Dan Martell - January 29, 2018


How To Manage a Remote Team As a Startup

Hosted by
Dan Martell
Mentioned
Scott Brick Jason Freed Scrum
Episode #8 How to deal with ADHD and still be Productive ⧸ w Jordan Kalev Kalevtech.com Episode #9 How To Coach & Advise Startups w⧸ Peter Lalonde @ Positive Venture Group

Episode Stats


Length

9 minutes

Words per minute

197.52

Word count

1,792

Sentence count

74


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, Dan Martell talks about the benefits of having a distributed team and how you can leverage them to your advantage. He talks about how to get more done, get access to higher caliber talent, and have a reduced cost structure.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.080 Hi, I'm Dan Martell, serial entrepreneur, investor,
00:00:02.080 and creator of SaaS Academy.
00:00:03.520 And in this video, I'm gonna teach you the five steps
00:00:06.440 to managing a distributed team
00:00:08.280 so that you can get even more done,
00:00:10.560 get access to higher caliber talent,
00:00:12.880 and at a reduced cost structure.
00:00:15.080 And be sure to stay to the end
00:00:16.160 where I'm gonna share two of my favorite books
00:00:18.440 to get even more insights on this topic.
00:00:30.000 So maybe you've tapped out your current hiring pool from the city you live in
00:00:41.100 and there's no new talent there.
00:00:42.420 Maybe you've kind of built your payroll to a point where it's not sustainable to keep growing,
00:00:47.980 but you want to keep building new stuff.
00:00:50.180 What I want to teach you in this video is how to hire people in other parts of the world
00:00:54.640 so you can get a few benefits.
00:00:55.680 The first benefit is that you obviously can take advantage of the reduced cost structure.
00:00:59.700 The second thing, which I think is just as fascinating
00:01:02.200 and valuable, is the day parting,
00:01:04.800 meaning that you can ask people on your team
00:01:07.500 to do work and projects, kick those off,
00:01:09.780 and when you wake up, they're moved along
00:01:11.580 so you can get a review.
00:01:12.820 That alone will get you on a 24-hour cycle
00:01:15.540 if you do it right and could add tremendous value
00:01:18.680 to your business, and I just wanna share the five steps
00:01:21.320 to doing this the right way.
00:01:22.820 Step one is focus on the results.
00:01:25.760 Instead of wondering what somebody's working on
00:01:28.660 minute to minute or hour by hour.
00:01:30.660 Instead what you wanna do is get right to the end point.
00:01:33.060 What is the task that you're asking this person to do
00:01:35.740 look like when it's all done?
00:01:37.200 I call that the definition of done.
00:01:39.680 And that's very descriptive,
00:01:40.980 how the customer's gonna interact with it,
00:01:42.840 how it visually looks, potentially some imagery
00:01:46.440 that represents kind of what you think
00:01:48.680 it's gonna look like when it's done.
00:01:49.680 And this is true for like event organizing,
00:01:51.620 product design, et cetera.
00:01:53.680 The more you can be descriptive of what it looks like
00:01:55.760 when it's done, then you can step back
00:01:57.720 and just allow the person to then decide
00:01:59.640 how they're gonna get it accomplished.
00:02:01.300 And I think that is the big difference
00:02:03.040 when you shift from in-house where you can kind of sit down
00:02:06.180 and help somebody shape the path
00:02:08.140 to getting a completion of a project done
00:02:10.120 versus saying, here's what it looks like
00:02:12.020 and stepping back and allowing them
00:02:13.540 to essentially commit to a timeline
00:02:15.420 and then hold them to that accountability.
00:02:18.040 That works way better in a distributed team
00:02:20.980 than for people typically in an office
00:02:23.560 that can communicate at a higher frequency.
00:02:25.600 Step two, set daily and weekly meeting rhythms.
00:02:30.600 So one of the challenges when you're in an office
00:02:33.740 is that you're always talking, you're always communicating,
00:02:36.180 you're always kind of looking over people's shoulders,
00:02:38.180 you're walking by, you're having water cooler conversations,
00:02:40.720 you're going out for lunch with people.
00:02:42.320 So the rhythm of information flows really naturally.
00:02:45.480 So it doesn't require kind of structured meetings,
00:02:47.960 but I will tell you one of the most valuable things
