How to stop stressing out and start rocking as a new Engineering Manager
Surviving as a newly promoted manager is hard. I make it a whole lot easier, more predictable, less stressful, and more fun
No spam, just to-the-point content
Dear Engineering Manager,
I get it.
It’s overwhelming to step into a career that is completely different from what you’ve been doing before. I know it was for me.
One day you’re committing code, delivering technical assets the impact of which is on a dashboard, another day you’re taking a deep-dive into some of the most complicated creatures, humans.
Where do you even start to get some solid ground under your feet again? And is it ever solid, or mere quicksand that sucks you in once you feel confident?
Individual people are complex enough (infinitely complex, to be frank), where do you even start about creating a team out of them? And what is a well-functioning team. How do you know? What is a step towards “better”? What is a step towards “worse”?
How will your first week on this journey be? What about your first month? Six months?
Who is a competent manager in your organization who can show you the ropes? Stick it out with you. If they’re great, they are probably going to get promoted soon and get super busy.
And please, please don’t tell me you had 3 managers change in the last 12 months :). And if you did, my condolences.
You probably started looking online and found bits and pieces. A couple of books, a couple of videos. Some may turn out great, some will be disappointing.
Maybe you even received some on-the-job training, that’s slightly more relevant for the environment you’re in. But is it the state-of-the-art? How does it all come together? How are you going to apply it? And when? Is there even time to learn in the ever more dynamic workplace?
I was so anxious about the journey when I first started it 8 years ago, I could hardly sleep.
I wish I could time-travel back and hand my earlier self a ticket to something like
A battle-tested Guide for surviving and thriving as an Engineering Manager. Taught live, in small groups (no more than 12 people) over the course of 4 weeks.
ABOUT ME
My name is Mikhail (or Misha for short). I’ve been around IT mostly as an Engineer (up to Principal/Staff) for over 20 years now, during 8 of them I was an Engineering Manager, Senior Engineering Manager, Head of Engineering or similar.
I am not famous or anything like that but over the years I have ironed out an approach that worked everywhere I went. It’s the same exact approach I used to coach over 20 Engineering Managers throughout my career in companies operating in very different industries. I have actually been in all roles and tangents of roles I will be speaking about, except the Product Owner.
I was promoted many times over the job role I will be giving you the insights into. The departments I ran and created from the ground up always delivered, had the lowest attrition and the highest engagement when compared to the similar departments in the bigger corporations I worked for.
I believe in merit. Merit shows when you listen to someone speak, or read the letters they type up, and it’s the best verification of competence one can have, so if you have never seen any of my videos, please check them out.
But this story is not about me. It’s about you. Here is to your success!