders come from and what they mean. So she credits Dr. Stacy Smith at USC for originally coming up with this concept, and says that it comes from diversifying talent in the media. And the concept is kind of pretty simple, right? It’s like: if you take a rider, which you may have heard about from the music industry— JL So a rider is like what you request if you are going to be performing somewhere. And it could be something like, “I need to have sparkling water, or I need to have a soundcheck of two hours before I’m going to go on.” It could be— KL A fancy rug. JL Or a fancy rug. It could be all these things, you know, maybe you want to make sure that you’re going to have some sort of food. Or in the famous case of Van Halen, you might say, “I demand there be no brown M&Ms.” Which really wasn’t a demand that they needed, they stuck that in their rider to make sure that it was actually being read. So it was one of those things where if they got to a venue and they saw that there was no brown M&Ms, then that means that someone actually read the rider, and the requests that they were going to do, and that they were going to have a good show. KL Paying attention. I mean it matters. JL That’s why Justin Bieber requests that his hotel room is decked out in carnations of a specific color pattern — I’m not making this up! KL I told you! It’s— [4:30] SWB Ok so, so the Bieber rider is not also what we want to talk about tonight. Although we could. Um instead I mean I really like the way that this concept applies to other facets of life. So what Frances was talking about at the Oscars was like, “Ok. If you are an in-demand name in Hollywood, you have an opportunity, in your contracts, to stipulate that the people who are working on the set, and the people who are working with you, um are coming from diverse backgrounds. You have this, you know, you have the opportunity to say that you want to make sure that they’re being paid fairly. You have an opportunity to make some demands that might actually be relatively small in comparison to what you could be getting paid if you’re a big star, but are really, really huge for people who aren’t you.” And so, what Nicole talks about in her article is really applying that other places like, let’s say, a tech conference. Like, if you’re an in-demand speaker, you also have a lot of power. And you can say, “I would love to speak at your event, but I’m going to need you to do some shit for me first.” And getting really specific about what you expect to make sure that that event is inclusive and welcoming to people who are not in demand like you are. KL Yeah, I really like what Nicole wrote because it made it really obvious and seemed really reasonable to have this filter out into a lot of different areas, right? And, like you were saying, you might not be a speaker who’s super in-demand, you might just be starting out. But I think a lot of it is just knowing that it’s very fair and totally appropriate to ask questions about the thing that you’re about to sign up to do. SWB Totally! That reminds me of what Erika Hall talked about when we interviewed her which is like the importance of asking questions and the power of asking questions. I have been thinking about this a lot and I talked about this a little bit actually on Twitter today. Like, one of the things that I’ve started doing is when I’m asked to speak at conferences which, you know, I’ve written some books, and I’ve done a lot of speaking. So I do get asked which is great but I’ve started asking some questions back and I try to make them pretty consistent, across the board, because I find if I ask the same stuff over and over, I’m more comfortable asking and it also feels a little less weird, like it’s not a special standard, it’s just my standard. And so I have a few things that I would say are kind of in my rider, or at least like, they’re in my Go/No Go [chuckling] kind of file, right? Like I won’t go to your event if you don’t answer these questions in a way that I can live with. So it’s things like, you know, for me I always ask like, “Does your event have a code of conduct?” That’s something that’s on Nicole’s list too. But I also ask things like, “What are you doing to ensure that your event has a diverse lineup?” And I ask it that way specifically because I want to hear how people think about it. And if they tell me things like, “Well, we just want to have the best speakers.” Then that’s a big red flag for me because I question, “Well, how do you know you have the best speakers? ‘Best’ according to whom? According to like people you already knew? People your Twitter connections already knew?” You know it’s like it brings up a lot for me. Or at least it’s an opportunity to have a conversation with them. And depending on how that conversation goes, that can tell me a lot about whether I’m interested in coming there, and also it’ll tell me whether I’m interested in investing time and helping them identify speakers they hadn’t heard about, which I’m super happy to do if I feel confident that, you know, if I recommend a speaker who is from a more marginalized group, who’s maybe less experienced than I am, to go to an event, I don’t want that person to be treated poorly. I want to make sure that I’m sending them to an event where somebody’s going to take them seriously. So I feel like by having those conversations, it gives me a chance to feel out how much somebody’s thought about this, how open they are to change, and how willing they are to kind of put in work. Because it is. It takes work, right? Just like we talked about on an earlier episode: it takes work to think about, you know, not centering all your events on drinking, which is a really answer. It takes worth to think about something like onsite childcare but like every single detail you do as an event planner is work and I want them to think about this as an important piece of their job. [8:33] KL Yeah, I mean, you just said that you have an opportunity to do this and I would almost say that established folks, like yourself, I imagine feel like they have a — an obligation to. SWB Absolutely. I don’t know that everybody does. I wish more people who felt like they had some sway — and I, you know, I have like some level of sway. There’s people who — who are like much more in demand and who make a lot of money speaking in our field. And I think that they have a huge responsibility. But I definitely, 100 percent like I — yes, I think of that as an opportunity in the sense of like, I’m glad to have the opportunity. But 100 percent it is an obligation and it is a responsibility. JL Yeah, um I’ve always did a similar thing to you, Sara, where I had a list of a set of questions that I asked every conference opportunity that came up and, you know, like you’re saying, it helps when you have the standard because then you can send an email back that’s like, “This is what I ask all my conferences. No matter what.” And I wrote a post about this awhile back, mine were focused a little bit more about seeing if they — if speakers were paid, and one of the things that I really like to ask is, “What is the cost of the conference? And how many attendees do you expect?” And then afterwards I would say, “What is your speaker fee?” To make sure that then, you know, if a conference will write back, “Oh our conference cost 12 hundred dollars, we’re expecting, you know, a thousand, 2,000, 5,000 people and then the speaker fee is zero, right? KL Then that math is wrong! SWB That math speaks for itself, right? Like it’s like, “Mmm, hmm, how do you like the way those numbers look on the page?” Right. [10:00] JL Not — not too great um so I think it’s really important, you know, for — to realize too and like it’s a mix of educating also, where I think some people never— never thought about that. And I’m not saying that that’s ok. But like it is — then I become, “Well, here are these questions and why I’m asking them because it’s not ok.” SWB Yeah, I mean I wish that everybody would have thought about this by now. I kind of feel like, “C’mon, like you sh— c’mon, you should be thinking about this already.” However, I also accept that that’s not the case and if my goal is to make more people aware, and hope that more people come along with me on this particular journey, then I do feel like part part of it — being able to do something than education is ok and important. I don’t expect everybody to do that, in all circumstances, but I feel like I have enough like sort of comfort and confidence of where I am that I— I can do that. And I think that’s a service to — I’m not so much worried about doing it as a service to the conference organizer, I think that’s like a side benefit. I think about that as a service to the industry, at large, and to the people who need that information to be more widespread. JL Completely. And, you know, I would say that, as a speaker, I did this but as an attendee I’ve asked for things too. And so I feel like people should feel empowered to ask questions as an attendee also, you know, “Will you have a vegan meal?” “Will you have a vegetarian meal?” And that’s something that I used to ask a lot um you know, “Is there a place to nurse?” Or “Is there a place to pump?” And like, “What sort of facilities will be available?” And, as an attendee, someone who’s paying for a conference, you should definitely feel empowered. I mean as a speaker, you should too, that wasn’t taking away from that. But you should definitely feel empowered to write the organizers and make sure that they will have these things available to you also. SWB And I’m also deeply suspect of any event that makes you feel bad for having— like if some event makes you feel bad because you ask for a vegan meal or you ask for a nursing room, like, “I’m sorry. What the actual fuck?” It’s one thing for them not to necessarily be able to meet every need, that’s like a different conversation. But I think if somebody comes to you with a need, and you write them off, or you minimize it, or you pretend like it doesn’t matter. Like, I don’t want to go that event. And I don’t want — I don’t want those people to have my money, or for them to use like my face and my talk to promote their event. KL Right. SWB Um so there were some things though on Nicole’s list that I’d never thought about before that I’m super glad to have heard about now. So for example, I had not thought about — and I feel silly not having thought about it but I never thought about asking about the people who are working the event. So like the laborers, the people who are doing setup and takedown, the people who are doing food, like how are they being paid? She specifically mentioned, you know, what are the labor conditions, are they part of a union? I think there’s probably a whole lot of different questions you might ask depending on your particular interests or your particular kind of like stance but I think asking