Matt Barnes Week 1 – Leader/Follower Relationships

I have just wrapped up week one with Behavior Design Media. BDM is being contracted to oversee the development of an app called Sunny, who’s purpose is to increase well being through easy micro-actions. I wanted to reflect on the leader follower relationships in my first post because the structure does not follow a traditional workplace hierarchy, and it is interesting to see the interactions between the various team members.

The formal structure starts with Amy Vest, the president of Behavior Design Media. She is the lead on the development of Sunny. Contracted through BDM is Amanda Tuft who oversees the app development of Sunny. There are also several other people working on the team currently, such as Lisa Cooke who is working on the training lines for Sunny’s chat bot feature. Finally, we are in the final processes of hiring a company to start the actual app development for Sunny. Overall, the team is comprised of a lot of contracting and subcontracting through BDM. As a result, it does not represent a traditional single entity business with a pyramidal hierarchy. Instead, a lot of responsibility is passed throughout the team. The structure of the development team is largely horizontal with respect to a hierarchy with several people reporting to Amanda and/or Amy.

There is no central location where work is being done. This is both because of covid and because many of the team members are scattered from coast to coast of the US. Additionally, several of the companies being considered for the development of the app have international teams. As a result, all communication is done virtually. Because the work is virtual, most of the work is done independently. Though most of the work is completed individually, there are frequent check ins and evaluations to give feedback. As a result, the development of Sunny may best be described as an iterative process with continuous improvements and changes as it goes along. In general, guidelines are provided by Amy or Amanda about certain features we are working towards, and then various people work independently on their parts to contribute to that goal.

More specifically, I believe both Amy and Amanda take a collaborative, supportive approach in their leadership styles. In my interactions with both, they highly value input and collaboration with respective tasks. As a result, I highly enjoy working with both of them because my opinions are considered, and it makes me feel like a valued member of the team.

One of the challenges I have run into during this first week however is getting input on my work sometimes. Because there is a three-hour time difference between me and Amanda, as well as all the work being remote, getting started on projects has been a little slow. However, I was just added to the company Slack, and once I get a little more direction on what I will be working on, I believe this challenge will no longer be relevant. Overall, I think I will learn a huge amount from this internship.