From Manager to Director: Guide to Managing Managers

hey this is the level up engineering podcast where we talk with some of the most successful engineering leaders who reveal actionable management insights that help you take your developer team to the next level this episode is brought to you by coding sans a software development agency building web applications from design to delivery with react node.js and angular check them out at codingsands.com hi there everyone i am carolina todd and it is my pleasure to welcome you to the level of engineering podcast this is another episode where interview with an accomplished tech leader today my guest is mike sivers but before before i hand it over to him i will tell you a few words about who we are and what we do this is an engineering podcast geared towards engineering leaders so you can learn a lot about um what you need to do to become the best possible engineering manager you can ever be um there are probably some links in the description please click them and so you can sign up for our newsletter which is the level of engineering podcast newsletter mike had been on the show before and we talked about self-managing teams which was also pretty interesting to look at to her here to learn from so click on that if you would like to learn more about that and um here are a few words about mike he was cto of riot games and now he is review of development at epic games and i will have him tell us a bit about that and about himself to begin with mike the stage is yours thank you caroline it's great to be on the show again um so yeah so i'm currently at epic games i lead uh development for our online team and online is essentially you know the epic games store if anybody's you know bought video games in the epic game store that's within online epic online services uh and a lot of our core technologies like infrastructure accounts um the data platform um and a few other things so um it's a pretty pretty fun group um so yeah is there something that we should know about you as the first thing yeah sure thanks um i um you know i think uh let's see what you know about me i love video games obviously i work for a video game company um i'm really into cycling uh cycling is kind of my uh how i how i uh relax these days um mostly virtual cycling now that we're in the pandemic still um in leadership obviously um and i do a number of side projects uh mostly mentoring and coaching other leaders at the moment i'm actually spending a pretty decent amount of time doing that in other companies and i just started working on a book that is going to be on the topic that we're discussing today so how awesome this is exciting news um so let me tell our listeners and watchers a few words about our topic today we will be talking about a topic that i don't think is that much discussed in our sector it's transitioning from manager to director so without further ado let us you know lay down some basics for the topic um what are some of the differences between managing individual contributors and managing a team of managers who manage individual contributors yeah it's a great question right and i actually think it's important to kind of use that as a definition i've seen a lot of different definitions of director especially in engineering you know teams um and i think that you know kind of the core definition that i think of um is is exactly that you you go from managing ics to now managing other managers and uh almost everything about that job is different and which is why it is such a challenging transition for a lot of people um i know it was for me um and and part of the reason is you know so what is different um you know when you're uh you know kind of a frontline engineering manager managing ics you know it's a good chance you're you know going to standups every day you're probably doing code reviews you might even be contributing um code in a lot of cases when you kind of step up to the next level and you start managing other managers you have to remember that you have managers that are doing those things that you used to be doing right and so if you try to continue to do those things you know at best you might disempower the managers that you have have working for them um at worst you might cause a lot of disruption you know imagine um you know being an engineer on the team and your director you know shows up to stand up you know which in some cases may be fine but in in other contexts you know it can it can be a little jarring for folks and and so you know there's just a there's a lot of new responsibilities that come with being a director like you know setting the vision and we're aligning the vision with the team connecting the team to the outside world solving a different type of of problems for the team that are you know potentially roadblocks to to productivity and so there there are so many things about the job that are different and i think you know that's why actually i see um a pretty high degree of uh failure rate for people making that transition they either um they either love it they hate it you know a lot of people don't don't make that transition very successfully wow what what the statement to begin our conversation with um okay so so let us talk a little bit more about some of these misconceptions so that uh our listeners can be on on the same page with us um what what do managers think when they or for example what did you think before you became a director it's a great question and i think you know there's there's kind of there's really three three areas or three conceptions that i see people the misconceptions people have that kind of cause them to fail but but there's a fourth one that just kind of starts with the motivation to begin with like why become a director in the first place and you know i think for me and this isn't true of everyone this just was for me um you know i thought if i became a director then i would have more control i would be able to fix all the things that i saw around me that i thought you know were were were broken um or or could be better and um what i think a lot of people don't realize is that you know when you take on a broader leadership role while it is true you take on more responsibility you actually often have less control um because you know you are now part of the leadership of a of a bigger you know in a bigger context and you can't you can't always just do whatever you want to do you need to there's a lot of relationships you need to manage there's a lot of um a lot of alignment that you have to get when you're driving change and things like that and so um you know this is why i'm pretty passionate about this topic when i um when i first took on a director role i did i did so many things wrong um and uh and i could i should tell that story um i was leading a team um this was probably 16 17 years ago at this point and um it was comprised of four or five sub teams and we were going through an agile transformation at the time and um so i was the director of this group um i had probably six or seven managers reporting to me and i think there was probably about 50 or 60 engineers on the team and um so we're driving this agile transformation and i spent all of my time with my team i you know we were you know i went to the stand-ups and we were teaching them scrum and we were you know introducing new tooling uh for how to manage the agile process it was changing the way we were doing our releases and there was just so many things that but i was