I wrote last year about things I learned as an engineering manager in 2022. It’s been another twelve months of ups, downs and sideways, so here’s a couple more things that I learned this year about leading people in tech.
Let good people go
A resignation in a team you manage is like a breakup: it pierces you to the heart; it instantly feels personal and devastating, and you’re plunged into a world of bargaining and denial. Just like the stages of grief, though, you eventually reach the “acceptance” phase and realise it’s probably for the best.
I got back from a month of paternity leave midway through 2023 and on my first day back, one of my team informed me they were handing in their notice. Still trying to remember how to do my job, I fired off all the HR beacons I could find, and gamely attempted counter-offers and opportunities for future growth. I couldn’t make it stick, though, and I think we both knew from the start that this was the end for this person on the team.
It was a big loss and the team is still feeling it today, but at the same time it was the right thing. This person was still at the early stages of their career with a huge appetite for learning, exploration and activity. I understood their frustrations with some of our current processes and priorities and realistically couldn’t do a huge amount to change them. In these situations you can try to buy yourself out of the problem—eg. shower them with money—but ultimately this isn’t really what they want, and in that scenario the best thing you can do is try to be objective about supporting that person’s career, even if it’s not with you.
The alternative here is to wait until someone is really, genuinely unhappy, and keep them pinned down in a role they’re miserable with but are sticking it out solely for the money or convenience. They’ll drag everyone else down with them eventually and they’ll look back on the end of their time with your team as something regrettable and frustrating. Much better to have someone bow out at the top of their game and excited to try something totally different – as painful as it is to lose them.
Take the time to pay it forward
One happy side-effect of the above loss was the opportunity to hire again for my team. It had been almost a year since we recruited a new engineer, and significantly longer since we’d hired anyone at a junior level. I managed to persuade my bosses to let us hire at a level lower than the one we were replacing, and that’s a micro-lesson for anyone with recruitment responsibilities who’s reading this: be the change you want to see in the world. There’s a paucity of entry-level jobs in software right now and the only way it’ll change is by convincing your bosses that your team can handle the additional workload of a newbie engineer (and genuinely wanting to bring somebody in at this level because you believe it’s your duty).
If you’re going to do this, though, you need to be prepared. I advertised my role and had to close it three days later after we received 250+ applications. I couldn’t even read all of them, let alone interview all the people who looked like they could do the job.
One thing I did commit to, though, was giving as much feedback and support as I could to everyone we shortlisted – and I also ended up doing this for a bunch of people we didn’t interview, too. I held informal CV review phone calls with any junior engineer who contacted me on LinkedIn or sent feedback and tips via the messaging centre there (with heavy caveats that these were only my personal opinions). For the people we interviewed but didn’t hire, I sent detailed feedback including notes from the panellists about their technical assessment findings, with the goal of helping them find their next role even if it wasn’t with us.
I’m not saying all of this to humblebrag about what a nice recruiter I am. I’m saying it because if you’re a hiring manager in the current job market, I think you owe it to the pool of applicants to do as much as you can to give them support – especially if it’s for a coveted entry-level role which are under so much competition right now. I’ve never seen a job market like it, and I felt so much pressure and emotional weight when it came to hiring for this role: all the people we spoke to would’ve been great fits for our team and given everything for the role. The very least we can do as managers is meet that effort and return it.
When you’re not doing well, call it out
As mentioned above, I was off for almost seven weeks of this year on paternity leave (in two stages). Although this isn’t my first rodeo, I was still knocked for six after the first chunk of leave, trying to work from my upstairs office with the now-unfamiliar-again sound of a crying newborn in the room below me. The broken sleep and lack of mental bandwidth is not a hallmark of great management, and I found myself struggling to keep focused, listen properly, or understand what the team were working on and where I needed to help.
I don’t think I nailed this, but I did try to actively own this not-quite-thereness, and call it out directly to my team when I felt I’d let things down or been less involved in something than I should’ve been. Partly because they needed to be aware that I myself knew this wasn’t matching expectations, but also to set a standard: all of them have had difficult, challenging years in their own lives in 2023, and I don’t expect them to bring 100% of themselves to work when they don’t have it to give – just like I didn’t.
Calling out your own performance is a tricky thing to get right because you don’t want to feel you’re making excuses for sloppy behaviour or making light of something important. But done correctly it promotes trust among your team and enables them to also be honest and reflective if something’s holding them back too, as it will from time to time. Nobody’s superhuman and we should normalise speaking about it when we’re not able to fake it.
Shield the team as much as you can
We had a complicated project to deliver this year and while we succeeded, it came at a cost: time spent on technical initiatives was impacted, and everyone’s fatigue levels noticeably increased as we reached the end of the year/project, with little appetite to do much of substance in the remaining quarter of the year as everyone recovered and caught up.
At times like this I reminded myself that my first loyalty is to the people I manage, above and beyond the objectives of the roadmap/KPIs. Written down like this it sounds—and is—obvious, but there are moments in your leadership role when you’ll be asked to try to squeeze in an extra bit of work, commit to a goal that’s unrealistic, or pick up a set of requirements that haven’t been fleshed out enough to get started with.
Again I can’t claim to have always nailed this, but this period has taught me about ensuring the people in your team are shielded from these kind of requests. I wrote last year about how “your understanding of reality is subjective”, eg. the traditional “shit umbrella” manager role is a bit of a misnomer because you should be involving the team with as much context as you can rather than “protecting” them from it.
But on the flip side, I think it’s important to be an advocate for your team’s wellbeing: eg. if some outside entity is asking for a last-minute component to be thrown onto your page, you have the power in your role to refuse to commit your team to do the work until the copy is signed off and the customer segments defined – don’t risk making your people chase up requirements and wait around for stakeholder signoff while the wheels spin.
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It’s been a challenging 2023 at times between year-long projects, team personnel changes and the birth of a new child. I’ve struggled at times, felt low and confused, and equally felt buoyed with pride and happiness by the great people I get to work with. I’m sure 2024 will feature more of the same feelings, but hopefully with a few different lessons to learn so I can keep feeling a sense of growth and development at work. Hopefully you’ve learned a few things this year too – feel free to share. Thanks for reading!