Dan Barak

I've started my professional life as an engineer, founded a startup, closed it, and led product management for **face.com**, that was acquired by **Facebook** (later Meta), where I spent several years learning how the greatest companies operate.

I then transitioned to lead a group of growth PMs at **Lyft**, founded another startup (**Stackbit**) that got acquired by **Netlify**, where I currently lead the entire product organization.


I'm Dan, an entrepreneur and a product person.

Open Tonal with Accessories, Source: Tonal website.

> [Tonal](https://fbuy.io/tonal/tpgnsqcx) makes sure that the only hard thing about weight training is moving the weight around. No overhead of going to the gym, building a program, keeping track of your limits and pushing you to safe personal bests. Tonal achieves that with the footprint of a mirror that can fit in almost any home. By solving for everything else, it increases the chance of forming great habits and being consistent.
>
> There are four main benefit categories:
>
> ⏱️ Removes any overheads leading up to your workout or during it.
>
> 🏋️ It's a versatile, world-class piece of equipment with cutting edge techniques that are hard to replicate in a regular gym.
>
> 📢 Tonal is a great personal coach that helps achieve your goals.
>
> 🏠 It has an extremely small and aesthetic footprint and can actually fit in most homes.

### ⏱️ Zero overhead

Going to the gym takes considerable extra time, that seems insignificant, but adds up. Most people have to drive to the gym, and even if it's 7-8 minutes, like it was the case for me, it's already 15 mins round trip, or 25% overhead of a one hour session. You can also look at it as an extra hour a week. This is even without considering parking that's not always trivial, occasional road work or other holdbacks, making sure the car is available, and so forth.
You're going out in public, which means doing anything from minimal effort to full dress-up on the presentability scale.

The overhead extends to the gym itself - if your responsibilities restrict you to rush hour, you'll often have to wait for machines to free up. If you're working with barbells, smith machines and others that need loading plates, those times can add up too.

Finally, coming up with a program, or refreshing it and keeping track of your exact weight limits per exercise is also an overhead, either at the gym, or outside of it when planning. I  often came to workouts doing the same exercises over and over, limiting my progress and just being boring.

Tonal is always just there, ready for you whenever you're ready. No need to get out of the house or get dressed, with the next workout a click away. It remembers your weights per exercise, will count repetitions, sets, total weight and time under tension for you, while also remembering which muscle groups are ready or strained from previous sessions. Oh, and changing exercises amounts to switching out the handles for a barbell or rope and moving the lever arms to a new position.

### 🏋️ Versatile world class equipment with advanced techniques

Gym equipment should be safe, first and foremost, which means good quality hardware that's well maintained and often also requires supervision from a trained spotter when working with free weights.

A home gym also needs to be versatile. While you can get to most muscle groups with a few exercises, that usually still means a rather large footprint that will take up considerable space and are often relegated to a garage or basement. Having too little versatility means being less effective and potentially getting bored and quitting more easily.

Finally, as you become more proficient, you will want to isolate muscle groups, try a wide variety of moments and even advanced techniques that load you up more on sections of your movement (the very end for example, or on the eccentric direction). Achieving those in the gym might require a coach or partner, or complex setups with chains, bands and so on.

Tonal takes care of most of these for you seamlessly:

*   Tonal is essentially a functional trainer or an advanced cable machine and it can do most of the exercises you can think of. Is that exactly the same as a full gym? No, not exactly, but good enough... I've felt the need to add a bit of "real" metal to my training regime after 2.5 years of exclusively working out with Tonal. I'd say that's pretty good, and Tonal still consists of the vast majority of my workout time.

*   The Tonal is extremely well made. I've had it for over 2.5 years without it needing maintenance even once. To the team's credit, when my friend encountered issues with his after a few years, maintenance and replacements were fast and efficient.

*   Tonal has built in spotter functionality, which means you can load up on your weights and set those PRs knowing the machine will drop the weight either at the click of a button, or when it automatically senses you need help.

*   Advanced training techniques - most people won't necessarily care, but the more you get into training the more you start understanding nuances and optimizing.

    *   For example - chains. Imagine a bench press exercise. You have quite a few levers to make it affect your muscles differently - you can change the weight on the bar, the number of repetitions and sets you do, your grip on the bar, and the angle of the bench. For most folks it's more than enough, but you can do advanced variations like adding heavy chains connected to your barbell. The trick here is that part of the chain is resting coiled on the floor in the barbell's bottom position, so you don't feel their weight. The higher you lift the bar, the more of the chain comes off the ground, making your barbell heavier and hence the exercise more difficult at the end of the motion.

