Intro

Mise en place is French for "put in place"... Chef's don’t start cooking until everything is literally in place. Mise en place reduces friction in the kitchen

• Good Habits, Bad Habits, Wendy Wood

The culinary process of mise en place is one that I had leveraged to organize my team at its inception. So it was fitting to once again leverage that process of preparation in planning to step away from that team for parental leave. Thanks to an immensely generous parental employee benefit, I've had the opportunity to be home, learning how to be a dad...and also picking up iOS development on the side.

Herein is my synthesis of how, as an engineering leader, I tried to ensure that everything was in place to empower my team to continue to succeed in my absence. As always, this is more reflective than prescriptive.

These are my personal opinions and as such are not intended to represent the specific viewpoints or policies of any employers past or present.

Strategy

Goal

Maintain progress and perhaps even increase momentum on the team's output during my leave.

Challenges

Inertia may overcome progress when…

• role definitions and assignments are excessively malleable or otherwise unclear. This is not conducive to taking ownership or making decisions decisively.
• engineers are unsupported in new roles, creating a protracted path to success

Advantages / Opportunities

Our team built momentum over a year+ of successful development, iteration, and documentation of execution systems.

Path forward

To achieve the goals and surmount the challenges, leverage the lead time before my child's then-presumptive arrival to

• Create clear lanes of accountability and support.
• Leverage opportunities for growth and experimentation created by my absence.
• Engender a spirit of adaptability within the team.