Author: Derik Hammer

Mindset framing Recovering from an infection of the responsibility virus requires us to change our mindset and to do it on faith. The over-responsible party tends to see the under-responsible party as lazy, incompetent, happy to ride coat tails, or simply useless. The do not trust the under-responsible party and feel justified in their need […]

Doubling down on my decision to lead My new understanding of the responsibility virus has helped me view a lot of my past experiences and, more importantly, my past perspectives in a new light. This has helped solidify my goals of pursuing IT Leadership. I consider myself an excellent engineer. There is no single topic […]

I have begun this journey focused on the monkey management problem because it had to most direct impact on me to cause my burnout. Taking on too many monkeys and becoming overwhelmed with the work caused my breaking point. However, mismanagement of monkeys was not the root cause to the problems. One potential root could […]

Part 1 of my journey to answer the question, “can a team, which has already fallen into a pattern of mistrust and resentment, recover? ”

One year and nine months ago, I took my first formal management position. I stepped into the role thinking that I knew a bit about management. I felt as though my team leadership experiences in my past meant that I knew enough to enter into this new position. When I say, “knew enough to enter,” […]

Earlier this year, I wrote about Failure Integrity Power Transparency and Respect. This was taken from the perspective of a person who is learning how to navigate their failures or the failures of a group which includes them. In this post, I want to talk about failure from the perspective of a leader who is […]