Shadow 2.0: 8 steps that will improve your Shadow experience
By Kenya Moura and Vitor Pires
Starting to work for a new company can be very scary. Specially when you pass through such an extensive hiring process like in ThoughtWorks Brasil. This pressure could be even greater. Here, we try to be as fair as possible in our process, so we invest time to learn more about the candidates and their past journeys.
Some people start at the company with a project already waiting for them and everything is ready for them to get their hands dirty. Others have the experience of participating in ThoughtWorks University (TWU), a full immersion in our practices, values and principles. There are also other people who are still waiting for projects or preparing to go to TWU. In that case, you have the opportunity of using your time to do whatever you think is important to help you in your journey. At ThoughtWorks we say that you are primarily responsible for your journey, so you must use that time wisely.
During this time, people usually study new topics or strengthen some point they want, others take the opportunity to meet more people and dedicate themselves to the community. In this text we are going to talk about people who want to know other projects, watch how people work and be able to learn in a real work environment. We call this practice "Shadow".
Shadow
One team will always be different from another, even if they work on the same product. After all, a team must adapt their practices considering its peculiarities and needs. And if you’re curious about how a team works in a given context, you can follow the ceremonies and interactions between the people. You will accompany the team at all times, take the opportunity to get technical and business context and to learn good practices.
This opportunity is especially important for a Business Analyst (BA). As team composition in general only have one person for the role of BA, it is more complicated to do pairing (common practice among developers on a team).
It is important to align expectations with the people on the team before the shadow starts. It is also important for people to know how they can support you and how you can contribute, now that you are a new but temporary member of the team.
In a traditional shadow experience, just like a real shadow as the name suggests, the person is always following the dynamics of the team to absorb their practices, however they do not necessarily act effectively. The relationship is much more of a passive observation.
However, we believe that it is possible to do much more with this opportunity, as the shadow is someone who has a lot to learn but also has a lot to share and contribute. Once we have aligned what the shadow person seeks to learn, we also need to understand what are the strengths of that person and how they can support. With this knowledge and set of expectations we have aligned specific goals for this relationship, including to have a clear vision of what we want to get as a result of the shadow experience.
However, often aligning these expectations is not so simple, it ends up requiring more self-knowledge and understanding of what is important for the person's journey. In this context, we adapted this shadow experience to be connected to what makes sense to people and team.
Shadow 2.0
A first step to start this “shadow 2.0” is to support self-knowledge and understanding the moment of their journey. Before setting expectations we need to understand what stage of development the person is in, that is, given his/her role, which skills they have already developed and which skills they still need to practice, receive feedback and improve. At this point it is also important to consider how those practices reflect on their career goal.
Once the gaps and their short-medium term career objective have been identified, we can think of specific and practical actions to be applied during the experience with the team, taking advantage of the moment to measure the results of these actions and obtain feedback from people, and thus continue to evolve.
Connecting Journeys
Remember when we talked about self-knowledge and setting expectations? Sometimes you may realize that someone else wants to develop on the same skills as you do. So your journeys cross and the two sides could benefit from it, as they can do the activities in pairs and each one is able to add their knowledge and experience in the process.
Pairing practice is common at ThoughtWorks, we do everything together, so why not learn by doing together? This way it is easier to run the cycle of experimenting, reflect on the activity, exchange feedback and move on to the next step.
See how to improve your Shadow in 8 steps
1 — Map your strengths and in development: Use a list or spreadsheet with the skills you want to develop or that the company expects you to develop for your career plan.
2 — Self-assess the items raised: In front of each item on the list, add how much you feel prepared to put that skill into practice. You can use a scale, for example: 1 for “I want to learn” and 5 for “I am recognized for this skill”.
3 — Make a reflection on your expectations for a medium term future, that is, how you want to be in 1 year: Sometimes we have some skills that are in the initial levels and we want to improve, maybe there are some other skills in the intermediate level that we want to leave as it is and others that we want to reach the maximum level. Well, it’s a reflection, so you’re going to align your expectations.
4 — Prioritize the points you want to work on, to improve some skill or even enhance some strong point: Given that you already have your expectations for the medium term, now you will have to think about smaller short-term goals, something up to 3 months. Then choose 1 or 2 items that you want to improve or achieve better results.
5 — Find people who also want to work on the points you have prioritized: It is a great opportunity to work with people you have not yet worked with. Have a transparent conversation about the subjects you already know and at what level is your goal.
6 — Establish metrics that guarantee that you have developed that skill: In order for you to understand how much you are improving, it is important to establish metrics to help you identify that. The number of times that you exercise a certain skill per week, or positive feedbacks that you received about the exercise of those skills can be good indicators of your progress.
7 — Share, so that other people have access to your learnings: This whole learning journey can be very useful and can help other people. You can share through presentations, texts, 1:1s or even in informal conversations. Share your knowledge whenever you can. Sharing is receiving.
8 — Move on to the next goal you want to achieve :)
Now that you’ve reached your short-term goals, move on to the next and the next…
As you progress, seeking feedback and giving visibility of your learning, you will grow and take paths that are often different from what you had planned in the beginning, and this is great! It means that you are in a constant process of learning and evaluating what you understand is best for your journey. Keep in mind where you want to go and periodically try to reevaluate if this goal still makes sense: Any time is time to redefine your trajectory, this ensures that you will be happy and being true in what you do on a daily basis.
And the most important: have fun on the way! Make the most of your experiences and the people you live with.
The Shadow 2.0 process is neither easy nor fast, we experimented, we had setbacks and improved this process for a period of about 2 to 3 months and today we are sharing with you.
What did you think of our Shadow 2.0 process? Have you done something like that? Let’s talk, just leave it in the comments.
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