internally focused i spent all my time uh focused on the engineering teams and um and i thought i was actually pretty proud of and still kind of am proud of what we were able to accomplish but when it came time for performance reviews to come around i actually got a really bad rating um it was actually probably one of the worst performance reviews i ever had in my career and a lot of the feedback that i had gotten was that the people around me my peers the other directors in the organization um didn't have a relationship with me they didn't know what i was up to all they saw was me making all this change happen on the engineering teams but i hadn't connected with you know the leader of the project management group or the leader of the release management group or the leader with the qa group and so um i was continuing to kind of do what i did as a manager which was focus inwardly and i didn't have any relationships outwardly to help those people understand the change that we're trying to make and and it caused me to fail it's actually one of the one of the worst failures i i can think of back if i look back in my career so so okay so you define failure as uh getting those performance reviews because it sounds like you made a lot of change within the team [Music] but well i did make a lot of change within the team but um you know that's that's why success as a director is not it's not just about getting results like you you can't get results at all costs right that's not that's not okay you have to get results and maintain your relationships and you know help you you're part of a you kind of step into a new category of leadership right and and your your primary team isn't necessarily that the people who report to you anymore but your primary team is the these is the collective leadership team that you are now a part of and um and so if you think of it that way while my engineering teams were probably you know adopting this change the rest of the organization had no idea what we were doing and i had not done a good job of aligning that um vision with all of the other elements of the company that that i needed to be successful what's an interesting perspective that you are giving us so let's un wrap that story a little bit if you don't mind um what was um or what do you think or what what is your recollection of what the kind of initiative was behind making you a director what what were you doing that made you the the best candidate for the director role um i think in that context you know um so this was i took on that role as part of a job change so actually switched companies um to step into that direct role and um this was you know back to motivations my my motivation at the time actually was was not necessarily to enable others or to be the best leader i could be my you know my motivation was you know i wanted the bigger title and i wanted to climb the ladder and i wanted to you know feel important um and i think you know that sounds maybe shocking for people to hear but i honestly think that's why a lot of people do it and they take on more leadership roles because or more scope and responsibility not necessarily because they want to but or they they have the skills to or they're ready for it it's because you know they're they're kind of chasing their ego a little bit and so um anytime somebody uh i'm talking to wants to become a director i always ask them why like what you know what is it about you know being a director and you'll hear people say things like you know they want a seat at the table they want to be a part of the decision making and while those things are good you know the real reason to want to be a director is because you believe in you know the power of leadership to you know to unlock you know the full potential of your team and the organization right and um and i think that mindset is just a little bit more um a little bit more of of the correct motivation so to answer your question i don't think i'd had the skills at the moment i think that was uh i think that was a failed transition for me into a director role and it took me probably three or four years to really figure out what success looked like there awesome that was gonna be my next question so you had this first performance review and you felt like okay i could have done better what should i do did you stay at the company did you switch companies um what were some of your strategies to improve the performance review from cycle to cycle the first thing i did was um somebody did me a favor actually um it was one of the senior directors that i worked with um they gave me some very hard feedback that i needed to hear and they pointed out a lot of those things that i said um you know that my motivations were wrong and i hadn't built relationships and things like that um and uh i asked them what they recommended and uh he told me he said he said mike he said i think you should go um talk to all of your peers and all the other leaders that you work with not your team you know and ask them for their honest feedback about you as a leader and i did that and i um that was i did it over the course of a couple weeks it's probably two of the hardest weeks of my career because i got to listen to you know all the all the reasons that you know people thought i wasn't doing a good job um and uh and that was it was hard to hear but it was also very transformative for me um i ended up leaving the company um and i you know looked for the the patterns and themes from what i had heard and all of those uh all of those uh interviews that i did with with folks and all that feedback and i i poured myself into reading books and taking classes and filling a bunch of the gaps that i had um and uh and you know obviously i didn't you know correct it overnight i still made other mistakes you know for for several years after that as i you know tried out new tools and learn new skills to be to be effective as a director all right thank you um so if you you have mentioned some of the things that are really important for for a successful director but um can we kind of make a make a list of the necessary skills so that anybody listening can sort of look at themselves or get feedback and check if they are ready yeah i think if if it's okay i'm going to start from the negative i want to talk about kind of the three areas where i think that you know i see the most failure and it kind of and i have stories for each one of these um uh and and then we can talk about what are the skills that you need to kind of make that trends is that does that sound okay um so there's really three three things that i think i see a lot one is a failure to recognize that it's a new job right um and so meaning people don't stop doing what they did as a manager so when you when you take on a new job you know you should stop doing the old job and start doing the new job there's a there's an excellent book called the first 90 days if nobody's ever read it um that talks about this very topic which is you know if you're going to step into a new role you've got to stop doing the old role um this is what i this was the mistake i was making in that story i was just telling you was i was still trying to act like you know a frontline manager when the job had changed the expectations had changed and so i needed to learn how to understand what was expected of me in the new context um the second area i see people fail a lot in is they fail to manage themselves and you can't manage an organization unless you can manage