Canvas of Colors

As a new engineering manager, I often asked my mentors how to have productive conversations with my team members. In the beginning months, I would often walk out of my 1:1s wondering whether I made the best use of our time together. The answer would often be a NO as I could think of so many ways in which I could have made the meeting more useful. This led me to think deeper about what are the most important things I want to achieve as a manager. These are the 3 goals I want to strive for:

• Team receives the inputs they need in order to do the best work of their lives. These inputs can vary from the feedback about their performance to learning about the organisation strategy, visibility on the work happening in other teams, the technical questions on architecture etc.
• Build the confidence that the team is on the right path, and they have the right support system in place to achieve the business goals as well as their career goals.
• The team walks out feeling empowered to make decisions to serve our customers in the best possible way. This is extremely important to me because we are no longer in a hierarchical setup. Rather we live in a world where everyone needs to feel accountable for the success of organisation. This cannot happen if the team doesn’t feel empowered.

These goals helped me build the content that I need to talk through in my 1:1s. While these goals help build a foundation for my discussion, I realised it’s even more important how I do I frame my discussion. The more I think about it, the more I feel that it is actually about common sense than some complex management philosophy. As a human being, we all need to feel heard, appreciated and inspired. Hence, it is very important to stay curious and interested to learn, no one wishes to talk to a person who doesn’t pay attention to them and gets distracted in the conversation. Listening is something we learn so early in our lives, but we it’s easy to loose when we have a brain occupied with so many thoughts and a phone with so many notifications. It’s best to snooze all other thoughts that are not relevant to the discussion. Some people like to take notes during the meetings and it is a very good practice to note down the important things discussed and also finish the meeting by summarising those notes. However pay attention that you don’t end up spending the entire meeting in making notes and not have enough face to face time. Remember you can always work on documents offline. The 1:1 is your chance to meet in person and discuss important topics. You don’t want to loose that opportunity for recording meeting notes.

Another important aspect is to ask the right questions. Asking questions is an art which is very important to learn as a manager. While asking a question shows that you are curious in the conversation, it also shows that you respect the other person’s opinion and are willing to listen and take inputs. Team would feel more empowered if you take their feedbacks to solve the problems in your role. Very often I observed that the team shares such simplistic solutions to the complex problems at the managements level. Never miss out on the chance to learn from your team. In some situations, it is important to mention the context explaining the reason you are asking the question. I remember so many times that sudden abrupt questions without any context creates so much confusion and disturbance. I would definitely want to remove any such confusion.

My last note is about inspiring the team. Remember everyone is working in the organisation with an intention to learn and grow. I remember each time my manager shared an important anecdote or a learning (either from their own experience or from other sources), I would feel really inspired to work in the organisation. My previous manager shared how he always assumes best intentions and this framework has helped him build trust in the team. One of my previous mentors described why it is so important to focus on giving more than taking. I know it sounds really philosophical, but that’s the way this universe works. Those who contribute and share more often receives the best rewards. Such inspiring stories has always kept me focused on my job, keeps me excited to learning new things and grow.

For every blogger, the first post is very special. I chose Strasbourg because I fell in love with the city at first sight. The grand red stone cathedral, the water canals lined with colorful flower pots, red and white boats, beautiful bridges and the most amazing lights show comes to my mind when I think about Strasbourg.

Founded by Romans, this city was part of France and Germany at different times in history till it finally became part of France. You can feel both German and French vibes in the architecture, cuisine as well as the language of locals. Being located in the eastern part of France, it is often referred as the heart of the Alsace region. One of the top visited cities in France, this city is so beautiful that you definitely want to come back.