about the welfare and the support of the people who are not kind of seen as like part of the conference, but are, in fact, like what makes the conference run. Like that’s a huge area that I’m going to be thinking more about. KL And the fact that, you know, she points out, is there — is there a process for intake of these kinds of requests, or like these kinds of questions, right? For like just handling that and — and talking about them. JL So I think the conversation that keeps coming up again and again, from conference organizers saying, “How do I make this happen? How do I diversify my lineups? How do I diversify my speakers?” And I think some people have provided solutions and ideas for this. An article I read recently on Medium was about the Enterprise UX Conference which um they’ve been working on this for four years and every year have slowly iterated on how they’ve been handling things. And I think one of the things that is really great about that is they didn’t just give up after year one. They’re like, “Well, I don’t know how to do it.” Is that they’ve been slowly trying to improve their process and they wrote about this and they were saying that one of the things they did was make sure to have different people, besides three white men, choosing the lineup and being in charge of the themes. And as soon as they started expanding from that, then so did their speaker lineup. SWB You know one of my favorite conferences, Design and Content, actually a conference that Stevie, our guest today, is going to MC this year, they’ve done a really similar thing where they have a selection committee and what they specifically did is they intentionally went out and identified people from a bunch of different backgrounds and then they paid them for their time to be on that committee. And it dramatically changed how they come up with who’s going to be on the roster for the year. And they’ve written about it publically, we’ll put that in the show notes, because I think that they have a process that is — is something that other people can follow. And, you know, part of it came out of their first year. They had really good intentions. They went out and thought about, you know, “You know let’s make sure we have a good, diverse lineup. Let’s ask some people who we’ve never seen before, and some new faces, et cetera.” And an attendee called them out for it at the event and said you know, “This lineup is really white.” And they had to take a step back and be like, “Yeah, it is.” And sit with that. Right? And figure out what to do about that. And I think that that’s hard but I think that’s one of the responsibilities that we have is to be able to hear those kinds of feedback and say, “Ok I’m going to listen to that and then I’m going to figure out how do I change?” And, you know, and that’s one of the reasons I like to ask these questions I ask, right? Is it’s like, do I get defensiveness? Or do I get somebody who can say, “Yeah, you know, we haven’t that diverse of a lineup in past years. You’re right that’s something we should change. I have some ideas but I would love to hear more,” or whatever it is. But that — that openness is really, really important. So, um, that’s one of the things about Enterprise UX that I think has been great as well is that they’re willing to write about it. Like they’re willing to admit it that it wasn’t great year one! Which is sometimes hard to do, right? You have to be able to look at your work and say like, “Here are the ways that this wasn’t where we wanted to be. And then here’s what we did differently.” [16:11] JL Another site that I found interesting was womentalkdesign.com. Their tagline is that they “elevate the best talks about design from women and empowers event organizers with tools, approaches, and information to engage more women speakers.” So this is a neat project because it’s an answer to that question of, “Well, I don’t know where to find these speakers!” And so I really like it because they went out and tackled this specific question that people kept asking. SWB Yeah, I mean Christina Wodtke who is one of the people who created that site, I know that part of this was born of her frustration. Like, she’s been in the industry a long time, working in tech and in UX. And people would frequently ask her, “Well, where do I find all these diverse speakers?” And now she’s like, “I don’t have to answer that question anymore!” Right? Like she’s like, “They’re out there. You just have to do a little bit of work, to get outside of the bubble that you have,” and then she was like, “Ok, let me go and do some of that work.” And um — and so the result is that it’s like, “Oh! You’re looking for more diverse lineups for your event?” That’s certainly not everybody, by any means, but like if you haven’t at least gone through that, like you’ve done not even the bare minimum. JL And I— I don’t think inclusiveness just stops at these conferences, right? I mean one of the things that came out recently was Lara Hogan wrote a great article about how to apply inclusiveness to your hiring process, and how to like tackle that, and one of the things that she had was to make sure that you have a diverse group of the team interviewing these candidates, and I think that’s great thing: making sure that it’s not just one group of people that are interviewing all of your candidates as they come in. SWB And I think it also goes back to some of the same stuff that we talked for like an inclusion rider is that if you are in a position where you feel like you have some choice about the job that you’re taking, which I recognize not everybody is in, but if you’re in that position and you’re thinking about, “I want a place that’s going to give me the most growth opportunity, I want the place that’s going to offer a really good salary package, et cetera, et cetera,” you know, I think that it’s another responsibility to be able to say, “I want to place that is willing to kind of put its money where its mouth is when it comes to being an inclusive environment,” and to ask those same kinds of questions, right? “So what are you doing to increase diversity in your team?” And “What are you doing to support people who come from different backgrounds? And like — what does that look like?” JL I love this question. I love this so much. Um I think it’s like— as a candidate, as an interviewee, you might be like, “Well, how do I phrase this? How do I make sure that this job is going to be a good job with me?” And I think that’s a great way to phrase it. Um when we interview people, one of the questions I always ask is, um I phrase it as: “Diversity and inclusiveness are really important values to us. What are some important values to you?” And, you know, it’s a very leading question but you’d be surprised at how many people go on some sort of tangent that is, like, “Ah. You know? I want to make sure that I have like — snacks.” No one’s ever said snacks! That’s an exaggeration [sure] but it’s certainly something that’s like, you know, not appropriate for the answer or where I was hoping that they would go. SWB We talk a lot about sort of how this relates to people who are working in like tech and design fields, but this is the kind of thing that I think is really transferrable to almost any field, right? Like that it’s not really about the industry that you’re in, it’s like if you were working in an industry that is not necessarily perfectly inclusive, which is like, newsflash: probably all of them. Then you know I think that the— the same kind of stuff applies and you can kind of bring some of these same principles and ideas along. So I’m really stoked that we’re talking about inclusion riders, I don’t think it necessarily has to be like a contract in every circumstance, I think it’s much more about how can you apply that concept to whatever it is that you’re doing in your professional and however you’re interacting with people who hold power in your industry. [19:55] ** **** JL** [Sponsor] No, You Go is proud to be supported by wordpress.com. Whether you’d like to build a personal blog, a business site, or both, creating your website on wordpress.com can help others find you, remember you, and connect with you. That’s why nearly 30 percent of all websites run on WordPress. You don’t need experience setting up a website, WordPress guides you through the process from start to finish. And takes care of the technical side. In fact, we use WordPress at No, You Go. WordPress also has 24 hour customer support, which is great because we all have different schedules. Plans start at just four dollars a month. Start building your website today! Go to wordpress.com/noyougo for 15 percent off any new purchase. That’s wordpress.com/noyougo for 15 percent off your brand new website. Interview: Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen SWB Our guest today is Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen. I first met Stevie back in the summer of 2015, after I gave a talk at a conference up in Vancouver, and they approached me afterward wanting to chat about my talk, which was very flattering. But more than anything, what I really remember about that conversation was that this person I just met had come to me with so much kind of kindness and generosity, and our conversation felt so uplifting. And over the next few years, I have paid a lot of attention to what Stevie’s been up to and the things that they’re talking about and interested in. And this year, fast forward, Stevie is now going to be the MC of that very event where I met them: the Design & Content Conference. They’re also a UX designer, a design educator who works with youth and teaches in two different university programs, and somebody who’s just really active in their community in Vancouver, and in design in general. I am so excited to welcome Stevie to the show today. Thank you so much for being here. Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen Thank you for having me. Can I add a moment and just also acknowledge that I am also on unceded Coast Salish territories, and while we may call it Vancouver, it is the unceded land of the Coast Salish people, particularly the Squamish, the Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. SWB Thank you for doing that. I think that actually sets the tone for this conversation really well because I think one of the things I would love to talk with you more about is sort of the way that you look at your role as a designer in your community and sort of the impact that you have on community and on the way that people from different backgrounds within your community are represented. So can you tell us a little more— how did you get to this place where you start a conversation and you say, “Actually, can we remind ourselves of the indigenous people whose land this is and this land has always been?” Like, what was your process of getting to a place that you were comfortable doing things like that? STAN Honestly, every time I have these moments where I’m like, “Oh! I need to say something, I should say something, this is the right thing to say,” and it is still really, really hard because I think always makes me uncomfortable not knowing how the other person may respond on the other end. Yeah, these issues are political and they are uncomfortable for people to talk about, hear, or acknowledge. I don’t know if you know what’s happening right now in Canada, but Tina and Coulton were murdered and people don’t talk about it because people don’t care. And so we need to bring these things up even though it’s really hard because people are dying. So that’s my response I guess. When I began to recognize that when we don’t talk about things, people die. And the more personal we make it, the more people who we spend time with who are directly affected by these things, by systemic oppression, the more we recognize the power that we have as individuals when we are in a place where we have to acknowledge these things. SWB That’s a pretty difficult topic and I think that that’s something pretty challenging to our audience — I mean, you mentioned that it’s hard for people to talk about, I think it’s hard to talk about on a podcast like this where we — where we really do want to talk about, you know, finding some joy even when things are difficult. And I don’t that that means erasing talking about the things that are difficult, by any means, and so, with that in mind, what is your day to day work? [25:23] STAN Hmm my day-to-day work probably doesn’t look too different from many people. I’m a parent; I have a five, almost six-year-old, son. And I have shared custody with his father. And so on days when he’s with me, I actually wake up at like 4:30 in the morning, and I wake up, and I shower, and I go to make a matcha latte for myself every morning. And I come out and I answer emails, I try my best to catch up on like Slack, on text messages, on WhatsApp, on Viber, on Signal, on my work email versus my personal email, and um what else is there? Messenger. So that’s kind of normal, I imagine, I think we all have these mornings of having to try to catch up with all that stuff. And then I get him ready for school, take him to school, and it’s a privilege that allows me to do that, and I come back and I work. And so some days that’s with Out in Schools, where I’m talking about queer and gender issues with young people in high schools. And sometimes in elementary schools. And other days it’s going to meet my own clients at their offices. And then other days, it’s staying home um and doing like UX work. So for me that’s everywhere from leading a workshop, like I did this morning, where I’m presenting to clients whatever our ideas are, whatever our proposals are, and then other days I’m heading off to go teach. And then I come home and I try to fit in some yoga somewhere. And pick up my son and then do things with him in the evening, feed him, put him to bed. And do some more work and then go to bed. That’s my day. SWB I think a lot of our listeners can relate to sort of the juggle and trying to figure out what the right mix of things is in a day and how to have some time for yourself amid everything else. Can you tell us more — like what was your journey into becoming a designer? How did you end up in this sort of life that you’ve crafted for yourself now? STAN I lucked into it, I think. I remember I was in high school and I had really no real idea about what I wanted to do and somebody came into the school who was an alumni and did a presentation. And she worked in — she worked in marketing for an ad agency. And I just thought her job sounded really cool. I liked that she got to like talk to people and I liked hearing about how she got to like come up with ideas to do things and like sell things to people, which I feel so much like cringey shame about now. But at the time it sounded really interesting. Um so I went into the university and studied communications but partway through my program, I did a certificate in innovative leadership from SFU, Simon Fraser University, and it was an eight-month program where the first four months we did workshops, and the last four months we got to do like a practical project with a local company. And the company that I happened to work with was a leadership development company. And at the end of this project, which was, funnily enough, all about looking at how people within the organization viewed their leadership skills, as opposed to people who are like several levels away from them. How did those people view their executives leadership skills. At the end of the project, the person I’d been working with at this company said, “Oh I noticed you like — maybe had some graphic skills. You know we really need a graphic designer.” And I’m like, “Well, I’m like — I’m taking my first course in design right now.” “Well, that’s great! That’s more knowledge than we have!” And so they hired me and I started off just like making PowerPoints and doing a lot of things in print, working within business development and supporting people people in sales. Packing suitcases. I did a lot of packing suitcases. But along the way I learned a lot about like leadership and leadership models and um when we talk about adult learning, that realm is something that I gained a lot of experience with over six years. And so at the same time I was still in school, had abandoned communications, and had — was fully in design now, and then I went away on an amazing field school and came back and was pregnant! So I took a year off. And I will say this is like — this is an important part of my professional journey, this is an important part of my growth and journey as a person, because having my son changed everything. I’ve always been someone that was really into research. So the moment I got into something, or the moment I found out about something new, I’d like totally geek out and go read every book, watch every movie and documentary, and talk to every person I could find about the thing. Uh I get really excited about new hobbies and interests. So I got really excited about being pregnant, and about birth, and about breastfeeding, um and about being a parent. And when that happened, I began to see the ways in which I had to make really, really clear decisions. So the same way in marketing or in design, you have to have a reason as to why you’re doing something for a certain desired outcome, I knew that I wanted my son, I wanted my child to be happy, and I knew that I wanted him to be really kind, and I knew that I wanted him to be really safe. Like I wanted him to live. Right? Like that’s all I really wanted and I knew that I had to make decisions to support that. And so that was like — we raised him vegan for the first like year because we felt it was important for him to have the choice, right? It was important for him to know that you don’t have to eat animals but you can and that’s your choice. But do you know what you are doing if you are going to that? So he still doesn’t really eat animals. But that’s still something that applied to me in my life. I began to think about like what am I doing? Is this who I want to be? Is this how — what powers do I have as an individual to like make all those things happen for him? And it made me really political. Like all of a sudden, things that I have always had values about like really mattered because I’d made an investment in the future by having him, and I needed to invest in the future. And then I got laid off from my job. The job that I’d had for six years. I was a marketing assistant or a project assistant but I was never actually a designer. And I was feeling a lot of doubt about this and I have a mentor at school, Russell Taylor, who is kind of the father to like so many of us in this design program. And I reached out to him and I said, “Well, I got laid off. I really love design but I have no design skills. I didn’t finish my degree.” And he goes, “Well come back and teach for me. Um like you know this stuff. You’ve taken this course and I like — I feel confident that you’re going to do a good job in this.” And so he brought me back and had me teaching his second year course with him. And then at the same time he was developing a conference that was in its second year. And at this conference, he brought in agencies and different companies to like do talks but also to do interviews. And while I was teaching, I also applied for an interview at this conference, and I came out of the conference and I was offered — I was offered some jobs! My first job in which I would get to call myself a designer. And so, Sara, this is where it kind of comes back around to you because this job was the first job that I gone in to do the interview and really felt like, “This is who I am. And like I don’t know these things. This is what I’m working on. Um please see some potential in me!” Like, “Please take some faith in me because I think I can do this.” Uh and I felt really good about some of the things that I felt were just really natural and inherent to me. And they absolutely said, “Yeah!” Like, “We think you can do this. We think that you can kick it out of the park. I feel confident putting you in front of like our — any client, right from the getgo.” And this was my manager, Robin Ashmore, and so it was the first job where I’m like, “Oh. Ok. Like I can admit that I don’t really know this but I can learn this and I can develop in these areas where I think I’m good.” And part of how he supported me was allowing me to go to that conference DCC, Design & Content, which is how I met Sara! And at this time though I was beginning to get really bitter, um I was beginning to look around and see that we, as designers, have all this potential to build things that really make a difference in the world and really help people, and yet we’re like focused on how to get snacks. Or we’re building technology that is actually enabling violence against marginalized people. So I — even now I tell people that I feel shame around calling myself a designer because as a whole, this industry is causing so much more problems than it is helping and I think so many of us have this power and opportunity to actually do something about it, and we’re afraid to. And we don’t. For whatever reasons. And some people have more ability to do something about it then others and I really do mean this in like ability, privilege, some people have more privilege in order to make change happen. Um but I went to this conference, I went to DCC, I met Sara. I’m like, “Oh!! There’s designers who really do see the same things I see! Who really are concerned about the same things that I’m concerned about.” And there are people who, like you, Sara, who want better things out of tech, who want designers to do better things — the tech industry to do better things. And so I