00:02:49.920 you could ever do is not only add a weekly meeting,
00:02:52.700 but also a daily standup.
00:02:54.220 And if you're looking for a structure
00:02:55.460 and want to go even deeper on it, check out Scrum.
00:02:58.200 It's a base from a technical background,
00:03:01.380 but the Scrum meeting structure works really well
00:03:03.800 to just build that foundation,
00:03:06.100 build the expectations that every week
00:03:07.640 we're going to realign kind of priorities and focuses
00:03:09.980 for each team in the company or each person,
00:03:12.340 especially in the distributed team.
00:03:13.900 And then on a daily basis, there's a heartbeat
00:03:16.520 of understanding what somebody,
00:03:19.140 especially distributed remote, is going to work on,
00:03:22.180 not only in this is the format,
00:03:23.600 What they did yesterday, what they're gonna do today,
00:03:25.640 and are they blocked?
00:03:26.680 And as a leader, a manager, the entrepreneur, the CEO,
00:03:29.320 the founder, your job is to unblock them
00:03:32.120 so that they can move forward.
00:03:34.120 So setting up a daily and weekly rhythm is key.
00:03:38.320 Step number three, hosting company off-sites.
00:03:41.920 If you have a team that's used to working together
00:03:45.000 in the same room, then it's hard to see the value of this.
00:03:48.420 But as you build your distributed team,
00:03:50.200 and you have three, four, five, maybe a dozen people
00:03:53.160 that work in different cities at least once a year,
00:03:57.400 ideally twice, sometimes three,
00:03:59.500 you wanna get those people together.
00:04:01.340 When I was building my company Flowtown,
00:04:03.140 we used to do this because we always had distributed teams.
00:04:06.040 I'd say half the team was remote, distributed.
00:04:08.400 Even people that worked in the same city
00:04:10.340 just decided to work from home
00:04:11.520 because they were more productive.
00:04:12.940 But three times a year, we would all jump in rental vans
00:04:16.120 and drive to Tahoe and rent some houses,
00:04:18.720 and we spent most of the morning skiing or snowboarding
00:04:21.680 to really bond, to do an activity,
00:04:23.420 and then afternoons into the night,
00:04:25.240 usually there was some beverages involved,
00:04:27.820 there was a lot of productivity and brainstorming
00:04:30.280 and kind of planning the next 90 days
00:04:32.700 and what was important from a product point of view
00:04:34.460 and what were customers saying about our product.
00:04:36.200 And as management and leaders and CEOs,
00:04:38.460 we get to share kind of our vision for the product,
00:04:40.340 but those off-sites are critical to create what's called
00:04:44.240 entanglement around the ideas and the way people work.
00:04:47.200 Even if they've been remote, bring them together
00:04:49.300 to allow that entanglement to happen,
00:04:50.980 to continue adding value after the fact
00:04:53.640 is key in the byproduct of doing those off sites.
00:04:56.840 Step number four, use collaboration software.
00:05:00.960 As your team grows, you want to create a structure,
00:05:04.640 even if you started off in an office,
00:05:06.760 so that you can collaborate with people.
00:05:09.260 And that could be as simple
00:05:10.480 as using project management software
00:05:12.280 so that everybody has a clear understanding
00:05:13.940 of what their workload looks like,
00:05:15.700 what's coming up next month,
00:05:17.120 so they can start figuring out how can they sharpen the saw
00:05:19.360 around the activities that they're working on
00:05:20.720 to the projects, but it goes even further.
00:05:23.360 I would argue that having software or tools
00:05:26.000 that allow you to do video conferencing,
00:05:27.760 like a Zoom or a Skype, is really powerful.
00:05:32.100 You know, I even do this for my daily stand-ups.
00:05:34.540 When I was building my company, Clarity,
00:05:36.160 we had team members all over the world
00:05:37.880 and we would do our daily stand-up meetings,
00:05:40.600 our scrum stand-ups, using video conferencing
00:05:44.080 so that we could, and we just used go to meeting,
00:05:46.080 so that we could see everybody's faces.
00:05:47.780 And you just gotta find a time zone
00:05:49.440 that works for everybody.
00:05:50.620 But that way, there's a real sense of when somebody's
00:05:52.580 reporting on what they did the day before and today
00:05:54.740 and if they're stuck, you get a sense of how they're feeling.
