Towards the end of 2017, we reopened hiring on the mobile team at Automattic which had been shut since the start of the year as we got things in order. I think of this as phase 1 of hiring on the team – nailing the basics of the process, and making some progress with diversity […]
Slides from my WCEU talk on the WordPress mobile apps, you can see the full version with speaker notes here. It’s a recap of what shipped in 2017 and explores our themes for 2018. Mega thanks to my colleague Matt Miklic who made the deck.
One year ago today, I tweeted: ✨ first day @automattic ✨ — cate, a human being (@catehstn) November 7, 2016 Three weeks after that, when my support rotation ended… https://twitter.com/catehstn/status/803379914988810242 As I recall, my friend James described it as “the most low key new job tweet”. I pointed out the extremely descriptive emoji for my […]
Accountable: People can have expectations of each other. This includes leadership. Problem: Often these things result in mobile being a bit disconnected. Server side changes can break clients, and then mobile teams take the heat from users and leadership. This can lead to resentment, which makes accountability hard. Accountability comes last, because it builds on […]
Let’s talk about automation. This seems like an out of place thing in this series. Predictable! Prioritized! Connected! Accountable! These are all fuzzy people things. Automated sounds like… more fun? Like Proper Developer Work? Automation is like documentation, but developers might actually write it. Without automation: It’s easy to have random esoteric things that few […]
Connected: People work together and take an interest in each other (this doesn’t mean everyone has to be friends – but they are friendly). Problem: We lack a clear model for mobile infrastructure. This leads to discussions like whether to have a mobile team or pods. Regardless of what your “mobile teams” look like – […]
Clear on priorities: When you ask people what is most important and why, they can answer. Problem: Leadership is often dominated by iOS users, so Android can feel like an afterthought. If you ask a person on your team what your top priority is as a team, can they tell you? Can they tell you […]
Predictable. The team has a regular cadence. They can set goals and expectations around deadlines. Challenge: Shipping compiled code. Most advice about improving team velocity talks about continuous delivery. Ship constantly! As many times a day as you call! Roll back if you need to! Tell us about that time you broke prod! YOLO! Here’s a fun […]
When talking about team effectiveness, the first thing to consider is what an effective team looks like. Predictable. The team has a regular cadence. They can set goals and expectations around deadlines. Clear on priorities. When you ask people what is most important and why, they can answer. Connected. People work together and take an interest […]
Since January first, I’ve been posting a picture a day on photo.cate.blog. Now I’ve been doing it for long enough to consider it a proper project, I asked one of my colleagues for a suggestion for a better theme, and she suggested this one – Cubic. I really like it. An incomplete list of what […]