Sergio Gago – CTO, Guitarist, and Reluctant Frontman
There’s a reason great teams feel like great music bands, or viceversa. I’m not talking about the dysfunctional ones where the bassist walks out mid-tour because the drummer slept with his girlfriend. Or the dysfunctional teams where everybody is fingerpointing each other (note to read Lencioni’s “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team”). I mean the ones that click—where people listen, build on each other, and create something far greater than any solo effort. Regardless of the genre.
Business teams, like bands, aren’t a collection of rockstars. They’re ensembles. And the best ones groove like legends. From hiring to performing all the way through forming, storming and norming. There are tons of analogies that one can take from the other.
When hiring people, I have a bias towards musicians because of this (and if you are reading, don’t sweat, I’ve built internal mechanisms to mitigate that, ha!). And the reason is because the attitude and ethos required is pretty similar. You can call it a proxy indicator, oftentimes better than your Github pattern of green.
So, in every band team, you’ll find archetypes:
- The Bassist: Holds down the groove. Not always visible, but you surely feel them. This is your backbone— For example the reliable platform engineer or ops person who makes sure nothing collapses when the tempo shifts. This person needs to be in the key, fully embedded in the team. Sometimes can shine when nothing else cuts through the mix. The best songs always have a steady bass line that is remembered for ages. (Try listening to RHCP without Flea at the bass and you will know what I mean)
- The Drummer: Keeps time, drives the rhythm. Perhaps the project manager or scrum master. When they’re tight, everyone else stays in sync. When they’re off? You’re in chaos. Even when you play in odd times or when you are jamming they are what keeps the pace. A drummer is process oriented. Keeps eye contact, and you know, when the audience (the client) claps at the wrong time they are able to adapt the groove to the public. Then the other musicians can adapt as well. Some companies have punk drummers, some have jazz ones, everyone dreams of having a Bonham. But the personality is very typical. Give them a bpm that they’ll kick off a rythm in their minds. Identify them by rapid calculations, excel spredsheets and tight structure. Does the groove need to change on the chorus? They will bring the band along for that rythm.
- The Rhythm Guitarist: Steady. Crunchy. Creates the actual value of the product and also fills the gaps. Your favourite riffs? They usually come from the rhythm guitar player. Everybody knows Angus, but Malcolm was the real deal. A fullstack developer who can solo if required but is truly the meat of the product. Your core features, your end to end understanding of the product. Filling the sound spectrum with what’s missing. This person can build structure while letting others shine. Most of the times they are the ones who stay in the band for longer and know all their songs by heart. Notes and feel.
- The Lead Guitarist: The technical wizard. Riffs when needed. But here’s the catch— knows to solo only when the song needs it. No need for 12 minute shreeding. This is the Jennifer Batten next to Michael Jackson, or EVH. In business, that’s your principal engineer or domain expert. Sometimes a lone wolf. A technical lead that can get pulled during a major client incident or downtime. They typically can’t keep the same pace and shredding for too long (unless they are Dragonforce or Dream Theater), so use them with caution. The rest of the band works as a build up for their performance but if not tamed they could alienate the rest of the band (“I’m playing myxolidian on the high range, just stay at your palm muted power chords!” is the new “don’t do anything else before you make things worse, just let me fix this”)
- The Vocalist / Frontman: The face of the group. The showman. People may think is the one that does everything but a capella may not be the best show ever (Unless you are Freddy, of course). This can be your product manager, your client lead, sales, or your team lead in general. It is the one grabbing the mic and connecting to the crowd. Empathy is their name. They can read the public and create the words that move people. Sometimes it can be one of the other band members (in my case I’m an average rhythm guitar and mediocre vocalist!). Who said two roles are incompatible for the same person? This person is an extrovert, can do conferences, can sell, loves to be on the spotlight and craves it. Knows that ethos, pathos and logos are the fundamental ingredients for everything. Looks like the star, but without the rest of the band? Karaoke at best.
