CodeCraftConf follow-up : notes on growing a team

Whilst I have a few thoughts I’m still processing after the whirlwind of fantastic insights I got from CodeCraftConf, I wanted to capture some of the highlights from some of the answers to my questions on Growing a Team.

Many thanks to everyone who came to the session. Lots of thoughts coming out of the conference.

When is it time to grow your team?

• You never grow a team, you create a new one.
• There’s always too much work, you should grow when you have capacity, so you don’t put new starts off

How do you deal with resistance from existing team members?

• Communicate clearly and address concerns (e.g, time to mentor)
• Involve team early
• Do you have a choice who joins?

Is it more important to find a culture fit or build a diverse team?

• Do candidates know what they’re signing up for?
• Introvert vs extrovert (see also hiring practice)
• Interviews should be structured to filter out arseholes – do they have empathy (or have they been taught to suppress it)
• Every new hire should bring the level up
• Don’t just hire for technical skill
• Diversify your interview pool

What is your biggest worry with your current team size, or with growing your current team?

• Are you doing Health Checks? Survey staff regularly
• Make sure the bigger team, outside your daily work, understand the culture – it only feeds from top down
• Fear of churn
• Loss of culture
• Try to understand
• Make the culture explicit

What practices do you use to ensure sustainable growth?

• Pair a lot, reflect (e.g. retro)
• face-to-face regularly, even if it’s video
• Values workshop – does everyone share them?
• Social convenor to ensure cohesion
• Slack channel dedicated to positive feedback on living the values
• Office/company changes should have their own backlog with an open grooming process so priorities are explicit

How long does it take to integrate someone new?

• Be careful about language
• Train everyone in personal skills
• Listen even when you disagree
• lack of ego
• Culture changes people
• What personalities do you want?

Power corrupts

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