In this talk, held at itnig the 8th of May 2014, Pau Ramon shared with us his mistakes and learnings as CTO at Redbooth. His insights can be really helpful for all of us, not only for people that want to build a technical team, but also for people who are actually part of one.

1. Building the
best tech-team

2. Management

3. Management
“ To coordinate the efforts of
people to accomplish goals and
objectives using available
resources efficiently and
effectively”

4. WhoamI?
CTO at Redbooth
!
Twitter: @masylum

5. Bewareof bullshit
• Learn from others
• Every company is different
• Don’t copy: common sense

6. Whatisthistalkabout?
• Recruitment
• Optimization
• Growth
• Success

7. Recruitment

8. Seduction
• Go meet interesting people
• Interview? Go for a coffee!
• Talk and listen, seduce and
be seduced

9. HireeHirer

10. WhoshouldIhire?
Bet on motivated generalists.
!
Knowledge is easy and fast to
acquire, talent is not.

11. WhoshouldIhire?
Invest for the long term:
Experience within the company
is the most valuable asset

12. Optimization

13. Throughput

14. Stablesystem
SystemInput Output

15. Idlesystem
SystemInput Output

16. Saturatedsystem
SystemInput Output

17. Washingdishes
Saturated Idle
Soaping Rinsing

18. Synchronicity

19. Synchronicity
• Inefficient in unstable
systems
• Less overhead
• Not flexible

20. Synchronicity
Soaping Rinsing
Soaping Rinsing
TeamA
TeamB

21. Asynchronicity

22. Asynchronicity
• Less waiting time
• Requires queues
• More overhead
• More flexible

23. Asynchronicity
Soaping
Rinsing
Soaping
TeamA TeamB
QueueQueue
Soaping

24. Queues

25. Queues
• Appear in saturated systems
• Measurable
• Ordered

26. LIFO:LastInFirstOut
C B A

27. FIFO:FirstInFirstOut
C B A

28. Prioritization
• Agreed and arbitrary
• Unfair but help focusing
• Add age to the mix to avoid
starvation

29. MultipleQueues

30. Multiplequeues
Alice
Bob
Chris

31. Multiplequeues
1day
5days!
12hours
Alice
Bob
Chris

32. Singlequeues
Alice
Bob
Chris

33. Trytoalwaysgofora
singlequeueand
multipleconsumers

34. Optimize!
• Go asynchronous
• Measure your queues
• Identify your bottlenecks
• Allocate people accordingly

35. Growth

36. WhoshouldIhire?
• Avoid Single Point of Failures
• Start getting specialists but
not too many
• Cultural fit is important!

37. Whenhiring,
getyourteam
involved

38. Success

39. Choosetwo:
Scope Resources
Time

40. Motivation
• Bad: Carrots and sticks
• Good: Autonomy, Mastery,
Purpose
http://bit.ly/1eVm5pI

41. Motivation
• Encourage Collaboration over
Competition
• Set team goals, not individual
• Let the team be the judge

42. Rules!

43. Norules

44. Rules

45. RulesandCulture
• Rules have to be agreed
• Culture is the enforcer: Let
the team be the police
• After a mistake, think of a
rule that could’ve prevented it

46. Teams
CoordinatorCoordinatorCoordinator
Vertical collaboration on a given project

47. Coordinators
• They are doers
• They are responsible for the
performance of the group
• They are the spokeperson of
the team

48. That’sallfolks
Thanks