This is a living document and will be updated frequently as things change.
Welcome to Parallel Capital!
This document is to help you better understand me and how I operate and also to help me articulate my workflow and values. This also helps you to keep me accountable!
Of course, this does not replace 1-on-1s or in-person interaction, it’s merely an attempt at a jumpstart to our working relationship.
This document applies only to me, not anyone else at Parallel Capital.
I’m the technical cofounder and responsible for Engineering at Parallel Capital. That means I manage the Data and Trading Infrastructure.
But what that really means is that my job is to attract and retain world class talent by deeply taking care of who we have. (That’s you!)
This means that whenever I do something that decreases the changes of retaining you, please let me know as soon as possible!
My other role is to provide clear context around what you’re working on, why it’s important to the business, and how it fits in with the bigger company strategy so you can make the best decisions possible for the product and the company.
“Every person in your company is a vector. Your progress is determined by the sum of all vectors.” — Elon Musk
You work for Parallel Capital, not me nor your direct manager. Optimize for Parallel Capital. I am here to serve you and make sure you have what you need to succeed.
I will make mistakes, and I want to improve just like you. Hold me accountable, don’t be afraid to say something when you think I’m not heading down the right track.
My primary objective is to foster a work environment where you feel happy and fulfilled.
My secondary objective is to be able to disappear for a month and not have that absence impact the company.
This implies that:
- You are empowered to determine what you need to do, how to do it, and then actually go and get it done.
- You have enough context to understand your priority for the next month.
- You have strong relationships with others in the company to give and get the information and resources you need.
What do I value?
Communication: When working in a cross functional team environment, good communication is absolutely required for success. Each team member has individual specialities that others do not, and the only way to expose all of that expertise and combine it into a well functioning product is by solid, clear communication. I strongly prefer erring on the side of over-communication to ensure that everyone is on the same page.
PNL Oriented Solutions: Please don’t get stuck in the weeds on individual tasks, take the time to understand how what you’re working on fits into the bigger picture and drives towards increasing PNL, and provide suggestions on how what you’re working on can be accomplished with less resources, faster, and deliver more value to the business.
Metrics/Visibility: "What gets measured, gets improved." This goes for engineering systems (via logs, dashboards, etc.) as well as individual contributions, i.e. please update the team on what you've accomplished as well as what challenges you encountered along the way, ideally Trello comments on the tickets you work on so the context is easy to find.
Simplicity: KISS.
Growth mindset: We will all be doing something we've never done before at some point, so it's crucial to be able to learn and grow and push our limits.
I sometimes work on weekends, which is a personal choice. I do not expect you to work on the weekend. I may send you email or Slack messages on the weekend but unless I explicitly mention that the situation is URGENT, there is no need to respond until Monday.
If I’m traveling or out of office, I will provide notice via the #officehk channel on Slack.
Feedback is always welcomed, especially constructive criticism. If you see anything that can be improved, please never hesitate to note the deficiency and ideally provide suggestions for improvement. Useful feedback requires three attributes:
- Safety (you should feel safe to give and receive candid feedback)
- Effort (neither you nor I should feel defensive about the feedback)
- Benefit (giving/receiving feedback should have impact)
Please provide feedback as soon as possible; it’s easier to maintain context that way. I’ll strive to do the same as well. If you’d like feedback, don’t hesitate to ask. Once you receive it, don’t just act upon it, consider it critically first, then make your best decision on whether or not to act on it.
Disagreements are always welcomed, because the best solution comes from rigorous debate. Be kind, be constructive, but don’t hold back on your opinion. I always separate ideas and ego and expect you to do the same - we’re all on the same team and it’s more important to find the best solution than to be right. But once a decision is made, even if you disagree, you need to commit and run with the plan.
Questions are always welcomed. I would rather that you double check on something that may be uncertain, especially if there are high costs (both time and/or money) associated with the decision, than to move forward haphazardly. I may not always provide sufficient context due to the curse of knowledge, in which case please ask as much as you need to understand how your particular task at hand fits into the bigger picture.
That said, I may respond that I trust you to use your best judgement, in which case I will not blame you if things go wrong. I do expect a justification for the decision prior to starting on the task so we have a decision journal. If things do go wrong, I expect a postmortem analysis so that we can learn from mistakes and improve the decision making process moving forward.
I aim to hold a 1:1 with each direct report at least once a week. Generally I prefer to set aside a scheduled time for each person but occasionally will need some flexibility.
1:1s are for YOU, not me. It is not an update/status meeting (unless you want it to be), it’s a sacred dedicated time set aside for you to chat about whatever you think is important to discuss.
I will always stick around for the full length of the meeting. Even if you have nothing to discuss I am happy to spend the time to get to know you better, especially your life goals and how we can help you achieve them.
Do not save urgent things for this meeting - if something is urgent, bring it up ASAP!
I use a Green / Orange / Red performance assessment model. You may safely assume you are Green unless explicitly stated otherwise.
Green: There might be things to improve (or not) but if you keep doing what you’re doing, we’re all good!
Orange: There are one or more behaviors that are not long term sustainable and need to be changed to stay on the team; you will be explicitly informed of this situation.
Red: There is a significant problem with a hard deadline to fix; you will be explicitly informed of this situation.
If you’re in orange or red, all is not lost - everything is fine as long as you adapt and change. When you do so, you prove that you’re willing and able to accept and implement feedback to grow which is extremely valuable!
These are personality quirks I have that you should be aware of. Some are "positive", some are "negative" (and I’m actively trying to improve upon these), but they’re me, so it’s easier if you know about them ahead of time.
I get passionate often when I talk. This occasionally might sound like I'm losing my temper. Call me out on it if you feel like I crossed the line. I may also swear (a lot). It doesn’t mean anything except that I’m excited, please don’t take offense.
I love constructive criticism, particularly receiving it. I may be slow to give criticism to give you the benefit of the doubt, and when I do, that criticism may come across a bit too bluntly sometimes, so please call me out on it if you feel like I crossed the line.
I may act passive aggressively sometimes - this is always subconscious and I’m actively trying to stop this habit. Please always call me out on this.
I believe in "no broken windows" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory). That means I expect attention to detail (i.e. clean code adhering to style guide, in-depth documentation, etc.). The attention to detail in the little things will spill over into the big things.
I have a few pet peeves:
Not providing context: it’s very important for me to always explain why we’re doing something. By explaining why, we allow for lateral thinking by questioning whether the approach is correct. I expect team members to also give the same context when communicating. If you ask a question non-sequitur, it’s much harder to answer than if you first mention what you’re working on / stuck on and then ask your question within that context. In particular, this also extends into screenshots - please err towards capturing and sharing the entire desktop or at least browser / application window, instead of just grabbing a small slice.
Not looking for answers yourself first: please perform a preliminary Google search instead of bothering someone else for the answer if you don’t know how to do something. This goes double for external tools with pre-existing documentation. Of course, please use your best judgement and balance this with the urgency of the task and the availability of the person you plan to ask.
Asking if you can ask a question: just ask. Don’t ever drop a message in Slack asking if I have a few minutes; if you’re asking, I assume it’s important and I will make a few minutes for you. Leave a note about what you want to talk about in Slack and I’ll get back to you ASAP.
Not following process: I am pretty anal about having things systemized and followed. This may occasionally be overboard from what we actually need as a team. Please push back when you think that’s the case, but also be aware that my desire for structure is a result of needing to manage a lot of complex systems simultaneously. Mainly this manifests in not updating Trello tickets or Github PRs.