Case study · Jungle Scout
Sam Johnson, CTO at Jungle Scout, had a theory.
As AI increased what each engineer could do, his whole team was effectively going to move up a level.
That meant skills he'd normally expect from more senior people were going to matter sooner: understanding what's happening in the business, knowing what different stakeholders care about, making a case for an idea, and being able to handle pushback.
And if AI was going to help the team build faster, they also needed to make decisions faster.
"Especially with AI, the speed at which you're releasing features and the speed at which you're making decisions is really important."
Sam had seen what got in the way:
"A lot of times things go slower, impeded not by anyone's individual skill, but by clarity: do we have all the right information to make a decision?"
That's what he wanted the team to practice.
We worked with Sam to understand who participants were dealing with, what was going on in the business, and the kind of pushback they were likely to get.
Over six weeks, the team brought in things they were actually working on: proposals, decisions they needed support for, and conversations with customers and stakeholders.
They would deliver their pitch, practice handling objections and then get feedback based on the TECH Model.
The TECH Model gave everyone the same framework: who are you talking to, what do you need to happen, what does your audience need to know, and how are you going to say it?
The difference started showing up in the work.
Sam was spending less time digging for context and asking follow-up questions. When one participant sent him a proposal, he could scan it, get exactly what he needed, and move straight into discussing the implications.
"Proposals now hit the points I care about, so we can get to decisions a lot more quickly."
Sam Johnson, CTO, Jungle Scout
Near the end of the program, Sam was leaving for vacation when an incident broke out.
It was exactly the kind of situation Sam would normally have needed to step into.
Instead, Leo, a first-time engineering manager, stepped in. He got in front of Jungle Scout's executive team, explained what was actually happening, handled their concerns and got the situation back under control.
Sam was on the plane home, watching the thread over Wi-Fi. He saw Leo's response and thought:
"Okay, he's got it."
"I think this program is worth it."Sam Johnson, CTO, Jungle Scout