Save polish for where it matters
I have a strong allergy to polished internal slide decks.
When I see one, my first instinct is not “great communication.” It is “how many hours went into making this look good instead of making the work better?”
That does not mean internal communication should be sloppy. It should be clear, direct, and useful. But for most internal work, a handful of bullet points in Slack, a rough doc, or an ugly slide deck is better than a beautiful deck that took hours to polish.
Polish is useful when the artifact itself is the product, when we are communicating externally, or when the audience genuinely needs a high-fidelity narrative. Internally, most of the time, I would rather we spend that energy on the actual work, clearer thinking, or faster learning.
Other notes about Company Building
- 🌿How to be better at making decisions
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- 🌿How to present to executives
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- 🌿Developer tools startups are playing on hard mode
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- 🌲Being unreasonably responsive has made my projects more successful
Creators who respond to feedback quickly unlock two virtuous cycles that allow them to build better solutions more quickly.
- 🌱How I manage my todos as a CEO
Kanban board with five columns: Inbox, Backlog, Blocked, Delegated, Done Most importantly: GTD-style “if it takes less than 2 minutes, do it immediately.” Create todos for everything (and I mean, everything, including replying to people) that go in...
- 🌿Message me whenever
Send me messages whenever inspiration strikes or when it makes sense for your workflow. I'll respond when I'm back online. This isn't about being "always on," quite the opposite: it's about respecting that we each know how to structure our own work l...
- 🌱How to run recurring virtual meetings efficiently
Start with a checkin question for connection (10% of the meeting length) Capture decisions made Capture open action items and check in on open ones every time, otherwise they get lost/forgotten due to poor personal execution Align on discussion ...
- 🌿How I run gratitude circles
Credit to Sue Ko who taught me this many years ago. Gratitude circles are a beautiful way to get team members feel seen by their peers. I run them in-person at least once a year with each of my teams. Quote from one of my engineers after their first ...
- 🌿How we make brainstorming work
Brainstorming usually fails. But, I noticed a pattern in the times that it worked exceptionally well. Here's how to make it work.
- 🌿How we foster deeper connections in our remote team
I believe that teams that are more connected perform better and that remote teams have worse connections. How can we improve that?
- 🌲Why I'm vigorous about giving feedback
Every day, you will find me hunting down a founder's email to send them feedback about my experience with their product. Why?
- 🌱How I get things done
The smallest project management setup I need: visible workstreams, one accountable owner, deadlines, status updates, and fast weekly demos.