#58 with Patrick Harris, VP Global Agency Development at Facebook

Shownotes

"You have to learn how to make a friend before you can call him a friend."
#OnTheWayToNewWork #Podcast58 #TheNewYorkTapes

Patrick Harris has been working for 20 years in order to connect Madison Avenue with Silicon Valley. In doing so, he actively accompanied both - the development of the classic web search and the development from search to the social web. He was the first employee in the Global Agency Development team. He could co-develop the New York location of facebook from 25 to 2,000 employees.

The decision to swap his corner office at Microsoft 7 years ago, for a job in the facebook company had several reasons. From the first moment, he felt that facebook was a mission-driven company that links hacker culture with the drive to share, connect and form communities. Above all, it was the employees of facebook who convinced him of this. One of the most common phrases he heard in his first months was the question: "How can I help you"?

Facebook helps its employees to build a sustainable career. An internal program called FUEL is about developing an individual plan. There are different components, and each team decides for itself whether they use it. When communicating with his team, Patrick strives to reach each of his direct reports as often as possible on their preferred communication channels. So in his experience, there are people who are more likely to belong to the category "phone guy", whilst others prefer Messenger, Workplace or WhatsApp and others again prefer it by mail. It does not surprise us that facebook workplace is the most used channel. For Patrick it is the "natural extension of our culture".

In this episode, we talk to Patrick about the 'meeting culture' within the facebook organization and get to know some exciting "hacks" here. For example, Patrick and his team are increasingly using "24 hour pre-reads" and he encourages his people “to present the last page first”. Facebook gives its employees the freedom not to go to meetings, if they feel they can not contribute to or profit from it. There are (developer) teams who have agreed on a "no meeting Wednesday".

The offices of facebook also have a special meaning behind them. For Patrick, who flies 250,000 to 300.000 miles a year, it always feels like coming home. Besides this fact, the office is always "unfinished by design" to remind everyone that facebook is not finished yet.

With very personal insights into his working style, his way of learning and communicating with his family, we come to an end and wonder again how quickly time has passed.
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As always, you will find the On the Way to New Work Podcast 58 (the first in the series "The New York tapes") on:

SOUNDCLOUD soundcloud.com/onthewaytonewwork
SPOTIFY spotify.onthewaytonewwork.com
And ITUNES itunes.onthewaytonewwork.com
And all book tips here books.onthewaytonewwork.com

With Christoph Magnussen and Michael Trautmann