Sam Allen User Manual 2024
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MY THREE VALUES ARE INTEGRITY, COURAGE AND DEPENDABILITY
Integrity and Courage have been consistent values for most of my adult life, although āCourageā has morphed from the physical version to the moral one. āDependabilityā has been a key value of mine over the past few years given how much I am relied upon in both my professional and personal life.
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WHAT ARE SOME HONEST, UNFILTERED THINGS ABOUT ME?
- I was born and raised in Kansas City, My family was lower middle class and we didnāt have much - everything I have in this life I had to work extremely hard for. This means I have deep appreciation for work ethic and a realization that everyone has struggled to get where they are - understanding this truth is a key to leading and dealing with people.
- I was born with a tremendous ability to read people. Then I became an Intelligence / Counter Terrorism Ofļ¬cer in the US Marine Corps where this natural ability was sharpened into a high functioning skill. This means I can smell bullshit from 50 feet.
- Spending 10+ years in the Marines means a lot of things, both obvious and not so. Primarily it means I am focused on the mission at hand, on making sure that people have the tools they need to do their job, and that their path to success is as obstacle free as I can make it. It also means I donāt wait for perfect solutions to anything and often move to execute very quickly. I freely admit this is not without its challenges.
- I believe that at the heart of almost every conļ¬ict lies a simple mis-understanding. Get to the core and solve that as rapidly as possible.
- Rationality will usually win out ā ļ¬nd a way to get past the friction and get to a rational
- I abhor sycophancy
- I relish dialogue - until it becomes repetitive
- I value people in all their forms. Everyone has value and everyone deserves to be treated with dignity. Diversity is not a buzz word for me.
- If I donāt eat by noon itās going to be rough. Donāt book a lunch time meeting w. me without preparing to handle the food part. On this point I canāt be more serious . . . š
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WHAT ARE SOME THINGS THAT PEOPLE MIGHT MISUNDERSTAND ABOUT ME THAT I SHOULD CLARIFY?
- Iām a combat veteran. In this job, no one is shooting at me and at night I sleep in a warm bed instead of a bug ļ¬lled hole in the ground. This means that I have stellar perspective and that I donāt ever rattle. This is mostly an advantage, however, the ļ¬ip side of this coin is that I have a stoic demeanor and people often misconstrue this as a lack of empathy. It is part of my style that I am constantly wrestling with ā feel free to tell me if you see this happening. One of the best pieces of feedback I ever received was from a direct report who told me she didnāt think I cared about the business problem she was dealing with ā it led to an incredibly important dialogue and was a demonstration of turning what could have been a destructive misunderstanding into a constructive resolution - as well as an opportunity for learning.
- I have a mild form of dyslexia, mostly related to numbers. Itās hard for me to keep numbers in my head, so if I ask for them repeatedly please understand itās not that I doubt what you are telling me. Additionally, donāt hesitate to correct me if I mis-state a number in a meeting.
- I am actually quite easy to talk to. Try it.
- I have a great sense of humor.
- I have combat induced hearing loss in my left ear. Itās very difļ¬cult to hear in crowded rooms or anywhere with lots of ambient noise. Because of this, I shy away from events such as happy hours. Iām not being anti-social ā I simply canāt hear in those environments.
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MY STYLE
- I am from Missouri, the āShow Me Stateā. Which means I like it straight. I am very transparent. You should feel free to ask me any question you like, but you better be prepared for the answer because you are going to get it, unvarnished.
- I try my absolute best to not have a bias, other than a bias to action. If you fear I have a bias inļ¬uencing my position, feel free to tell me.
- I donāt hide behind a veneer of acting like I know everything. If something is beyond me I will ask a lot of questions about it - I have zero fear of appearances and am not afraid to ask what may come across as an obvious question. I canāt be effective if I donāt understand.
- I enjoy collaboration and everyone needs to have a voice in the things that impact them. This is an important maxim. However, when things start to enter āanalysis paralysisā I will force a decision and move things along. I am happy to make decisions.
- I like to be in motion and have little patience for ļ¬nding the perfect solution to everything. āDirectionally accurateā is one of my favorite terms. There are certainly times for precision, but in most things, I pick a direction and go. If you think I am making a mistake, you need to tell me so, trust that I will listen. One caveat: I like precision in numbers - there is no guessing in math.
