T-Rex Radio: How Turntide's Values Drive Innovation and Quality  - Turntide Technologies

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T-Rex Radio: How Turntide’s Values Drive Innovation and Quality 

At Turntide, our mission is to invent and scale breakthrough technologies to optimize how humanity uses energy, but that’s only possible if our Tideturners feel supported and encouraged to pursue new ideas. 

During this episode of T-Rex Radio, three Turntide engineers — Andrea Croce, Senior Engineering Integration Manager; Troy Carmichael, Mechanical Engineer; and Jonny Bird, Engineering Integration Manager – explore how our company values have driven a culture of innovation and quality. 

https://softwaremotor.wistia.com/medias/eez79bh15f

Key Topics 

How were you introduced to Turntide’s values? 
Andrea was introduced to Turntide’s values when Richard Hellinga, then the CTO and now the Global Head of Technology and Innovation, met with the new engineering leads shortly after Turntide acquired Hyperdrive, where Andrea worked. “He walked us through the five values. I found it a bit strange at the beginning because it was literally the first thing he introduced before defining what we do and what we build and how we do things. He said, ‘We believe in five things.’ And that was a revolution from my point of view.’ 

How do Turntide’s values make you a better engineer? 
According to Troy, Turntide’s focus on creating sustainable value was instrumental to forming a cohesive engineering team following Turntide’s acquisition of three electrification companies in the UK. “We formed an internal newsletter called The Tidal Wave that has information about the different engineering programs we have in transport. It covers all the things that are going well here and the things that are not going so well. It always spotlights someone that is going above and beyond, and it talks about where we’re going in terms of product roadmap. I think that’s created sustainable value in the sense of providing that information to everybody, but also in a format that saves time and is efficient.” 

What experiment would you encourage listeners to try that has to do with our values? 
Johnny recommended an activity that his own team has been experimenting with: “Next time you’re in a meeting and you’re making a decision, take a look at our five values and use them as a filter to determine your solution’s value for the overall company. We ask ourselves: How does this contribute to Turntide’s goal? How does that contribute to revolutionizing the way humanity uses energy? It helps me to feel as if my work has value. And inherently with that comes motivation and excitement.” 

Transcript

Senia 
Hello. Welcome to the inside episode of How the Values Helped me as an engineer, where we’re going to be talking about the Turntide values and how for these three engineers, they help. So let me introduce Andrea Croce. Hi, Andrea. 

Andrea 
Hi Senia 

Senia 
And let me introduce Jonny Bird. 

Jonny 
Hi Senia, thanks for having us. 

Senia 
Delighted you’re here. And Troy Carmichael. 

Senia 
So now you three are engineers. Here at Turntide. And my first question is, how did you come to get introduced to the values at Turntide? What was one of your first recollections or even your introduction to the values? Let’s, let’s start with Johnny. 

Jonny 
Mm. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Good question. So I, I traditionally was an electrical hardware engineer and then I transferred into the technical operations team about six or seven months ago, and I kind of heard of the values and I kind of thought, yeah, I roughly agree with them. They seem like good things to be talking about. And then it wasn’t until I joined the technical operations team where I started to dig into them a little bit more deeply and started to hear some of the kind of the why behind we have these values and in particular Tess ran a great session on the values and action, you know, what they were about, why do we have them? And that was really helpful for me just to dig a little bit deeper. So it’s not just a poster on the wall, but it’s actually something which makes sense in my head.  

Senia 
And isn’t that just something we’re all used to from different experiences that we’ve had in life? Here’s a poster on the wall which supposed of take it in… Jonny before I go out to Troy and Andrea, what which of the values kind of stuck with you of the five or what what’s what sort of did you walk away and say, oh, yeah, that’s, that’s the particular one that resonated if there was one. 

Jonny 
Yeah, of course. I think there’s a few, but there’s one particularly I’ve been thinking about recently, which is build trust, and I’ve been trying to think a little bit what this means both relationally and also technically. So the idea of being able to build trust as an engineer, obviously having trust that my colleague is going to get the designs right or do the right testing but then also having that relational trust and kind of that social trust of I feel safe to raise ideas. I feel safe to suggest maybe concepts which are slightly out there. So the idea of build trust and how that that breaks down almost into different elements of trust has been something I’ve been exploring recently so that that one’s going around in my head quite a lot at the minute.  