00:05:57.680 And you can see if somebody's gotten a haircut.
00:06:00.040 I mean, it's just it creates that rapport.
00:06:02.160 And I think that software in today's world
00:06:04.000 has enabled us to build our teams in a distributed way
00:06:07.040 that was totally different and way more valuable,
00:06:10.240 and I would argue more effective than it
00:06:13.000 used to be previously to these tools.
00:06:14.960 So be sure to invest in software around collaboration, video,
00:06:18.540 project management, chat are all really important
00:06:21.640 infrastructure pieces to allow you to manage
00:06:23.420 that distributed team.
00:06:24.540 Step number five, conduct one-on-one meetings.
00:06:28.720 You know, and this could be for your direct reports
00:06:32.020 or your managers to manage with their team,
00:06:34.620 but I think it's super important that at least twice a year
00:06:37.420 you sit down with your direct reports
00:06:39.060 and talk about their performance,
00:06:40.400 talk about their aspirations.
00:06:42.200 What do they wanna get out of this role?
00:06:43.800 How do they see their future evolving with the company?
00:06:46.760 Where do they want to grow into?
00:06:48.600 What kind of training do they need?
00:06:50.200 How are they performing?
00:06:51.300 How do you feel about the performance?
00:06:52.940 The truth is is people don't quit companies,
00:06:55.600 they quit bosses.
00:06:57.100 And creating a structure and enforcing a policy
00:07:00.040 where people create these one-on-ones,
00:07:01.980 even in your distributed team,
00:07:03.380 doing those remotely through video conference calls
00:07:05.580 is still very important so that they understand
00:07:08.880 how you feel about their work
00:07:10.180 and they have the opportunity to give you
00:07:12.160 feedback in your business.
00:07:13.760 I even have certain people on my team
00:07:16.120 where I meet with them every week one-on-one
00:07:18.520 so that we can gauge our effectiveness, right?
00:07:21.560 And we actually use a simple scoring system,
00:07:23.560 a one out of 10 as a leader.
00:07:25.100 How have I been for you for the past seven days?
00:07:27.160 And in their role, how have they been for me?
00:07:29.160 And we can give each other a quick number
00:07:30.940 so that it starts the conversation
00:07:33.040 of where the opportunity is to grow.
00:07:34.780 So setting up that, making sure that all your leaders
00:07:37.780 in your company have one-on-ones with their team,
00:07:40.020 at least team members, at least twice a year
00:07:43.020 is critical to managing a distributed team.
00:07:45.780 So just to recap, one, make sure that you focus on results.
00:07:50.140 Two, ensure that you set up a meeting rhythm.
00:07:52.720 Three, spend the time to go off-site with the team.
00:07:56.120 Four, invest in software so that you have the tools
00:07:59.720 to collaborate and connect.
00:08:01.660 And then finally, one-on-one meetings with your key people.
00:08:05.160 Now, I wanted to share with you two books
00:08:07.320 that I think are fundamental in understanding
00:08:09.600 how this could look.
00:08:10.520 The first one is A Year Without Pants by Scott Birkin,
00:08:13.720 who worked at Automatic, the company behind WordPress.com.
00:08:16.880 They have hundreds, if not now at this point,
00:08:18.560 thousands plus employees that work distributed.
00:08:21.720 They do have a central office,
00:08:23.620 but I know that each department comes together.
00:08:26.500 Once a quarter, they have a travel budget to do that
00:08:28.420 and they do it all over the world
00:08:29.860 to make sure they create that entanglement concept.
00:08:31.640 And second, remote office not required by Jason Freed,
00:08:36.060 who really pioneered this concept early in the day
00:08:38.580 as the founders of Basecamp.com.
00:08:41.660 Both books are incredible resources
00:08:43.340 to help you get even more insights into distributed teams.
00:08:46.560 If you liked this video, be sure to click the like button,
00:08:48.680 share this with a friend, and subscribe to my channel.
00:08:51.660 As per usual, I want to challenge you to live a bigger life
00:08:53.920 and a bigger business.
00:08:54.940 Thanks for watching.
00:08:55.720 I'll see you in the next video.
00:08:57.120 For those who were not aware, all my videos
00:08:59.120 have been one take to date.
00:09:01.440 And now I've got to retool the whole flow, the whole process.