It was a short week, and that brings danger that people will try to cram five weeks of meetings and activity into three. This happened, alas. Even so,

• Giving people the (exceptional) option to skip critique or 1:1 for this short week provided a little relief to folks chasing urgent projects, even though few took advantage. (Schedule relief for those who did, psychological relief for those who did not.)
• A plan came together (with coaching, but that's fine) to distribute work among the team to keep things moving as people get into their suppertime time away from work. We'll have a smaller crew than usual next week but everything that needs to move will keep moving.
• Is the team getting the messages I'm sending more consistently, that superficial aesthetic variation is not interesting but informational and interactive design exploration, aimed at well-expressed informational and interactive goals, is? Yes, mostly. Not everyone all the way, but yes, mostly.

Scattered wins this week:

• After three tries (all administrative or preparation missteps of one sort or another) the girl now has a learner's permit; a small but crucial step toward learning a few adult skills.
• Disconcert between two teams is giving way to eagerness and collaboration. Three things I often talk about are helping us along:
  1. referring to real customer data,
  2. finding and negotiating common goals, and
  3. humans remembering to relate to one another.
• A couple of the people I support are getting the message that attention to detail must be demonstrated. (In the details! Surprise.) This has required some tight feedback loops, but I think I'm successfully avoiding micromanaging.
• Mentorship is fun! I might have a new mentee, perhaps just for the duration of their job search.

Group coaching is valuable when the message is positive ("I invite you to do this") and useful to all and there's no need to single someone out, or when singling someone out would be more pointed than the situation warrants. It allows the saving of face. Small issues such as not having the correct email signature, failing to make a fresh pot of coffee when taking the last cup, etc.

I used group coaching today when I pointed out to my team that, yes, the time slots in our weekly critique are short and it is hard to go deep, but I invite them to pursue feedback in other ways as well (and listed some ways). There were two people who needed that message the most, but it was relevant to all of them.

It's not the same thing as complaining to someone about problematic behavior, or escalating this complaint to their supervisor, which are more inherently pointed or even confronting.

We all wish that people would come directly to us individually for their wishes and corrections, but sometimes they are not sure they should, or don't want to confront, or are nervous about their skills in such an interaction, or don't want to make a big deal of it, or mention it in passing in more established relationships, or…myriad options.

(If you spend too much effort parsing the behavior of others you are likely to do the same for your own behavior, or vice versa, which will make it harder to relax and act in the moment. When I find myself stressed about how someone else's complaint came to me I try to set aside the manner and just focus on the content. Often there's at least a little something right in the complaint.)

The lady is out of town, but

• I'm mostly eating right anyhow, in contrast with other such times
• Chauffeuring to and from ballet and other events has not been a problem (and I have people to help next week)
• The girl was interested in seeing Snarky Puppy with me on Tuesday, and it was a good show. No opener, right to the good stuff
• Nothing blew up while the one PM director was away, a credit to the team. Yay

I had a medical…thing…to do on Monday so this was another shortish week, the sort where all the meetings get slid atop one another to occupy available space so you can pretend that it was not a short week. Even so,

• The medical thing went fine. I remember nothing.
• Friday was meeting-light so I got a little bit of non-meeting work done.
• I realized that for a handful of the initiatives I'm on I needn't toil in obscurity but would do better to send async questions to a handful of people, so I did.
• A team-wide message from the CEO mentioned "The transition to a multi-product company, the importance of AI, and strengthening the role of UX and front end engineering have emerged more clearly for me as priorities." – It's sinking in!