“A team where you feel safe bringing full self to work is a team where you’re more likely to be willing to bring your full self.”
Recently, we invited Lani Rosenthal, a Product Leader at Autodesk to share her perspectives with our community at PMDojo. Lani has experience both as an individual contributor, direct manager, matrix manager, and leader. Prior to joining Autodesk, she took a year away from work to travel around the world.
Her career path has wiggled its way through urban planning, the hospitality industry, account management, and running a support organization, and she has found value and inspiration with each turn. This is another reminder for anyone looking to transition into Product that you can find your place from many different backgrounds and experiences.
PS: EARLY APPLICATIONS ARE OPEN FOR OUR NEXT COHORT!
Join PMDojo Product Accelerator to learn, think and grow in Product in your first or next role. Gain real-world experience where you get to collaborate as a diverse team, solve a market problem and launch a real product with real users. Early applications are open for the Fall cohort so apply now!
Together, we dove into creating high-velocity teams with a healthy, sustainable culture and Individual Contributors who perform as leaders. This was an interactive workshop where our participants learned actionable ways to build trust, fun, and empowerment within their teams, through leadership. What we absolutely loved was how we discussed ways both individual contributors and leaders would take small steps right away towards this.
Some of our key takeaways:
Having a healthy work/life balance is important. We all need to see a person before an employee.
Living up to your leadership philosophy starts with trust, empathy, and compassion. Psychological safety is a key part of high-functioning teams.
It is important to spend time talking about preferences, working styles, and values, outside projects, and tasks as it reveals similarities & differences and opens an opportunity to create a shared vision.
Be proactive with helping Individual Contributors think about their growth. Some ways include asking about 2-year goals and helping set SMART goals not just for KPIs but also for personal growth.
In the same way, take ownership and be proactive to discuss your growth needs with your managers and how you can support your managers well.
Team success looks like ICs proactively anticipating & answering questions before managers even ask or constantly asking questions you haven’t even thought of as managers, suggesting new ideas, or better yet implementing them or facilitating team meetings. There’s a culture of honesty, vulnerability, and support.
The entire recording of the event can be found here on our youtube channel. be sure to subscribe to our channel: https://bit.ly/2ReVWkc
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PS: EARLY APPLICATIONS ARE OPEN FOR OUR NEXT COHORT!
Join PMDojo Product Accelerator to learn, think and grow in Product in your first or next role. Gain real-world experience where you get to collaborate as a diverse team, solve a market problem and launch a real product with real users. Early applications are open for the Fall cohort so apply now!
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