17AV��

Growth at 17AV�� isn’t about titles, career ladders, or hierarchy. It’s about flexible paths that are motivating and clear for everyone, no matter what growth looks like for them.

As 17AV��’s Team Experience Manager, I recently sat down with our Talent Manager, , to talk through the biggest project I’ve led so far: the redesign of our growth frameworks. As we’ve grown past 50 people, it became clear that our previously solid frameworks just weren’t keeping up with the needs of our team or how we actually work anymore.

In this interview, Julia and I focused on why this work mattered, how I approached it with care and collaboration, and what I learned along the way. If you’re working on org design, performance, or team development in a growing company, there’s a ton to take away from this (plus a fun tangent on old-timey baseball uniforms ⚾)

What you’ll hear in the video

Julia and I dig through and describe the full arc of the project. You’ll hear about the moment we realized it was time for change, the research and input-gathering that followed, and how I tackled the challenge of building something that’s truly useful and .

Some of the topics we explore:

• : Why the old framework wasn’t cutting it anymore
• How I gathered company-wide input (in Italy, no less) and why that made all the difference
• How we’re thinking about leadership beyond job titles
• My use of the MECE framework to avoid overlap between competencies
• : How I designed our competency framework to be useful all year round

Resources that informed this work

As mentioned in the interview, here are a few of the resources I leaned on to shape my thinking. I pulled ideas and inspiration from:

• The Player–Coach–Captain model
• by and
• Tools and frameworks from and

What’s ours is yours

At 17AV��, we don’t gatekeep 😉 If this kind of work is on your radar, feel free to dig into our full , which we’ve made public.

If you have questions or want to swap notes on building better frameworks, reach out 👋 We’d love to hear what others are trying too!

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Read the transcript 👇

Julia: Hi everyone. Welcome. I’m Julia, the talent manager here at 17AV��. I’m joined by Amber, our team experience manager. Amber, how are you?

Amber: I’m great. Excited to be here and talk about growth frameworks.

Julia: Me too. We’re going to have a 20–30 minute chat about Amber’s recent project: redesigning our growth frameworks here at 17AV��. To set the scene, what are growth frameworks? How are they used? What are they for?

Amber: Growth frameworks give you a structure to evaluate your current performance and plan for what's next. They’re usually laid out in a table with competencies related to your role, and you can see how those progress as you move forward in your career.

Julia: Got it. So, a way to see where you are now and what it takes to keep growing. We already had growth frameworks at 17AV��. What prompted the redesign?

Amber: The original frameworks served us well for years, but as we grew to around 50 people, each department started evolving in its own way. It became clear we needed more specific guidance within each domain to really support growth. The original framework was one-size-fits-all for the whole company, and we realized we needed more refinement by department. We also wanted something that would stretch us into the future. 17AV�� is growing, and we needed a framework to grow with us.

Julia: So, making them more robust and relevant to different roles, rather than using one blanket framework for everyone, from a talent acquisition coordinator to a senior engineer.

Amber: Exactly. And the way the old ones were written needed polish. They were a bit abstract and generic. This time around, we focused on being clear and objective with the language so people could actually use them to evaluate performance.

Julia: That makes sense. You’ve touched on what wasn’t working with the original frameworks and some of what you wanted to improve. But when we finished round two, what were the main goals for the redesign?

Amber: We had a few big goals. One was about structuring growth paths. Traditionally, you have an individual contributor path and a management path. We have a lot of senior ICs at 17AV��, and we knew we needed growth paths that didn’t require moving into management. We wanted these to be motivating, and that meant not designing them in a vacuum. It couldn’t be a few people behind their computers deciding what growth should look like. It had to feel relatable and accurate to our culture.

We also wanted the frameworks to be used year-round. In many companies, people look at these things only during annual reviews or when there’s a performance concern. We wanted something that anyone could refer to anytime to understand how they’re doing and have good conversations with their manager.

Julia: That year-round use is huge. And one of the things I always talk about with candidates is how we support growth without requiring people to become managers if they don’t want to. Managing is such a different skill set. You don’t have to go that route if it’s not for you. There are still ways to keep growing.

