Skyline Drive: 2019/08

Teamwork / time management / ability to adapt

situations - condense 60-day forecast into 30-day
task - getting 40 analysts and 10 teams to function differently, short cycle, change controls, analytical rigor, process redesign
action -

I put a premium on communication and cycle information quickly, leveraging slack channel, the confluence pages, office hours to do real-time info sharing
I advocate a set of analysis on the common variables, such as volumes, market rates, saving analysts time as they won't have to pursue their own
I institute analytical standard to address the needs of the analytics, year over year
I also make sure I have quick 1x1 with leaders of the business to elevate from the numbers to the storytelling

high-quality product, analysis, meets the need, without dragging the teams to endless hours of repetitive works
some of the learnings have influenced us to make a permanent enhancement to the forecast process

Difficult customers - different styles

situation - a customer who is very detail-oriented, conservative and risk management focus
challenge - teams are feeling tired and feel his questions are intimidating, the reputation of a difficult customer
action -

I personally dive into details along with him, be a good listener as I learn why the details matter to the customer
I also appropriately ask, how often do they occur, the variability of the drivers, what is the downside of not knowing all of it
I raise awareness that not all things are equal of business leverage, and things require a different level of effort
I also gather support, buy-in from his own team about where the models are strong with predictive power, where things will require attention
I led the collective recommendation of simplifying the reviews, some in difference paces, different frequencies, also the monitoring and escalation plan

result - again high-quality forecast, focusing on solving the real problems vs forecasting problems, better morale of accomplishments

Analytical Failure

situation - brand new marketing campaign, market test varies a lot between 5% to 40% impact
challenge - national advertising, applying market-based tests into the national scale; recency bias, availability bais, taking the easy route, making everyone happy bias ... at times, at the spur of the moment, we choose the safe bet
act -

foster a personal board of director, marketing, product, cost in the ecosystem
have the patience to ask everyone for what is the binding constraint, and how that impacts the business they are in
have a disciplined framework, and have consistent usage of it

Relationship Failure

situation - one person was not responsive
challenge - this person is in the upstream of creating the common variables of the forecast, his silence is making people feel being left out in the dark, frustration
act -

I invited the analyst community to do a powerday, flow chart mapping, challenging each other why things need to happen the way this is
I gathered inputs and calibrated, identifying that this person is the single person dependency because he takes on too much of the work and they all happen at about the same time
I highlighted the constraint with accountable executives and proposed making the adjustment to the workflows
I also coached this person to have dedicated communication work block, talking in the slack channel, have the base to support him as he breaks the news of many important things around account origination

result - establishing trust across human beings, getting to the deeper iceberg and explore human traits

Goal setting

situation - enablement score is 40% low, having the tools to get things done, it's difficult to do work
challenge - there has been no top-down determination of a chosen systems
action - smart goals

I advocated 20/20, to create room to learn new skills, and initially, there is no stipulation as to what they learn
I also study group with our most technical analyst leading everyone to download software and do coding, everyone learns at the same pace
I measure, the number of hours, spent, share with the team, and eventually, we will measure how many of the team analysts are capable with SQL, Python, etc

result - big turnaround, 70%; pay attention there will be result, prioritize, there will be result

Communication

situation - during financial and business planning, the strategy calls for branch reduction
challenge - there is a lot of myth, for instance, fear of sales loss, book of business ... made it really difficult to engage with good inputs
act -

I am obsessed with context and transparent for what we know, where we put our bets, what risk mitigation actions exit
I use data driven insights, for low to mid income people, de-mystifies the story
I pay lots of visit to leadership offsite, panel discussions to share what I had learned during the financial planning work

result - happiness to be part of the destination, learning new skills, creating new opportunities, give us good inputs

Successful presentation

Learning new jobs

interview predecessors, people first, finding my allies
interview business customers, team members, people first
process - workshop to document workflows, hands on to see data lineage, level of effort, forecast methodologies, cycle information very quickly
process - tell people what worked for my prior life before, see if they are interested in something
product - the look and feel, the brand of it, new name, new look etc

Change management

Time management / major project

Skyline Drive