began to look for places in which I could try to do better things and I could try to learn on how to be a better designer. This is where I’m at right now. Like I’m still working on that. I’m still trying to influence and like bring kindness into the world, bring safety into places where I think people need someone to invite them in or to support them while they’re there. So yeah that’s where I am right now. [35:25] SWB Well, I am so proud and kind of tearing up a little bit to think that I played even just like a tiny, tiny, little role in your story— STAN Big role! SWB —oh gosh! Ok, ok I wouldn’t — I wouldn’t oversell that. I really think like, you know, your work and your what you are bringing to your community is— is big and different than anything that I do. So I definitely don’t want to oversell what I might’ve played a role in. Something that I’m really interested in hearing more about that you mentioned a little bit ago is the work that you’re doing with Out in Schools. So can you tell us a little bit about that organization and how you got involved with them? STAN Yeah, oh. So I guess one of the key parts of the story that was a huge pivot point in my life, that happened shortly before I met Sara, is that I realized that I was queer. And I like to say that I “realized” because it was something that kind of — it’s always been a part of me. It’s who I am. I am a queer person. But I didn’t have the words for it and I didn’t know that’s what other people were calling it and when this happened, I was 27, I had already had my son, Noah, and I had a cis male partner. And realizing I was queer, finding queer community, making queer friends, really like embracing and exploring what that could mean for me was like so amazing! It sounds so cheesy, but I really did feel like I was born again. And I was also really disappointed and sometimes embarrassed to admit that I was 27. And I think about how I grew up with very conservative parents. I think they’re a little bit more liberal now than they used to be but they are conservative, they’re still very Catholic. I grew up in a very Catholic cishet family. And I was also really protected, care for, loved, I still am. And for them, that meant sheltering me from just sexuality in general. And so that included putting me in an all-girls private school um great school, I mean great academics but it was also an all girls Catholic private school. So we didn’t get sex-ed. And when I was 27, I realized that I was queer and I was so happy about it because I think like being queer is so liberating, and so fun. I really wanted to make it happen — or contribute to a culture where queerness is normalized. And so I found the Queer Film Festival, I met some people there, including some facilitators from Out in Schools, and they became my friends. Jen Sung, in particular, reached out and was like, “Hey! You kind of said that you would love to do this. Were you serious?” And I said, “Yes!” And she goes, “Well! We’re hiring! You should submit an application!” And I submitted an application and became an Out in Schools facilitator. So we’re led by Gavin Somers and Brandon Yan, and we go around to high schools, and elementary schools, and we talk to young people about queer and trans issues using media, like using film. So we watch movies with them, we watch music videos with them and we lead discussions. And it’s interesting in the ways in which like that also ties back into the skill I have around facilitation because that’s part of what I do in my job as a designer. So I get to practice, like, being in front of people, and presenting, and engaging with audiences. Like, in everything that I do, in many places in my life. [39:24] SWB That’s such a cool additional piece to your professional profile that I didn’t know about until — you know just now, right? Like you being involved with Out in Schools seems like, in some ways, you know, really different from doing the design work, but it feels very natural, the way that you talk about it all together. STAN Thanks. It feels really natural to me. SWB I’m also curious, you know, you mentioned coming out as queer at 27 and sort of realizing to yourself that that was even the case and I know that in that same time period you also started going by different pronouns, and coming out as non-binary, and I’m wondering if you can talk a little bit about what that was like? And especially what was that like, you know, in the context of work where that seems like maybe it could be a challenging thing to do. STAN Well, what had happened was that you did this amazing talk and you were really vulnerable and real and talked about how important it was to like create spaces and technologies that allowed and encouraged people to be who they are uh rather than try to force them to fit in any particular box. And I came up to you and I was in tears, I remember this, because I had this name tag and the name tag actually had my name, like “Stevie” was on it, but Stevie’s like — is not my given name. And I was expressing to you, like, “Oh my god, how amazing is it that, yeah the Eventbrite form for the conference was like, shout out to Steve Fisher and Shannon Fisher for recognizing the significance and importance of this. But the conference signup form allowed me to input my name. Like it didn’t ask me for a piece of ID to like prove that that was my name.” And I’m like tearing up now, thinking about it, but yeah that’s like it was the first piece of paper that I wore around my neck that allowed me to identify myself and identify myself to other people as Stevie. And it was in a professional context. And then all the speakers, everybody that I met that weekend like called me Stevie. Like everybody that knows me from that time onwards, calls me Stevie and so it felt so good. I came back and I didn’t immediately do it but from then on, anytime I introduced myself to somebody I was like, “No, Stevie.” Like I’d been doing this previously, as a nickname to personal friends but not professional contacts. And being at Design and Content, meeting people who would use my name eventually I think, a couple weeks later, gave me the confidence to actually casually, jokingly at work say, “Actually! Like all my friends call me Stevie.” And so my co-workers were like, “Do you want us to call you Stevie?” And I’m like, “Yes!!!” And I had another amazing colleague, like Jason Landry, he reached out to me privately on Slack and said, “Hey, I know that you’re going by Stevie.” And like, “Awesome! Stevie’s a great name. I just wanted to check in. Like have your pronouns changed? Like what pronouns would you like me to refer to you as?” So at the time I said, “Oh um like no, like, she/her is fine.” And she/her is great. I just don’t use she/her anymore. Like they/them is super comfortable to me. Like it makes me feel really good. And so I use they/them and eventually like it was people in my team making me feel like welcome. And doing that work of like welcoming me as opposed to me having to step out and be vulnerable is what allowed me to come to work and tell people, “My name is Stevie.” And now like over time I’ve built enough confidence to include it in my email signature. If I meet someone new, I always say, “Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen. My pronouns: they/them/theirs.” So I try to assert myself and I know that from what we tell young people in schools, every time that I do that, I can help somebody else feel more comfortable sharing their pronouns. And as a practice of allyship, that’s the best thing folks can do is share their pronouns. SWB I love that story so much and I’m so thankful that you had a colleague who reached out to you sort of made it ok for you to say like, “Yeah, actually I prefer to go by different pronouns.” Was that a scary conversation to start to have? Like the first few times you were doing that in these professional settings? STAN Mm hmm yeah. And I mean, let’s be honest, my team, most of the people on my team are great. They use they/them pronouns. Some people still make mistakes. I think it’s interesting the way in which every time someone new comes onto the team, if I don’t already know them, I have to find a time or an opportunity to, hopefully, quickly get in there and let them know that my pronouns are they/them/theirs before they hear maybe the wrong pronoun from somebody else, or make an assumption, and then I eventually have to awkwardly correct them. But yeah it was initially really hard because I didn’t even understand the — like once I understood how it felt empowering to me, it was hard because there was always a lot of explaining. People like need explanations or they look at me, you know, like, “Wait. What does that mean?” And they like — I think — I think people look at me and they’re like, “Wait. What does that mean for your body parts?” SWB Which um is — has nothing to do with it at all. STAN Exactly. But— SWB It is not an appropriate question for work — like pretty much ever. STAN Well it’s just like — I don’t think it needs to be even verbally said sometimes, it’s just like people stop and look like the same way. Some folks know — like particularly feminine-presenting folks knows what it looks when someone looks at you and looks you up and down [mm hmm]. I think like queer and trans and non-binary folks, we know what it looks like when you look at us and you’re like, “Mmm,” like, “What’s under your clothes and how do you have sex?” [44:55] SWB Which I, you know, I understand that it’s kind of uncomfortable for people when they are first presented with pronoun and gender stuff that they’ve not encountered before and that they don’t understand, and um and then even still, you know, I mean I think I, for example, like I have several friends who would identify as non-binary or who identify as, let’s say they’re trans, and I have tried to unlearn some of that like default gender binary language and it’s hard. And I screw it up. And I screw it up oftentimes when I have, you know it’s like something gets coded in my brain early on, whether it’s an assumption, or whether it’s something where, you know, I have a friend who I met when they presented as male and they, at some point, came out as trans. And they’re a woman. And I sometimes still have like that little mental like kind of hiccup right? That like is about the history that I have with them, and sort of having to shift my thinking, I mean that just is what it is but that that’s up to me, right? Like it’s my job. It’s my job to figure that out. It’s not their job to figure that out. And if I feel weird or if I have to like go through an extra like you know mental circuit in order to make sense of it and make sure that I’m doing it correctly, like, that’s work that is on me to do. And that the more I do that kind of work, the easier it becomes. And that’s kind of like the way that I’ve tried to deal with it but I think