Investing in technology teams

Investing in your technology teams requires more than just money–these investments must also take the form of data-backed, human-supported efforts. 

Here’s why. 

Imagine your new software developer has completed onboarding and is ready to integrate into their team.

How are you measuring their success? How are you setting them up for continuing success? What data are you using to guide your decisions?

Sure, your organization has its measurements of success. But is your data telling you the whole story of success? Is it also telling you problem areas? 

Making data-informed investments and decisions require teams and tech leaders to recognize when the data serves its purpose and when there is a problem.

Human-supported investments and decisions require tech leaders to understand how to measure team satisfaction. Data-informed and human-informed decisions need the right inputs to ensure the data you are collecting is used to its fullest potential. 

If you want to ensure your investments in your tech teams are fully utilized, then the areas your organization should be focusing its data on are productivity, skills gaps, insights and team satisfaction. 

Measuring team productivity is a data-backed decision— But is your organization gathering the correct data to inform your investments? Your technology teams need constant analysis to pivot and change when needed quickly. So, what areas should organizations invest in to gain these insights? The areas to analyze to inform your investments are Identifying skills gaps, team insights, roadblocks and team satisfaction. 

Identifying skills gaps means measuring the current skills of your technologists versus the skills you will need in the future. By identifying skills gaps, your organization gains insights into critical areas that your organization needs to focus its hiring and training efforts— An easy win for organization's looking to future-proof. 

Every organization has its own culture, values and style. Therefore, organizations need to clearly define their high-performance metrics by asking clarifying questions: what does high-performance look like? How do they identify numbers that enable them to quantify value and track technologist performance against overarching goals or KPIs? It should be noted that metrics are subjective. Their primary purpose is to identify if your organization is heading in the right direction based on the organization’s current goals; This also means recognizing when your organization is not heading in the right direction and identifying when it's not, I.E., roadblocks and bottlenecks. 

Team satisfaction is a human-backed investment that also requires data-backed efforts. 

Good tech leaders want to build a productive, happy team. 

To maximize your team's potential, tech leadership needs to ensure their technologists are happy with their teams. Why? Because high employee satisfaction leads to lower attrition and higher job performance. 

Why? Because there is a correlation between employee engagement and satisfaction. 

Engaged technologists are more likely to be dedicated to helping your organization achieve its goals. On the other hand, technologist satisfaction is more about whether or not technologists feel happy and fulfilled—and satisfied technologists are more likely to stay with your organization for longer periods. 

So, how can tech leaders measure and promote team satisfaction?

They can measure their organization’s culture, productivity, and retention through data-backed efforts. 

Are you ready to learn more about investing in technology teams?

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