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Lane Shackleton
@lshackleton
Building at Coda & Superhuman, previously YouTube, Google, Bluebird Wines, Alaska Mountain Guides. Dad, maker, meditator, aspiring Sir Ernest.
Mill Valley, California
Joined December 2008
Posts
  • Pinned
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    Super fun talking product, teams and books with @lennysan, thanks for having me!
    Lane Shackleton (@lshackleton) is Chief Product Officer at @Coda_hq, where he’s led the product and design team for over eight years. Lane started his career as an Alaskan climbing guide, then as a reviewer of AdWords ads, eventually becoming a product specialist at Google, a
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    Does your team have a ‘presentation culture’ or a ‘memo culture’? After living through both, I’ve come to believe there is a better approach.. Thread:
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    Early in my career, I sucked at keeping up w/ people. I didn’t have a system. And personal CRMs never quite fit...or evolve with me. Instead, they reduce people down to LinkedIn profiles & transactional interactions. Here’s my take on a CRM that is a little more human.
    CRM vs HRM diagram
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    12) You can see what I mean in action here, with some real examples from Coda.
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    8) One CEO I interviewed memorably said: “It feels like the most important decisions in our company are jammed into the 100-pixel panel hanging off the side of our Google Docs. Is that really the best we can do?”
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    9) That leads to a key ritual at Coda & one of our secrets to shipping fast, with high quality: two-way writeups. Phase #3: Two-way writeups start w/ the premise that questions/feedback are key to fast iteration—not combing through Google Doc comments to make progress.
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    2) I had the goal of building a great network, but no approach to make it systematic. It reminds me of James Clear’s distinction between systems and goals. “You don’t rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems.”
    You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.
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    Amongst an otherwise chaotic year, welcomed a new baby girl to our family and feeling very thankful.
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    10) If you’re interested in reading more, check out:
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    3) Phase #2: One-way writeups, aka Amazon six-page memos In 2004, Jeff Bezos wrote his famous ‘No more Powerpoint’ memo, and Amazon started planning in doc-based memos.
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    Nap wake ups never get old
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    8a) You can make a ‘CRM’ more human just by structuring the information you record. 🔴 — a ‘Notes’ field in a CRM 🟢 — fields for their spouse & kids names 🟢 — field for you’ve learned from them 🟢 — field for opportunities to meaningfully help 🟢 — field for their superpowers
    HRM person view
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    7) I see 3 problems with one-way writeups: - You don’t know who has read them. - The feedback is unstructured and all looks the same. - The most important questions get buried in comment threads.
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    Replying to @lshackleton
    10) With two-way writeups, you can: - Know who’s read the doc, so you can get moving. - Gather structured feedback, then reflect as a group. - Focus on the most important questions, by getting the group to add theirs and vote on each others.