    *   Another example would be an eccentric mode - you've probably encountered this while doing an exercise you couldn't do on your own, like your very first pull up. Someone would help you get to the top (or you'd jump there, use a band, etc.) and your job would be to get down in control and as slowly as possible. This mode is based on the principle that if I gave you a pair of slightly-heavier-than -you-can-lift dumbbells, you'd still be able to lower them down with control, getting you some muscular benefits (aka gains!). Doing this in the gym is doable, but very cumbersome. You'd usually need a partner, and / or load and unload weights... with digital weights that can detect tension on the cable and understand when it's the end of your movement, then change the weight instantly and automatically.

    *   Finally the last technique is burnout. For any weight you lift, you'll hit the point where you can't make another repetition. Your only option then is to stop. You can decide to rest and do another set, or you can also try to lower the weight quickly and then try to continue immediately. Many claim that this is the best way to get muscle growth. Taking a dip as an example, you can start with regular dips and when you cannot do another one, you can add a band to help you do a few more (effectively lowering your body weight) and when that fails you can use a prop to climb and start from the top position of the dip and lower yourself slowly, until you can't even do that. I've once had a coach that told me to close my eyes as I was nearing failure on a bench press (with a smith machine, which means the bar is following a rail, making it safer and impossible to imbalance) and asked me to always do "1 more rep", which I miraculously was always able to do despite it feeling like each was the last I could do ... what I couldn't see was that he was taking weights off with each rep, ending up with a completely empty bar that I was barely able to lift with the last rep. Again here Tonal offers you that technique for free and without you even having to think about it... it's the decision of the coach.

### 📢 Personal Coach

The best way to get in shape and improve your workouts is with a personal coach - they keep you accountable to keep showing up, they observe and correct your form so you don't get hurt and become more efficient (they will also spot you), they keep track of your max weights and push you to new PRs in a safe way.

Their only drawback is that it's a personalized and hence expensive service.

Tonal manages to serve as a great personal coach that's always with you at a fraction of the cost (and you can always tap a live coach to set up a custom program or get more help). Here's how it does it:

*   First is the vast library of workouts and programs that Tonal offers, that fit every single goal, intensity and timeframe you have. You can share your goals, like increasing strength, getting lean, etc. as well as how much time you prefer your workouts to be and it'll show you all the options (and there are a lot of other options to filter by).

*   As we know decisions are always hard, so the great thing about choosing a program is that you're all set for the next 4 weeks and the only thing you need to do is turn the Tonal on and the next workout is just there for you.

*   Like a super diligent coach it remembers exactly how much you lift per exercise, keep track of trends, and can adjust a one-time "recovery mode" if you're extra tired. Since it also senses how difficult the current weight is for you, it can either assist or slightly increase the weight for you. Since I refused to use a notebook and keep track of my weights, I would always guess, spend some reps at the wrong weight and just not move forward.

*   Form feedback is also super useful - simply through its internal sensors it can make suggestions about your range of motion, speed, balance between sides, etc. Every motion has a coaching demoing while you do yours to allow you to follow it easily. You can also connect your phone to Tonal and position it to the side for example, and you'll see your live camera view from your phone on Tonal's screen, being able to adjust. Lastly, Tonal has an amazing community on Facebook where members can share questions and you can often see "please give me feedback on my form" posts. 

*   Here's an example of a split squat exercise I did, showing the power output over the reps, the range of motion for each leg, and I can also see the difference between the sets if I cycle through them. 
    ![](/images/IMG_9728.jpeg)

*   To cap it off, as you'd expect Tonal has very tasteful and subtle gaming mechanics that encourage consistency:

    *   It counts your cumulative pounds lifted (I'm getting close to 6 million pounds and am very excited about it),

    *   It maintains your streak - I'm currently at a 138 weeks streak, which means that ever since I got my Tonal about 2.5 years ago, I have worked out at least once a week (often every day).  This pushed me to work out when I didn't feel great and would have opted out otherwise, and it got me to use their app to do off-Tonal workouts while traveling for business or pleasure for more than a week.

    *   There's a strength score that tracks your progress (I'm close to 200% stronger than when I started), a workouts count (it also knows to include other workouts you might have done like running, biking, etc.), movement count, etc.

    *   Special occasions grant you badges ("Icing on the Cake" is the one for those who don't miss a workout on their birthdays)

    *   Connectivity to other apps, like Strava, increase social sharing and notifications make sure you don't forget your favorite workouts.