it’s — I think it’s something that seeing people like you who are willing to be vulnerable and to say, “Hey, this is who I am.” And to know that you might get reactions that aren’t positive and that aren’t good. I think that that’s — it’s such a gift, I think, to the rest of us, in terms of opening our minds and helping us get to a more inclusive place. KL I also just want to say that— that you said something, you said the words, “practice of allyship,” and I wrote that — I just wrote that down because I like that so much and I feel like if we can just share that as much as possible, that is — that is such a gem of a thing to think about. STAN Let me — let me credit that Mariame Kaba who is @prisonculture on Twitter because I heard Mariame — actually I may be pronouncing this wrong: M-A-R-I-A-M-E. I heard her speak on a webinar, which is run by Talila Lewis, TL Lewis, who does not use any pronouns, and this is what they — the whole discussion was about, was about the practice of allyship. That no one gets to say like, “I am an ally! So I am done!” Like it’s not about what this identity, it’s about how do you continue to practice allyship. KL Exactly. It’s like — it really, truly is a practice. It’s like all things that you, you know, I’m — at least I know for myself that I want to get good at, you know, between yoga, and just being a, you know, a better friend and publisher and coworker. It’s— it really, truly takes practice. And you have to be — you have to be aware of that. STAN Yeah, and it takes like that, like what you talked about earlier, Sara, that constant, the constant practice and I think when we’re in community with other people, we’re all practicing our allyship to marginalized people, and marginalized communities, there has to be a practice of forgiveness as well. Like grace, for us as individuals, and the practice of forgiveness for each other. Like I wouldn’t know anything I know if somebody didn’t tell me I was wrong if somebody didn’t like — wouldn’t forgive me, and like didn’t cast me out of their life because I made a mistake, but it also has to come from a place of like being willing to sit around and like shut up sometimes. SWB So as somebody who has gotten more comfortable bringing your whole identity to work, and who has kind of gone through some of those scary parts, what would you tell someone or what advice would you have for somebody who is thinking about some of the same things, about being able to be more of their authentic selves in their professional environments and being able to kind of fuse maybe some of the stuff that they’ve kept personal or private with the way that they present professionally. [49:40] STAN Hmm. What would I tell someone? I think the first thing I would want to make sure is that person feels safe. And I know this word like “safe” or “safety” gets thrown around a lot. But, quite honestly, what are your risks and dangers? And what violence may you face if you fully — if you bring yourself fully? And this is me speaking from a position of privilege of where I am able to bring myself to work, where every part of me is at least, at the very least, recognized and acknowledged. And then I would say: surround yourself in community and with allies to support you through it. I don’t think I could do it if I didn’t think — like I don’t think I could show up, assert my name, assert my pronouns, talk about my politics, if I thought that I would be attacked in any way, or punished in any way. And so that — that’s sort of required first. Make sure you’re safe and make sure you have support. And then, like show up and be real. This — it’s, again, cheesy sayings but I was tweeting, I tweeted about it this morning. But this idea of like nobody — I don’t know anything other than my own experience and I have so little that I know, but all I know is like myself. And so if I show up at work as myself, then I’m in a state of being in my greatest power. And I think if you can find a workplace where they want you to be there in your greatest power, then like, yeah, show up. This is how you do it. KL I love that. STAN Does that help? SWB That’s so great. That is so great. Yeah. So, very last question then is you mentioned safety and the importance for people who are going to do something vulnerable, whether that’s you know coming out at work or anything else, to feel like they have some sense of safety. So what can listeners do who feel like they can — they have some power in their workplace or in the organizations they’re part of, to help foster that safety for people. Like what are some of the ways that we can ensure that more of the people that we work with feel safe around us? STAN Well I think for people of marginalized identities, yeah, showing up so that you can be that example, so that you can be another person who like makes someone feel safe because you see someone who’s similar to you. That’s one way. But if you aren’t, like if you are someone who is in a position of privilege and power, gosh, like: not punishing people. How do you make — how do you make that space? Inviting it? Educating yourself? Like and making it — like I’ll bring it back to the beginning: like making it personal. I think if you genuinely care about the people in your company, then these are things worth learning about and these are things worth like not just acknowledging and recognizing and forgiving, for some reason, like if you think it’s wrong and you “forgive” them for this thing. Like get past that point where you can love them for that. [55:08] STAN I think that’s it. FYOTW SWB I have a pretty important Fuck Yeah tonight. It’s the Fuck Yeah to the um real champagne that Katel brought over today. KL Uh we have to take this moment to say a little “Fuck yeah” to ourselves because we made it onto the New and Noteworthy in Apple Podcasts and I’m really excited because we are a little, indie podcast that we started because we just really wanted to talk to each other and see where this went and, I’m psyched. SWB We started talking a while back about how much we were really hoping we could get onto the New and Noteworthy list because it’s a really good way to get new audience, and have people kind of be aware of you, plus it just feels good to know that what you’re doing is working. And, when I started looking at the other shows that were on there, almost all of them were supported by a bigger brand. It was like a podcast coming from Gimlet, or a podcast coming from Slate, or some other organization that was backing them and funding them, and so it’s a kind of a big deal to have a podcast like this that’s completely independently run be able to make it onto that list. Or at least, it feels like a big deal to me. JL Fuck yeah! It’s a big deal! KL Feels like a huge deal. SWB And I was also thinking about how much of a big deal to see a podcast ran by women, and more podcast run by women coming out because I feel like for a long time, there were just so few. I remember seeing a stat the other day that was like something like 70 percent of podcasts are run by men. And I don’t know if that’s true. Like it wasn’t the kind of stat that I felt like I could easily back up. But it is something that’s talked about quite a lot in the industry is just how male-dominated podcasting is. And how almost all of the biggest name podcasts are run by men. And, you know, there’s some really great podcasts run by men. It’s not like there aren’t but like man, there are so many interesting women doing interesting things. And I would love to hear from more of them. And, like, that’s what we’re doing. JL Yeah! I mean, also, fuck yeah women’s history month! And with that in mind I just started looking — I went a little Google-wild again and I just started looking at all these like, you know there’s all these lists, it’s the internet; of course there’s lists. But I just started looking into more like women-run podcasts and I just started going through them all — and I just — I have so many queued up right now. I’m so excited to listen to them all because I feel like, again, the more we support each other as women podcasters, the more that we get our — like we share our message! And we keep listening to each other and raising each other up! So it’s been so fun to try to listen to some of these other podcasts also. Katel, I know that you have been like super into one recently. KL Yeah, I gotta be honest: I’m actively looking for more podcasts that are just basically more diverse voices. And one that I really like lately is by a music artist that I just really love, her name is Lizzo. And if you don’t know her, just Spotify that shit immediately because it will make you feel good and it’s totally worth it. But she has a new podcast, that I think launched like right around the same time ours did, which is so cool, and it’s on Spotify. She describes it as, “A safe space for the baddest women in music.” She’s an alternative rapper, she sits down with iconic queens and rising stars and basically sets the record straight on making a name in a very male-dominated world in music. So I just love that. I love her. I’m so happy that I get to hear her not only sing but also talk and talk with other women. JL What’s the podcast called? KL Sorry, I should’ve said that! It’s called Good As Hell which is also just a really fucking good name. And yeah it’s really inspiring and you should take a listen. JL Maybe we could do a crossover episode: No, You Good. KL That would be amazing! SWB I love this whole concept because it feels like a sister podcast to No, You Go. Because I think that that’s really like — similar stuff we’re trying to do. Obviously we don’t have as many connections in music but if any, like, musical stars want to be on our show, that’s great. JL Kesha! [Ahem.] SWB Kesha is definitely like Jen’s number one dream guest. She’s literally on a spreadsheet right now. But I think that — that’s a lot of the same stuff that we’re trying to talk about, right? It’s like who are the most badass women and non-binary people we have encountered in our professional lives who are doing great things and who have something to say to the world? And how can we talk about ways to elevate their voices and make spaces that are more inclusive? So fuck yeah to women-run podcasts. JL Fuck yeah! KL Fuck yeah on New and Noteworthy. [59:59] JL Well, that’s it for this week’s episode of No, You Go! The show about being ambitious— and sticking together. NYG is recorded in our home city of Philadelphia and produced by Steph Colbourn. Our theme music is by The Diaphone. Thanks to Stevie Thuy Anh Nguyen for being our guest today. If you like what you’ve been hearing on our podcast, we would love it if you subscribed and rated us on Apple Podcast where we’ve been New and Noteworthy! And fuck yeah! New and Noteworthy! Deserved! Your support really helps us spread the word. We’ll be back next week with another great guest.

