I write and make videos about what nobody prepares you for: becoming responsible for other people, making uncertainty visible, and keeping trust intact when the plan changes.
If you've just been handed a team, or you've had one a while and still feel like you're making it up, you're in the right place.
I spent two decades getting from a windowless basement to running production at a multinational games company, leading teams of up to 87 people and building a function that didn't exist before I arrived. Nobody trained me for any of it. I learned by getting it wrong in front of people who were relying on me.
Now I write and make videos about the part nobody prepares you for: what actually happens when you become responsible for other people. Making uncertainty visible instead of hiding it. Keeping trust intact when the plan changes. Getting out of the way of people better at their jobs than you.
Have a look around. And if something here sounds like your week, tell me about it, I answer everything.
Leading Teams from the Basement Up. The book I wish someone had handed me the day I first became responsible for other people.
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Leadership, management, and team insights from the front lines.
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Practical field notes on the skills that sit between planning, trust, and delivery.
01 / Role
A manager helps teams turn uncertainty into shipped work. The role combines planning, communication, risk management, prioritization, and people leadership. After two decades leading teams, I write about the management skills that are rarely taught directly.
02 / Audience
The Job Nobody Trained You For is for anyone who has just been handed a team, or has had one a while and still feels like they're making it up. It is written from lived experience: starting in a windowless basement, growing into running production for a multinational games company, leading teams of up to 87 people, and learning how to lead without pretending the job is cleaner than it is.
03 / Leadership
Many people become managers from another discipline and learn by improvising under pressure. I want to make those lessons easier to find. If you are trying to become a better manager, lead a team for the first time, or understand what leadership really asks of a person, this site collects the ideas, stories, and resources I wish I had earlier in my career.
Five questions before a management decision becomes a management problem. This checklist distills the kind of management thinking behind The Job Nobody Trained You For and gives teams a fast way to test whether a decision is clear enough to act on.
See the book01
What problem are we solving, and what are we choosing not to solve today?
02
Which teams or roles need the decision translated before work starts?
03
What changes if the estimate is wrong by 20 percent?
04 – 05
The remaining two questions, with notes on how to use each one, are in the full PDF.
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A manager's job is not to remove every hard conversation. Healthy teams still disagree, estimates still move, and creative work still reveals surprises. The difference is whether the team can see the risk early enough to respond. I use simple signals because simple signals travel well: people remember them during planning, leads can repeat them in standups, and executives can understand them without needing the whole backlog in front of them.
The table below is the kind of practical comparison I use when coaching managers or reviewing a plan. It is not a replacement for judgment, but it gives the conversation a shared starting point. If a team can explain the decision, name the owner, describe the tradeoff, and show when the next update will happen, the work is usually manageable. If those answers are vague, the manager should slow the decision down just long enough to make the next step visible.
| Management signal | Weak pattern | Manager response |
|---|---|---|
| Ownership | Everyone agrees, but nobody can name who makes the final call. | Assign one decision owner and one update owner before work starts. |
| Scope | The team says yes to the goal without saying what will not be done. | Write the tradeoff in plain language and make the excluded work visible. |
| Risk | The plan only works if every estimate lands perfectly. | Ask what changes at plus or minus 20 percent effort and prepare a smaller option. |
| Communication | Different disciplines are repeating different versions of the same decision. | Translate the decision for each group and confirm the next visible milestone. |
— ALLAN STOWE, THE JOB NOBODY TRAINED YOU FOR