- The Keyboardist: Adds color, mood, depth. Fixes the song. Sometimes overlooked and when composing sometimes they just add the final touches at the end instead of right at the beginning. The product wouldn’t feel whole without them, or would not feel at all (Imagine “Jump” by Van Halen without the keyboard! or Flake from Rammstein). They think end to end. How people will benefit from the product and they adapt their instrument to the song. They tend to have amazing skills and musical knowledge (sometimes are the only ones with musical training in the band, like PhDs in your company!). They help with the overall arrangement and oftentimes suggest improvements to their bandmates. Think data scientists, UX designers, frontend developers, etc.
Everyone needs their moment. Not everyone gets a ten-minute solo. But they all make the track.
Play for the Song, Not for the Ego
Bands that work well understand this: you don’t play for your instrument, you play for the song. That includes the lyrics and the vocalist. In business, too many teams get trapped in instrument-first thinking. “I wrote 300 lines of code today,” says one dev. “I closed a ticket,” says another. “It works in my machine” repeat the rest. Great. But did we move the song forward? Did the crowd dance? If the public is not dancing your job is not done.
True collaboration is about listening to each other and to the public. Adjusting. Backing off when needed. Hitting hard when it’s your turn. No amount of virtuosity saves you if you’re off-tempo or playing in the wrong key. And it is ok to miss a note or a beat here and there! As long as you fix it as a team.
Rehearsals are like stand-ups. Neat, predictable, relatively safe. But when you go live—whether that’s a client meeting, a product launch, or a conference demo—everything changes. You might miss a chord. Hit a bug. Forget your lines. Doesn’t matter. Keep the groove. Smile. Most of the audience won’t notice—unless you make them do. When playing live I had a tick that my teacher helped me solve. Whenever I made a mistake live I made a face, a small wink (a kind of mental f**k!). And that face was what gave away the mistake. Should I kept going like nothing happened people would have thought I was just playing a disonant jazz chord on purpose.
Execution isn’t about perfection. It’s about resilience and flow. You need stage presence in business too. A live concert is a whole set not just one song.
The Axis Progression of Projects – All about the Flow
Let’s talk music theory for a second. The I–V–vi–IV progression (Axis of Awesome, anyone?) is the backbone of more pop hits than you realize. That is, four chords that put together allow you to play absolutely everything. From Eagle-eye Cherry to James Blunt or Justin Bieber. Absolutely terrifying but useful on a campfire evening when you are 17 and you are playing guitar to… make friends…
Music, like business projects and teams are also about flows. Most of the times is not about the absolute number (a KPI, Revenue, Project status) but the differential and how that flows with the ecosystem. The interval when you play a C and a G note (a perfect 5th) sounds very similar to the interval when you play an E and a B right after. In companies you can ascend the scale chromatically (one semitone at a time) or through crunchtime in startups you ascend octave by octave.
What does that have to do with chord progressions on teams? This is how the progression typically works:
- I (Tonic) – It’s Home. Stability. The kickoff of your project. Strategy meetings. Scope. Calm before the storm. The place you leave, the place you will want to return.
- V (Dominant) – Tension builds. Engineers are stressed. PMs are sweating. Customers want features you never promised. Deadlines approach or are missed. Something is slightly dissonant.
- vi (Submediant) – The emotional phase. Burnout sets in. But you pivot. Find a new angle. Add nuance.
- IV (Subdominant) – You stabilize. Deliver. Reflect. Close the loop… and begin again.
This never ends. Companies live in these cycles. Good teams learn the rhythm and use them for the better. Bad ones stay stuck in the bridge forever.
🎸 Final Riff
Music has no shortcuts. You don’t become a decent player without rehearsal, trust, and the courage to play in front of others. Exactly the same goes for business. So next time you’re assembling a team, don’t ask if they’re rockstars. Ask if they can groove, listen, and serve the song.
Because in the end, the crowd doesn’t cheer for solos. They cheer for the song, for the band and the overall performance.
(Post inspired by Ozzy. Long live the prince of darkness. Thanks for all the good moments.)