Building Productive Teams

New Project? New Team? Here's How to Hit the Ground Running Starting something new, whether it's a project or a role, can be both exciting and terrifying. As I’m gearing up to take on a new program to expand my current scope, It’s got me thinking about all the lessons I’ve learned about navigating those first few critical steps. Whether you're joining a new company, taking on a new role, or simply starting a new project with a new team, these tips can help you make a strong start: ✨ Embrace the "Beginner's Mind" ✨ Don't be afraid to ask questions, even those that seem "basic." It shows you're engaged and eager to learn. Take notes and do your research offline to deepen your understanding. ✨ Find the Sweet Spot of Knowledge ✨ Read the existing documentation and materials, but don't get stuck on every detail. Focus on understanding the big picture and the key challenges. ✨ Acknowledge Expertise (Yours and Theirs) ✨ Recognize the team's expertise in their respective areas, but also confidently own your own expertise. After all, there's a reason you're leading this project! ✨ Define the "Why" and the Boundaries ✨ Work with the team to create a clear charter that defines the problem you're solving, the project's scope, and, equally importantly, what's NOT in scope. This sets expectations and prevents scope creep. ✨ Build Relationships Early On ✨ Take the time to get to know your team members as individuals. Understand their strengths, their working styles, and their motivations. Strong relationships are the foundation of successful projects. ✨ Don't Be Afraid to Challenge (Respectfully) ✨ You're bringing a fresh perspective. Don't hesitate to challenge assumptions and suggest new approaches. But always do so respectfully and collaboratively. ✨ Overcommunicate (Especially at the Start) ✨ Keep everyone informed about your progress, challenges, and decisions. Transparency builds trust and ensures alignment. Starting a new project is like embarking on an adventure. There will be challenges, surprises, and hopefully, great rewards. By embracing a proactive mindset, building strong relationships, and focusing on clear communication, you can set yourself up for success. I'm eager to put these tips into practice on this new program, and I promise to keep you updated on my progress and lessons learned. Do you have any other advice for me as I ramp up? Anything specific you'd like to know more about? Share your thoughts in the comments! 👇 – 👉 Follow me, Rony Rozen, for real-world insights on tech leadership.

My team are disengaged. What should I do? A disengaged team isn’t always obvious. People don’t generally rage quit (even if they imagine it multiple times). It’s more of a slow burn. Over time, they start to care less. It looks less like frustration and more like indifference. Before we can solve it, we need to understand how it starts and diagnose the core concern. Disengaged team members usually lack one of three things: 1) Belonging: when people don’t feel seen, heard or valued, they slowly withdraw. 2) Purpose: when the why behind the work is unclear, energy and motivation drop. 3) Growth: when there’s no opportunity to learn, develop and step up, people lose interest. If you’re seeing signs of disengagement, don’t jump straight to solutions. Diagnose the cause first. Here are some good questions to help: Ask your team: Belonging: - What would need to be true for you to feel like you belong here? - What little things stop you from feeling like you belong? - What could we do to make team members feel more connected? - What are we doing that undermines trust? How could we fix it? Purpose: - From your perspective, why do we exist? What’s our mission? - How could we make our purpose more clear? - What parts of your work feel disconnected from our mission? - What about your work lights you up? Growth: - How effectively do we develop and grow our people? - What would need to be true for you to say you have great growth opportunities here? - What does growth and progression look like to you personally? - What are your biggest growth goals this year? - What support do you feel you need to get there? Don't wait for the annual engagement survey to work out where your team stands. If you're vibing that something might be off, start by asking the questions. #culture #leadership #belonging

