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1-1s serve two purposes. First, they create human connection between you and your manager.
need if he has context on you as a person. Great managers notice when your normal energy level changes, and will hopefully care enough to ask you about it.
Being an introvert is not an excuse for making no effort to treat people like real human beings, however. The bedrock of strong teams is human connection, which leads to trust.
The second purpose of a 1-1 is a regular opportunity for you to speak privately with your manager about whatever needs discussing.
A great manager will notice some of the little things you’re doing well in your day-to-day, and recognize you for them.
Ideally, the feedback you get from your manager will be somewhat public if it’s praise, and private if it’s criticism.
Good managers know that delivering feedback quickly is more valuable than waiting for a convenient time to say something.
If you don’t ask your manager about a promotion, do not expect her to just give you one magically. If you’re unhappy with a teammate, your manager may not do anything unless you bring the issue to her attention.
Your manager should be the person who shows you the larger picture of how your work fits into the team’s goals, and helps you feel a sense of purpose in the day-to-day work. The most mundane work can turn into a source of pride when you understand how it contributes to the overall success of the company.
as well as learn new technical skills. You want to build a strong foundation of skills because you will need them to succeed.
great CTOs have strong communication skills, project management skills, and product sense, in addition to good technical sense.
Developing a sense of ownership and authority for your own experiences at work, and not relying on your manager to set the entire tone for your relationship, is an important step in owning your career and workplace happiness.
When you are persistently unhappy, say something. When you are stuck, ask for help. When you want a raise, ask for it. When you want a promotion, find out what you need to do to get it.
Especially as you become more senior, remember that your manager expects you to bring solutions, not problems.
Asking for advice is always a good way to show respect and trust.
Listen carefully Listening is the first and most basic skill of managing people. Listening is a precursor to empathy, which is one of the core skills of a quality manager.
Software development is a team sport in most companies, and teams have to communicate effectively to get anything done.
The tech lead role, after all, is a leadership position, even when it’s not a management position.
that even experienced managers fall for. Tech lead is not the job for the person who wants the freedom to focus deeply on the details of her own code.
My job as tech lead was to continue to write code, but with the added responsibilities of representing the group to management, vetting our plans for feature delivery, and dealing with a lot of the details of the project management process.
The tech lead role is not a point on the ladder, but a set of responsibilities that any engineer may take on once they reach the senior level. This role may or may not include people management, but if it does, the tech lead is expected to manage these team members to the high management standards of RTR tech. These standards include:
If a tech lead is not managing directly, they are still expected to provide mentorship and guidance to the other members of the team.
They are empowered to make independent decisions for the team and are learning how to handle difficult management and leadership situations.
A leader, responsible for a (software) development team, who spends at least 30 percent of their time writing code with the team.
Being a tech lead is an exercise in influencing without authority.
How do I empower them? How do I remove the obstacles slowing them down?
the willingness to step away from the code and figure out how to balance your technical commitments with the work the whole team needs.
From now on, wherever you go in your career, balancing is likely to be one of your core challenges.
The worst scheduling mistake is allowing yourself to get pulled randomly into meetings. It is very difficult to get into the groove of writing code if you’re interrupted every hour by a meeting.
Part of your leadership is helping the other stakeholders, such as your boss and the product manager, respect the team’s focus and set up meeting calendars that are not overwhelming for individual contributors.
Your highest priority as a tech lead is taking a wide view of the work so that you keep the project moving.
a project. This role requires you to have a good sense of the overall architecture of your systems and a solid understanding of how to design complex software.
understand business requirements and translate them into software.
you’re learning to find efficient ways of breaking down the work so that the team can work quickly. Part of the challenge here is getting as much productive work done in parallel as possible.
you will want to gather input from the experts on your team, and talk to the people who know the affected parts of the software deeply,
You will also want to start identifying priorities as part of this process.
Sometimes tech leads are tempted to go to heroics and push through these obstacles themselves, working excessive overtime to get it all done.
as tech lead, you should continue writing code, but not too much.
Your product manager should know as early as possible about any possible challenges.
Teams often fail because they overworked themselves on a feature that their product manager would have been willing to compromise on.
Start looking for opportunities to delegate work,
you have to act as a software developer, a systems architect, a business analyst, and a team leader who knows when to do something single-handedly, and when to delegate the work to others. Fortunately you don’t have to do all of these tasks at once. It may be uncomfortable at first, but you’ll find a balance with time and practice.
It is common for people to try out management at some point, realize they don’t enjoy it, and go back to the technical track.
Give yourself a fun task occasionally, as
Taking on a new report Holding regular 1-1s Giving feedback on career growth, progression toward goals, areas for improvement, and praise as warranted Working with reports to identify areas for learning and helping them grow in these areas via project work, external learning, or additional mentoring