Senia 
Thank you so much. So relationship component and also a competence component that your work is. Yeah. Thank you so much. Troy, how about you? How did you come to know or come to get introduced to the Turntide values? 

Troy 
Yeah. So I’ve been at Turntide for a little over three years now and I came on as a mechanical engineer and now I’m on the tech ops team with Jonny and Andre here. And when I was looking for a new job, I had come from a culture that really was quite different from Turntide’s and there was a lot of walking on eggshells and kind of politics and things like that. And so something I was very specifically looking for in the new company was an emphasis on culture and values. And when I found Turntide’s website, I saw, hey, this is displayed prominently on their web page and it’s something they seem to be really serious about. But to Jonny’s point, you know, I’ve seen it on company websites before. So I went through the interview process and my first impressions through interviews when I flew out to interview in person was, wow, these people are really take these values in this culture seriously. They’re actually talking about these things. How do we apply it to our everyday life and that coming on board Turntide over the last three years, I’ve found it to be really true that, you know, nobody’s perfect and we’re always trying to get better. But it’s really a place where people don’t just put the values on the website. They’re actually trying to think through and talk through how we can use them in our everyday work. 

Senia 
In a slightly different follow-up question then to Jonny. As you started working, you saw people used to values, what value did you see people hover around or use the most? 

Troy 
Yeah. I think something that really resonated with me was the idea of the growth mindset of including and growing individuals. It’s something that I guess previously the way I thought about things was I was kind of naturally good at something or I wasn’t right. And if I tried something new and I wasn’t good at it, I didn’t want to do it or I just wanted to stay away from it. But what I saw people talking about a Turntide was using failure as an opportunity to grow. Right? That you’re not going to be perfect at something the first time and that you can learn from your mistakes, that you can get better, that you can try new things. And that’s something that really was kind of a total mindset shift for me and I really had that had to change my way of thinking around that. And it’s, it’s one of the biggest takeaways that I’ve had at Turntide. I’m really grateful for the people around me that have exemplified that. 

Senia 
I’m so happy that you’ve just done that Troy, that you connected the include and grow individuals to the growth mindset. I completely agree with you and being on the people team, I very much care about that value, about include growing individuals. Thank you. Andrea, how did you get introduced to the values? 

Andrea 
I think I was introduced to the values by Richard Hellinga. He was the CTO at the time of the acquisition of the gateshead site. So we had a meeting with the engineer leads and he walked us through the five values. And I found it, I found it a bit strange at the beginning because it was literally the first thing he introduced before defining what we do and what we build and how we do things. He said, we believe in five things. And that was a revolution from my point of view. It was very different to the approach I was using there in the past. And I think it does it did make a difference. It did strike me at the time, and I’m super happy we have those values and we can apply them on day to day basis. 

Senia 
When Richard was introducing the values or shortly thereafter, which values stuck in your head? 

Andrea 
And my favorite value, I think I’ve got two, three favorite values. The first one is clear and concise communication. That’s more of a necessity for me. So English not being my native language. I do have to exercise my way of being clear and concise. I usually tend to do that when I walk the dog in the morning, usually go for a walk, and then I work through my agenda and think, how can I explain what I’ve got in my brain clearly and concisely? And that that sometimes works like that. 

Senia 
I love that image of here you are, you’re walking your dog and you’re sort of going through your day and thinking in this situation or in this meeting, how do I… 

Andrea 
Yeah, I’m kind of kind of playing scenarios. And I’m I always try to find ways of improving and being more concise and in and explaining things, things better. And the second one I strongly agree with Jonny is building trust. As part of our job in the in the organization, we measure a lot of stuff that goes from the engineering performance to, to lots of things. And to me, building, building trust really means being transparent in what we measured and in the conclusions we come to. I really think if something is worth measuring, then it’s also worth sharing the outcome of the measurement. And that’s what we try to do is to pick up steam every day. 

Senia 
And the outcome of the measurement may be good or may not be good, but you’re sharing it and you’re building trust by sharing it. However. 

Andrea 
We’re trying to be very open and transparent in what we do. 