Most leaders get this wrong daily, and they don't even realize it. They're not asking enough questions. 8 years ago, when I took a career break. A conversation with a mentor and coach changed my trajectory. I decided to get myself certified as a coach as part of my leadership development. When I went back to work, it changed the way I lead. My team then was used to being told what to do. My questions initially irritated them. It took me two months to shift their mindset. They began to take more ownership of their work. Great ideas came from them (not me). And I saw a more engaged team. Fast forward, I am now a leadership and team coach, working with organisations to help their leaders build better team engagement. Because I know what it takes. Here. I have put together 10 types of coaching questions leaders use to improve team engagement. Feel free to download it. 1️⃣ Open- Ended Questions ↳ Encourage expansive thinking and prevent "yes" or "no" answers Example: What are some approaches you think we could take to achieve this goal? 2️⃣ Clarifying Questions ↳Ensure understanding and encourage deeper exploration. Example: When you say the timeline is tight, what specific challenges are you anticipating? 3️⃣ Reflective Questions ↳Help the team member assess their own thoughts or actions. Example: How do you think your approach impacted the team's outcomes? 4️⃣ Empowering Questions Build confidence and ownership of decisions. Example: What resources or support would help you feel confident moving forward? 5️⃣ Goal Oriented Questions ↳Focus on objectives and desired outcomes. Example: What would success look like for you in this role? 6️⃣ Challenge Questions ↳Push boundaries and encourage innovative thinking. Example: What if we approached this problem from an entirely different angle? 7️⃣ Feedback Oriented Questions ↳Invite constructive input and foster two-way communication. Example: What’s one thing I could do differently to better support you and the team? 8️⃣ Future-Focused Questions ↳ Encourage forward-thinking and vision-setting. Example: Where do you see this project or our team a year from now? 9️⃣ Performance-Based Questions ↳Evaluate current work and identify areas for improvement or celebration. Example: What do you think went well in your last project, and what could have been improved? 🔟 Solutions-Focused Questions ↳Guide team members toward actionable steps and creative solution Example: What options do you see for addressing this challenge? ♻️ Share this if you found this useful. Follow Adeline Tiah 謝善嫻 for content on leadership, future of work and Life 2.0.

Ever feel like your team is stuck in an endless loop of manual data entry? (Automation Tip Tuesday 👇) That’s exactly where one of our clients — an education consulting firm — found themselves. They were juggling a whole tech stack of tools that didn’t “talk”  to each other, creating inefficiencies and double work. We started with a look into their sales workflow. 🔹 Sales data lived in HubSpot, but once a deal closed, someone had to manually update Asana to track project progress. 🔹 Internal teams worked from one Asana board, but clients needed visibility into their own project timelines — cue more manual updates. 🔹 With so much repetitive data entry, valuable time was being wasted on low-impact admin work. Here’s what we did: 🔗 HubSpot → Asana automation: We created an integration that auto-generates project tasks in Asana when a deal reaches a certain stage in HubSpot. No more copy-pasting! 📢 Internal and client boards sync: Internal progress updates in Asana now automatically reflect on client-facing Asana projects, reducing the back-and-forth. Less busywork, more productivity. By eliminating duplicate data entry, the team saved 10+ hours per week — time now spent on strategy and client success. When your tools work together, your team can focus on what really matters. Where is your team losing time? Drop a comment below! ⬇️ -- Hi, I’m Nathan Weill, a business process automation expert. ⚡️ These tips I share every Tuesday are drawn from real-world projects we've worked on with our clients at Flow Digital. We help businesses unlock the power of automation with customized solutions so they can run better, faster and smarter — and we can help you too! #automationtiptuesday  #automation #workflow #efficiency

Many teams tell me they’re overwhelmed. For some, it’s true: there’s simply too much to do. But for many others, the overwhelm is not the result of volume. It’s driven by the fact that too much of their brainpower is going to the wrong things. In the 1980s, Peter Kraljic created a simple 2×2 to help companies decide which suppliers were truly strategic and which just needed efficient management. It gave leaders a clearer way to focus. Inspired by that thinking, I built a version for teams. It has two dimensions: (1) Value Creation. Does this meaningfully move results? (2) Cognitive Load. How much mental energy does this consume? Those questions, of course, are not perfectly precise. But, I've found, they’re clear enough to start a different conversation. When teams plot their actual work on this matrix, here’s what shows up: - The standing meetings - The Slack threads - The AI pilots - The reporting deck - The “quick” requests - The big strategic initiative And four patterns emerge. A. Impact Multipliers: The automation that saves five hours a week. The clear decision rule that eliminates three meetings. The AI tool that drafts the first version in seconds. These create disproportionate return. Scale them. B. Strategic Bets: The new direction. The capability shift. Embedding AI into real workflows. Hard and worthy. Protect these from distraction. C. Energy Drains: The meeting no one owns but everyone attends. The manual process everyone complains about. The project that lingers because stopping feels harder than continuing. This is where burnout happens. D. Hygiene Work: Admin. Formatting. Status updates. If AI can take it, let it. In my experience, this framework helps because teams rarely choose their cognitive load: It accumulates. One request, one meeting, one workaround at a time. When you map the work visually, you see how much energy is leaking, and how little is going to multipliers. You clearly see that “busy” and “valuable” are not the same thing. High-performing teams are busy, yes. But they are ruthless about where their brains go. And they spell out clear and shared ways of working to ensure that happens. #teams #collaboration #focus #effectiveness #leadership #learning

