Work With Me: Chris Reynolds

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Values

I strongly value Collaboration and working as part of a team. I thrive in environments where I’m able to bounce ideas off my peers, ask for help, and help others.

In that way, Communication is huge. I am a natural communicator and I strive to be open in my communication with my team and I expect the same in return.

I value good, well-written Documentation. Documentation is what drew me into open source and, in particular, WordPress, and poor or incomplete documentation can often be worse than no documentation at all. I enjoy writing documentation and finding easy to understand ways to explain complex concepts.

I value outcomes over outputs, particularly when discussing, writing and refining user stories. Outputs may have a specific implementation or use case. Focussing on the outcome first allows us to ask questions about what the best possible user experience might be, and whether the chosen output even makes sense or is applicable.

Personality

I am creative and the act of creation is important to me. This can take the form of writing, making music, DJ’ing, role playing, coding or just about anything, really. If I am not able to make things or am feeling unmotivated to do so, it’s often a sign that something’s wrong.

Humor is also important to me. I try hard not to take myself too seriously and value humor as a way to break tension and foster positive relationships.

I strive to be as inclusive as possible. As a white male in the tech industry, I’m well aware of my privilege and the doors that are more open to me than to others who don’t look like me. I try to position myself as an ally and “use my privilege for the forces of good.”

Receiving Feedback & Recognition

I sincerely appreciate feedback. I would much rather know about a thing that I am doing and be able to change a behavior, if needed, than continuing to make the same mistakes. This applies to all things, whether they be development related or interpersonal. If I’m doing something wrong or out of place, please let me know.

I respond best to private critique. A quiet kick under the table is better than publicly saying “Chris, you’re doing it wrong,” although I work hard to accept feedback and critique graciously in any context. If I am feeling burnt out, my responses to criticism may be more defensive. If you feel that I am acting defensive, I encourage you to DM me privately to check in if you feel comfortable doing so.

Work Patterns

I am in the Mountain time zone (UTC -6/-7). My usual work hours are 08:00 - ~15:30/16:00 with a lunch somewhere in between. I’m not a morning person and I’m most productive in afternoons, but I try to balance that with family and personal commitments as well as trying to not be tethered to work/computers, so I try to be fairly strict about work hours most days.

I typically work ~7 hour days. I have found that this gives me the greatest benefit of actual productivity vs. feeling stressed/overworked/burnt out and makes it less likely that I fall ill. I have a fairly strict policy against working on weekends, in fact, I tend to avoid my laptop altogether on weekends or holidays.

While I can be available after normal work hours, it’s not something I enjoy and generally try to avoid if at all possible.

Communication Preferences

I have a fairly strict system of notifications across communication platforms. If you are trying to get in touch with me, personally (via DM or @ message), I will recieve an audio notification on my desktop and mobile. I may not see a message sent to me in a Slack channel if it does not @ me directly. I will likely not see an email. While I check my email sporatically throughout the day, I am not looking at my email and I do not recieve notifications for new email messages outside of a badge icon. TL:DR; the best way to contact me is DM or @ on Slack.

After 4pm Mountain time, I may respond, but my responses may be delayed. Before 8am Mountain time, I will not even see your message until I log in. I tend to leave notification settings intact when on vacation, and I will often check (though not necessarily respond to) work email while on holiday.

When taking calls on Zoom or Slack, I prefer using video when possible. We see little of each other enough as it is, and I feel more connected to my team when I can see their faces, not just a name or an avatar. However, I typically prefer asynchronous communication via Slack to calls of any kind.

How To Know I’ve Gone To The Dark Side

Warning Signs

How to help

Me Being Me

I try to be conscious of my words before speaking/typing but I have a natural tendancy to speak first and think later, which comes out in fast-paced discussion over Slack, in person, or in video chat. I may slip up and say something out-of-place, interrupt the person speaking, or appear short or disrespectful. This is definitely not my intention and please, if you see me doing this, this is a great opportunity for a quiet kick under the table. I want to be aware of when I am falling into these patterns so I can continue to break the habits.

Pet Peeves

I don’t expect this list to change your actions—but it might help you better understand and empathize with my reactions.

Career Goals & Future Interests

I am interested in being more involved in the meta work that happens around development. Writing/documentation, project planning and development, team building and management are all things that are interesting to me to pursue.

Areas for Development

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