Amber: Yes, and that’s where the Player, Coach, Captain model came in. The coach is on the sidelines, guiding and leading. The player is the IC, on the field, bringing their skills and delivering great work. The captain is more of a seasoned leader in their craft, still in the work but with leadership experience.

This gave us a different lens on growth. Leadership shows up across the board, not just in formal management roles. So we created paths where ICs could grow and feel inspired without needing a title change. Our captains can even manage a few people. When we surveyed folks, many said they didn’t want a full-on manager role, but they still wanted to lead in some way. So we built that flexibility into the structure.

Julia: That’s awesome. Silly tangent, but in baseball, coaches still wear player uniforms because they used to be players too. So maybe the best analogy is old-timey baseball coaches. But we can settle for captains.

Amber: I love that.

Julia: So Amber, when you were at the start of redesigning these growth frameworks, doing research and discovery, walk me through what you were doing and learning.

Amber: It was a lot of fun. I started with some external research. I looked at tools like Pando and Lattice, which have plenty of documentation. I also looked at other companies that have shared how they built their frameworks. That helped a lot: seeing what worked, what didn’t, what they tried. But the most valuable insights came from our team. At our 2024 meetup in Italy, when everyone was in the same room, we ran a 50-minute workshop. We split into departments and mapped out competencies across our structure, technical, shared, and so on. The prompts were things like, "When you see high performance, what does that look like?" and "What do you find motivating about doing your work?" It was a bottom-up, inclusive approach. We wanted people to see themselves in the end result.

Julia: It really was a great exercise. And it's so much more meaningful when the framework reflects what people at 17AV�� actually value. After you collected all those ideas, probably hundreds of sticky notes, what came next? What were some of the hard parts of building the competencies?

Amber: There was a lot. It was fascinating how the same idea could show up in five different ways. But when I zoomed out, the patterns were clear. We weren't trying to reinvent the wheel. We didn’t need to rename communication or problem solving. Those are essential and always will be. What got interesting was defining what those things mean to us. What does communication mean at 17AV��? What does prioritization mean here? That’s when our culture really came through. As a remote, async company, communication is fundamental. It’s not just how you talk, it’s where and when and how consistently. If you don’t get that right, things break down. So we couldn’t use a generic definition. We had to make it ours. That was the most interesting part: writing those definitions in a way that captured the nuance of our culture.

Julia: That’s so interesting. Stakeholder management is another one. Every framework includes it, but the way it shows up at 17AV��, and why it matters here, can be totally different.

Amber: Yes. And we tried to strip out all the jargon, fluff, and vague language. I didn't want anyone to glaze over or feel disconnected reading it. Once I started bringing in the real language we use, the way we actually think and work, it all started to feel real and useful.

Julia: Totally. That relevance makes such a difference. What were some of the other challenges? You mentioned earlier that we have a high concentration of senior individual contributors. Did the framework help with that?

Amber: The research I did at the start helped us shape what we needed. We didn’t want to push people into management paths just to grow. And honestly, at our size, we don’t have a lot of formal management roles, and we don’t want to create layers just for the sake of hierarchy. So we leaned into building growth paths that allow people to stay in the work. If someone decides they want to manage, we’ve added a separate set of four competencies that cover things like leadership and delegation. What I’m really excited about is that it creates consistency. Whether your manager is a director or an IC who has a couple direct reports, the expectations are the same. From a team experience perspective, that gives everyone a more equal experience and growth opportunity at 17AV��.

Julia: That’s so important. You hear those horror stories about people having totally different experiences depending on who their manager is. Having consistent standards across the board helps protect against that. It makes sure people get a fair shot.

Amber: Exactly.

Julia: So now that it’s been built, what are you most proud of after seeing it in action for a few months?

Amber: Honestly, I’m proud of how much time and space I was given to do it properly. In a lot of companies, this kind of work gets pushed to the back burner. It took about six months to complete, and that’s a big investment. But now it’s here, and we can keep tweaking as we go. I’m also proud of how inclusive the process was. We really took time to listen and iterate, and that made it so much stronger.

Julia: We need to do a whole other video on your project management skills. I had a front-row seat to this, and it was impressive. You took a big, messy project and broke it into clear, doable pieces.