### 🏠 Extremely small and aesthetic footprint

Home gyms are really great, but they do require a lot of space. Unless you're absolutely obsessed with working out (or very rich) and can dedicate a room in your house for a home gym, you'll be relegated to a garage or a basement, and often be restricted there too.

The Tonal can aesthetically fit and take up zero space in your home. It goes on your wall and protrudes only a couple of inches. While working out you do need a free square of space around it (officially about 7'x7', and I personally have a bit less and still haven't encountered an exercise I can't do) but that's easily manageable.

Mine is my home office and so every time I get up or sit down, it's staring me in the face and in my mind it asks "have you worked out today?". This technique of positioning good choices in your daily routine is a well know hack to create the habits and behaviors you want. For example, by placing a bowl of apples on a highly trafficked section of your kitchen counter, your family is likely to eat more apples, rather than having to intentionally have to search and get a chair to bring that sweet bar from the top shelf.

> The bottom line is that [Tonal](https://fbuy.io/tonal/tpgnsqcx) removes any and all excuses for not working out. There's no overhead, no intervening circumstances like weather, opening hours and traffic to hold you back, the plan of what to do and the right weights are already locked it, so you can just go.

Note: this is not a sponsored post, the links to Tonal are my personal referral code that provide you with a discount and me with a few months of free membership.


Tonal is a full advanced gym and personal coach, that aesthetically fits in most homes, and it'll change your life.

[Meta's smart glasses](https://www.meta.com/smart-glasses/) 👓 proved to be a real game changer for me, especially as an active, who also happens to be a parent and loves taking photos and videos. It's a great fit for many others,  but this isn't a marketing or sponsored post, so I'll just relate my experience. I've been using the glasses for over two years, currently on the second generation.

🕶️ SUMMARY CENTRAL 🕶️

*   Capture good quality photos and videos while experiencing the world directly without a screen intermediary

*   The camera placement provides an exact point of view experience that makes reliving the moment much more vivid

*   Unobtrusive design that looks just like regular glasses that you can wear anywhere. It also helps capture candid moments without people posing (but there's a clear indication when capturing, so it's not about sneakyness)

*   Always ready, button or voice-activated, very fast and doesn’t require an additional device

*   Open-ear speakers for safe listening to music and audiobooks while running, walking, etc.

*   Suitable for making calls with better voice quality due to microphone placement closer to your mouth

*   While not cheap at a little above $300, they're still in the same range of regular high quality sunglasses.

The one feature I regret losing with the new version of the app is the ability to create a short summary video from all the videos and photos you've taken. It was much more digestible and I felt better sharing a clip with music rather than my very audible panting while running 🙂

If you'd like to learn more, here's all of the above in a bit more detail. I've tried separating it into clear sections for easy browsing.

**🌎 Experience the World, Not Just the Screen**

When using a smartphone to capture moments, you often find yourself focusing on the screen to keep the subject in frame. This means you’re not fully present in the moment, but rather watching a reproduction of it on your device. With Meta Smart Glasses, you can engage with the live action happening, hands free, in front of you, enjoying a richer and more authentic experience, also know as life.

**👀 Capture Life as You See It**

One of the standout features of the Meta Smart Glasses is the camera placement. Positioned right next to your eyes, the camera captures footage from your exact point of view. It's a stark difference when compared to other devices like helmet-mounted or chest-mounted cameras (and obviously handheld devices). When you watch the footage later, it feels like you’re truly reliving the moment, seeing it just as you did the first time.

**👶 Unobtrusive Recording**

The unobtrusiveness of the indication light is another highlight. While it lets people know when they’re being recorded, it’s much less intrusive than pulling out a phone or a camera. This is especially beneficial when photographing or recording kids or candid moments, as people tend to act more naturally without a device in their face. I'm sure that just like me, you've tried to get your kids to make the cute face again, but getting the forced-camera smile instead.

**⚡️ Always Ready and Easy to Use**

The Meta Smart Glasses are always ready to capture the moment. They are voice-activated and can be controlled with a simple tap, eliminating the need to pull out an additional device. This convenience ensures that you never miss a moment, as the glasses are always on you and ready to go.

**🎧 More Than Just a Camera**

These glasses are not limited to just taking photos and videos. They come equipped with open-ear speakers, allowing you to listen to music, audiobooks, and podcasts without blocking your hearing. This makes them safe to use while running or walking, as you can stay aware of your surroundings. The speakers are loud enough for personal use but not disruptive to others. The first generation called RayBan Stories had considerably lower max volume which made it hard for me to hear when on anything but neighborhood streets or nature trails, but it's now completely solved with the second generation.

