Feynman's Radio

The value of passing through.

I’ve been thinking a lot about building teams recently. In a former job, I ran a large UX team, and one of the metrics I was judged on was employee retention. If people were sticking around, I was in good shape. If they were leaving, that was bad. 

Starting and running my own design business has made me a lot more Zen for too many reasons to count. In my emerging Zen-driven approach to team building, I don’t focus so much on retaining people as I do in getting the most out of their time in our studio while they’re here - and that’s going to be different for every team member.  If they add value to the company as they pass through, I’m thankful. If we’re lucky, they’ll pass through more than once during their career.

I love the idea of someone returning after their own voyage of career discovery to bring back a fresh, but well-framed perspective to the team.

We’ve got someone returning to the studio this week after spending the last year and a half somewhere else. We’re super excited - the growth in this individual has been amazing, and I can’t wait to see how they impact our evolution as a team as they pass through this time.