Senia 
Thank you, everyone, for a little bit of the view of how you came to the values. Let’s get to the crux of it, which I so enjoyed having a preview call with you about and just even getting a sense of this. So let’s start at this time with Troy. Troy, how do could you give us a one or two specific examples of how the Turntide values make you a better engineer? 

Troy 
Yeah. So I think I’d love to highlight a story recently that I think is in line with a couple of our values but really around create sustainable value since we haven’t talked about that yet. So when Turntide brought together these three companies in the UK to make Turntide Transport, obviously there were a lot of different engineering programs going on, a lot of engineers working on different things, and in the beginning there was not much visibility into what other people were working on or knowing what was going on. And so Charlotte, who was part of the tech ops team before, helped to institute this Monday update meeting for everybody in transport engineering to be able to run through. Here’s the different programs we have going on. Here’s the status of those, you know, here’s where we need help. Here’s where it’s going well, and I thought that was a great example of, you know, building that trust and communicating openly and concisely. But then to build on that, you know, it’s evolved over time. And I think the next step was to take that information and put it into a dashboard on Confluence, where it was easier for the program managers to update the status and, you know, save people time and also make that information available to anyone at any time. And that’s now or recently evolved into a newsletter that’s sent out via email and shout out to Mark Lord has kind of been heading up that effort. It’s a newsletter that is called The Tidal Wave, which is pretty similar to Patti’s Tide Report. And it’s it has this information about here are the different engineering programs we have in transport. You know, here are the things that are going well here, the things that are not going so well. There’s a spotlight of someone that’s doing really well. Here’s a bright spot for the week. Here’s where we’re going in terms of product roadmap. So I think that’s created sustainable value in the sense of providing that information to everybody, but also in a format that saves time and is efficient. So yeah, I thought that was a great story that I wanted to highlight. 

Senia 
That story has at least three iterations starting with the meeting and then starting with more details and then with the Tidal Wave. So it’s almost like, even iterations on communicate openly and concisely. 

Troy 
Yeah. Yeah, most definitely. Yeah. I think it’s it’s one of those things where, like I said before, you know, you don’t have to get it perfect the right time. We just want to move in the right direction and get the information out there. And then you can get feedback. And with that feedback, feedback loop, you can improve and get better and better and yeah, make it what everybody’s looking for. 

Senia 
Thank you so much. Really clear. Thank you. Thank you so much. Johnny, how about you? What’s an example when one of the values has made you a better engineer? 

Jonny 
Yeah. So, again, this is a very recent example, which was a bit of a humbling experience, and it was a lesson for me to learn. So I’m very happy to share it. And I think it maybe comes from, I guess a little bit of context to start with. Often in my mind, the way to increase engineering performance is just to do more engineering and try harder and work harder and you know, do harder sums and design more complex things. And I think it’s easy to try and build your performance from that basis. And actually what’s really challenged me recently is I’ve seen examples of people actually, rather than working harder, it’s more working smarter. And then it sounds cliche, but actually the smarter is really zoning in and focusing on some of these values. And actually that has been the most efficient way to improve their actual tangible technical engineering performance. And a really good example of this was one of the things we’ve been doing in the in the tech ops team is looking to try and get everyone across all of the different businesses that have joined over the last year using the same engineering tools, using the same processes, all coming together to kind of consolidate our tools portfolio. And Troy and I were involved in a in a group that was looking at implementing a new electrical cab tool. And from my perspective, I was thinking, great, let’s be really efficient. Let’s just do more engineering, let’s roll out this tool, let’s get it sorted. And so we chatted to the engineers and they were on board with this new tool. I was really excited, things are going well and then in in perfect it’s kind of open and concise communication. One of the engineers took it to one side and said, Yes, I agree, we need to move to a new tool, but here are the 11 things that are going to stand in your way. And it just blew my mind because we would have spent weeks and weeks realizing that these 11 things were going to be blockers and realizing that we can’t just roll out the tool. And he was a guy who was so experienced and kind of within a sentence, challenged my plan and kind of forced me to react in a slightly different way. And I said, okay, Nedra, we need to tackle these 11 things before we do anything else. And so while it forced me to, I guess, to be agile and adapt the agenda of the meeting and what was fantastic is you have someone he has a colleague, he has maybe 30, even 40 years experience in the industry. And he was able to communicate what we needed to do in a sentence and just that rather than implementing a tool and then spending six, seven, eight weeks battling with the consequences of rushing that. So that was particularly humbling, but it was also a great example of kind of open and concise communication, working to make people kind of do better engineering. 

