Wes Kao: recommendation

Transcript context

…How do you suggest folks do it? I actually have a tip, but is there something you want to share in that? Yeah. I think one really big way of doing that is keeping your boss in the loop on the kinds of decisions that you're making and what you are working on. It feels almost blase like, well, duh, but actually I think we all know that we should do that, but the way that we execute, I think sometimes your boss doesn't feel like they're in the loop. And so proactively giving the right amount of context for your manager to be able to weigh in on what you're doing and to be able to give feedback, I think that's super, super important. And then thinking about the right level of context to give them, is this a reversible decision or is this one that is irreversible or difficult to reverse or expensive to reverse? Using your sense of judgment so that you're not necessarily going to your boss for everything and telling them everything. That's overwhelming for your manager who has a lot going on, it's really using your sense of judgment and good common sense to think about, okay, I want to recommend that we do this thing. How do I share enough context about my thought process and rationale so that my boss has enough information to be able to push back if needed or to be able to approve and know that I've gotten it taken care of? Awesome. So to build on that, something I did for a long time, that was really powerful, it's really simple is I sent my manager a state of Lenny email every week, just titled the state of Lenny. And it had basically three sections, my priorities currently, blockers that I need their help with, and maybe that was the first thing that I put up just to make sure that they saw that, and then just things on my mind currently that week. And that I think is such a simple, but such a powerful way to do exactly what you're talking about, keep people in the loop about what you're doing, make sure you're aligned on priorities, make sure things are getting unblocked, and also just avoid surprise as much as possible. And so there's a little tip.…

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