The CEO shadow program at GitLab is not a job title but a temporary assignment to shadow the CEO. The shadow(s) will be present at all meetings of the CEO. GitLab is all remote but sometimes the CEO has in-person meetings. Therefore, you will live in San Francisco during the entire rotation and travel with the CEO.
The goal of the shadow program is to give current and future directors and senior leaders at GitLab a overview of all aspects of the company. This should lead to leadership who are able to do global optimizations.
You will attend all meetings of the CEO, this includes:
The CEO's executive assistant should ask external people if they are comfortable with the shadow joining prior to the scheduled meeting and will share a link to the CEO Shadow page to provide context.
These meetings can have different formats:
You will not attend when:
This is probably the most open program in the world. It depends on the participants respecting confidentiality, during the program, after the program, and after they leave GitLab.
We want many people to be able to benefit from this program, therefore we rotate often. It is also important that an incoming person is trained so that the management overhead can be light. Therefore we decided to make a rotation two weeks:
The shadow should be available for the full two weeks. When the CEO has a week or more of paid time off or during Contribute the shadow program will pause, one shadow will see one before and teach one after that time.
We want this program to be as accessible as possible to team members. These rotations spanning one or more weeks without a shadow are great if you can't to be away from home for more than one week at a time. Also, if you'll need childcare to be able to participate, GitLab will reimburse you for it.
For new team members this might be the first thing they do after completing our onboarding.
Start date | End date | See one | Teach one |
---|---|---|---|
2019-04-15 | 2019-04-19 | Mayank Tahil - Alliances Manager | None |
2019-04-22 | 2019-04-26 | Mayank Tahil - Alliances Manager | None |
2019-04-29 | 2019-05-03 | Tye Davis - Technical Marketing | Mayank Tahil - Alliances Manager, Alliances |
2019-05-06 | 2019-05-10 | No Shadow - Contribute | No Shadow - Contribute |
2019-05-13 | 2019-05-17 | No Shadow - Contribute | No Shadow - Contribute |
2019-05-20 | 2019-05-24 | No Shadow - CEO Summit | No Shadow - CEO Summit |
2019-05-27 | 2019-05-31 | John Coghlan- Evangelist Program Manager, Marketing | Tye Davis - Technical Marketing |
2019-06-03 | 2019-06-07 | Cindy Blake - Sr Product Marketing Manager, Security Specialist, Marketing | John Coghlan- Evangelist Program Manager, Marketing |
2019-06-10 | 2019-06-14 | Nnamdi Iregbulem - MBA Candidate at Stanford University | Cindy Blake - Sr Product Marketing Manager, Security Specialist, Marketing |
2019-06-17 | 2019-06-21 | Clinton Sprauve - Technical Marketing Manager | Nnamdi Iregbulem - MBA Candidate at Stanford University |
2019-06-24 | 2019-06-28 | Lyle Kozloff - Support Engineer Manager | Clinton Sprauve - Technical Marketing Manager |
2019-07-01 | 2019-07-05 | No Shadow - Vacation | No Shadow - Vacation |
2019-07-08 | 2019-07-12 | Marin Jankovski - Engineering Manager, Delivery | Lyle Kozloff - Support Engineering Manager |
2019-07-15 | 2019-07-29 | No Shadow - Vacation | No Shadow - Vacation |
2019-08-05 | 2019-08-09 | Emilie Schario - Data Analyst, Finance | Marin Jankovski - Engineering Manager, Delivery |
2019-08-12 | 2019-08-16 | Kenny Johnston - Director of Product, Ops | Emilie Schario - Data Analyst, Finance |
2019-08-19 | 2019-08-23 | JJ Cordz - Marketing Operations Manager | Kenny Johnston - Director of Product, Ops |
2019-08-26 | 2019-09-06 | No Shadow - Vacation | No Shadow - Vacation |
2019-09-09 | 2019-09-13 | Clement Ho - Frontend Engineering Manager, Monitor | JJ Cordz - Marketing Operations Manager |
2019-09-16 | 2019-09-20 | Eric Brinkman - Director of Product | Clement Ho - Frontend Engineering Manager, Monitor |
2019-09-23 | 2019-09-27 | Danielle Morrill - General Manager, Meltano | Eric Brinkman - Director of Product |
2019-09-30 | 2019-10-04 | No Shadow - Vacation | No Shadow - Vacation |
2019-10-07 | 2019-10-11 | No Shadow - Vacation | Danielle Morrill - General Manager, Meltano |
Since a rotation is over a short period there are no long running tasks that you can assume.