**🎤 Superior Call Quality**

Making calls with Meta Smart Glasses is another great and unexpected advantage. The microphone, being closer to your mouth, provides better voice quality compared to traditional earbuds. This ensures clear and crisp communication, whether you’re making calls.

**💰 Affordable and Accessible**

While Meta Smart Glasses are not cheap, they are priced reasonably compared to other tech-enabled devices, as well as high quality glasses. Costing around $300, they are more affordable than most modern smartphones. Considering the range of features they offer, they provide great value for their price, making them accessible for everyday use.

**📱 Convenient and Private**

The glasses are rechargeable, have ample memory, and sync automatically with an app (and no, you don't have to post anything to Facebook, Instagram or any other Meta products) allowing you to manage your media effortlessly. The video clips, which can be up to 60 seconds, are easy to share and digest if you do want to.

**📸 High-Quality Camera**

The second-generation Meta Smart Glasses feature a 12-megapixel camera with image stabilization. This ensures high-quality, stable photos and videos, even when you’re on the move. While it may not match the top smartphones, the quality is still very impressive, and the convenience is just unparalleled.

**🔮 A Glimpse into the Future**

While these glasses do not feature augmented reality, they do have AI capabilities that can identify objects in photos and provide information about them. This hints at the potential future applications of the device, but to be honest, I haven't found any real life uses yet beyond the novelty effect.

**📋 Conclusion**

I definitely recommend these smart glasses to most people I meet. There are a ton of use cases for anyone who loves capturing and sharing moments of their lives, as close to the way they've experienced them. Speaking from my personal experience and usage, they are perfect for active people that love capturing glimpses of their experiences without interrupting the moment, for parents that love to candidly take photos and videos of their kids, and for avid podcasts and audio books lovers. Too bad there's no referral program 🙂


Meta's and Ray-Ban's Smart Glasses Are A Game Changer

Stay up-to-date with my words ✍️

Originally posted while I was still at Lyft in 2018.

This post is direct and personal, so let me introduce myself. My name is Dan Barak — I’ve been at Lyft for almost 2 years, supporting the Growth Platforms teams, after spending more than 4 years at Facebook. I’m also very passionate about recruiting and interviewing and am actively working to make these processes better at Lyft.

At Lyft, we view hiring as one of the most important and leveraged responsibilities PMs have. Our goals are to both hire great talent, as well as provide the best experience for candidates.

That probably sounded a little too vague and corporate-y, so let’s bring it down to earth:

- We want you to succeed — the interviewer is on your side! Hard to believe? Not really… your success usually means the conversation is stimulating and interesting (we’re not here to check boxes) and we’d love to work together.

- You should know what to expect. This post is the first step and we have awesome recruiters that will guide you through the process. Moreover, each interviewer will open the conversation with an overview of what this interview is about and their expectations. If you feel you don’t know what to expect, please let your recruiter know. This isn’t a loophole to ask for the question ahead of time, but nice try :)

- The interview is mutual. This process is a representation of us as a company and we hope you like what you see. Deciding which company to work for the next several years of your life is an important moment for you and we want you to make an informed decision about how the next phase of your career.

**Lyft’s Core Values**

Bear with me… you should already know I’m not about empty slogans :)

![](https://www.danbarak.com/images/1_9BBx6upFv1m5KQLMrt0H_w.webp)

You’ll get plenty of chances to prove you embody the latter two, but start by being yourself!

I cannot stress this enough — we’re not looking for people that fit a mold and diversity is our secret superpower when it comes to creating great products people love and use effectively. One way to practice this is by expressing honest opinions. I once interviewed someone who took hundreds of rides with Lyft and claimed our app was perfect, with nothing to improve on… that’s either not being thoughtful or not expressing your real thoughts.

Here’s an easy sell: being your authentic self means you have one less thing to stress over and focus on, leaving you free to think about the problems at hand more clearly.

Harder sell: yes, you definitely want to be accepted to all the positions you’ve applied for and choose between them, but you also don’t want to spend the next few years pretending to be someone you are not. Nobody wins in that situation!

**General interview structure and guidelines**

We’re trying to get the most signal about your ability to be a successful PM at Lyft in a short amount of time, so using that time efficiently is very important.

That means, for me personally, I probably won’t chat you up as we get started, since I find I get less meaningful signal during “small talk”. I will try to put you at ease by clearly explaining what we’re about to do and acting like a human being that cares about you. Each PM has their own style, but remember that each of them wants to make the most out of your mutual time.

