An Elegant Puzzle: Systems of Engineering Management

by Will Larson

Baseline: In the best case, you’ll be able to drive the organizational impact you need with contextualized nudges, but in some cases that isn’t quite enough. The next step is to work with the key teams to agree on baseline metrics for their performance. This is useful because it ensures that the baselines are top-of-mind, and it also gives them a powerful tool for negotiating priorities with their stakeholders. In some cases, this does require some organizational authority, but I’ve found that folks universally want to be responsible. As long as you can find time to sit down with the key teams and explain why the goal is important, it typically doesn’t require much organizational authority. Review: The final phase, which hopefully you won’t need to reach, is running a monthly or quarterly review that looks at each team’s performance, and reaching out to teams to advocate for prioritization if they aren’t sustaining their agreed-upon baselines. This typically requires an executive sponsor, because teams who aren’t hitting their baselines are almost always being prioritized against other goals, and they your help explaining to their stakeholders why the change is important.