All Episodes

March 22, 2020 48 mins

If you’re in a leadership position in the engineering industry and have suddenly been thrust into working remotely, it may feel like your world has been turned upside down. In this episode of Simple Leadership, Dana Lawson and I discuss a few tips to help you manage remote teams. You want your team to thrive and be successful during a time of great uncertainty.

Dana describes herself as an atypical engineer. She wanted to attend college to be an artist but soon realized the ‘starving artist’ lifestyle wasn’t going to cut it. She took the ASVAB test when she joined the military and scored high in engineering categories. In the last 20 years, she’s worked in every tech position possible—most recently, she is the VP of Engineering at GitHub. Listen to hear her unique story!

Outline of This Episode

  • [1:38] Dana Lawson: from art major to engineer
  • [6:18] How Dana found herself in a leadership role
  • [9:02] Mistakes Dana has learned from throughout her career
  • [12:27] We got to eat dinner at Al Gore’s house
  • [15:48] Tips and strategies for managing remotely
  • [26:38] Don’t forget these aren’t just transactional relationships
  • [30:42] How to onboard a new hire completely remotely
  • [34:45] What happens when the process doesn’t go well?
  • [37:04] Help remote employees advocate for themselves

You have to embrace a leadership mindset

Dana states that “Anybody can be a leader, it’s just how much you wanna unlock it”. She believes it’s an attribute that’s been ingrained in her personality. She’s naturally an A-Type and has never been afraid to speak her mind. In whatever capacity she was working in, she always took the initiative to move the ball forward. 

You don’t have to have a management title to be a leader. 

She just believes that some of us gravitate towards being a leader more than others—but that we all have the calling to lead in some way. Dana argues, “Anybody has the ability to go influence change and bring up the people around them to do great things”. 

Tips and strategies to manage remote teams

Dana shared some tips she’s learned from a managerial role:

  • Write it down. Have a good practice of writing things down. Track what’s being done throughout the day. Reiterate tasks and instructions multiple times through different modes of communication whenever possible. 
  • Form a daily structure for your team and yourself. Don’t stop the practices you already have in place because you suddenly have this new obstacle of working from home. You can still hold the same meetings, just do them virtually. 
  • Take advantage of ALL the communication tools available to you. Slack and online chats are great, but if the conversation is going to be longer than 5 minutes, hop in a video chat (Zoom, Skype, FaceTime) or a phone call. 90% of communication is non-verbal and it’s okay to jump from chat to a call.
  • Invest in some camera gear: This is my tip here, but get a decent webcam off of Amazon and use appropriate lighting when using Zoom or other video applications. 

To keep things light-hearted—though partially serious—Dana points out that you have be on-point with your emoji game. There’s verbal communication, non-verbal, and emoji verbal. Humans have reverted to Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Oddly enough, each company has its own set of social norms with emojis—so learn quickly. 

These aren’t just transactional relationships

Don’t forget there are humans on the other side of your communication. How would you interact with someone in the office? What about pleasantries like “Hey, good morning!” or “How are you today?”. Dana points out you can ask about your tea

Mark as Played

Advertise With Us

Popular Podcasts

Dateline NBC

Dateline NBC

Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com

Stuff You Should Know

Stuff You Should Know

If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.

My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.