It just took us 2.5 hours to reach Strasbourg from Paris and we checked in into our beautiful apart-hotel Residence la Canopee located close to the city center. After quick check-in, we started our trip with the famous Gothic masterpiece – the red limestone cathedral right in the city center. If you are someone like me, you can also hop into the tourist office right next to Cathedral to build the day’s itinerary. The cathedral is so grand, no wonder it was the tallest building in the world for 227 years till 1874. The interiors of the cathedral are so appealing with the stained glass and lights that it leaves you both amazed and calm at the same time. Worth noting is the astronomical clock from Renaissance period decorated with animated statues and paintings and there are 2 shows at 11:30 and 12:30 to showcase the history and also depicts the 4 stages of human life. You need to buy the tickets for 2 euro, unfortunately we were late for it.

Another important attraction of the cathedral is the view from the top of cathedral where you can see the complete city and a little glimpse of Black forests if it is not clouded. You need to walk more than 300 stairs to get to the top and pay 8 euro for the ticket for this experience, but it’s worth it. You also visit the mini museum about the history related to construction of the cathedral and a big compass of major cities. To preserve the walls of the cathedral from lovers wishing to carve their name, they have a provisioned a virtual way to carve the names and send it to your email. We also didn’t miss this chance to engrave our love on the virtual wall of the cathedral. To avoid feeling giddy on the spiral stairs, I really recommend going slow and pausing to peek out of the windows and may be capture few photos. After this mini hike at the cathedral, we strolled around the cathedral and took some great pictures. Treat yourself with some rose petal gelato ice cream as I did (Amorino) while you gaze the surrounding stores showcasing amazing collections of Christmas goodies. I have still not talked about the biggest attraction of the cathedral, saving it for the end.

Next, we added Petite France in our map and walked towards the most beautiful part of Strasbourg to discover the old canals lined with colorful flower pots, plenty of small cafes and half-timbered houses on the narrow quant streets. Walking leisurely around Petite France, we spotted some historical anecdotes about the canals and some best photo spots. It’s not possible to miss the reflections of the bright colorful houses on the river canals adding to the ambience of this place. We also located the place to buy tickets for the boats. Group or private boating in canals can be experienced for an hour or even more for a reasonable price. It’s strongly recommended if you want explore Petite France without straining your legs. We strolled between the canals in a small garden to reach another great attraction – Les pont couvert (covered bridges). This name is still used for the bridge, although the bridge no longer has roofs to over it. For the best view of the bridge, we walked further down towards the entrance of Barrage Vauban. Barrage Vauban is another beautiful bridge and dam which hosts some old classic statues and also offers a panoramic view from it’s terrace. Both ends of Vauban bridge gives you amazing views of the couvert pont. Both the bridges look amazing in the daylights with shadows on water as well as in the nighttime with the dim lights.

We headed to some fine dining just near the bridge as we did not want to miss witnessing Petite France with the lights in night-time. It’s not always to easy to find vegetarian meal suiting the Indian palate (as we love spices 😉 ), but Marco Polo really surprised me with a delicious Italian pizza with a lot of vegetables including my favorite artichauts. For dessert, we tried some German speciality called as “Kougelhopf glacé au coulis d’églantine sauvage arrosé de Marc de Gewurz” – ice cream with raisins, eggs, little alcohol and served with chantilly . It will take few more servings for me to be really able to admire this new flavour. I must say that Meringue glacée on the next table looked so attractive, that it’s added on my “To do” list now. Other than the food, we really enjoyed the views from the restaurant with covered bridges on one side and river canals at the other.

It was 11:00 pm by the time we finished our dinner and we were already tired, so we headed towards hotel. Walking back, we realised how beautiful Petite France looks in the night time and I got some very good pictures of both the bridges. On our way, we saw on a small bridge near Place de Corbeau and witnessed the gushing water near the dams. The canals have been so calm, that we were really thrilled to hear wild sound of water. This was the last surprise for the day and we reached our hotel to rest and prepare for adventures for the next day.

