# Jonathon Halpin's Manager Readme

**Enablement Manager at Toast**

# Motivation for this document

Welcome to my Manager README, a document that helps introduce you to my management style, philosophy, and expectations. I've taken inspiration from my skip-level leader, [Emil Sit](https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/my-manager-readme-emil-sit/), as I actually read his prior to meeting him during my interview process with Toast and it helped me understand the type of leader I will be working with.  

The intended audience is primarily anyone who reports to me, though anyone is free to read it - or even provide feedback on it! Please treat it as a reference and promise on how I will conduct myself as a manager, and what I expect from you.

As you will hopefully see from the following sections, I try to be truly honest about the type of manager and leader that I am. I aim to shine a light on some of my strengths and some of the areas I am working on to become a better leader. 

# My role

I am an Enablement Manager for the Research & Development (R&D) department at Toast. I am specifically responsible for our onboarding enablement program. My team is responsible for ensuring that every new hire R&D Toaster is equipped with the knowledge, skills, and behaviours to be effectively ramp up in their new role.

# What do I value most?

I put high value on the details when it comes to the employee or customer experience. My team is responsible for enabling folks to be effective in their role, and at the very least, we should provide a consistent program that executes as planned. I encourage my team to introduce mechanisms or processes to ensure that we nail the basics in our programs. This furthermore will allow the team to spend more time inventing as opposed to fire fighting. 

I appreciate where my team can identify process improvements. Can you automate something that gives you back 2 hours a week? Can you introduce a process that makes it easier for new hires to complete a specific task? I ask that my team continually identify where frictions exists and over time iterate and improve. 

Over the more recent years of my career, my scope and responsibilities have increased and I am learning more each day that I can't do it all. I have a tendency to 'revert to type' as an IC and can find myself head down and diving deep on how to solve a tactical problem. I know my team is better positioned to do this type of work because they understand the details better than me. I appreciate when they take initiative and proactively deep dive and then share their findings with me and others on the team. 

Feedback is a two-way street. As a leader, I want to provide my team feedback so they can see where their strengths and growth areas are. Similarly, I value when my team gives me feedback and I will ask openly for feedback on where I am doing well and where I can do more. 

# My Expectations

Before I describe some of my expectations, it's worth describing what my team should expect from me. I see management as a privilege and it's a responsibility that I don't take lightly. People's working lives account for probably 50%+ of a standard weekday; it's important for me that my team feels fulfilment from work and that it enhances their life. I will treat my team with respect. I will try my best to make work enjoyable. I will defend my team when they are not there to defend themselves. I will publicly praise and privately provide constructive criticism. Most importantly, I will try to help you grow by providing feedback and helping you identify opportunities to stretch yourself. The expectations that I describe below from my team, they should also expect in return and I encourage my team to hold me accountable if I am not doing so. 

I expect my team to be transparent and to collaborate. If you disagree with something - say so (while still being respectful to others). If something isn't clear - Ask questions until it is clear. If you need help from others - please shout! If you have concerns or risks about a deadline - let us know early so we can try to find a solution. If you're seeing a team member struggle - speak to them and see if you can provide guidance or coaching.  

You should feel empowered to experiment and try new things, knowing that everything is not going to work. I am comfortable with my team and I "failing" as long as we have done our due diligence on identifying and mitigating the risks where possible. My favourite quote is "Sometimes you win and sometimes you learn," and as long as we learn from our losses then it was time well spent. I ask that my team try their best to be self-aware and be self-critical when they think they could have done something better and learn from that experience in the future. 

I block time in my calendar to spend time with my family and I encourage my team to do what works for them to manage their work-life balance. I expect my team to manage their time or ask for help if they are struggling with doing so or need help prioritising work. 

# 1:1s

I consider 1:1s sacred time on my calendar and I try not to move them unless absolutely necessary. Our 1:1s are dedicated time to support your career development, help remove blockers, and share important updates. I like to work with each of my directs to define the agenda. While our 1:1s may have a standing agenda, I am happy to adapt the format of specific 1:1s where needed, for example, if you need additional support on how to complete a specific goal or task, we can dedicate the next 1:1 to focus on that goal. While career development is a standing agenda in our 1:1s, I like to encourage a regular dedicated 1:1, usually 4 to 6 weeks, where we focus specificly on your career development. 

# Personality quirks

I'm a curious person and tend to ask lots of questions to help me fully understand how things work. I am aware that asking many questions, especially questions starting with "Why", may come across as somewhat interrogative but that is not my intention. My curiosity extends beyond work, I like to learn about people too. I try and allocate some time in 1:1 meetings to learn about them. I personally believe this can help create greater working relationships when you can understand people's motivators for work. 

I aim to seek different perspectives (so I can avoid being stubborn and always believing I am right!). Over time, this may result in me changing my original opinion or stance on something as I gather more data, insight, and perspective. I imagine this could be frustrating for my team when I originally had one opinion and now it's different. This is where the importance of transparency and alignment comes in. I'll aim to share as much context and data with you, and you should feel free to continue to ask questions and raise concerns if you don't understand why we're going in this direction.

As an Amazon alum, I built up a tendency to be specific when discussing impact. If someone describes something as "good", I will likely follow up with a series of questions such as (1) What does good mean and how do you know it's good?, (2) Where are you getting the data?, (3) What anecdotes do you have?, (4) What actions did you take to get it to good? This is just another example of me being curious and not interrogative. 

Thanks for taking the time to review my readme. Feel free to reach out with feedback or questions on any of the above.