Observations about Polly S.

  Observation created 3 months ago
Featuring:Polly S.(2) Speak Up, Step UpCommunitySquad Orbiter

Starts with observing an issue by (conversing with her direct report)[https://careerplug.slack.com/archives/C037Z53KPHQ/p1713276253909209].

Then she identifies a potential solutions and steps up to execute the solution.

Then owned it, and lead the 5 dysfunctions of a team workshops.

Ensured it was not in the squads way (additive and unobtrusive)... and handled the scheduling to ensure it stayed that way.

Has had (great communication)[https://careerplug.slack.com/archives/C037Z53KPHQ/p1736174398474009?thread_ts=1735833915.695419&cid=C037Z53KPHQ] with the management team.

But more importantly than any of that... I've personally heard from multiple members of the team that they found it to be really valuable and the issues they were dealign with are beginning to melt away 💪🏾

Speak Up Step Up - Results - Improvement of Daily Work - Without anyone complaining about it?!?!?! Rare and wonderful!!

  Observation created over 2 years ago
Featuring:Polly S.(2) Speak Up, Step UpProject ManagementForward Progress Facilitator

Let me tell you a story about initiative, care, teamwork, and ultimately bringing clarity to a very confusing situation.

Context

  • The Onboard and Engage squads do not have a PO right now
  • Onboard is deep in shaping a titanic milestone for us... Project: Tax Form Completion so simple luddites can do it (improved name coming soon 😂)
  • Onboard is all but done with the ADP POH project 🙌🏾🎉❤️💪🏾
  • Engage is deep into shaping a titanic milestone for us... Project: Understand you Employee, BEFORE they leave you (improved name coming soon 😂)
  • Project: First step in moving plug to the right... Ascension of the new Team/Profile is launching, but in its testing party many opportunities for improvement were identified

Specific Struggle

The context came to a head in a Onboard sync meeting where is became clear that Paul would be mostly focused on shaping (organizing and executing on spikes... which is deserving of an OGO itself... stay tuned for that one), Kentucky Joe didn't have a ton next up, and new Onboarder Ryan wouldn't have something he could cut his teeth on initially. Especially give the season we are in where nearly all of Product is operating in a more stressed gear than any of us would like, this was a rare opportunity. Like some have disposable income, meaning income not directly allocated to other things, it is rare for Product to have disposable capacity. We want more of that, but we aren't in disposable capacity season... so what do we do?

  • Three different moments of coaching were going on simultaneously which led to even more confusion without a clearly defined Forward Facilitator
    • Canaan was giving good coaching to Paul, making sure he knew there were Classic::Onboarding bugs that we haven't touched because Classic::Onboarding is in "Maintenance Mode"... but if we have disposable capacity... why not?!
    • Clint was giving Polly good coaching, making sure she knew of a new, short-lived, objective coming up... Project: Ensure Alex has a great time (Alex being the shared ADP/CP clients). He has a list of 21 opportunities he believes will help and he has started shaping. Could this disposable capacity be used for that?!
    • AR3 was giving Teresa Berg coaching, making sure she remembered the context around Project: First step in moving plug to the right... Ascension of the new Team/Profile... that Onboard and Engage will both be equally working in the Team/Profile space, so if we used that disposable capacity to help orient Ryan and Kentucky Joe to this area, while also knocking out some of the scopes we had to cut and polishing up Team/Profile in response to the testing party?

Polly, noticed the collision of confusion and decided to SPEAK UP, STEP UP!! 💪🏾

What did she do?!

  1. She spoke up by calling out the confusion / lack of clarity happening
  2. She stepped up by essentially saying "I'm going to be here to assist Paul and Teresa as they take on some of the PO duties... and where I see an opportunity to directly take on a PO Assignment, I will"
  3. She worked with me, Ashley G, and Jaclyn to figure out how she can best help with the PO Assignments
  4. But the point of this OGO is the initiative she took in creating this Team/Profile Opportunity list

What do I love about this Opportunity list?!

  1. It is very well organized...
    • The Legend/Key of breaking things into Bugs, Value Enhancements, and Privacy/security concerns is very smart... at a glance you can see what type of work is available to us
  2. The categories of Ready to be worked, Needs Shaping, Bigger change might be best to hold off, and Do we want these things... immediately focuses everyone on the things that are most important in this "best use of disposable capacity" mini-season we find ourselves in. In the meeting where we covered this, we immediately focused on the Ready to be worked lane.
    • Side note: PO's are strongly encouraged to work out of ProductBoard. But the reason I'm so happy about the fact that Polly decided to work out of FigJam is this... she didn't wait. She saw a need, and used the best tools at her disposal. Much of the way she organized this FigJam is how we are organizing statuses/tags in the roadmaps of ProductBoard as well. We use different names, but they mean the same thing 🙌🏾

Here's the thing... I am fully confident that not only is the confusion likely gone... but crystal clarity has been achieved. This level of alignment is the ultimate goal of Forward Facilitators, and Polly has not received any coaching on the ways we want to do this Assignment... so the fact that she did it so well speaks volumes.