My User Manual
My User Manual is a team exercise in which each member writes a short guide to working with them: how they prefer to communicate, when they work best, how they like to receive feedback and what tends to frustrate them. The team then reads the manuals out to one another, asks questions and agrees a few adjustments to how it works together. The version described here follows the Atlassian Team Playbook; the underlying idea of a personal user manual or personal README is widely used.
Facilitation script
- 1
Set the stage: purpose, voluntary depth, questions for understanding only. Agree who goes first.
5 min - 2
Sharing round: each person presents their manual in about four minutes, followed by two to three minutes of questions. Keep a visible list of overlaps and clashes.
50 min - 3
Review the list together and pick the two or three clashes that affect daily work the most.
10 min - 4
Agree a concrete adjustment for each and write it into the team's working agreements or notes.
15 min - 5
Decide where the manuals live and when they will be revisited. Close with one sentence each on something learned about a colleague.
5 min
Tips
As the facilitator or team lead, present your own manual first and include something that is honestly unflattering; the depth of the first manual sets the depth of all the others.
Ask for concrete behaviour in place of adjectives: 'send me the document a day before a decision' is usable, 'I value clarity' is not.
Keep the questions to curiosity.
The moment colleagues start arguing with a manual, people edit theirs down in their heads before speaking.
Common pitfalls
Manuals are filled with flattering generalities such as 'I am direct and value honesty', which give colleagues nothing they can act on
A manual is treated as a set of rules others must follow, so the most assertive person's preferences become the team default
The session ends after the sharing round with no agreed adjustments, and nothing in daily work changes
The documents disappear into a folder nobody opens, so new joiners never see them and old ones go out of date
People feel pushed to disclose health, family or neurodivergence details because others did; that damages trust instead of building it
Variations
One-page card: Management 3.0's Personal Collab Cards compress the same idea into a card with availability and time zone, communication preferences, roles and areas of responsibility, interests, demotivators and regular external contacts, filled in before a workshop and kept on a shared board. Pair version: two people who work closely together, such as a manager and a new report, exchange manuals in 30 minutes. Asynchronous: publish the manuals in a shared space and use a 30-minute call only for questions and clashes. Onboarding: a new joiner writes their manual in the first week and reads the existing ones as part of induction.
Where it fits
When to use it
A new team is forming and people know each other's job titles but not each other's working habits
A new manager joins and both sides want to shorten the months of guessing how the other operates
A remote or hybrid team keeps misreading tone, response times or silence in chat
Two teams have merged and bring different unwritten rules about meetings, availability and feedback
You plan to write working agreements and want individual preferences on the table first
When not to use it
There is an open conflict between team members: manuals become ammunition or a list of grievances, so address the conflict first in a mediated conversation
Trust is very low and people expect what they write to be used in performance reviews; start with a lighter exercise such as Personal Maps
The team needs binding rules, not individual preferences; go straight to Working Agreements
The group is larger than about ten: the sharing round becomes a long series of monologues, so split by sub-team or share asynchronously
People were given no time to prepare; manuals written in five minutes in the room stay generic and the session produces nothing to act on
Related methods
Frequently asked questions
What is My User Manual?▾
My User Manual is a team exercise in which every member writes a short guide to working with them, covering communication preferences, working hours, feedback and typical frustrations. The team shares the manuals and agrees small changes to how it collaborates. Atlassian documents it as a play in its Team Playbook, and similar formats circulate under names such as personal README or manual of me.
What should a personal user manual include?▾
Useful sections are: when and how to reach you, the conditions under which you do your best work, how you prefer to receive feedback, things about you that people tend to misread, and what you need from colleagues. Write observable behaviour and specific requests. One page is enough.
How long does a My User Manual session take?▾
Plan about 30 minutes of individual preparation beforehand and 60 to 90 minutes together, depending on team size. Each person needs roughly six to seven minutes for presenting and questions, and the group needs another 20 to 30 minutes to turn clashes into agreements.
How is it different from working agreements?▾
A user manual describes one person; working agreements are rules the whole team commits to. The two fit together: the manuals reveal where individual preferences collide, and the agreements settle how the team handles those collisions.
Do people have to share personal information?▾
No. Each person decides how much to write and say, and the facilitator should state that at the start. The exercise works on the level of work habits; nobody needs to explain the reasons behind a preference.
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Try it freeMethod descriptions on Workshop Weaver are original content written by our team, based on established facilitation practices. This method was inspired by work from Atlassian Team Playbook.