Like a lot of teams, we went fully remote in 2020. And as we’ve grown, there are people on the team I haven’t spent much in-person time with and don't work with in my day-to-day. That makes it harder to pick up on how I think, make decisions, or prefer to communicate.
I wrote a “How I Work” doc to make those things clearer and I share it with the whole company, not just direct reports.
It’s a single place where I lay out how I approach work, what I expect from others, and how to best work with me. It saves time, builds trust, and helps the whole team move faster when we’re not all in the same room.
These types of docs aren’t a new idea. I first came across the concept in the High Growth Handbook, where Claire Hughes Johnson (former COO of Stripe) shares her “Working with Claire” guide. It’s common for execs joining an existing team to write one of these to get aligned quickly.
The goals of my How I Work doc are to:
Here’s what I included and why each section is helpful.
My doc is split into a few sections: background, management style, beliefs, communication preferences, and how to work with me. Each section is concise and uses bullet points or tables to convey ideas quickly.
I included this section to offer some personal context—not just what I’ve worked on, but how I think and what motivates me. A big part of working well together is knowing the mindset someone brings to their role.
I started Streak in 2012 after working as a PM on Google Docs and Drive. I still write code when I can and love diving into product decisions. That builder mindset shapes how I approach everything from product strategy to team conversations. I believe small teams can achieve big things with focus, ownership, and craft.
Outside of work, I’m a Canadian turned Bay Area dad of two. I spend my free time skiing, surfing, or playing basketball—anything that gets me moving.
The thread across all of it: I like solving problems hands-on, whether it’s code, product, or company-building.
Everyone leads differently—and the better you understand how I lead, the easier it is to work with me.
This part of the doc outlines my general approach to management, including how I communicate, how I make decisions, and what I expect from teammates. It helps avoid misunderstandings and gives people a clearer sense of how to collaborate with me.
I default to trust but believe in validating decisions. I prefer open, public communication (Notion > Slack > meetings). I value direct feedback and expect disagreement in the early stages of a decision—but alignment once we commit.
This section shares the principles that guide how I think about building a product and a company. These beliefs shape how I prioritize, how I evaluate tradeoffs, and how I make decisions when things aren’t clear. They give the team context for why I push on certain things or default to certain actions.
For example: we ship early so we can learn faster. We don’t over-hire—we’d rather stay small and move quickly. We talk to customers constantly because that’s where the best answers come from. We hire people who raise our average. And we focus on profitability and durability over growth at any cost.
I included a table of my preferred communication channels, what I use each one for, and what kind of response time to expect.
Most things should go in a public Slack channel or Notion doc. Loom is great for walking through product ideas. Skip the DM unless it’s urgent or private.
This section exists to make it easier to work with me day-to-day. It's not about values or high-level principles—it’s about the practical stuff: how I think through problems, how I prefer to receive information, and how I can be most helpful as a teammate or manager.
If you bring me a decision, I’ll almost always ask why—probably more than once. That’s not a lack of trust, it’s how I think and how we’ll get to the root of something. Flag blockers early, give me your proposed next step (even if it’s wrong), and don’t wait for a 1:1 if something feels off. When we share context and recommendations early, we avoid spinning our wheels and can move forward with more clarity and confidence.
Here are a few things we did and learned while writing these docs at Streak:
Two good references are Claire Hughes Johnson’s original doc and this “User Manual to Me” post. We borrowed structure and prompts from both.
There’s no set template, but these sections worked well for us:
Our Head of Ops, Lowell, used the DISC assessment as a starting point. It’s more work-oriented than other personality types and helped him reflect on how he collaborates with different people.
I used AI to get started with my doc. I already had a bunch of writing out there—Slack messages, internal docs, interviews, tweets—so we fed that into AI to generate a first draft. It did a pretty good job pulling all that context together and getting 80% of the way there. From there, I edited and shaped the content to sound more like me.
It was a useful shortcut, especially since writing about yourself can feel awkward or time-consuming. If you’ve written things before—whether it’s emails, docs, or posts—AI can help you connect the dots and create a solid base to build from.
Don’t try to write everything. Be specific and honest about the things that matter most. And treat it like a living doc—it should evolve as your role or team changes.
Writing down how you work makes remote collaboration easier. It helps teammates understand how to approach you and how to work with you—without needing to guess or read between the lines.
Don’t overthink it, just start. Share a few honest notes about how you work. And update it as you go.
It’s one of the simplest ways to make your team stronger—especially if you're remote.
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