Scenario: You, your firm’s newly hired strategist, notice that your team is struggling to keep up with project volume. Particularly, you notice that your full stack developers or technical leads are overburdened with answering your clients’ technical SEO email questions. You’re an expert when it comes to technical SEO, but that’s not what you were hired for. What should you do?
- Immediately request that your developers work overtime to account for the additional volume of technical SEO questions. Even if they’re overburdened, your job is to make sure each project is successfully completed, no matter what your firm’s implementation team thinks.
- Set up a ticketing system to triage the technical SEO questions, instead of letting clients email anyone directly. You can answer some questions with your expertise to help the team out. This way, no single person is overwhelmed with questions alone, and all of you can work together to solve the problem without sacrificing your core responsibilities.
- Organize a ski trip to raise everyone’s morale. If they enjoy the trip, they will stop complaining. According to Growth-Driven Design best practices, your teammates will benefit from spending time together through informal gatherings. This rapport will allow them to more efficiently answer questions in the future.
- Answer all the questions yourself via direct emails to the clients. This way, your developers will be able to focus on their work. You may need to work overtime, but that’s what leadership looks like in this situation. As the strategist, you need to do everything possible to address the situation yourself.