Leading geo-distributed teams to build frameworks and applications that provide end-user productivity and delight http://jeffhandley.com I’ve been setting up several new machines recently. As part of this, I’ve found myself repeatedly going through my Windows post-install setup steps. I finally decided to write them down so that I can have more consistent results. When I got my first draft written, I joked that for this... Wed, 05 Apr 2023 03:05:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2023-04-05/making-edge-usable http://jeffhandley.com/2023-04-05/making-edge-usable Many times, a chat begins during a Teams meeting and the conversation continues long after the meeting concludes–sometimes even for weeks or months. When recurring meetings are set up, the same meeting chat is reused for each occurrence, and this keeps the chat momentum in the right place. But did... Mon, 30 Jan 2023 17:05:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2023-01-30/reusing-microsoft-teams-meeting-chats http://jeffhandley.com/2023-01-30/reusing-microsoft-teams-meeting-chats My father-in-law’s iPhone recently died. More specifically, the screen died while the rest of the phone remained functional. After a few service attempts, Apple finally replaced his phone. Unfortunately though, the representative at the Best Buy (Apple service center) chose to set his replacement phone up as a new phone... Sat, 21 Jan 2023 11:00:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2023-01-21/recommended-iphone-settings http://jeffhandley.com/2023-01-21/recommended-iphone-settings Back in 2003, I had the pleasure of contributing to an exciting project: StatsWorld Fantasy Football. I had been a passive fan of American Football my whole life, but I’d never studied the game and I’d never participated in fantasy sports. Working on StatsWorld gave me the opportunity to learn... Sun, 15 Jan 2023 12:13:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2023-01-15/statsworld-fantasy-football http://jeffhandley.com/2023-01-15/statsworld-fantasy-football I’ve recently been setting up and resetting several machines. One task in my setup list is to get my custom Edge search engines configured. Unfortunately, Edge does not synchronize custom search engines as part of profile data (Chrome does). But I synchronize this data myself. What’s a Custom Search Engine?... Mon, 17 Oct 2022 15:00:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2022-10-17/custom-search-engines http://jeffhandley.com/2022-10-17/custom-search-engines I’ve recently set up or reset multiple PCs. Some of them were personal machines and others were work-issued machines. When resetting a work-issued machine while at the office, I found a specific series of steps that accomplished the end state I desired. The desired machine name Domain joined (not Azure... Fri, 14 Oct 2022 17:15:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2022-10-14/install-windows-domain-joined http://jeffhandley.com/2022-10-14/install-windows-domain-joined Over the years, our family’s technology setup has grown and evolved. I’m married and we have 2 children who have been online for several years. When they first needed email addresses, we wanted to grant them autonomy while being able to monitor what they received and coach them to identify... Sat, 09 Jan 2021 22:00:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2021-01-09/family-email-setup http://jeffhandley.com/2021-01-09/family-email-setup I’d like to tell a story about my White Privilege. It’s one that helped me land my first office job, which contributed to starting my career while I was still in high school. I first shared this story on Twitter, but I wanted to capture it here too. My First... Sun, 14 Jun 2020 12:40:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2020-06-14/my-first-office-job-white-privilege http://jeffhandley.com/2020-06-14/my-first-office-job-white-privilege At the end of 2018, I decided to invest in setting up a home office so that I could grow the skill of managing a team from home. I was in a role with managers reporting to me who worked from home; I wanted to identify what parts of my... Tue, 24 Mar 2020 14:00:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2020-03-24/my-home-office-setup http://jeffhandley.com/2020-03-24/my-home-office-setup I’ve been focusing on leading geo-distributed teams for the last several years. I believe the software industry will keep moving in that direction and I want to be as close to the leading edge of that shift as possible. My primary motivation is to ensure that my teams are well... Mon, 23 Mar 2020 20:15:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2020-03-23/managing-a-team-from-home