💡 Hi, Operator! Before we jump in, I have a question for you -

Since launching Force Multipliers, there have been an insane number of people with very impressive backgrounds who have subscribed: Chiefs of Staff and COOs at startups worth billions, operational machines at Google and Salesforce, consultant wizards at McKinsey, Bain, and BCG.

You all probably have your own operational questions and wish you could ask a coach and operator who’s seen it all.

So if I open up “Dear Regina” submissions from all of you, would you write in with your questions?

If the answer is yes, would you please reply to this email and tell me? This will give me a good gauge on how much interest there is. I would keep everything anonymized the same way I do for current Dear Regina entries, giving only your title, stage of company, company size, and approximate amount raised.

OK, let’s get into this issue! xx

JD #1

JD #2

Step 1: Shift your mentality 🧠

It shouldn’t be a surprise to you that the first shift you’ll have to make is a mental one.

A good operator is someone who says, “I will make sure everything gets done by enforcing through chasing.” (Read: “Things will get done when I am an overbearing, resentful babysitter.”)

A great operator is someone who says, “I will make sure everything gets done by enforcing through systems.” (Read: “Things will get done when I set up visible structures of carrots and sticks.”)

I recommend taking a post-it and putting on your laptop: “I AM NOT A BABYSITTER.”

Or, for fun, you can download this photo and set it as your desktop background 🙂

Make no mistake: if you are in a babysitting role, you put yourself there. And so long as you’re always in the weeds, you will never be seen as a strategic partner. It stings to hear, but when you complain about being a babysitter, you have put yourself into a state of Victimhood in The Drama Triangle.

Younger operators might protest and say, “That’s not true! I was forced into working this way! If I didn’t babysit, nothing would ever get done!”

Wrong. Your solution to the problem of people not getting their work done was chasing them down. This was a reaction, not a response.

And so through your actions, you have taught everyone subliminally: If I don’t get my work done, the Chief of Staff will just chase me down and remind me to get it done. In other words, there are no consequences - you have created yourself a babysitting job.

But there is good news! If you created your own problem, you can fix it, too.

The proper solution here is to stop thinking like a fixer, and start thinking like a systems designer. How can you set up a system so everyone is incentivized to do what they say they’re going to do?

Step 2: Set up your carrot using Slack threads 🥕

Using Slack as your carrot is the best for a number of reasons:

First, most companies already have a #shoutouts channel or something equivalent to recognize great work.

If yours doesn’t, set it up. Don’t wait for permission - create it and say, “We all work hard and want to celebrate creating a culture of excellence. So I’ve made this channel so we can recognize people for their deliverables, especially when they’re above and beyond.”

Second, putting 🥕s in Slack makes it easy for people to emoji react, which is the equivalent of dopamine hits for many people. Everyone loves being celebrated, and non-assholes especially love celebrating others. This breeds positive sum thinking in your company.

And lastly, Slack gives it some recorded posterity: you can recognize when people do great work, and they can look back at it and think, “Yeah, I did do good work.” Even the most stoic of technical engineers usually feels pretty good when someone recognizes them for their quiet efforts, especially in the background.

When someone does what you want, make sure you celebrate them. An astonishingly small number of people remember to celebrate and appreciate the people around them - it feels especially weird sometimes to celebrate someone more senior than you, too.

Do it anyway. This will get you more of your desired behavior.

Step 3: Set up your carrot-stick combo using weekly memos 📝

💡 QUICK NOTE ON NOTION HUBS:

Before we talk about weekly memos, we have to talk hubs! If you don’t have a hub set up on Notion for whatever projects you’re working on, you’re missing out and creating babysitting work for yourself.

Every project should have its own dedicated page, with relevant people tagged in as DRIs, relevant links for easy access, a section for weekly memos, and an Actions Task Board. If you don’t, of course you’ll be chasing people down for work.

Now, let’s talk about the weekly memo. The most important four bits for any memo are:

Here’s an example of a project-based memo that forces accountability:

When you have a weekly memo set up, you get to highlight exactly who is doing what and where.

Then, the only person that you really have to force to read through and comment is the DRI’s manager. It seems devious…but it works.

For example, if the CEO reads this memo every week and comments on it saying, “Why has this been behind for two weeks already?” it serves as a great stick 🏏 to get people to get their work done.

Everyone wants their managers to know when they’re doing great work, and no one wants to be caught by their manager lagging on deliverables - it’s like getting caught with your pants down.

Step 4: Set up your stick: accountability action boards ✔️ 

Action boards are the easiest way to create a stick that doesn’t feel like a stick. This is because no one can fault you for wanting to keep track of who is doing what. So use it!

I recorded an extensive tutorial here that will teach you to make an Accountability Action Board on Asana. I recommend watching this one at 1.5x speed:

Accountability boards are incredible because it makes it abundantly clear who owes you what.

You can build a system that automatically notifies someone when their action is almost due or past due.

You can get the board to babysit for you.

And best of all, you can simply take a screenshot of everything red and stick it in your weekly memo. This creates visibility, so follow-ups aren’t your direct responsibility.

Helicopter parents monitor their child’s every move - they hover and yell, expecting excellence at all times and allowing very little leeway for errors. They usually mean well, but they use brute force to get their way, often thinking of themselves as martyrs to their families. Children who have this kind of parent tend to grow up nervous and anxious, and usually want nothing to do with their parents the second they’re old enough to be self-sufficient.

Hands-off parents expect their kids to manage themselves - they offer little to no support when it comes to the child’s responsibilities at school or at home. These parents see themselves more as friends to their children, rather than as trusted adult figures. Without proper guidance and boundaries, these children usually have a hard time adjusting to the real world, coddled by an upbringing with zero consequences.

Involved parents ensure a relationship of respect with their children, but remember children need guidance and routine to do well. Instead of helicoptering their way to excellence, they set up systems that encourage their children to be self-sufficient, rewarding good behavior and letting their children deal with real-world consequences when they choose to misbehave. This is obviously the preferred type of parent.

Want more operational content?

Check out Coaching Founder for over a dozen free, downloadable Notion templates to use at your company, and tons of write-ups on how to level up your execs, your teams, and yourself.

About Regina Gerbeaux

and has worked with outrageously talented operators on teams like Delphi AI, dYdX, Astronomer, Fanatics Live, and many more companies backed by funds like Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz.

Her open-sourced write-ups on Operational Excellence and how to run a scaling company can be found here and her templates can be found here.

She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her partner Lucas and dog Leia, and can be found frequenting 6:00AM Orangetheory classes or hiking trails nearby.