Amber: Thank you. It was definitely complex. But when you build a solid foundation, it becomes something you can grow and scale. It’s worth putting in the work.

Julia: What surprised you during the process? Anything unexpected?

Amber: I didn’t expect just how important the cultural fit would be. I tried a few different things to check for that. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention ChatGPT. Not for strategy or critical thinking (it couldn’t tell us who we are or what we want to become) but it was helpful in making sure the competencies weren’t overloaded. A common mistake is packing too much into one competency, which makes it hard for people to know what’s really being measured. I used the “Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive” framework to check for that. I had ChatGPT review my draft to make sure competencies didn’t overlap and were fully built out. It helped catch places where ideas were running into each other or could be made more distinct.

Julia: That makes so much sense. But how do you avoid going too far and cramming too much into something like “communication”?

Amber: I limited each competency to no more than three bullet points. Within those, I made sure each point was unique and well-rounded. There’s an art to writing them clearly while keeping them flexible enough to apply across different roles. For example, we have shared competencies that apply across all departments, like communication. Writing those in a way that fits everyone, without being too vague, takes some fine-tuning.

Julia: To be specific, we landed on 16 competencies max. Four are for people managers only. So if you’re not a manager, you’ve got 12. Eight are shared across the org, and four are department-specific. Is that right?

Amber: Correct. It was complex to set up. As we grow, we’ll probably shift to more department-specific ones and fewer shared across the whole company. We’ll make that change when the time’s right.

Julia: We’ll do another video in a couple years when it’s time for round three. You also mentioned earlier that our frameworks are designed to be used year-round, not just at review time. Tell me more about that.

Amber: Whether you’re a team member or a manager, you’ve probably asked yourself, “How am I doing?” or “How do I grow to the next level?” And on the manager side, “How do I evaluate this person?” Those are common questions, but often hard to answer with clarity. I wanted us to say, here it is. Let’s be transparent and clear. So we created a companion document called the growth tracker. We’re rolling it out now as part of our June mid-year reviews. It’s a simple system where you evaluate yourself, and your manager evaluates you, against the competencies, using a scale of needs improvement, performing, or outperforming. It creates a more objective way to prepare for those conversations. We do formal reviews three times a year, but nothing stops someone from using it at any time. The idea is that you’re empowered to own your performance. You’ve got the tools.

Julia: I love that. You’re the one who knows how you’re really doing. Your manager sees a lot, but not everything. The framework is there to help you have better conversations, and it’s on you to use it. You own your career.

Julia: Okay, last few questions. What advice would you give to someone just starting to build growth frameworks?

Amber: Keep it simple. Make it relatable. Build it from the bottom up. Include your people. It might seem slower, but it’s faster in the long run. What leadership thinks is needed may not match what the team actually needs. Bring in diverse voices. And yes, it can feel vulnerable. You might think, “It’s easier if I just do it myself.” But even if you’re an expert, you’re still only one person. A company is many people. Their input matters. Also, use clear language. Avoid jargon. That makes a big difference. And make sure you have the right stakeholders and support in place. I was lucky to have that at 17AV��.

Julia: If you could go back to the start, would you do anything differently?

Amber: I’d remind myself not to get overwhelmed. At the beginning, it looks huge and impossible. But just break it into small pieces. Finish one piece at a time. Celebrate little wins. It adds up. You’ll get there. Just keep going.

Julia: Hang in there. I’m so glad you did, because we now have a strong, useful framework. I’ve looked at it and it’s comprehensive, but also really specific to what I do every day.

Amber: There’s something powerful about getting thoughts out of your head and onto paper or screen. We create a lot of assumptions, but when you write it down using an objective tool, you can really check yourself. It helps you reflect, grow, and have better conversations. This is just the start. Now people need to use it. I’m sure we’ll learn more once it’s been out in the wild for a while. But I hope it feels like a gift and something people can use to move forward.

Julia: Absolutely. Looking at the facts instead of judging yourself. That’s so valuable. Amber, thank you so much for joining me. We’ll link to some of the resources you found helpful. And if anyone watching is going through this themselves, leave a comment. We’d love to hear from you.

Amber: Thank you so much, Julia.