Helping Confluent's managers turn remote-first principles into a team operating system that actually works.
Helping Confluent's managers turn remote-first principles into a team operating system that actually works.
Indrusty
Data Infrastructure / Software
Year Founded
2014
Headquaters
Mountain View, California, USA
Employess
3,000+
Results
The Numbers That Matter
Leaders developed
40
Capability Growth
36%
Mission completion
95%
Countries
8
Lab rating
9.5/10
Facilitator Rating
9.0/10
Challenge
- Principles vs practice — Confluent had clear async principles ('Async Commandments') but teams applied them very differently.
- Managers inventing alone — Communication norms, availability and decision-making were designed team by team, with little shared guidance.
- Trust vs clarity — Where outcomes weren't clear, teams leaned on responsiveness and visibility as proxies for performance.
- Change fatigue — Leaders didn't want more theory or language. They wanted tools they could apply.
Solution
- Discovery first — Interviews and insight sessions mapped how remote-first worked in practice, and set learning outcomes on trust and team operating systems.
- Application Session — A live session on the Trust Equation, Radical Candor and coaching-question reframes, practised on Confluent remote-work scenarios.
- A real Mission — Each leader used a Remote Gap Finder with their team, then designed and tested at least one team ritual and launched a new team framework.
- Integration Session — Leaders brought back what happened, worked peer challenges in small groups and left with a date commitment to their team.
Outcome
- Rituals in motion — Commitments included stop/start/continue norm resets, team office hours across time zones, a team operating-system guide and a review of standing meetings.
- Team Operating System — A new way of managing remotely, standardised across the org, applied to individual teams.
- Tools leaders kept — Radical Candor, coaching-question reframes and the Remote Gap Finder were the most-cited takeaways.
- Peer connection — Leaders valued learning from peers in other functions; small breakout groups were singled out.
