First 90 days at a job
- Ask Kelvin
Forma wishlist * RRSP matching, a bigger expense budget * Work from home stipend
Architecture¶
An exec who wants to save money (they get a huge bonus at the cost of the company)
They have arbitrary rules
- Eg: sales shouldn’t be more than 10% of the first year’s return
- I refuse to pay my sales people more than $XXX a year
- They believe in high base, low compensation
- Drive desired sales behaviour
- Focus on the specific customers
- Focus on generating revenue, not saving money
- Understandable and transparent
- Easily tracked by everyone involved
- How to make it straightforward
- Attract/retain high performers
Manager Questions¶
- How do I make you look good for your boss? (John Mourra)
- How are you evaluated?
- How can I help make your job easier?
- How do you prefer to communicate?
- Weekly progress updates on Friday mornings
- TLDR (bottom line)
- Do you prefer having all the details
- What do you like most about working here?
- What are the team’s biggest priorities going forward?
- Top Priority project I’ll be working on
- What other projects are important?
- Deadlines/meetings/projects I should be aware of?
- Second quarter is ending soon
- Typical Day?
- Focus for the 1st week?
- How is success measured?
- 5 things
- Needs improvement
- Satisfactory
- Exceeds
- Project/team level
- Individual level
- 5 things
- Top concerns
- Easy to use integrations with transactional context
- Routines I should know about how the team works together?
- Best ways to learn more about the Business Automation
Challenging situations that I should be aware of
- Who is the internal expert on ___Topic X?
- Advice for me as someone new to IBM?
- Key relationships for getting things done in this role?
- QA, DevOps
- If I suggest a change
- Eg: using prettier for automatic code formatting
- Are there processes for showing business value
- quantitatively
- Eg: saved developer time
- Faster
- Anything about the overall culture?
- Was there someone who was in my role who did things well?
- Is there anything I should know about my predecessor and how they approached things?
Rapport
- Can you share more about your background?
- What did you enjoy most about working on ______
- What do you like most about working at IBM
- What do you like to do outside work?
- Favourite coffee places?
Process/approaches that work really well on this team?
Teammate Questions
- What projects are you working on right now?
- What’s the culture like here?
- What’s the coolest thing you’ve worked on?
- What’s the biggest priority in your role?
- What're the most important things to know about how things get done around here?
- Tips for me to get up to speed quickly?
- Any tips on how my manager likes to work?
- Expectations
- What’s your role like?
- How will we be working together?
- How do you prefer to communicate?
- DM/slack or a tap on the shoulder
- Key priorities for my team/role?
HR Questions¶
- Working From Home (a bit later)
- Getting here earlier and leaving earlier on Thursdays
Relationship Mapping
- People critical to your success
- Decision makers
- Gatekeepers
- Internal experts
Culture
Group Dynamics
Key Business Priorities
History of what works
Ins & outs of how things get done
Best Conference rooms, how to book them
Notes on people
info & subtext & attitude conveyed
What they do, how your roles interact, what you can learn from them, how they operate?
Boss: big picture? (few details)
one key detail for each person
- Quirk to remember their names
- Eg: Julia => earings => jewel ia
end of day: write questions
Job Description details
Deep dive into company products
Glassdoor review
Project plans
Team Bios
user guides for proprietary software
Who should I introduce myself to right away?
Personal SWOT
Weaknesses: specific to new role
Threats: budget cuts, reorganization,
Relationship Mapping
Stakeholders: a/one who will affect/be affected by me
What will you miss most about your last position?
What will you have to learn to do better for the new role?
What brought you to IBM?
- Learning
What else have you worked on
Spare time
Day 1
- Achievable goals for Day 1
- Identified specific people I need to meet with