Build high-performing teams

(Photo credit @samalex)

1. As you progress in your career, try to work on and/or to build teams that are full of people who are at the top of their game individually AND who think and operate like a team.

• The Important of Working with "A" Players

• A Study of Thousands of Dropbox Projects Reveals How Successful Teams Collaborate

• Creating a High-Trust, High-Performance Culture + check out ReWork by Google for guides

2. If you're not on one of those teams right now, it's ok! Most of us go through cycles of being on high performing teams and on 'normal teams.' To help your 'normal' team thrive & grow, consider two ways that you can help your team have more impact:

• Run more effective meetings (thereby saving time and demonstrating efficient decision-making/organization)

• Consider implementing OKRs & using these stretch goals to push the team

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Do you speak data?

(Photo credit @kmuza)

Do you speak data?

As you consider or advance a career in tech, you need to sharpen your data literacy and analytics skills.

• Understand your fluency level with data manipulation.

• Figure out if you are a data translator as they help bridge the gap between data scientists and executive decision-makers.

• Check out these 6 rules from Google for great data design.

• Mastering these skills is critical before progressing to the next level Data/AI skills required for ‘Jobs of Tomorrow,’ according to the World Economic Forum.

Does your team speak data?

You should evaluate the digital dexterity and the data literacy skills of the team/business unit/company that you are joining.

• Don’t assume that your team is data literate simply because it’s a tech firm. You’d be surprised how often everyone needs to build and refresh those skills, mainly because data availability and the tools to manipulate it keep changing!

• Here are two great guides (one from HBR and another from Gartner) on how to boost your team’s data literacy skills. It’s crucial that you understand how tech-literate your team is to help you when launching new initiatives.

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Managing Remote Work Effectively

(Photo credit @dtopkin1)

I suggest becoming ‘fluent’ in how to effectively manage remote teams as well as how to manage your own work when working remotely. 

1. Ensure that you are keeping some type of structure to your days, especially when working remotely. 

• 4 ways to help you break up the monotony of the week (in fact, there is an Ivy League Step Challenge going on right now)

2. Managing asynchronously is a skill that will serve you well in any tech company!

• There are studies that show that remote workers are happier and stay at jobs longer.

• And 47% of US workers work remotely for at least some part of their job, while 3% of US workers are completely remote (up from 1% in 2000).

3. Create new daily rituals

• For those of you who normally work outside of the home, you have morning & evening rituals (whether you recognize them as such, or not). Those routines are what signal your mind & body that it's time to go to work, take a break, head home, etc. You *need* to replicate & modify those rituals when working at home.

• This article does a great job explaining this (look at Item #3). I also love their idea of 'workstation popcorn'!

4. Find an accountability buddy

• I made this suggestion to a student last week, and she told me today that it worked really well for her & a friend!

• The idea is simple: find a friend you trust. Book an hour on each other's calendars. Join the virtual platform of your choice at the start of the hour. Share with each other what you both want to accomplish in the hour. Leave the virtual session open to mimic sitting next to them in 'real-life' which will help you stay focused (as long as you don't chit-chat). At the end, review what you got done & celebrate your progress.

• Don't have a friend you trust? I suggest checking out FocusMate.com to sign-up for a time slot with a stranger (and maybe it'll help you find new friends too??).

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Want personalized career guidance? Take a look at my Career Strategy Session options.