http://jeffhandley.com/2020-03-23/managing-a-team-from-home A little over a month ago, someone asked if I could share advice on how to maintain a good work-life balance as a leader. I was reluctant to respond as I’m no paragon for maintaining balance. But several weeks later, here I am sharing my story. Let Things Go Ultimately,... Fri, 10 Jan 2020 23:00:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2020-01-10/work-life-balance http://jeffhandley.com/2020-01-10/work-life-balance I’ve talked about fostering remote work and how during my time at SAP Concur, we succeeded in building a remote-friendly culture for our UI Engineering group. Over time, I identified several indicators that helped me measure that success. If you are trying to assess your group’s progress, or if you... Tue, 24 Dec 2019 14:10:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2019-12-24/remote-friendly-culture-indicators http://jeffhandley.com/2019-12-24/remote-friendly-culture-indicators I’m a big proponent of remote work and geo-distributed teams. During my 4.5 years at SAP Concur, I had the pleasure of working in an environment where we could foster remote work and invest in our remote-friendly culture. We had engineers from Prague to Palo Alto, with a healthy combination... Tue, 24 Dec 2019 10:35:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2019-12-24/remote-for-the-right-candidate http://jeffhandley.com/2019-12-24/remote-for-the-right-candidate Effectively sharing ideas can be a challenging skill for managers to build and refine. It’s common to have a disconnect on expectations when a manager shares an idea. When a direct or skip-level report hears an idea from their management, it’s natural for the idea to be perceived as something... Fri, 16 Aug 2019 13:00:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2019-08-16/suggest-recommend-need http://jeffhandley.com/2019-08-16/suggest-recommend-need When crafting goals in our group, we keep an emphasis on personal growth interests, defining personal growth goals before other categories. But what does a personal growth goal look like? How do we come up with personal growth goals if they’re the first category we discuss? While the nature of... Wed, 02 Jan 2019 13:30:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2019-01-02/conducting-a-skillset-gap-analysis http://jeffhandley.com/2019-01-02/conducting-a-skillset-gap-analysis Like many companies, SAP Concur has moved away from annual goals and reviews. In 2018, we transitioned to a quarterly goal cadence and we now conduct quarterly “SAP Talk” sessions. An SAP Talk is less like a formal review and more like a “super one-on-one” where we review the goals... Fri, 21 Dec 2018 13:15:00 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2018-12-21/crafting-quarterly-goals http://jeffhandley.com/2018-12-21/crafting-quarterly-goals When I joined SAP Concur in 2015, I realized I would have an opportunity to grow my skills working with geo-distributed teams. Both SAP and Concur have engineering offices around the world, which was a new experience for me. I had dabbled in remote work over the years but I’d... Sun, 21 Oct 2018 21:30:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2018-10-21/fostering-remote-work http://jeffhandley.com/2018-10-21/fostering-remote-work For a couple years, I’ve observed scores of developers making ill-informed claims about GraphQL. People have claimed that GraphQL allows the client to demand sorting, paging, and filtering from the server. People have claimed that GraphQL can result in execution of arbitrary queries or joins. People have claimed that GraphQL... Thu, 13 Sep 2018 11:30:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2018-09-13/graphql-is-not-odata http://jeffhandley.com/2018-09-13/graphql-is-not-odata I enjoy puzzles–especially math and pattern puzzles. I have a collection of various Rubik’s Cubes that I learned to solve without referencing any guides. I’ve worked through several books of Sudoku puzzles along with other math and pattern puzzle books. I also enjoy learning about Nikola Tesla. I’ve watched many... Thu, 12 Apr 2018 03:30:00 -0700 http://jeffhandley.com/2018-04-12/nikola-tesla-puzzle-collection http://jeffhandley.com/2018-04-12/nikola-tesla-puzzle-collection A couple years ago, we invested in Luxafor flag lights for everyone on the team. These lights are attached to our monitors and we communicate with each other using them. If someone's light is green, they are "free" and you're welcome to drop by and interrupt what they're doing. If... Thu, 08 Mar 2018 01:10:12 -0800 http://jeffhandley.com/2018-03-08/node-luxafor-cli-with-keyboard-shortcuts http://jeffhandley.com/2018-03-08/node-luxafor-cli-with-keyboard-shortcuts