About this Episode

Parent Driven Development

Episode 043: Pressure and Considerations Around Leaving a Job for Ethical Reasons.

Welcome, Nick Means!
Nickolas Means loves nothing more than a story of engineering triumph (except maybe a story of engineering disaster). When he's not stuck in a Wikipedia loop reading about plane crashes, he spends his days as a Senior Engineering Manager at GitHub working on Security and Compliance tooling for our users. He's also a co-host of the Managing Up podcast, a show about leading and managing in the world of technology. He works remotely from Austin, TX, and spends most of his spare time hanging out with his wife and kids, going for runs, or trying to brew the perfect cup of coffee.

01:54 How do you approach management with parents on your team?

Treating your team as you would want to be treated as a parent
Setting examples to your team as a manager
Evaluate the job performance on the work actually done, and not clock a few hours taken off for kid responsibilities
Flexibility and trust in team members and manager

07:12 Work life balance and work life integration

Work sometimes becomes an escape from parenting life
Self care for parents! No kids included, you need you

11:35 How do you encourage your team members to take time for themselves

Ask the right questions to figure out what will fill their cup?
As a manager, you’re more aware of the state of your team members and can identify things quicker
Applaud team members when you see them take the effort for PTO

17:18 When you’re the only parent on the team.. How to make others understand

Speak with kindness, set boundaries, have trust
Time zone issues
Setting boundaries with your team members
How to structure workflow with team members in different zones

26:20 Managers making it explicit that it is OK to be done when you leave your workstation

28:02 Managing for non-remote teams

Inflexibility when have to go into office
Complexity for parents when they are totally out of the convo when working in an office

31:40 Moms vs. Dads double standard

Putting family time on calendar
Single parenting, the lack of help

33:40 How can managers support parental leave

Encouraging more time for first time parents
The job to support parents starts when they decide to have kids, not just during the leave
Twins

37:50 Genius // fail

Chris Sexton, how do you spell drop? #fail
Josh had the sex talk…. but bombed on the timing with his daughter #geniusfail
Allison has a nice turkey day with kids and neighbors, building her more positive memories! #genius
Chris Arcand makes his nanny wait on her scheduled time off #fail
Mandy gets a puppy… and it's a beautiful new experiences to share with her daughter
Nick and his wife forget about homework… his son gets it done, but they all struggle the next day #fail