The Manager’s Toolbox (to address the scenarios coming)

OK, even though this book isn’t going to delve in the importance of having those things, but know, they are important, and doing them right is extremely important.

I will skip the How to do them right, I will touch on What you gain as a manager from having them, it might come in handy for your day-to-day and could reduce tensions that were building and you had a blindspot to

It’s important to know the tools you have as a manager and also as the writer I know I’m going to name drop them in the scenarios in the next chapters, so I am doing my due diligence here to make sure you at least know them.

So very briefly and simplistically, I present to you, The Legendary Manager’s Toolbox (the uncomplete and undetailed list 😃)


What you achieve as a manager?

  1. The team openly discusses their success and celebrate it
  2. The team openly discusses what isn’t working for them, in the process, with the communication and they work to solve it – it’s super empowering and creates a culture of “can-do” 
  3. You gauge with the team and see if issues are boiling between team members if people are having issues with each other from the technical, personal or any other thing that ends with …al perspective
  4. The team is actually agile, not “you need dailies, 2-week iteration, follow these strict rules and you’ll be agile” Agile, but actually fitting solutions to their specific problems agile 
  5. The team grows to be more autonomous, they create action items and they deliver them to completion
  6.  The team learns to experiment, learns that failure is not bad, but the opportunity to grow and change

A message from the author:

I want to share my feelings here, if someone had put a gun to my head and told me, out of all the rituals drop them all but one, what is that one that stays? To them, I would say

  • I would keep retrospectives! Give me a team that is doing action-driven, small changes retros and I’ll give you a team that in a couple of iterations will have defined a tailored process to their needs if they’ll need dailies – the retro will make it happen, if they’ll need planning, they’ll figure it out in the retro… Retro (when done right) is the most powerful tool in the adaptive process we live in, it the core for change and improvement… 


  • And also I would say, Dude a gun for this? You could have just asked!
    and also if you want to threaten me, just tell me you’ll add cucumbers to my gin and tonic, there’s nothing worst than that on earth! (Gin and Tonic you drink with limes or nothing, cucumbers are the worst, sorry I’m going back to topic now)

One on Ones

What you achieve as a manager?

  1. You get to build a safe space with your team members and create psychological safety
  2. You get to know the people you work with and you grow a connection, keeps you connected to the heartbeat of the team, even if you might be in meetings and a bit distant sometimes… 
  3. Feedback is the main part of this meeting, so it reduces the difficulty on the receiving end to get feedback when feedback is given – it’s what expected, it’s not out of the blue, we’re prepared for it, it’s what this meeting is there for
  4. You will receive feedback and be able to improve yourself, it’s like every team member will direct a small mirror at you and reflect to you what you are doing well and what not
  5. It’s a place to push people out of their comfort zone
  6. It’s a place to sync (but just a bit, it shouldn’t be the main part of the meeting)


Of course, it’s not all, and as far as the how-to conduct the 1:1s, there are many articles you can read, but let’s keep this book practical…


Root Cause Analysis

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