**A word about unconscious bias**

It’s assumptions and shortcuts our brain makes when we don’t have enough information, and it’s something we go to great lengths trying to prevent, including dedicated in house training sessions. For example, if you and I have the same hobby, my mind might play tricks on me (“this person is like you and that’s good”) and add signal that has nothing to do with you being a good PM.

We’re don’t believe in “greater minds think alike, greater minds think like me”. Diversity across the board is our secret power, remember?

**Interacting with your interviewer**

Let’s start with a reminder — your success is our success. And a successful interview means we both got the signal needed to help us make a better decision. Since time is short, we might cut you off (as gently as possible) if we’ve either gotten the information we needed regarding the specific rubric we were aiming for, or the conversation is getting a bit off track and we need to bring it back to the focus. Please don’t see this as rudeness, but as us attempting to make the most out of our time together.

For most of our interviews you don’t need any domain expertise. Of course, if you’re applying for a senior PM of payments infra and claim 15 years of experience in the field, we’ll test that, but that’s a special case.

If any understanding of the problem space is assumed or needed, the interviewers will help with the setup and context so you’re on equal grounds with everyone else. It is a good idea to have used ride sharing at least once (we do provide you with credits to get to our office) and have a very general idea about the complexity of marketplaces.

The interviewer will ask you questions and might offer pushbacks or guidance as is required.

Remember my tip about being yourself? Your aim is **not** to please the interviewer, make them feel smart, or anything of the sort. If you think the guidance makes sense, by all means work together with them as you would with any fellow PM, but also feel free to stick to your guns and push back, with ample reasoning.

Your interviewer cares much more about the “why” over the “what”, so treat them as you would a team member you’re trying to bring along with you on a journey, not as an interrogator you have to appease with the “right” answer.

Finally, a few minutes before the end of your time, it’ll be your turn to ask us questions. Use that time to try to figure out if you would like to come work for Lyft and spend the next several years with people like your interviewer. As I’ve mentioned — we will not sugarcoat answers just to reel you in (and then mutually discover later it’s a mismatch). Ask us about challenges, culture, etc., but please don’t ask us about some niche detail of our product or roadmap — we might not be able to divulge that information, nor will it give you with the signal you need.

![](<https://www.danbarak.com/images/1_7yaSTI_36o2kVQDcUFXJPw%20(1).png>)

**Interview Roles**

Being a PM isn’t easy and requires many sets of skills, some more easily quantifiable than others and so we’re focusing on getting signal on everything we care about through several interview types.

**Product interview**

The questions we’re trying figure out during this interview are:

Can you turn big ambiguous problems into great products?

Do you have user empathy, UX chops, the ability to build an MVP?

What can you expect?

Usually a prompt about a problem space, often related to ride sharing and transportation, but equally likely about any other domain. You’ll play the PM leading this space and trying to decide if we should build anything here or leave it for others to solve, what would we build first and what would that teach us and finally what could be a long term vision.

Remember the why trumps the what — there’s no correct solution that you have to get to in order to pass… it’s much more about showing us how you’d approach such a problem and lead a team to solve it.

While starting at a high level, this interview can drill down into specific flows and interactions with the product.

Lastly, yes, we know that like any good PM you’ll look at tons of data before embarking on the journey and you’ll do user research and focus groups — you don’t need to mention it and it’s fine to make assumptions that are supported by solid arguments.

**Analytics Interview**

The questions we’re trying figure out during this interview are:

Will you use data to find and solve problems, prioritize correctly?

Can you work well with engineers / analysts to run experiments, debug problems?

What to expect?

We’d like to see you’re comfortable with data and you use it regularly. If that’s to construct a useful dashboard, to understand what might be wrong with your product and to decide what to build next.

You won’t need to write any sql in this interview, but will be expected to do some back of napkin math to estimate opportunities and make tradeoffs.

It’s important to be specific in this interview and not hand-wavy. If you want to measure impact, please specify what metric exactly and how to measure it. Assume that some of the people you interact with are either junior, or can’t necessarily read your mind and hence accuracy is of the utmost importance.

**Leadership Interview**

The questions we’re trying figure out during this interview are:

Can you build, motivate and support a team?

Can you deal with ambiguity? Get through tough times and learn from failure?

What to expect?

While this interview is less structured than the rest, it’s still a very important piece of the puzzle. You’ll probably get a mixture of questions about your work and interactions in the past, as well as some hypothetical situations that might arise.

We already know you’re awesome as you’ve made it this far, so while tempted to share everything from your past positions so we know you best, make sure you’re driving the right points across.

