Introduction to the Manager's Playbook Project
The Manager's Playbook is a valuable resource designed to guide aspiring and experienced managers in honing their managerial skills. It compiles practical advice and strategies based on real-world experiences and aims to maintain brevity and clarity. This playbook serves as a living document, continually evolving to address the challenges faced by managers at various stages of their careers.
Who is this for?
The playbook is a go-to guide for those embarking on their journey as a manager, though seasoned managers looking to enhance their skill set will also find it beneficial. It encapsulates a variety of heuristics and advice that cater to managers eager to learn and refine their approach.
What Makes a Great Engineering Manager?
An effective engineering manager is a proactive leader who channels their team's capabilities to meet goals. They excel in coaching, communication, and decision-making. By fostering a culture of innovation and improvement, great managers continuously elevate their team's performance levels, driving them toward achieving tangible, energizing results.
How Technical Should I Be?
Engineering managers should possess a robust technical background, ideally with over a decade of technical contributor experience. This knowledge equips them to understand complex technical challenges and contribute to decision-making processes without being overly involved in day-to-day coding, ensuring they are not a bottleneck but rather an enabler for their team.
One-on-Ones
Regular one-on-one meetings are crucial for building rapport, offering feedback, and coaching team members. These sessions should provide a structured environment for discussing goals, challenges, and career paths while allowing for flexibility to address unique needs and concerns of team members.
Effective Teams
Effective teams demonstrate autonomy, mastery, and purpose. Managers should ensure that their teams operate independently, with without unnecessary dependencies, foster deep domain expertise, and maintain a clear understanding of their role in the larger organizational context.
Coaching
Coaching is central to a manager's role and involves asking open-ended questions, summarizing conversations, and steering discussions productively. It empowers team members to take ownership and evolve professionally, facilitating growth and development.
Project Management
Project management methods should be tailored to fit the team's size, project type, and maturity. Key strategies include breaking down projects, prioritizing based on impact, avoiding excessive parallel projects, and assigning clear ownership and accountability for each initiative.
Giving Feedback
Prompt, specific, and constructive feedback is vital for alignment and trust-building. Feedback should focus on observable data rather than subjective behavior, with a collaborative approach to addressing and resolving issues.
Thinking Strategically
Managers should always be thinking strategically, understanding the big picture and aligning their team's work with broader business objectives. This involves assessing priorities, identifying pain points, and maintaining focus on contributions that drive significant impact.
Making Decisions
Decision-making involves distinguishing between reversible and irreversible choices, with thorough documentation and transparent communication. Managers must ensure the team understands the reasoning, especially in disagreements, fostering a culture of open dialogue and commitment to chosen paths.
Ticket and PR Process
Effective ticket and PR processes involve setting clear guidelines, prioritizing tasks, and streamlining reviews to avoid bottlenecks. Encouraging automated tools ensures consistency and efficiency in code quality and style.
Meetings
Productive meetings originate from well-prepared proposals and agendas, with an emphasis on long-form written communication for clarity. Meetings should conclude with clear actions, responsible parties, and deadlines to secure follow-through.
Hiring
Hiring is paramount and involves seeking candidates with strong ownership, collaborative spirit, effective communication, and a passion for learning. Managers should look for individuals who will not only meet but elevate the existing team standards.
Onboarding
A well-executed onboarding process is critical for new hires, ensuring they integrate smoothly, understand their roles, and become productive team members efficiently.
The Manager's Playbook stands as a comprehensive guide aimed at equipping managers with the necessary tools to lead effectively, fostering team success, and driving organizational growth.