Senia 
It’s so interesting you say that, especially as we’re all speaking about them, it feels like that could be an example of a few of the values. 

Jonny 
Yeah. Yeah. 

Senia 
Creating sustainable value. It could definitely be about building trust. Certainly open and concise communication. It could be about including and growing individuals too. 

Jonny 
Absolutely actually. 

Senia 
Inside spoke to you privately. You got it right away. And then what’s the last one? I feel like I’m missing one. But that. 

Troy 
Reasoning from first principles 

Senia 
Oh, my gosh. That’s actually the first one I thought of, sort of that this colleague of yours, Jonny, sort of thought, well, from reading from first principles, do we want Jonny to go all the way on this project? Well, what if we if we back up. 

Jonny 
And what was great as well, I guess building on that, having the reasoning from first principles means that we always say in ten times that we’re always allowed to ask the why behind things. So when he said, you know, here’s 11 things you’re going to encounter, what was great was and I had permission to open that discussion is a great talk is three why are these 11 things so important, why are these going to be the crux of the issue? And then as he told it through, actually, it meant that we had more buy in from engineers and people willing to work together. And it kind of it was probably the most successful tool integration we’ve done all based on that. So it just shows how sometimes just trying to do more engineering isn’t necessarily the way to kind of to wear these things through. So that was a really good example. 

Senia 
I completely agree with you… a really good example of just so holistic in a sense of bringing the values together. As engineers, you all know the postmortem, right? Of course. Are you do you all use the pre-mortem as well? So what he did almost reminds me of this idea of a pre mortem, which is before a project goes, you think what could possibly go wrong? And you do it for the purpose of okay, here are 11 possible things that can go wrong. We’re going to address each of them in the process of building this. It almost seemed like he used that kind of approach, whether he called it that or not. 

Jonny 
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Spot on. And it just it just means that, you know, from using those values and focusing in on trying to see the kind of task at hand through the lens of the values it meant that we save so much time and things were so much clearer. And it also meant that we kind of saved a lot of arguments probably as well. 

Senia 
Nice. And Andrea, what’s an example that you’ve seen where it has made you a better engineer or colleague of yours? The values. 

Andrea 
I think my example is about one of the activities that I’m doing at the moment, which is a capacity plan to essentially work with measuring the allocation of the engineers and on several projects to see how if we have enough engineers and if we’re allocating them to the right activities. So that’s obviously a group activity, it involves probably between 15 and 20 people. It requires those people to meet together so I think all five values are necessary for that activity. Surely the communication needs to be clear and concise. We do have templates that we share and prepare for in advance. And there is a lot of building trust in there because you need to be able to share information, hoping the information is correct and hoping nobody else is going to use the information for the wrong purposes. And then there is also I was thinking about growing an individual. So something I’ve seen in the last especially in the last month, there’s been a growth in the in the way that the team is behaving as a whole. And we move from individuals working on their own to actually working together as a team. And we have adopted a common framework. We have a common language, and we have ways of working that are common to the entire group and everybody understands what’s going on. So I think these along with Jonny’s, but it’s probably another way of phrasing the efficiency problem or answering the efficiency problem and that there’s a lot about efficiency and being smart in your decisions and there’s also a lot about playing together as a team and that that goes a long way. 

Senia 
Yes. So you’re saying that it actually even just from the beginning of how all of these folks come together, it really uses all the five values. 

Andrea 
It does use the five values. And I think, well, probably at the beginning we did not use all the five values and that was why the process at the beginning was a bit clunky. And it needs a lot of refinement. And then working the process through several steps and several refinements and working in checking that each step of the process against the five values had to move in the right direction as a whole. And I’ve seen lots of improvements. 

Senia 
Yeah. And that’s so true even to Troy’s story with the thing that became the Tidal Wave, the iterations. So even if we have the values and we’re using them as a lens, we can always iterate to some degree. And we also know where the where it’s enough of risk or enough benefit costs that we’ve iterated well and we don’t have to keep… What else would you all say? So before we get to kind of a meta level of what the values help us do, any other clear examples that come to mind or any other place where you yourself have actively explored using the values in order towards engineering? Really I’m opening up to any of you. 