First sign that you’re going a bit off track — you’re not coming up for air and your interviewer hasn’t been able to put a word in in 10 mins. Long monologues are usually not a sign of great communication skills… rather, try to make sure you understand what your interviewer is asking, answer concisely and validate you’re both on the same page.

Please be truthful — we know everyone makes mistakes and we even celebrate those learning moments. Being able to bring up failures and how you dealt with them is a good thing. If you seem too good to be true, we’ll suspect you are :)

**That’s about it.**

If you have any questions, please get in touch with your recruiter. They will be delighted to help you with anything. Please let us know how we did at the end, regardless if the process continues or not. We truly believe interviewing is the most leveraged thing we can do for the future of Lyft and want to constantly get better.

Looking forward to seeing you roam our halls!

[Link to original post, October 2018.](https://medium.com/lyft-engineering/what-to-expect-when-interviewing-as-a-pm-at-lyft-fd13634ca381)


WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN INTERVIEWING AS A PRODUCT MANAGER

It feels like the Apple Watch celebrates almost every non-stationary action, while my Garmin Fenix 6 is outright abusive. But which one gets me more motivated and what leadership lessons can you learn from both, either as the watch (the leader) or as the wearer (the individual contributor).

I'll cover the range between both approaches and provide some practical advice how to find your own leadership style, as well as how to adjust to others' leadership style in a way that keeps you happy and productive. I probably won't solve all your problems with a post, but if you'd like to discuss further, please drop me a line.

> _"Unproductive" is often my Garmin's response to a near-death exercise I've attempted. "Maintaining" is the norm and I've seen "detraining" more than once. When it's generous I get "productive" and twice in four years of multiple runs a week I even got "peaking". It works for me. Sometimes._

Most of you are probably familiar with "closing the rings" on the Apple Watch. There are three rings representing a movement goal, a standing goal and an exercise goal. Each person can set their own goals of course. The watch prompts you towards the goal and celebrates with great fanfare each achievement.

By comparison, Garmin indicates when a goal is met (e.g. steps per day), but you have to check for it. Moreover, there's a much more important score, called the VO2 Max, that's pushed into most watch faces and post-activity scorecards that quickly becomes the de-facto thing you're measuring. It's absolute, so you can't "set it" and it'll tell you exactly what your fitness score is compared to the general population.

In my early days with the watch I actually discarded a few activities that I knew would lower my VO2 Max score, until I realized what I was doing and stopped. I realized what I was doing, analyzed the situation and my goals and adjusted accordingly. We'll soon get to how you can do the same when faced with a reaction that doesn't make sense.

#### **FAKE YOU'RE AN ATHLETE, UNTIL YOU ARE ONE**

I got the Garmin watch when I started working out seriously about four years ago. It wasn't the "get the expensive gym membership" effect I was going for, but the tracking of data and seeing the progress that motivated me. Garmin is usually a marker of athletes, so some people buy it to feel like they are an athlete and slowly become one as their identity starts shifting. It's a very powerful method that has worked for many, but it has also failed for many, as such changes take time, and without seeing enough improvement early on many people also drop off.

#### **FAKE SUCCESS UNTIL YOU MAKE IT**

I fondly call this method, the pit of success. Success is addictive and the more you have of it, the more you want to keep feeling it, and celebrating every single success, as long as it's not completely meaningless, will push you to get more. As the goal post is set further and further in small increments, great achievements can be unlocked.

> \*My personality and upbringing makes me respond much better to an objective assessment of my skills and celebrating only major achievements. This isn't for everyone, and sometimes it even isn't for me, so as we proceed into exploring leadership lessons, the most important thing to keep in mind is to read the situation and adjust accordingly. \*

#### **CHOOSING YOUR LEADERSHIP STYLE**

First, realize that you probably have a "built-in" style that's natural for you when interacting with others. Often, it'll be the style you treat yourself with, but not always (some folks can be very critical of themselves but lenient on others). Now write it down somewhere and add some examples of how you tend to react and give feedback. Are you happy with what you wrote down? Don't rush to change it if you're not. To complete your assessment, I would now try to recall how are other reacting to you and if possible also ask them for direct and guided feedback (when you came to me with this accomplishment, did you feel I acknowledged it properly, would you have preferred I reacted differently, etc.). Even after this assessment, don't rush into changing things. Start by "advertising" your style to others you work or interact with. Some people might call this "publishing your manual" and it allows others to calibrate to you.