For next day, we took a train to Colmar to do a short day trip and returned by 5 PM. Colmar is again a very beautiful small town with a lot of beautiful canals and churches, details deserve a dedicated blog. For now, let’s continue in Strasbourg. For the remaining day, we decided to hire bicycle to explore rest of the city. This worked perfect for us as this gave us the opportunity to explore places a bit far from the city center.

We took our bicycles from the railway station of Strasbourg by using Velhop. It was really easy to hire the bikes. We installed their app, add details about our phone number and bank card. Velhop blocks 150 euros on the card and allows us rent out bikes from the railway station parking at a very reasonable price starting with 1 euro for an hour. Price reduces further if you use bike for more time like 5-10 hours is fixed 5 euros. One restriction with Velhop is the bicycle needs to be parked pack after usage in the railway station only. With our bikes, we explored a lot of places in a span of 5 hours. Riding across the city center, we passed by Palais du Rhin, National Theatre of Strasbourg, Opera National and the church of Saint Paul. Our first hop was Parc de l’Orangerie and we soon realised why this park is so special. This park is the house for more than 800 storks. Once endangered species, this park has helped to preserve them by providing suitable habitat. Other than hosting storks, this park also has a zoo and hosts a lot of exhibitions and events. We were late for the zoo, but we really enjoyed the serene lake with a pretty waterfall and numerous playful swans. It’s perfect place to do a picnic with family. Next destination was Citadelle park with a big fort and big lawns for walking and sports activities. We also saw the beautiful Citadelle bridge and mini port near the bassins on the way. The best part of cycling in Strasbourg is the riverside cycling dedicated lanes that lets you enjoy the scenery on the ride. And we rode along the riverside for long while till we reached the city center. We decided to dine in an Indian restaurant as my husband was really craving for his biryani, skipping the link as the food lacked authentic Indian flavours and was more like mixed cuisine. After dinner, we were almost planning to return back to the station, but decided to revisit the cathedral for its shine in night and this became the best part of our Strasbourg trip.

This is the biggest attraction of cathedral I was talking about. The lights show at the cathedral – the most amazing lights show I have ever seen. It is a 13 min lights show played in a loop on every night in the summers. It’s almost like the cathedral is transformed into a canvas and an extraordinarily talented painter is coloring this canvas. It’s very hard to describe the show in words or even capture a video portraying the exact quality of the show. The show was so captivating that I watched it 3 times in loop without noticing it’s on repeat. I must say this show is something you shouldn’t miss if you are in Strasbourg during summers.

Tips for new visitors:

• Best Season: Strasbourg and the entire region of Alsace is famous for the Christmas markets and the ambience is really unique during the Christmas time, be mindful that it can be crowded. Summer attractions are the light show in cathedral and the colorful flowers everywhere in the city. So decide when you want to visit, I would suggest winter season if you have to make a choice. But both seasons are really amazing.
• Language: People speak German and French here, so download google translator if you don’t speak these languages. In general, people are very friendly and you will feel welcomed in the city.
• Food: Gastronomic experience can be really worthwhile. Choucroute, Baeckeoffe and Flammekueche are really famous. Check more on blog.
• Transport: Considering the city is not very big, you can either walk or rent bicycles. The tram network is also reliable and can be good for internal transfers.
• How to reach? From Paris, train is the fastest way (3 hours approx) and affordable way to reach Strasbourg. Buses can sometimes be cheaper, but takes 6 hours. In any way, I suggest to book as early as possible to save money on tickets.
• Days needed: One needs 2 days to be able to explore city peacefully. However if you have only one day, limit your destinations to cathedral and Petite France. If you have a few more days, you can also visit Colmar, Riquewihr for vineyards, Kayserberg, Eguisheim and there are lot of other small villages too.
• Weather: Do a weather check before packing. Pack umbrella, jackets and summer hats accordingly.
• Not to be missed: Must see places are Cathedral and Petite France area. Rest can be added from the above itinerary based on how many days you have.

PS: I am not being paid for the links on this blog, sharing as my personal recommendation.