Jonny 
Yeah, of course. Another example which again, I can’t claim credit for this. But so someone shared with me the other day with the idea of what do we actually work on, what projects do we work on? And I think sometimes there’s a temptation where let’s say there’s a contract dangled in front of us with a one-off product where we can produce a one off, get it done, make a little bit of money and move on. And the idea that if we’re actually looking to create sustainable value, having the idea of actually what can we create maybe a platform, can we use this design then in some of our other designs, can we make sure we get we get kind of, I guess that the most holistic approach to kind of build a sustainable value in the future, and that’s obviously good for the company because it means that you can kind of do less work for more value. And that’s always one of the problems in engineering, isn’t it? But then also the idea that in many ways it’s better for the environment as well, which is the whole reason we’re doing it now. This idea of sustainability being both financial sustainability, but also environmental sustainability is one of the ways I try and wrestle with this. The idea that actually if you can have one product, which is a platform that actually you can go into lots of different things and you actually need to spend less time testing. You need to actually it can stay in situ for longer. It can be a project which is not dated. Kind of the idea of thinking about rather than what’s easiest actually what is most sustainable. And maybe it’s a little bit of a more of a lift in that kind of short term, but in the long term actually it’s going to benefit Turntide, it’s going to benefit the planet, it’s going to benefit our customers. And so looking to challenge ourselves through the values as well, we’re saying actually if we’re making this decision and yes, there may be a contract that’s dangled in front of us if we if we accept this rather than something else, you know, are we really adhering to our five values? So that was something that was shared with me recently that’s made me really think about kind of things in terms of environmental and also financial as well. 

Senia 
Yeah using it as a challenge. How can we create more sustainable value in this project from an engineering lens? 

Jonny 
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And it goes it can drill down into smaller levels as well. So if I’m doing again a similar principle, if I’m doing a document and I’m sharing with people, I think, oh, actually, can this document be used again and again? Can I put it in a format which is adaptable? Can I make it a template? This idea of sustainability and kind of increasing our efficiency and looking at how can what we do last furtherand  into the future benefit others rather than just quickly get the job done, is something which is personally really challenge me as well in my own work as well as in a company level. 

Andrea 
Yeah, yeah. Johnny, you’re making a great point. And I think it’s about scalability of the values. So the values don’t only apply at a high level, they apply at every level. And I can use the values regardless of the job I’m doing. I’m still I can still use them as a sanity check. And they I still have to find an instance where the values check has failed or has led to something that doesn’t that doesn’t work or doesn’t make sense. 

Jonny 
Yeah, they have to be scalable because you think about build trust. There’s no point building trust with only our customers. But then actually, you know, we don’t have trust with our colleagues. But equally, if we’re building trust with our colleagues and then our customers can’t trust us, it has to be able to be a personal, a team level kind of an organizational level and then in the market as well. That’s a really good point, Andrea, about the scalability and how if the values fail at one level, then they don’t work. But I agree, so far I’m still looking for a level where they do fail. So I think whoever came up with them was obviously to do some good thinking, I think. 

Senia 
Andrea, can you say a little more about using them as a check or as a almost like a filter for things that you’re working on? 

Andrea 
Yeah. I usually tend to tend to use the values just to double check if my, my gut feeling is telling me something, right. So I think we all have an internal compass that we use to make decisions in general. And then sometimes businesswise, we tend to make decisions that disconnects a bit from the internal compass because we think that’s what that’s what’s best for the business or that’s what’s best for, you know, our position, our career, whatever, and taking a step back and putting everything on pause to check where we are, assess where we are, and check what we’re doing against the values. Um, always adds a lot of value to me. And if something doesn’t work with my internal compass, then it’s probably also going to fail one of the five values. 

Senia 
So interesting. Go ahead. Who else would like to add to that or to a related idea? So interesting. 