Want to supercharge your employee engagement strategy? Start by asking the right questions. As leaders, we often focus on metrics and results, but the true pulse of our organizations lies in the voices of our employees. Here are five powerful questions to ignite conversations that foster connection and drive meaningful engagement: ✅ What inspires you in your work? Understanding what motivates your team members can help align their passions with organizational goals, creating a sense of purpose that drives performance. ✅ How do you prefer to collaborate? Everyone has different communication styles and preferences. By discovering how your team likes to work together, you can create a more inclusive and effective environment. ✅ What obstacles do you face in your role? Encouraging openness about challenges shows your employees that you value their experiences. Identifying these barriers can lead to solutions that enhance productivity and morale. ✅ What skills would you like to develop? Investing in your team’s growth not only benefits them but also strengthens your organization. When employees feel supported in their professional development, their engagement skyrockets. ✅ How can we celebrate your achievements? Recognition is key to engagement. Understanding how your employees want to be acknowledged can help foster a culture of appreciation that motivates and retains top talent. At CraftCulture, we believe that asking these questions is just the beginning. It’s about actively listening and taking action based on the feedback you receive. When employees feel heard and valued, they become more invested in their work and the organization as a whole. Let’s not just check the box on engagement—let’s create a culture where everyone feels empowered to contribute and thrive. If you’re ready to elevate your employee engagement strategy, let’s chat! Together, we can craft experiences that truly resonate with your team.

𝐀𝐬 𝐚 𝐂𝐎𝐎, my day is a mix of 𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐟𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐳𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐞𝐱𝐞𝐜𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠—all while making sure 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐦 𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐨𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐜𝐥𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐲. Early on, I realized that trying to do everything leads to doing nothing well and a messy outcome. So, I built a simple system to prioritize my time: 𝐓𝐡𝐞 3-𝐁𝐨𝐱 𝐅𝐫𝐚𝐦𝐞𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤: 𝐁𝐨𝐱 1: 𝐔𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐭 & 𝐂𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 (𝑫𝒐 𝒊𝒕 𝑵𝑶𝑾) These are 𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐡-𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐭, 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞-𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 tasks—things that affect revenue, operations, or people immediately. ✅ A client crisis ✅ A major hiring decision ✅ A process breakdown 𝐁𝐨𝐱 2: 𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐭𝐡 & 𝐋𝐨𝐧𝐠-𝐓𝐞𝐫𝐦 𝐈𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐭 (𝑷𝒍𝒂𝒏 & 𝑬𝒙𝒆𝒄𝒖𝒕𝒆) These are 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐠𝐚𝐦𝐞-𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐬—the projects that don’t scream for attention but define long-term success. ✅ Scaling a system ✅ Building leadership depth ✅ Strengthening brand & culture 𝐁𝐨𝐱 3: 𝐍𝐨𝐢𝐬𝐞 & 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 (𝑬𝒍𝒊𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒐𝒓 𝑫𝒆𝒍𝒆𝒈𝒂𝒕𝒆) These are things that seem urgent but 𝐝𝐨𝐧’𝐭 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐥𝐞. ✅ Endless status update meetings ✅ Random low-priority emails ✅ Tasks others can (and should) own 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐞𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐭? 𝐌𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐨𝐨 𝐦𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐁𝐨𝐱 1 & 3, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐢𝐧 𝐁𝐨𝐱 2. 👉 But real impact comes when you shift your focus to Box 2—the work that builds sustainable success. 𝑰 𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒏𝒅 20% 𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒆 𝒊𝒏 𝑩𝒐𝒙 1 𝒂𝒏𝒅 3, 𝒂𝒏𝒅 60% 𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒆 𝒈𝒐𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝑩𝒐𝒙 2. Every morning, I ask myself: 𝘞𝘩𝘪𝘤𝘩 𝘣𝘰𝘹 𝘢𝘮 𝘐 𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘮𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘺 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘪𝘯? And that question alone changes how I work and what's the outcome of my time spent. #Leadership #COO #Execution #StartupGrowth