Pour ce 7ème épisode, notre invité est de Nancy : c’est David Lakomski, Growth Hacker et érudit des startups ! — Parmi les références citées dans l'épisode : ► Startup Weekend : www.startupweekend.org ► Recherche et développement (R&D) : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki ► Idéation : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idéation ► CNAM (Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers) : www.cnam.fr ► SaaS (pour "Software as a service") : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logiciel_en_tant_que_service ► "C'est quoi une EdTech ?" www.mauricelargeron.com/decouverte-de-ce-que-sont-les-edtech ► Trello : www.trello.com ► "Comment devenir Growth Hacker en 3 mois avec Koudetat Growth Hacking" (Youtube) : www.youtube.com/watch?v=KB2cfFok6pk ► Retrospective agile : www.agiliste.fr/art-de-la-retrospective ► BizDev ou Business Development : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_development ► "Comprendre le Growth Hacking en 5 minutes" : www.lafabriquedunet.fr/blog/comprendre-growth-hacking-5-minutes ► Slack : www.slack.com ► Numa, réseau mondial de l'innovation né à Paris : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/NUMA_(soci%C3%A9t%C3%A9) et ► Jam (chatbot) | Jamais deux fois la même journée : https://www.hellojam.fr ► Adéquation Produit-Marché (Product-Market Fit) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product/market_fit ► "La gestion de projet : méthodes classiques vs méthodes agiles" : www.access-dev.com/access-dev/la-gestion-de-projet-methodes-classiques-vs-methodes-agiles ► Ethereum, protocole d'échanges décentralisés : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethereum ► Deux.io, Agence de Growth Hacking / Marketing à Paris : https://deux.io ► Brice Maurin, ondateur & Expert Growth (Deux.io) : https://www.linkedin.com/in/bricemaurin ► Communauté Slack "Growth Hacking France" : http://slack.growthhackingfrance.com ► Steve Blank, père du Customer Devlopment : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Blank ► MVP ou "Mimimum Viable Product" : Minimum viable product - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_product ► Jean-Charles Kurdali, CEO de Fetch : https://fr.linkedin.com/in/jean-charles-kurdali-b7358a98 ► Fetch, livraison de vos restaurants favoris : https://fetch-livraison.com ► "Comprendre Scrum en moins de 10 minutes": www.thierry-pigot.fr/scrum-en-moins-de-10-minutes ► "Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results" de Christina Wodtke : https://www.amazon.fr/Radical-Focus-Achieving-Important-Objectives/dp/0996006028/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8 ► "Who: The A Method for Hiring" de Geoff Smart : https://www.amazon.fr/Who-Method-Hiring-Geoff-Smart-ebook/dp/B001EL6RWY ► "La semaine de 4 heures : Travaillez moins, gagnez plus et vivez mieux !" de Timothy Ferriss ► Timothy Ferriss, écrivain et entrepreneur américain : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Ferriss ► Andrew Chen, VP Growth chez Uber : www.andrewchen.co ► Guy Kawasaki, un des premiers responsables marketing chez Apple en 1984 : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Kawasaki ► Richard Branson, le patron de Virgin Group : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Branson ► Elon Musk, patron de Tesla + SpaceX + Solar City : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk ► La citation de David : "Data levers all arguments" (= les données manipulent tous les arguments) Vous pouvez découvrir et suivre David sur : ► Medium : www.medium.com/@DavidLakomski ► Twitter : www.twitter.com/davidlakomskii ► Facebook : www.facebook.com/davidlakomskii ► LinkedIn : www.linkedin.com/in/david-lakomski-11a50554 Vous pouvez découvrir et suivre la Poudrière sur : ► notre site web : www.poudriere.org ► notre page Facebook : www.facebook.com/poudriere.coworking ► notre compte Twitter : www.twitter.com/CoworkingNancy