Jonny 
I mean, I think we could probably we could probably end everything there because I think Andreas absolutely nailed it. I agree with the idea that the idea that you have a check against it. And I think, again, this is one of the things that appeals to me about Turntide, the fact that even as a kind of a in many ways junior engineer in a division of a kind of a global company, the fact that these values give me the permission to ask people, “Hang on a second. Do these do these add up?” So let’s say that that Ryan comes and he has an oil company meeting and he says, we’re going to be changing direction. We’re going to do this. The check works both internally but also externally. The fact that I can say, okay, Ryann, fair enough, but I have this question, how does this build trust? You know, are we are we ruining the trust that we have with people? You know, okay. Reason from first principles, I’m allowed to ask why. And so I think one of the things I love about the values is the fact it empowers everyone at every level in the company to be able to challenge. And obviously, along with that challenge, you have to challenge it with the best intent and one to get the best out of people. But the idea that you can say, okay, let’s work through this decision together and let’s see how does it stack up against our five values? And that’s a really, really good way to ask hard questions often without seeming personal and without it kind of being being defensive. Just having this checklist to work off is actually a really useful framework for, for having difficult discussions as well.  

Troy 
Yeah, just to build on that, Jonny, is something that I’ve thought about. So we talked about including and growing individuals and we talked about kind of the growth part of it, the growth mindset part, but there’s also that inclusion part which is, you know, ultimately for engineers, the goal is to get the best ideas out there. Right, regardless of where they come from. Right. And so you’re going to get a much better chance of fleshing out the best ideas and raising them to the surface if you include voices from different backgrounds, from different areas of expertise, from different parts of the company, different perspectives. Right. And that’s what you’re talking about, like Turntide creates that forum where people feel empowered to raise those ideas, raise those questions. And I think ultimately, going back to what you said, Andrea, which is, you know, I think our whole thesis here is that the values and kind of the personal side, the soft side is not something you need to put aside in order to do your job in order to be an engineer. It’s that those two things work together. You can bring your whole self, your whole person to work. And that by practicing these values, by using them as a filter, by using them as a challenge, it will ultimately help you perform better as an engineer day to day and kind of across the organization. So I think that’s great. 

Senia 
One more specific question that I remember from our pre conversation, which is one of you said they can’t remember which one. One of you said that it helps with not filtering creativity and I think it was the build trust value. Which one of you was speaking about that? 

Jonny 
Yeah, I seem to remember and again, I seem to remember I discussed that, but I think it’s a conversation we’ve had quite a lot in the office as well. The idea that in order to kind of often share, as Troy says, your whole self and come into a meeting with ideas that perhaps are controversial or out there and maybe a little bit more creative or slightly different to what you’ve done if if you don’t quite have the trust in the room, you feel as if you have to filter yourself and feel as if you have to filter, “Oh, can I say this? I’m allowed to say this idea?” And actually, in order to let those best ideas bubble to the surface, it’s really important that you have the trust in the room. Again you know, if Troy, Andrea, and I are in a meeting this week and I don’t feel as if I do have that trust to be vulnerable and I feel as if I’m going to be shot down for an idea or whatever, I’m not going to say it. And, you know, I think one of the things which Turntide is good at doing is encouraging people to speak up when they have ideas when they have that, even if they see issues, and then they want to flag them. And if you don’t have the trust, there’s not a forum for that. It all relies on being able to have that almost that that relational safety to be able to do that. 

Andrea 
It does provide some support to psychological safety, especially when you’re in meetings with more senior people, with the parts of the business you don’t know that well, it really gives you weapons to ask questions that are going to be useful for everyone. And also on a slightly different note, Senia. We’ve been talking a lot about values lately. We throw in Johnny when we get a chance to meet in the office. And I think it’s because Troy has been using the value in practicing the values for a long time and having people like him joining our team in the UK is really helping out in the process of rolling out these values to the entire company. So that’s extremely beneficial, at least from my point of view. 

Jonny 
Yeah, I completely agree. It works on such a personal level that if you have someone who comes and sits next to you in the office and is talking about them, sharing them, using them to question things, using them to give people an opportunity to speak up, then of course, they’re going to be more than things on a poster on the wall when you go down the corridor. When you see it in action and when you have the opportunity to have that, of course it’s going to mean more so, yeah.  

Troy 
And just to build on that, first of all, thanks for the feedback, but we’ve been discussing this book about a football coach. It’s called the Barcelona Way, and it has this idea of cultural architects in it, which is, you know, applied to this sport and this team sport. But I think it plays really well to business, which is that you have people throughout your company that walk and talk and represent those values. Right. And I see you, Johnny and Andrea, as those people within Turntide Transport that can that can represent this and kind of spread the word about the values and not only spread the word, not only talk about them, but live them out. And that’s kind of the way that you can create the sort of environment and culture that you’re after. 

