zzz Work Well Together
MLC To become an Axelerant.com article during October 2021.
Probably the most significant advantage of working remotely and asynchronously is the flexibility it provides. This makes it easy to combine work with your personal life, although it might be challenging to find the right balance. This can be mitigated by either explicitly planning your time off or plan when you do work. When you don't work, it is recommended to make yourself unavailable by turning off Slack and closing down your email client. Coworkers should allow this to work by abiding by the communication guidelines.
If you worked at an office before, you lack a default group to lunch with. To look at it from a different perspective, now you can select who you lunch with and who you do not. Haven't spoken to a good friend in a while? Now you can have lunch together.
Get to Know Your Peers
Understanding that working remotely leads to mostly work-related conversations with Axelerant folks, everyone is encouraged to dedicate time to having social calls with any teammate - get to know who you work with, talk about everyday things, and share a virtual cuppa' coffee. Please make friends and build relationships with the people you work with to create a more comfortable, well-rounded environment.
Besides #general, # humor, and latest book comments in #guild-cafe-literati channels in Slack check out the many other #guild- topics for your interests.
You will be automatically paired with a random team member on the #general for a virtual donut & coffee break every other Monday by The "Donut" bot. Please schedule a chat together, and Donut will follow up for feedback.
Make Good Decisions
Decision-making happens at each level organizationally via an informed and knowledgeable hierarchy. These decisions do not come from a consensus or through a collective or democratic vote. Our team leads through C-level decision-makers are appointed to their positions and hold them for definitive and distinct reasons. We trust these individuals to make the right decisions—including you. Everyone working at Axelerant has a role that supports our mission at large and within which your best judgment must be exercised.
According to research in this article by the Harvard Business Review: "experience and knowledge of leaders in the subject matter still outperform purely data-driven approaches." We expect our leaders to make data-driven decisions but consider environments that do not allow reliable data collection. The person that does the work makes the decisions. While the decision-maker only needs direct approval from their manager, they should listen to others' data and informed opinions to arrive at their conclusion. Part of making good decisions is knowing who has good information and experience that informs that decision.
Refer to our decision-making framework.
Respond Accordingly, Consistently
Though we have instantaneous communication protocols like instant messaging or calling people, not every interaction needs real-time. A fraction of delay often acts as a calming catalyst. Therefore, set reasonable expectations about when a response will follow within 24-hours or before the end of the next business day. Also, be respectful about other people’s typical work times as they might not align with yours.
When an interaction requires follow-up, get back within a few business days or other up-front stated time. And, when that time has elapsed, actually follow-up. Further, consider having an order of communication-type preference such as in-person (video or voice call), near real-time (SMS), then asynchronous (Slack, email).
When something is urgent, mark your message as such with the option to SMS or phone the recipient after a 15- to 30-minute wait when longer isn’t feasible. And, in using Slack, your recipient might be in Do Not Disturb (DND) mode. During so, you can send a direct message and click on the Send Notification option that Slackbot provides, which will push an immediate DND-bypass notice.
Workplace Etiquette & Empathy
Our team is diverse; we do not make jokes or unfriendly remarks about race, religion, gender, or orientation.
Make your Slack message as complete as possible; this is especially true for DMs.
E.g., avoid greetings without the actual content of your request.
We don't tolerate safe space violations of any kind at Axelerant, and we recognize that this happens, even within a remote workplace.
If this happens to you or recognizes this happening to others, raise this immediately via email to people@axelerant.com.
Everyone at the company cares about your output, but take a break if you need to break.
Everything is always in draft or iteration in our line of work, subject to change—including this. Make iterations as accessible as possible.
Before replying to a request, complete the requested task first. Otherwise, indicate when you plan to complete it in your response.
Be courteous when it comes to projects and tasks by communicating clearly.
If you don't have time to do something due to priorities, let people know when they give you the tasks.
Don't let requests linger; inform so that others can find an alternative.
There is no need for consensus. Make sure that you give people that might have useful insights a chance to respond.
Make a call yourself because consensus doesn't scale.
Make a conscious effort to recognize the constraints of others within the team.
Workplace Etiquette
Give frequent and lots of honest feedback to your peers. Don't hold back on suggestions to improve.
Please keep an open mind and ask people for their feedback.
Be on time for starting work and meetings. Take a few moments to refresh your relationships at the start of meetings, but don't hold back on getting priorities resolved.
Strive to make Axelerant operations simpler. Does the task require consensus, delegation, or a meeting? If not, don't do such. Make a decision and move forward.
We're professionals and jointly have responsibilities. Share the burden of effort, yet make sure each people wants it and is capable of it by trust and verification.
Always communicate professionally with consideration to spelling and grammar, as though your words will be publicly promoted.
Axelerant is a community for a purpose with conditional love, not a family of unconditional love.
Be aware as best you can of your unconscious biases.
Ensure that those you manage to experience a sense of progress in their work to aid their motivation.
Help our people understand why we’re doing what we are, work together on what to do, and then let them own the how.
Never begin without the end in sight—pick a metric before starting something.
Not everything is going to work out, and that's ok because we’ll learn from it.
People will not be given a raise or a title because they threaten to quit.
Praise and credit your team members' work to the rest of the company; don’t steal it.
Promptly and responsibly reporting bad news is essential to preserving trust.
The ratio should be around seven per manager to ensure personalized one-on-ones and get your own responsibilities met.
Remove barriers by helping people overcome them.
Set appropriate goals upfront to keep mutual expectations clear and address underperformance immediately.
There are different ways to get to the same goal; therefore, discuss rather than argue over the different perspectives.
Watch for results, not articulate answers.
When something is done well, shout about it. When correcting someone, keep it quiet and private.
When times are great, be a voice of moderation. When times are bad, be a voice of hope.
While we do our best to be transparent about what we do, we respect an individual's privacy.