On this week's episode, Kate escapes from her cage, so Christina Wodtke valiantly takes her place to talk about how designers can talk to people who aren't designers. That's right. Two designers talking to each other about how they might hypothetically talk to other people.  Drink Pairing: Gin! 

Episode 11 highlights: - Why understanding a business model is critical for designers
 - Using design to do more than make a great interface or a sexy advertisement
 - Humanizing business and letting design/design thinking drive how business gets done
 - What OKRs are, where they’re used and how to do them
 - How Christina has used OKRs for both business and her own life
 - Embracing business metrics as designers
 - How you can be more innovative than Steve Jobs 
- Tools and techniques for looking at your customer feedback and research insights to get beyond your assumptions

In this episode of Success Factors, I speak with 5 successful women – Laura Klein, Kate Rutter, Donna Lichaw, Christina Wodtke & Indi Young to understand what makes them successful as product makers. I ask them one question – “What makes you successful / different as a product maker?”. What will you learn about these successful […]The post DYT 097 : Successful Women in Product & Design | Medley appeared first on .

In this Focus Forty episode, I speak with Christina Wodtke, product designer, design thinker, teacher and author about the product mindset and the future of product management and design. Who is Christina Wodtke? Christina has helped grow companies like LinkedIn, Yahoo, Zynga, the New York Times and numerous startups throughout Silicon Valley. She's the author of […]The post DYT 073 : Evangelism, Politics & Art of Product Management | Christina Wodtke appeared first on .

