Day 11: The Most Important Lesson I’ve Learned Working In Tech Leadership
I like to believe that I learn something new every day.
I might go after a new topic, learning about some new tech (or an Excel formula 🤓). Or I might reflect and learn how to deal with a situation differently.
The type of lesson changes every day, but the goal is to step by step, pasito a pasito, build a foundation of knowledge that eventually is going to be game-changing.
I like to write small “What have I learnt today?” reminders that always help me to reflect on my day and inevitably bring some closure and separation between work and home.
Over the past 10 years working in Leadership, if I have to choose one big lesson, perhaps the most important one I have to share is:
Always Have A Templated Presentation Ready
And here’s why.
You never know when someone is going to ask you for a presentation.
You don’t know how much time you’re going to get.
You’d have to think about it, execute it and polish it. All in record time.
So what I like to do is to have a master presentation with:
- Several separator slides
- Team layouts
- Team member photos, names and roles
- Team mission, context and vision
- Overview of the product
- Nice to have stats
This way, if I’m ever caught in a situation where I’m asked to do a presentation then boom! Here comes the template.
Put the info together, review the look and feel so it matches what you’re looking for and you’re gold!
You can’t account for everything so if you have to build something from scratch then always pick out the best parts and enrich your template.
This might seem like a neverending task, but the goal is to have always fresh content that you can use as the building blocks for any presentation you’re asked for.
❓Do you have a master presentation like this? What other tricks do you have on your sleeve?