My Master's degree advisor is a very matter-of-fact person, a brilliant thinker who expects the same of his students and is stingy with his praise. Not acutely so, but enough to make my young self insecure after getting back a draft of my first academic paper coated in bright crimson. Luckily other students in the group were kind enough to let me know their first one was much worse and this is actually quite high praise.

Adjusting your style based on the person you're currently dealing with and their state of mind (and yours) will often achieve better results.

If you're managing a high performer who had just gotten her second promotion in a row, you could be more critical and focus on things to improve. But talking to a great past performer who is currently dealing with a few personal issues, you would probably do better to get him in that winning streak.

People are also seldomly self aware, both of their performance at work and how they treat themselves, so as a leader, you'll have to do some digging and assessment for them to understand what works and doesn't.

While A/B testing isn't really an option, you can go on a journey with them.

Pick a low stakes situation and analyze it. For example, don't do it on the most important meeting of the year with the CEO of your most important client.

Clearly declare this is an exploration of a situation to help both of you become better and work better together and make sure they're in the right state of mind for it.

Now try to look at the situation from various points of view - how could this be perceived as a huge success? Could it also be a catastrophic failure seen without some context, or from someone else's point of view?

Try to take several types of feedback and ask them what would they have thought about the situation of you said "Great job", or "This is the best darn performance I've even seen", or "This was good, have you thought about doing it this way next time", or even "It could have gone better, can you come up with a plan for next time?".

#### **ADJUSTING TO YOUR LEADER'S STYLE**

The reality is that you can often only affect your behavior and reactions, and it's important make sure you're comfortable with whatever your leader is throwing your way.

Taking stock is the first step - make a self-assessment of how you react to encouragements, feedback and reactions from your peers and superiors. To make sure that you're being as realistic as possible, add real examples from your recent experiences to back up your assessment, and try to also find counter examples. Not all your examples must support your self view as you're bound to develop over time and not every period of your life is the same.

In particular, try to think about influential people in your life with whom you've interacted with and left a great impression vs. less so. Can you glimpse which type of leader they were when it comes to encouraging and motivating you?

Let's be realistic, you might come up with a big fat "it depends" or "I don't know exactly", and that's okay. Keep this in mind as you go about your days and see if you can analyze new situations and how you respond to them.

Just like leaders often share their own "operating manual", you can do the same. Since some folks have larger egos, you might have to be more subtle about how you share it, since a direct "please work this way with me" could be perceived badly. Do make sure to be rather open and communicative, allowing your thoughtful leaders to decipher how you react to their feedback.

Doing so in the moment is great if the situation isn't too tense for either of you. A good way to go about it is to "put words in your leaders mouth". An example of this could be:

"I heard you said that I did well in this executive presentation, and next time I should control the room a bit more. If you had to objectively rate my performance for this specific meeting, would this be an eight out of ten, or a six out of ten? Or if I ran every meeting for the rest of the quarter this way, would you be satisfied?"

To diffuse any possible tension, you can also take some notes and review this later in your one on ones, or during a review process, etc. It's usually easier to look at things that happened in the past more objectively and with less emotion. Furthermore, if there are patterns or similar things happening, it's easier to see in aggregate.

Wherever you land, whether you were able to get your leader to adjust to your preferences to some extent, you'll also have to calibrate your reactions. The simplest example is to create this immediate translation in your head, so if you're a person who needs a lot of encouragement and your leader praises very seldomly, you'll realize that when she says "okay, next challenge is", you'll hear "fantastic job, you've clearly met all my expectations and I'm about to entrust you with a larger one".

Sadly, some personalities and styles will never work and the translation function cannot and should not cover unbridgeable gaps. If you feel this is the case, moving on to a different leader or organization might be the only solution.

**Just like I'll have to sell one of these watches soon. Right?!**


ARE YOU AN APPLE WATCH OR A GARMIN WATCH LEADER?

Today at Kung Fu practice my son ran through a pretty complex routine and at its end, the Shifu (teacher) asked him if he knew what was the problem with it. I was super proud to hear him uncharacteristically answer "no, I'm not sure" and I immediately reinforced his decision to take the harder route, admit that he doesn't know, and ask for guidance.

Questions like "do you know what problem is?" and "is it clear?", often illicit us to respond affirmatively or simply keep silent, because it's hard to admit that you didn't understand something and what it might imply about your mental abilities. Yet often not speaking up to make sure there's full alignment and understanding on both sides yields frustration, anger and much worse down the line.

I'll explain why this behavior really is "dangerous" to your career and what to do instead to avoid these dangers, as well as coach your team through them.