Senia 
I’m going to summarize by saying some of the things that I’ve heard and ask you what I may have missed. So if I go to a meta level and say, Why do it? Listening to you all, why are the values working to help you all and other engineers in their engineering? Here are some things I’m hearing. It allows you to filter whether the thing that you’re working on is the right thing. It’s scalable, like Andrea mentioned, in that at all levels of the organization, you can use this kind of reasoning of thinking of the values. What else did you say? You talked about them working together, so that’s another thing that might make it work, that it’s not just one, but they are actually, they’re cohesive. What else may I have not mentioned that’s sort of at a meadow level why the values are working to help. 

Jonny 
I think probably a cultural thing often we do in engineering is we try and focus on the engineering as Troy said and then these values are like a 2% time thing at the side. And I think from a really practical point of view, if you want to grow and become a better engineer, growing in the values is one of the places to start. Of course you need that technical depth and the technical knowledge, but it’s almost countercultural. And I think so if you’re an engineer looking to grow, look to grow the values.  

Troy 
Another thing I would say kind of at a high level is that practicing the values as an engineer helps us, helps us to move faster together. Right. Like building trust. I think Ryan likes to use the phrase that building that trust is the rate limiter of speed, I think, which just means like the more trust you have, the faster you can go because you don’t need to have these explanations or these verification steps or you don’t have to double check other people all the time. And, you know, communicating openly with other teams also allows you to move faster. It gets the best ideas out there. It creates those bridges of communication. You don’t have to, you know, take the time to go through different channels. And as I mentioned before, like including the right people brings the best ideas up in the in the fastest way possible. Right. So I think it helps us move quicker together as a team. 

Senia 
Last question for each of you. For people who are watching, listening with us, what experiment would you encourage them to try that has to do with the values? Any of you, please go ahead. 

Jonny 
That’s a very good question. I can recommend a bit of an experiment, I guess, that we’ve been doing on our team, which is, which is this idea of next time you’re in a meeting and you’re making a decision, or maybe if there’s a slight change of direction or even if it’s a case, if you are, you have lots of different pieces of work and you’re trying to prioritize which ones do first, at a really personal level, have a look at the five values and use them as a filter to kind of say, hey, are we including and growing individuals, you know, are we asking why are we reasoning from first principles? You know, if we built more trust, would we be doing things differently? Is this the most sustainable way? And actually using it as a bit of a five point checklist in your personal kind of day to day life on a really human level? That’s an experiment that we’ve been doing and our team and I’ve been doing in my work, and it has really framed my work, but also help me to see how does the work that I do today in my little office here in Northumberland, how does that contribute to the Turntide goal? How does that contribute to kind of revolutionizing the way we we use energy? And it helps me to feel part of the organization. It helps me to feel as if my work has value. And inherently with that, comes motivation and excitement from working. 

Senia 
Thank you. 

Andrea 
I think, my exercise, my suggestion for an exercise would be next time someone’s in a meeting and you feel a bit scared about asking a question, please run the question against the five values. If it ticks all the boxes, then it’s absolutely a question that that’s worth asking. 

Senia 
That’s so cool. That’s really clear. And you can just do it. Should I ask this question? Yes, it does address these. Yeah. Why don’t I? Because then other people are probably having the same question. 

Andrea 
Exactly. 

Troy 
And I think something I would say going back to this story about the Tidal Wave newsletter is, you know, looking for opportunities within your own work, within your day to day work to create more sustainable value by, you know, maybe instead of, like you said, Johnny doing something once, maybe there’s a way you can put in a little bit more effort and create a new process or do something that benefits everybody, not just yourself, making that information available to everyone, thinking about what sort of meetings you run as a team. Like, how can you streamline that? How can you communicate more openly and concisely? Yeah, and I think that’s in line with some of the stuff that Ryan’s been writing about lately, like the Tide Report about, you know, how can we, how can we in our everyday work, just be as efficient as possible and create the most value? 

Senia 
Jonny, Andrea, Troy, thank you so much for talking with us about how the Turntide values make us better engineers. Thank you so very much. 


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