- I understand that everyone has incentives and If you donāt tell me what they are, I am going to do my best to tease them out.
- Everyone has the right to change their mind; and everyone reserves the right to be wrong.
- I donāt care what your title is or how much experience you have or donāt
- I am not āhigh energyā but I have a large motor. Iām more like a freight train than a speeding bullet. I am very well grounded and have found that this has been a boon in high temp environments.
- I have always built high performing teams, my secret to this is to hire people who are smarter than I am and work harder than I do; this is not an indictment of either my intelligence or work ethic, as both are formidable. But I need to learn from the people around me.
- I like organizational reporting structures for administrative reasons, but I act as if things are ļ¬at to be operationally efļ¬cient. Please do the same.
- I have to be in a fast-paced I love to be around people and I love building teams. When I am in the ofļ¬ce, I am all over the place as I believe in āmanagement by walking aroundā. For me, the hardest part of COVID was the impersonal nature of virtual communications - I prefer to be around people as I feed off that energy. But I have adapted to this ānew normalā and have built proxies to engage with people in our new virtual community.
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WHAT I VALUE
- I often boil things down to the most basic: are you on the train or off? Are you part of the problem or part of the solution?
- You should absolutely feel you can come to me with a problem, but you need to have a few ideas on how the problem can be solved and what the blockers are . . . I get frustrated when people simply point at something and say āHey, thatās a problemā. Be part of the solution.
- I value work ethic, steadfastness, and managers who put their people before themselves.
- I value clear, concise communication.
- I value people who lead with values.
- Mentoring and career development are very important for an org to mature and blossom. I am passionate about both.
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WHAT I DONāT HAVE PATIENCE FOR
- I donāt understand why people prefer to bend the truth in order to shy away from transparency. Trust me, we will both be better off if you just give it to me straight. It helps us both in the long run.
- You can survive almost any mistake with me other than lying. Donāt modify a conversation you had with someone to your own beneļ¬t and then expect me to not ļ¬nd out, because I probably will.
- Ambiguity is an enemy. Intentionally creating ambiguity is a problem.
- Failing alone.
- Self-congratulation.
- The echo chamber.
- Not understanding the basics of business when operating in the business world, and not taking the opportunity for self improvement.
- Ā Tribalism.
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HOW TO BEST COMMUNICATE WITH ME (FOR INTERNAL EMPLOYEES)
- Be clear and transparent.
- If itās urgent, Slack or IM If it can wait 24-48 hours, send me an email. If you donāt hear back from me, ping me again.
- When writing me an email, husband your words. Brevity is king.
- Donāt ever hesitate to just come ļ¬nd me. If you are taking the time to track me down, I will ļ¬gure out how to take the time to help you.
- We are all awash in meetings. I am happy to come to a meeting - but if itās simply status updates, etc, emailing me a deck or a doc is a better use of our time.
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HOW TO HELP ME
- Please give me feedback. The more direct the better.
- If you bring me something requiring my input, I need background and context before you dive into the issue at hand.
- Use as much data as you can. But it should guide your decisions and conversations, not make them for you.
- If you show me a number, I need to see it in context. As an example, if you say āRevenue is $xxxMā, that is irrelevant to me if I donāt know what periods are under comparison and what that may mean in terms of growth. Think of a number or a stat as a chapter in a story - show me the rest of the chapters.
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SOME PERSONAL STUFF
- I have been married for over 20 years and have two college age I also have two dogs, who I adore. I have more pictures of the dogs than the kids.
- We live on the peninsula in the SF Bay Area.
- I love to ski, I am a voracious reader, mostly of historical non-ļ¬ction, I like to work on cars with my younger son. I have been a gym nut since I was 16 and like to road & mountain bike. I also love to golf although I almost never get to play.
- I am on the Board of Habitat for Humanity, Bay Area. I also do pro bono consulting for small businesses in distressed parts of San Francisco.
- I love the World Champion Kansas City Chiefs, and am a huge fan of the SF Giants. I love all things college sports, from football to softball.
- I am passionate about veterans affairs. I am passionate about equality. I am passionate about equal access and I believe that education lies at the heart of improving the state of our world.