#### **WHY DO WE HESITATE TO ASK FOR CLARIFICATION?**

Everyone wants to be perceived as smart, both by their peers and in their own mind's eye, and not understanding something right away can make one feel lacking. Admitting the fact we didn't fully understand something, especially to a figure of authority like a manager or a professor, or simply to someone we care about, can be a daunting task.

Try to remember how many times a professor was explaining a concept and while you didn't fully get it, your mind went something like this: "oh no, I didn't get it... should I ask her to explain again? Clearly the entire class got it because no one else is speaking up... I don't want to hold them back and have everyone think I'm stupid...". Later in life you've probably realized that this thought was shared by at least half the people in class, while the professor also remained frustrated thinking "why are they not asking anything? Did they get it? Perhaps I'm explaining this so badly that no one understands but has given up on asking?"

The same thing happens in our personal and work life. We tend to forget, both as managers and employees that no one has developed mind-reading or mind-projecting abilities, so making sure both parties are aligned isn't trivial.

We all know the scenario: a person delegates a task to another person and thinks the task is pretty well defined. In most cases while it probably is not, the outcome will be still good.

**How come?**

Well, it's probably not well defined in the sense that a genie could easily find a way to misinterpret it if it was formulated as a wish (we all know genies specialize in finding every way to misinterpret a wish).

So how come the outcome ends up being acceptable? Because most such handoffs are made with enough joint context. People know each other at work, they have company values to go by and usually work on the same team, so gaps can be easily filled.

Most of us have also experienced another version of this interaction though, where a misalignment resulted in the wrong thing being delivered, and that's why with mission critical projects, extra care is taken to ensure the deliverables are clear, timelines are accurate to the hour, etc.

The bottom line is that our minds take many shortcuts and assumptions into consideration as part of their routine operation and these are further reinforced by just working most of the time.

#### **WHEN SHOULD YOU ASK FOR CLARIFICATION? A CHECKLIST FOR BOTH SIDES**

1.  High stakes, like a critical presentation, a milestone delivery, a customer meeting, and so forth.

2.  Minimal context. This happens with a new team member or manager most often that doesn't know you or the team's work very well.

3.  A truly confusing explanation was given, which can happen for oh so many reasons. If you're really not clear, please ask.

4.  Finally, lack of interaction from the receiving party. If you've just talked for ten minutes straight and the other person didn't have anything to say, double-check yourself.

#### **HOW SHOULD YOU ASK FOR CLARIFICATION? TIPS AND TRICKS**

Sometimes a "could you please clarify" will do the trick, but not always. You might also hesitate to use it because of all the insecurities we've mentioned before and stalling the conversation/interaction.

Sadly, some people when asked to clarify will just repeat the same thing again, maybe slower, maybe louder, and sometimes add some detail. But if it's still not clear, the chances of asking for another clarification are slim.

> A much better way is to repeat back the explanation or request.
>
> This has multiple benefits:
>
> 1.  It shows people you've listened and paid attention
>
> 2.  It really reflects your understanding of the situation and helpful details can be added
>
> 3.  The conversation isn't stalled but moves forward in a beneficial way

#### **HOW TO MAKE SURE YOU WERE UNDERSTOOD?**

Remember that you usually have more control or power in the situation if you are the one explaining a subject or delegating a task. Ultimately it's your responsibility to make sure you've communicated properly, and that includes validating the information has been internalized.

Just like you can control if you're asked questions at the end of a presentation by asking either "do you have any questions?" which almost guarantees no questions, or "what questions do you have?", so you should also own proper understanding.

Don't hesitate to ask the recipient, in a gentle and constructive way as suggested below, to elaborate or repeat the information themselves.

Please take extra care, because simply asking someone to repeat something back might be rude or show a lack of confidence in their abilities, so find a good spin on it. Explain how this is a complex subject that requires context you're not sure they have, or that you think you could have done a better job explaining the topic, or clarifying the stakes and confess paranoia.

Instead of asking for a reiteration, an even better approach could be to ask what their plan of execution is, whether they plan to show you a draft, when you could expect that draft, do they need your help, etc.

Did you ever experience this situation? Do you have other methods to deal with it? I'd love to know.

> -Dan


THE DANGERS OF "YES" IN KUNG FU AND YOUR CAREER

Interview Coaching

I'm excited to help startup founders make fewer mistakes than I've made. Stackbit is the second startup I've cofounded. I've been employee #6 at face.com that got acquired by Facebook and advised multiple startups at various stage.

I'm Dan, an entrepreneur and a product person.

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