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘇𝗲 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗸𝗳𝗹𝗼𝘄 𝗪𝗶𝘁𝗵𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗪𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗥𝗲𝘀𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗲𝘀 I often hear leaders say, "We need to optimize our workflow with digital tools." But here's what usually happens: They buy a fancy new tool. Spend weeks setting it up. Train the team. And then... Nothing changes. Why? Because they didn't solve the real problem. Here's how to actually optimize your workflow: 1. Map out your current process What steps do you take? Where are the bottlenecks? What takes the most time? 2. Identify the root causes Is it a people problem? A process problem? Or a technology problem? 3. Set clear goals What does "optimized" look like? How will you measure success? 4. Choose the right tool Look for one that solves your specific problems Not just the one with the coolest features 5. Implement in phases Start small Get quick wins Build momentum 6. Measure and adjust Track your progress Be ready to change course if needed I've seen teams cut their workflow time in half using this approach. Without spending a fortune on new tech. The key? Focus on the problem, not the solution. What's holding your team back from peak efficiency?

After years of managing rocky relationships between product and engineering leaders, these are the top 5 things I've learned you can do to make these partnerships great: 1. Foster Strategic Action: Maintain a well-thought-out backlog of problems that acknowledges potential risks and strategies for overcoming them. This approach keeps engineers engaged, solving real customer issues, and builds trust across teams. 2. Simplify Processes: Introduce only necessary processes and keep them straightforward. Maintain a regular schedule of essential meetings and minimize ad-hoc interruptions to give engineers more time to focus. 3. Collaborate on Solutions: Instead of dictating solutions, work closely with engineers to understand problems and explore solutions together. This partnership leverages their technical expertise and aligns efforts with customer needs, enhancing innovation and ownership. 4. Respect Technical Debt: Recognize and prioritize technical debt within the product roadmap. Trust engineers to identify critical technical issues that need addressing to keep the product competitive and maintain high-quality standards. 5. Build Relationships: Spend time with your engineering team outside of regular work tasks through meals, activities, or shared hobbies. Building personal connections fosters trust and improves collaboration, making it easier to tackle challenges together effectively. I’ve seen amazing product and engineering partnerships and some not-so-great ones. Teams that take the time to improve their relationship really see the benefits. While natural tensions exist, the best teams put in the effort to work well together, resulting in more successful products. #techleads #product #engineering

Building High-Performance Remote Engineering Teams is not just about video calls.... I’ve worked with teams across the UK, Europe, and the US, and one thing is clear: remote work isn’t inherently slower. But a lot of engineering teams fail because they try to run distributed teams like co-located ones. Here’s what really makes a remote engineering team high-performing: 1️⃣ Communication by Design, Not by Chance Async-first: Chat isn’t enough. Document decisions, architectural diagrams, and API contracts in a place everyone can access. Structured updates: Daily standups are optional; status tracking through PR reviews, automated CI pipelines, and project boards is mandatory. 2️⃣ Ownership & Clear Boundaries Each engineer owns services, APIs, or modules end-to-end. Service contracts are explicit. Teams don’t block each other because ownership is clear and dependencies are well-documented. 3️⃣ CI/CD Is Non-Negotiable Remote teams must trust that pushing code won’t break production. Automated testing, linting, and deployment pipelines reduce friction and async bottlenecks. Feature flags and incremental rollouts are your best friend. 4️⃣ Knowledge Visibility Remote teams fail when knowledge lives in heads. Maintain internal wikis, architecture maps, and runbooks. Code reviews aren’t just for QA—they’re the primary async learning tool. 5️⃣ Metrics That Actually Matter Velocity in story points? Fine. But measure deploy frequency, mean time to recovery, bug escape rate, and codebase health metrics. These metrics highlight systemic issues instead of punishing individuals. 6️⃣ Tech Stack Choices Matter Prefer tools that support async collaboration: GitOps, Slack with integrated threads, Jira/Trello boards, distributed logging, observability dashboards. Avoid systems that require constant synchronous attention or centralised knowledge bottlenecks. 7️⃣ Culture Is Explicit, Not Implicit High-performing remote teams share principles in writing: “We merge only green builds,” “We document before we ship,” “We pair when ownership overlaps.” Bottom line: Remote engineering success is built on process, ownership, tooling, and visibility, not on heroic effort or long hours. If your team is still treating async work like a co-located office, you’re leaving productivity and sanity on the table.