The tasks consist of short term tasks, for example:
For now this role is called a CEO shadow to make it clear to external people why a shadow is in a meeting.
Other names considered are:
First state that you're a CEO shadow for two weeks, then that your normal role is X.
A ongoing shadow program with a fast rotation is much more time consuming for the CEO then a temporary program or a rotation of a year or longer. Therefore most organizations either have a shadow for two days or have someone for a year or more. We want to give many people the opportunity to be a shadow so we rotate quickly. To make this happen without having to invest a lot of time to train people coming in we need great documentation. Therefore a quick turnaround on documentation is of paramount importance. And the documentation will have a level of detail that isn't needed in other parts of the organization.
You are eligible to apply for the program if you havev accepted an offer at GitLab as a:
Lodging during the CEO shadow program is provided by the company. CEO executive assistant books the accomodation based on availability and cost. You can express your preference (hotel or AirBnB) via email to the EA in question, however the final decision is made by the EA based on the distance from CEO and costs. EA will provide the accomodation details no earlier than 1 month and no later than 2 weeks before the scheduled rotation.
Accommodation is provided only for the active shadowing period, it is not provided during the shadow program pause (cases when the CEO is unavailable). In case you are coming from a timezone that is more than 6 hours difference with Pacific Time, it is possible to book the weekend before the first shadow work day to adjust to the new timezone.
Airfare can be booked according to our travel policy or spending company money policy. In case your shadow rotation includes time without shadowing, it is possible to expense airfare to fly home and back within the continental USA. If you are from outside of the USA, it is also possible to expense airfaire during the time without shadow because of the possible high cost of lodging in San Francisco if you chose to stay at a different location.
Outgoing shadows are responsible for training incoming shadows. Here's a list of things to make sure you cover:
You are welcome to work from the boardroom but its not required to be present in-person unless there is an in-person meeting, event, or dinner. It's up to you to manage your schedule and get to places on time. If you are traveling somewhere, meet Sid at the boardroom at the beginning of the alloted travel time listed on the calendar.
If there is a day during your program where all meetings are Zoom meetings, you can work from wherever you want, as your normally would. You can work from the boardroom if you prefer. If you decide to split your day between remote work and working from the boardroom, make sure you give yourself enough time to get to the boardroom and set up for the guest. It's OK to join calls while mobile.
When entering the building, the doorperson will ask who you are there to see. Don't say "GitLab" since there is no GitLab office. The doorperson will direct you to the correct lobby.
There is one set of keys so the shadows will need to coordinate access to the boardroom. The fob is for the elevator and the key is for the boardroom.
We have monitors in the boardroom. One of them has our sales dashboard, you can configure this with:
Use one monitor for 'this quarter' and one for 'next quarter' (blue link near the top).
The wireless mouse and keyboard are connected to the middle, bottom TV by default. To update the view on another TV, you have to connect the wireless keyboard and mouse to the desired screen.
In preperation for guests (customers, investors, etc.) who will be meeting with Sid at the Boardroom, please note the following prior to the meeting start:
Start date | End date | Name | Title |
---|---|---|---|
2019-03-18 | 2019-04-05 | Erica Lindberg | Manager, Content Marketing |
2019-04-01 | 2019-04-19 | Michael Fahey | Security Manager, Red Team |