In this Focus Forty episode, I speak with Christina Wodtke, product designer, design thinker, teacher and author about her secrets to success, productivity and creativity. She speaks of productivity hacks, coaching and more. Who is Christina Wodtke? Christina has helped grow companies like LinkedIn, Yahoo, Zynga, the New York Times and numerous startups throughout Silicon […]The post DYT 072 : Productivity Hacks from a Curious Human | Christina Wodtke appeared first on .

In this interview with Christina Wodtke, we talk about the meaning of sketchnoting, drawing, and how they relate to language, interpretation and improvisation. Christina also shares her thoughts on the importance of creating lots of bad drawings to get to good ideas, her tools and 3 tips for sketchnoters. Listen in! SPONSORED BY The Sketchnote Army Clothing Collection! A variety of t-shirts and sweatshirts available for sale at Teespring that support Sketchnote Army and look fashionable at the same time! http://sketchnotearmy.com/t-shirts SHOW NOTES Christina on Twitter - https://twitter.com/cwodtke Christina's Website - http://eleganthack.com Christina on Medium - https://medium.com/@cwodtke California College of the Arts - https://www.cca.edu/academics/faculty/cwodtke Stanford Continuous Education Department - http://continuingstudies.stanford.edu Radical Focus - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0996006028/therohdesignwebs Dan Roam - https://twitter.com/dan_roam Kate Rutter - https://twitter.com/katerutter Alex Osterwalder - https://twitter.com/AlexOsterwalder Ed Emberly - http://edemberleydrawingpages.blogspot.com Mayan Script - http://www.omniglot.com/writing/mayan.htm Pareidolia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia Alphabets and Ideographs - https://medium.com/@cwodtke/alphabets-and-ideographs-486d59d1dc01#.v4vg2rq2b In defense of the visual alphabet - https://medium.com/the-xplane-collection/in-defense-of-the-visual-alphabet-a8dcca7cf151#.uqvwpw53p The Choreography of Sketching - https://medium.com/@evalottchen/the-choreography-of-sketching-b21f8ba644e#.d114j86so Paper by 53 - Autodesk SketchBook - http://www.autodesk.com/products/sketchbook-pro/overview Muji Notebooks - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00I6Y0MH8/therohdesignwebs Micron Pigment Liners - https://www.amazon.com/Sakura-Archival-pigment-line-width-technical/dp/B01N0UC0VM/therohdesignwebs Tombow Gray Dual Brush Markers - https://www.amazon.com/Tombow-Brush-Markers-Grayscale-6-Pack/dp/B0044JOPZY/therohdesignwebs Linea for iPad - http://linea-app.com iA Writer - https://ia.net/writer/ Procreate - http://procreate.si Brushes Redux - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/brushes-redux/id932089074?mt=8 Microsoft Surface Pro - http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface CHRISTINA'S 3 TIPS Make as many bad drawings as you can, They do the job. Quantity! Sketchnote books and chapters. Write what you want to keep for yourself. Copy everything you like, because it's wonderful!

Christina talks about teaching, sketching, OKRs, and the beauty of a good fail. And she explains why most people are wrong about planning.

Today, we speak with Storium advisory board member Christina Wodtke. “The Shape of the Story”: http://eleganthack.com/the-shape-of-story/ Show Notes 00:32 Intro 00:52 Who is Christina Wodtke 108:20 Outro   Links: Storium Links: Survivor Season 2: https://storium.com/game/survivor-storium-season-2/chapter-1/scene-1 Primogenita: https://storium.com/game/scion–2/chapter-1/scene-1 Games for Beginners: https://storium.com/games/for_beginners The Wizard is Missing: https://storium.com/game/the-wizard-is-missing/chapter-1/scene-1 Non-Storium Links: Game Developer’s Conference (GDC): http://www.gdconf.com/ Humble Bundle: […] The post Episode 27! Talking Story With Christina Wodtke appeared first on Storium Arc.

Christina Wortke on her book Radical Focus and OKRs

Christina Wodtke is a designer, educator and author who’s worked for a string of iconic Internet companies - Yahoo, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Zynga. Now she teaches design thinking, story structure and how to use OKRs (Objectives & Key Results) - with her own unique twist. Christina has a gift for bringing ideas from different disciplines into design & management. Listen in and learn about Christina’s boundary-crossing model of design thinking as distributed cognition. It blew my mind - I know you’ll enjoy it to.

You might know of Christina Wodtke from her best-selling book, Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web. She’s spoken on the topic of the human experience in information spaces at conferences worldwide, currently consults and teaches at Stanford and California College of the Arts. She is the guest on this UX-radio podcasts about Information Architecture, User Experience and Design. Listen to inspiring conversations with industry experts. The purpose of this show is to educate, inspire and provide valuable information architecture and user experience resources

Episode 11! In this episode we discus a new Storium crew-member Christina Wodtke. We also have our first part in a series on Narration and talk about different literary genres. Show Notes 00:00 intro 00:43 news 07:37 Genres 32:53 Narration geek out 50:15 Sign off Links FreeXenon Hosts (storium links) Justin – @Twisted_Gnome Aaron – @MacStainless […] The post Episode 11 What Genre is this? appeared first on Storium Arc.

Finding product/market fit is the key to success for new ventures. But it’s often elusive, and understanding the needs and desires of your potential customers is harder than many of us expect. Christina Wodtke, of Wodtke Consulting, shares design techniques to help you glean meaningful insights about your target market.

Today on Build, host Maggie Crowley sits down with Christina Wodtke, author of the legendary book Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results, which Maggie describes as the best book on goal setting – ever. In the episode, Maggie and Christina, dive deep into Christina’s experience in product roles at MySpace, Zynga and Linkedin, her transition out of industry and into academia as a lecturer at Standford, and of course using Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) as a framework for achieving your team and company-wide goals. So if you’re looking to start 2019 off on the right foot, this episode is for you. Before you go leave a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review and share the pod with your friends! Be sure to check out more insights on the Drift blog at drift.com/blog and find us on Twitter @maggiecrowley, @drift, @seekingwisdomio and @cwodtke.