Building the TPM community at Careem

At Careem , we aim to simplify the lives of people in our region. An ecosystem that seamlessly integrates a suite of services to facilitate our day-to-day activities.

Over the last couple of years, we remotely built a technical program management organization to bring colleagues together and materialize Careem’s vision efficiently. With 1600 colleagues of which approximately 580 are technologists, across 60 squads. Each squad is in charge of a building block that makes up Careem’s ecosystem, powering 11 businesses through a distributed architecture of over 770 microservices. There is no shortage of internal and external change and dependency management.

The Journey

After 12 years of building software and leading global engineering teams, I joined Careem as a founding member of the Technical Program Manager (TPM) team on the 8th of March 2020. We started working remotely to slow down Covid-19 transmissions just three days after. At the time, Careem had multiple stand-alone applications focused on ride-hailing (Careem), food delivery (Careem Now), B2B delivery (Express), and multi-commuter (Bus).

Careem was by then part of the Uber family (January 2020) with a Super App in the works that would accelerate its focus on eCommerce business as workers retreated home. As ride-hailing, our core business was down 70%, colleagues came together to brainstorm impactful ways to surpass this uncertain season. It was in this context that I joined the business domain that focused on the ‘Mobility of Things’ (Food, Groceries, Goods).

The engineering organization was structured in a series of siloed business domains. As we launched the Super App strategy in April 2020, it became very apparent that our structure needed to evolve with our long-term ambitions of being the Super App of the region. By the end of 2020, we started our transition into building a cohesive engineering institution that embodies technical specialization to efficiently scale the eCommerce, mobility, and fintech domains.

As a result, my scope expanded to cover the Mobility of People (Ride-hailing and Marketplace). During the 1st quarter of 2021, we focused on establishing our founding TPM team. By May 2021, we were a team of 6 TPMs working on topics varying from organizational change management; infrastructure cost optimization to launching an ultra-fast delivery business. Topics are prioritized based on business impact and execution complexity.

Over the last two years, we grew the TPM community from 2 to 12 colleagues. This necessitated a set of core principles that guided our organization as it grew in size, scope and impact.

The Principles

1. Finding community members

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others” - Mahatma Gandhi

The first step in building a community is the membership of individuals. Individuals who are passionate about solving problems on topics they deeply care about. Careem is no ordinary workplace. To strive, one needs to be driven by purpose and hunger for growth. Identifying members that hold to the company’s values and are curious to embark on a growth journey is a critical step in the interviewing process.

Knowledge sharing, clarity in expectations, and anchor projects ensure new joiners have a successful start. We focus on empowering colleagues to positively impact the wider community and region. Throughout their journey, we recognize their strengths, highlight learning opportunities, and build the right avenues for them to excel and showcase their mastery.

2. Building community culture

“You are human because of relationships” - Archbishop Desmond Tutu

To build a lasting institution, one needs to understand Ubuntu - I am because you are. You cannot be a person without other people. The TPM community is aware of its interdependence and consciousness of responsibility, especially highlighted during the execution of company-wide initiatives. We win together, and we lose together.

The power of having a small team gave me the ability to manage a flat organization, impartial of disciplines, grades, or titles. We focus on open communication for the flow of information and different perspectives. This enabled us to foster a culture of continuous and dynamic learning, where colleagues are dedicated to developing and supporting each other as they venture into new areas within the organization or utilize skills that they are still honing.

3. Setting community norms and processes

“A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor” - Franklin D. Roosevelt

Careem is a fast-paced environment with lofty ambitions. If something is not working, we rapidly re-adjust to ensure we remain on track with our mission. This agility in change management requires intentionally lightweight norms and processes. Every standard, process, or tweak is the product of small cross-functional work streams where we hash out implementation details and challenge the change from different angles. This level of agency enables us to bring the company along through every adoption of change.

Challenges and how are we managing them?

At Careem, we have the privilege of collaborating with some of the most intelligent and inspiring people in our region. For the technical program management community, this privilege comes with the responsibility of ensuring we all maintain a synchronized flow of execution - similar to conducting a 500+ orchestra.?

Skillset range

“We learn who we are in practice, not in theory.” -? David Epstein

Due to the broad skill set of TPMs who are regularly wearing different hats, colleagues outside this community can easily form their interpretations and expectations of the role. With such a nascent community, we ensure we ruthlessly prioritize and focus on areas we can drive the most impact. Such as coaching teams on improving their performance or driving complex cross-functional and cross-team changes or deliverables that have a wide reach beyond a domain.

Alignment and commitment

“Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships.” – Stephen Covey.

Patiently bringing colleagues along on the journey is the secret ingredient for the success of any change, delivery, or process we establish. This gets significantly easier as TPMs build trust and sincere rapport across the organization. Similar to the advice I got from my mentors, I regularly remind new joiners to focus their energy on building relationships. Connections pave the way for their journey at Careem and beyond.

Building trust also requires consistent credibility and reliability, elements that are a product of our actions and words. Therefore leading by example and with trust creates a multiplier effect that accelerates the company forward.

What’s next?

I am privileged to have been trusted with building this community from the ground up. A community that empowers colleagues to drive Careem’s digital strategy forward efficiently and effectively. As we continue to scale the Super App, having a strong TPM-led organization ensures effective execution, and end-to-end oversight of strategic technical commitments that span across government institutions, regulators, technical vendors, merchants, and internal functions.

Closing remarks

I hope this article helps shed some pointers in establishing your community, especially in hybrid or remote working environments. Below is the first slack message to the founding members on the 31st of May 2021, inspired by Careeem's values and one of my all-time favorite books: Team Spirit by Brenden Hall.