Introducing oneself
The leaders who share a personal note on who they are and their working style get off to a running start. In doing so, you set your own narrative rather than people making their own stories about who you are.
Here was the intro note I shared my first week at Forerunner:
Hi I’m Jackie 👋
I am so excited to be here. In an attempt to break the ice, I wanted to share a bit about myself, as I know it can be tricky to get to know one another in a remote-first environment.
About Me
About Me: Avid runner, mom to three little ones, love old school card games & board games, inherited my musical taste of 70s rock from my dad, aspire to live on a commune, really into tuna melts, Enneagram Type: 7w8 and social subtype.
Family: Husband Alex, daughter Scarlett (4yo), twins Evelyn & Clark (2yo in May), and Frankie the cat (6yo).
Where: Based in Palo Alto, CA, but spent the majority of my life in the East Bay: grew up in Fremont, college at Berkeley, and post-college in Oakland. A few stints in San Francisco, Ukraine, Houston, and the Sierra foothills.
My career: post college exploration → Peace Corps → Coder Camps → Vida Health → ClassDojo → Coinbase → Forerunner
Fun fact: I can ride a unicycle 🤡
What motivates me: Being a part of something bigger than myself; building great teams that make an impact in the world, and supporting individuals in their professional development along the way.
Working Together
I wanted to share some of the values and principles I care deeply about. It is by no means an exhaustive list, but I don’t want to bore you too much, so here’s my top 3:
Building trust
I believe trust is built through:
Transparency
Assuming positive intent
Doing the work
Ownership mentality
I believe that well-functioning teams require each individual to deeply internalize ownership. This doesn’t mean burn yourself out, but it means that anyone’s problem is everyone’s problem and we each need to own solution-oriented action.
This also means we own when things don’t go as expected, we take a critical look at what went wrong and how we can improve it in the future.
Culture
Culture eats strategy for breakfast, and I will invest heavily in fostering a culture where we can all do our best work and be the best version of ourselves.
Working With Me
Communication style:
Direct, open, and timely. I believe feedback is a gift, both positive and negative. I try to give feedback near real-time and appreciate it in return
Praise in public, criticize in private
Positive reinforcement - when I see examples of “great” I try to highlight and like to see peer-to-peer recognition as well
Working hours:
I’m available for live meetings 8am-5pm PST.
I’ll be unavailable 5pm-8pm PST most weekdays.
I’ll likely reply to slack messages in the evenings 8-9pm PST, and by default I don’t expect a response until business hours. If something is more urgent, I’ll note that in the message.
In person:
I aim to go to the Berkeley office every other Wednesday (perhaps weekly as I onboard over the next couple of months).
Thank you for reading! Here’s a picture of me and the family at Glowfari at the Oakland Zoo from a couple months ago. Looking forward to getting to know each of you in 1:1 over the coming weeks. Feel free to ask me about anything in here and I look forward to working together!
