New Job New Blog

This blog has existed for a long time. The first entry is nearly thirteen years old. I’ve always been a big believer in blogging and I have met many people and learned many things from blogging. It kind of tailed off a bit as I got busier and I haven’t really blogged at all since I got my new job in January 2023 (just one entry since then).

I used to blog technical stuff, bits of code and whatnot. I don’t actually do that any more and I unconsciously thought that my blogging days are behind me. But in the last 6 months or so I’ve got more and more interested in thinking about and describing what happens when somebody with a technical job (like my old job) gets a substantially less technical job (like my current job). Although I still talk about data science and think about data science most of the day, I never write any code any more and to be honest a decent chunk of the stuff that goes on in my team is a little beyond my grasp technically.

I’m going to start blogging some of the stuff I learn and think about. I do not know if there is any audience for this blog whatsoever however I’m writing it for the version of me that existed in 2017 when I started down the “manager” road just in case there are other 2017 Chris Beeleys out there who will find this and find it useful. For those of you in the know the content will be very basic indeed. No great insights follow, just my own meandering journey to get where I am.

So, a fairly random example to get us started. One of the things that I found really hard as I started to lead a data science team was that your failures are personal. I came from a world where your code ran without errors or it didn’t, your analysis was robust or it wasn’t. Suddenly people were looking at me and thinking:

  • Has this person got my best interests at heart?
  • Will this person help me in my career or lead me down a blind alley?
  • Will this person take credit for my work and put blame on me, or the other way around?
  • Do I believe in the things this person believes?
  • Will this person help me to work at a pace I feel comfortable, or pressure me to work more and harder?

Put simply, they were asking themselves, do I trust this person? I found this scrutiny very worrying at first, and constantly second guessed myself as to what I should do and say to build trust and to sell what I thought and what I wanted them to do.

If you’re in this boat, I advise you to relax. If you recruited them, they came to your team for a reason. And if you didn’t, well, who knows, maybe they’re not buying it. But worrying won’t make it so. Just try to:

  • Share credit with the team and take the blame for yourself. It is your job to take the fall if it all goes wrong, sadly, that’s what the money is for
  • Be honest, always. You don’t have to say everything, and you will know things that others are not supposed to, but don’t lie. Just keep it to yourself
  • Be positive. Moaning and complaining doesn’t help anybody. Look for the good in people, look for the good in situations, and chart a path through
  • Be consistent. People want to know what you believe, and whether they can trust you, and being inconsistent really undermines that
  • If you make a mistake, put it right. Don’t avoid it out of awkwardness. Go back to the person and admit the fault. Then put it right

I found it really rough at first, and I have had bad situations in the last year, and they feel awful because you feel like you failed as a person. And of course I don’t at all do the things above every time. It’s not easy to get right. Do your best and believe in yourself and believe in your team. When everyone pulls together and you’ve got a whole team achieving great things, it’s really satisfying. You feel like you didn’t do anything, and really you didn’t, the team did, but you’re on the team and you’re just proud to be there alongside all these people doing great work.