How To Set Performance Standards for Your Startup’s New Hires – Yahoo! News.
Category: engineer
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In June 2011 this year, when I was looking at my investment accounts, I noticed that it had fully recovered from the nearly 40% drop since March 2009.
I was in the middle of selling my house, moving into a new rental, planning for a wedding for next year and starting an investment in a restaurant. I asked myself how I would feel if the market dropped another 40 percent. Was I mentally ready?
The answer was that I was going to very stressed *and* I might be tight on cash flow.
I immediately liquidated all stock mutual funds out of my 401K, 529 plan,education plan for Cate, Cate’s custodial account and my investment account. I moved everything into the Vanguard Total Market Bond fund.
The reason I am writing is that I had put a note for myself in remeberthemilk.com to evaluate the decision 2 months later. And today is that date. This is how using a GTD system with tools like RTM is helpful.
In hind sight, I was very lucky to be out of the market when I am in need of feeling less stressed.
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Something I started doing last year is to ask for recommendations on my LinkedIn profile while I’m still working at the company. Instead of only doing so when I have already left the company.
LinkedIn’s value is the business contacts and also an online resume with real recommendations from people who are also on LinkedIn. To maximize the value
- I try to keep the job history quarterly up to date
- I ask for recommendations from people I work with and people who have left the company ( right now I think it about 10% conversation rate)
- I also write recommendations for people who leave the company without them asking
Of course this is not a common practice. In order to not scare my current co-workers that I might be leaving, I preface my email honestly. “I’m not looking to leave any time soon, but I want to keep my LinkedIn profile up to date. Please write a recommendation for me….etc”
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How many meetings have you been in, or email exchanges with a selected small number of people. What you discuss and decided doesn’t get surfaced to the right people? How do you know where to send the information to?
In general, how do you get the right information to the right people?
I’m trying something new, that is model after how w3c setup their email lists. They have a working group <email list> and a public-<email list>.
I’ve started a t####-public@yahoo-inc.com list internally at yahoo to try this out where I will forward emails decisions that is of value to others.
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I have been wanting to be a proficient iPhone programming for 1 year now. I have tried 3 times to start but have stopped for various reasons.
My most recent attempt has worked, and here is what I’ve changed
Focus, pay attention to only one thing at a time
I have created a separate account on my machine named ‘Tony Tam iPhone’ so that when I’m learning or doing my homework for the iTunes U CS 193 class (iPhone class), my context on the computer is all related to that task at hand. The Xcode project, my Evernote, email my email address is related to iPhone programming. Multitasking doesn’t work for humans
Daily Habbit
I work on this every day, even if it’s just 10 minutes a day. When I take the bus to work, I always watch the podcast or work on my homework. Have a daily commitment helps, and I respect myself more when I stick to my commitments
Do the homework, follow instructions
I take the class online as if I was there. I do all my homework assignments and even try for a few extra credit. I even try to finish the homework in the same timeframe like the real students do.
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That was my thought last year… however, I have changed my stance. The most successful way to get children and adults to change is to model the behavior yourself consistently.
If you want people to act a certain way you model it over and over again. Don’t ask them to change though, just act on it. For those who can change, they will slowly follow, for those who do not have the ability to change, they won’t.
You can only accept this, be happy if your behavior changes at least one person.
I have seen this multiple times being successful
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- Be prepare for meetings ahead of time. You will be in the minority and you will get more of what you want
- Have an agenda ahead of time and send it, you will likely get more time
- If you want to a decision to go your way, anticipate the arguments, the fear, convince the decider ahead of time, use the meeting to just communicate
- Be prepare to take on the risks that other don’t want to take
- Don’t walk into meetings without knowing what will be presented
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I have a reminder to myself to review whether I’m doing what my job description is defined as
Here is the job description and how I rate myself from 1 (needs work), 2 (meets), 3 (exceed)• Evaluates new technologies; builds prototypes if necessary
- 1 : I barely do any of these right now as I am in firefighting mode
• Writes documentation and provides training on technologies and solutions
- 2 : I am spending most of time doing this and encouraging others to do it
• May own shared code components
- 1 : I own no code and have not coded
Responsibilities as a Solutions Architect
• Maintains visibility into properties and platforms- 2 : I have given up a lot of the platform visibility to others, need to get better here
• Recommends solution architectures to properties and advises on best practices
- 2 : I have spent a lot of my time here as I am more customer facing right now
Responsibilities as a Technical Product Manager
• Defines engineering requirements for platform teams- 1 : have given up control here to other architects
• Performs strategic planning and analysis for her/his area of expertise across Media
- 2 : I have done this, but need to get better
• May act as primary Media point of contact for platform teams; or, works closely with Product Manager in that role
- 1 : have spread the responsibilities here, may need to do more planning ahead
Responsibilities as an Evangelist
• Ensures that Media property engineers are aware of recommended/mandated solutions- 2 : I have done a good job here
• Ensures that platform teams are aware of Media requirements and mandates
- 1 : not enough forward planning again
• Advocates best practices and solutions inside and outside Yahoo!
- 2 : I have done so pretty well, need even better documentation and communication
See Also: Solution Architect: 2nd week iteration on my job at Yahoo!
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I have been mentoring several engineers and a common theme has emerged.
We often don’t spend enough time actively managing our own career.
These are the positive steps you should ask yourself.
1) The things I am working on right now, are they important and will they help further my career?
2) If they are not, perhaps I should stop doing them or hand them off to a junior person who wants that responsibility
3) Who in the organization would give me an honest opinion besides my manager?
4) What do I want to be in 3 years and is what I am doing getting me there?Another good exercise is to write your year end review in the beginning of the year and you will notice what is glaring obvious.
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I will not try to repeat what a software architect is, you can read it here at wikipedia
There are various types of architects.
- Solutions Architect
- Enterprise Architect
- Application Architect
- Systems Architect
A large part of the duties of an architect in a large organization is to design and to communicate. In my experience as an application architect and in my observation of other architects, I believe the following are the soft skills that are needed in being a successful architect in a large organization.
Run Effective Meetings
It’s rare to see a meeting that is small in size when an architect is in the room. This is actually a good thing. This means the architect has a forum of people who are there to listen. Make sure you prepare ahead, arrive early, get the logistics all setup. Prepare the agenda ahead of time, prepare the material ahead of time and make sure to set the context for everyone in the room. If there are people in the room who need extra time to catch up, you can either prep them ahead of time or it’s worth the extra time in the meeting to make sure they are caught up. Try not to cram a lot of information, but focus on the most important decisions or information. It’s better that people walk away in agreement on one thing rather than being confused with 5 things.
Understand How Decisions Are Made
Often times, there are more than 1 way to solve the problem. There are usually tradeoffs in picking any one solution. Make sure to communicate these tradeoffs and also avoid jumping into the solution you prefer. Layout the tradeoffs, allow others to weight in, clearly communicate who the ultimate decider is. When the decision is going to be made, expect there will be people who will not agree, that is OK. But make sure to talk with the people who disagree that you understand and ask for their help to implement the decision if they want to prove you are wrong.
Listen, Stop Talking
This is one of the hardest thing to do. In a meeting, as an architect, after you get your 15-20 minute, shut up and listen. Let others talk and you make sure to listen. Capture what people say, listen and understand why they are saying it. Think about the outcome of the meeting, would it be better served for you to talk or let others talk. Most of time, I try to let others talk and ask questions. When there is silence, this is the perfect time to go around the room and ask for a vote or an explicit consent. Leave 10 minutes at the end and focus back on getting the outcome I hope to achieve.
Recently I’ve taken up a role, which I have written about My New Role At Yahoo! : Solution Architect