My takeaway is that nobody cares about how many (or how little) hours you dedicate to something, but about your impact.
I'll try to apply to myself the idea of negotiating my level of investment in different workstreams. I never thought about it this way, instead, I was just jumping wherever I was needed.
I'd love to read more about how to make sure that your low level of investment in some workstream makes the most impact possible. I think it would be very easy to plan for that 20% time investment and when things go wrong you end up stretching yourself.
If I am a entry level engineer or I haven't gotten those higher up positions, how can I protect my time on unimportant tasks that are thrown on to me. Do I do a worse job that gets the job done but doesn't require a huge investment or do I push that work on to others. But the thing is I am entry level I don't really have the power to push things to people under me because I am at the bottom. Is the strategy to not to get put in that position in the first place when it comes to planning and communication to my manager on the things I would like to take on.
Great post Ryan!
My takeaway is that nobody cares about how many (or how little) hours you dedicate to something, but about your impact.
I'll try to apply to myself the idea of negotiating my level of investment in different workstreams. I never thought about it this way, instead, I was just jumping wherever I was needed.
I'd love to read more about how to make sure that your low level of investment in some workstream makes the most impact possible. I think it would be very easy to plan for that 20% time investment and when things go wrong you end up stretching yourself.
"You can’t say no to everything but explaining why work isn’t impactful should help you get some time back."
Something I recently came across.
Though, I proposed a simpler solution than the complexity involved.
I should've instead asked what immediate value addressing tech debt in that situation would bring to customers compared to other work we got in place.
It's so easy to forget the customers in midst of hardcore engineering.
I would like to add two links that may be of interest:
How to manage tasks as a product manager (or developer): https://www.leadinginproduct.com/p/how-to-manage-tasks-as-a-product
Prioritizing Quality, not Tasks alone: https://www.leadinginproduct.com/p/prioritizing-quality-not-tasks-alone
If I am a entry level engineer or I haven't gotten those higher up positions, how can I protect my time on unimportant tasks that are thrown on to me. Do I do a worse job that gets the job done but doesn't require a huge investment or do I push that work on to others. But the thing is I am entry level I don't really have the power to push things to people under me because I am at the bottom. Is the strategy to not to get put in that position in the first place when it comes to planning and communication to my manager on the things I would like to take on.