This is a guide to working with me: what I ask of others and what you can expect from me. The concept is modeled on Urs Hölzle's Personal User Manual, a document where he explains to others how to best work with and interact with him.
In return, I will work to listen with curiosity, make my requests clear, and take responsibility for how I show up.
I often notice what needs work before I say what is working.
My feedback often comes as brief, specific corrections. I may focus on what needs to change without restating what already works. A correction is not necessarily an assessment of the whole. I'll work to make my overall assessment clear.
That said, if my feedback is landing as personal rather than useful, tell me. I care about the work, but I also care about the relationship.
Some of my best work happens in conversation. I often clarify my own thinking by pressure-testing ideas with other people.
When I think out loud, you do not need to turn every idea into an assignment. Let's distinguish exploration, advice, and a decision.
I also like hearing other people's half-baked thoughts. You do not need to have everything polished before bringing it to me. In fact, I'd usually rather be involved earlier.
I sometimes move into problem-solving before I understand what someone needs. I'm working on listening with more curiosity and less agenda.
Tell me if you want help thinking, help acting, or simply to be heard. I also have a responsibility to notice how my approach lands and adjust.
I have enormous respect for people with high agency: people who take ownership, move quickly, make things happen, and treat obstacles as problems to solve rather than reasons to stop.
Use the context and resources available to you. Find what you can, resolve routine obstacles, and carry the work through to completion. Bring me in when you need my judgment, a decision, or context you cannot reasonably obtain.
I do not believe great work starts perfect. I believe great work usually follows this path:
done → improved → improved again → excellent
Bring me drafts, prototypes, half-formed thoughts, ugly first versions, and real data. I would rather react to something concrete than discuss the theoretical perfect answer.
I begin by trusting that you know your job and can do it well. You do not need to earn that. It is the default.
I also hold a high bar. Trust is not a substitute for it — I assume competence, and I expect the work to show it.
Trust depends on doing what we say, being honest about reality, and learning when things go wrong.
Bad news early is collaboration. Bad news late is damage control.
If something might go wrong, tell me early. I will usually become calmer, not more upset, if I know while there is still time to help.
I am introspective and highly motivated to get better. I respect people who take feedback seriously, update their behavior, and keep raising their own bar.
I do not expect perfection. I do expect learning.
I prefer clear, honest communication over excessive diplomacy.
You do not need to manage me with vague language. Say the thing. Tell me what you recommend and what you need.
Be precise about what we know, what we infer, and what we hope will happen. Give people accurate credit.
Make the strongest case the evidence supports, and be clear about its limits. I trust judgment more when I can see the uncertainty behind it.
My written replies are often short. Brevity by itself does not signal frustration. If something needs to change, I aim to say so directly.
I do not want to be blindly agreed with. I value people who can push back, sharpen the argument, and tell me where I am wrong.
Bring your own recommendation, including when it differs from mine. Explain what drives it and what would change your mind.
I'll work to understand your reasoning and be clear about what would change mine.
In general, my preference is:
in person → video → phone → written updates
Important, nuanced, or emotionally loaded topics are usually better live. Written communication is great for documentation, decisions, and follow-up, but not always for resolving ambiguity.
I tend to feel urgency earlier and more intensely than most people. When something matters, I want forward motion quickly.
This can look like impatience. Sometimes it is. But the underlying driver is usually that I can see time, momentum, or trust being wasted.
The best way to work with this is to show visible progress: a next step, an owner, a deadline, a partial answer, or a clear blocker.
If my urgency conflicts with another commitment, name the tradeoff and recommend a priority. I want us to choose deliberately. If I add something urgent, help me see what needs to move.
If no one seems to own something important, I tend to assume it is mine to fix. This can be useful, but it can also become overwhelming and disempowering.
Make ownership explicit. If you own something, say so. If you need help, say that too.
Asking for help does not always come naturally to me. When I ask, a clear response matters: whether you can take it on, what you understand the request to be, and when you can follow through.
If you cannot, tell me directly so I can make another plan. I'll work on making the ask explicit.
Back-to-back meetings and constant context-switching drain me. If you catch me at the end of a long meeting day, I may sound tired, terse, or scattered.
That is usually about energy, not about you.
The best interactions with me are focused, candid, and high-signal.
I am not at my best as a process-heavy manager. I am much more useful when you bring me:
Keep routine updates brief. Bring me the decisions, questions, or obstacles where I can help.