So long, and thanks for all the fish.
They say that all good things must come to an end. Today we’re announcing that after six wonderful years, Jam is closing down.
To this day, we have thoroughly enjoyed everything we’ve done together. Our events were fun, different, and a pleasure to organise and run. You brought them to life and we couldn't be more grateful for all the great moments we enjoyed in your company.
In this announcement, we’d like to share the rationale behind this decision.
2020 has had a disastrous impact on society and the economy as a whole. From a business standpoint, companies operating in the events industry have been hit particularly hard.
Our revenues crashed, and we lost a considerable amount of money in deposits paid to venues – including Hawker House, who we were saddened to hear, are also in the process of closing down.
We successfully ran several online events throughout the year, but it quickly became clear to us that it was going to be impossible to recreate the experiences we'd created in the past, online.
But we didn't throw in the towel. At the end of the year, we attempted a pivot, and launched – Jam Club – an online community for our most committed members.
Our vision was to build a thriving space for growth-minded product leaders, offering intimate virtual workshops every month.
Pivoting from an in-person events company to an online community has proven significantly harder than we’d originally hoped, and the losses we accumulated in 2020 have proven too significant for us to overcome. And so now we’d rather stop here, celebrate the journey, and say a proper goodbye.
What now?
We’ll keep Jam Club open for the next six months. We won’t be moderating it or running any workshops, but you'll be able to access all workshop recordings, discussions, and member profiles. We hope you’ll be able to use it to reconnect with friends made at past events.
To claim your free invite just drop us a note at hello@makingjam.io.
You can also find all past talk videos on our YouTube channel.
Thank you
A huge thank you to our amazing team of staff and volunteers; Marta, Sunil, Jessie, Maria, Francesca, Stephen, Joan, Monica, Ecem, Steve, David, Michael, Mahtab, Eva, Gizem, Antoine, Jeff and all those that helped run our events every year. We’re deeply grateful for the friendship, shared memories, and support you’ve shown us over the years. We couldn’t have achieved everything we did without you.
Thank you to Doug and Chris at Intelligent People. You supported us from day one, and have always been a pleasure to work with.
Thank you to all our speakers and workshop instructors for all the brilliant content you’ve delivered over the years.
And thank you, for the good times we created together.
Seb & Mathilde
About
Blog
Remotely Managing Time and Team
In this era of remote work, staying on top of day-to-day tasks while managing team communication can feel like an insurmountable tangle of setbacks and challenges.
Summary
In this workshop, author and consultant Matt LeMay shares immediate, actionable steps that product managers working remotely can take to better manage their time and their team. You’ll learn how paper checklists can help you avoid missed meetings, how a simple one-page manual can improve the way your team works together, and why many Agile teams have it completely backwards when it comes to synchronous and asynchronous communication.
Who it's for
Anybody who has struggled to prioritize their time and manage their team’s communication while working remotely. While this may be particularly relevant to product managers, the tactics we explore will be relevant and immediately useful to anybody working with a remote team, whether they are a designer, a developer, a marketer, or a manager.
Key takeaways
What we’ll cover
Why all of us, no matter how smart and organized, are likely to forget things unless we write them down.
Using daily and weekly written checklists to manage our time and our tasks.
Creating a simple comms manual to help your team answer critical questions like, “How quickly do we expect a response to a Slack message or email?” and, “What is our protocol for sending and receiving messages outside of working hours?”
Readjusting your team’s meetings and ceremonies to better use both synchronous and asynchronous communication channels.
Key takeaways
Use daily and weekly checklists to keep yourself organized and avoid missing deadlines and to-do items.
Create a simple comms manual to clarify expectations and address assumptions on your team.
Try to conduct status updates asynchronously, and reserve synchronous time for decision-making and generative work.
Requirements
You’ll need access to Google Drive.
About the instructor
Matt LeMay is the author of Agile for Everybody (O’Reilly Media, 2018) and Product Management in Practice (O'Reilly Media, 2017). He has helped build and scale product management practices at companies ranging from early-stage startups to Fortune 500 enterprises. Matt was selected as a Top 50 Product Management influencer by the PM Year in Review for both 2016 and 2015. Previously, Matt worked as Senior Product Manager at music startup Songza (acquired by Google), and Head of Consumer Product at Bitly. Matt is also a musician, recording engineer, and the author of a book about singer-songwriter Elliott Smith. He lives in Portland, OR with his wife Joan and their turtle Sheldon.