themselves manage yourself um one of the things that happens when you become a director is you suddenly have all these new stakeholders and all these new relationships that you have to build yet and you've also probably you know doubled or tripled or in some cases quadrupled your direct reports um in your organization or not direct reports but indirect people that you're responsible for and so your plate just became really full and um if you don't manage your time and your and your energy and all of those other other things you can you can not run yourself ragged i a very good friend of mine um became my boss one time and um uh he was going through this transition and we've we've talked about this quite a quite a bit since then um and i remember sending in i mean sending him an email um because he was in this state like he was just running around and he couldn't make time for me he couldn't make time for the team um and you know he's just in meetings constantly never really seemed like he had you know uh his his house in order you know things under control it just kind of gave off this air of just being stressed out and worried and you know and i sent him a really long email and i you know i told him i said you know i i'm really worried about you um i'm worried about you and um and i'm worried about you know the impact that you could potentially have on the organization if you can't figure out how to manage your time basically and um and uh and and through that and some other conversations you know uh this person was obviously able to able to kind of turn that around and realize that they could control their calendar um only you can hit accept or or deny on a on a meeting invite and it's hard to make those trade-offs sometimes but you know um a director who's running around with their hair on fire all the time doesn't exactly exude confidence right and that's probably not the best uh the best situation to be in so you've got to figure out how to get your time under control um and then the third thing is uh directors that they they don't they don't take on the leadership role and what i mean by that is um you know leaders i believe um one of the primary jobs of a leader is to shape the world around you right and i see a lot of directors that fail to shape the world around them so what does that look like that looks like you know um people who are expecting other people to solve their problems for them um i'll tell another story here i had someone that reported to me once and um in the first you know four or five or six weeks of our relationship you know and ask this person you know how are things going how's the team doing and they would tell me things like you know well i you know the team isn't aligned around this thing or i have this manager that's not doing the right thing over here or you know the team messed this thing up over here and this went on for four or five weeks every every week you know how's it going like you know you just got the sense that the team was really unorganized and not delivering and you know kind of in bad shape and i remember asking this person whose responsibility is it to fix these things right um and and and they had this this outward perspective like like they weren't responsible for the team and i and we went through a number of kind of coaching conversations where you know i had to tell them that you know if your team is in disarray and this manager is doing the wrong thing or you know the team's misaligned around this thing over here that's your responsibility you're the leader you have to you have to solve those problems right yeah that's that's that's kind of what we expect of the directors to be able to kind of shape their organization and get it you know into a really healthy state and you know coach the managers underneath you if they need coaching and you know things like that and so um that's really um one of the bigger areas and and that even gets that's just i mean that story is just an internally focused one it gets worse when you start talking about you know kind of the world around the teams and people leaders that are unable to kind of you know affect the change that they need to to set the conditions of success for their team so um i'll pause there i don't know if does that uh any uh does that does that totally yeah make sense my question is um about the last role so if you're a manager you're already kind of hopefully making waves within the organization or that's how i picture it um even as a manager you should you should be this buffer zone between your team and the rest of the company and help your team you know get aligned with the company values and all that stuff um and also not blame the team if they are not to be blamed um or if you haven't um haven't been able to tell them exactly what you want them to to do and why but um how is that different from a new director kind of failing to take on their leadership responsibilities if i understand the question i think it's because um you know i think it's because of the second thing that i mentioned you know not being able to manage your time well it takes time to um to set the culture on the team it takes time to go problem solve you know health issues on the team it takes time to coach your team it takes time to connect with other people and i think you know that first you know kind of now you're in this role and you've you have all these new direct reports and a lot of new stakeholders and probably more context uh more responsibility maybe it maybe even in areas that you are not the subject matter expert in um you're going to have all of these demands on your time and i and i see and i think i think some leaders just get too busy and they don't prioritize you know the leading of their team really that you know they're still focused on doing the work and don't get me wrong you know getting results i think is a very very important um uh you know measure of success for any leader but the results are more than getting the work done the results are you know building a healthy team you know uh creating psychological safety you know communicating well connecting the vision and those kinds of things okay okay so now that we have uh kind of established what to be watch watching out for um how can how can our newly developed directors overcome these challenges yeah that's a great question i think um you know i think there's some really important skills to to have as a director and i think um you know there's a lot of uh there's a lot of material out there that you'll hear about you know leadership is more important than management and and things like that and i and i generally believe that's true um but i think to be a great director you also have to have great management fundamentals i think you have to know what good management looks like and when i talk when i say management what i mean is um you know hiring and firing performance management you know coaching you know all of all of the things that the mechanics that go into teasing the best performance possible out of out of individuals and teams and the reason that's important is when you become the director remember you now have managers reporting to you and you need to be able to teach them you need to be able to guide them on that journey you need to be able to meant you need to be able to hold them accountable and if so if you don't have really solid management fundamentals you're not going to be very effective at coaching and and guiding and holding your teams accountable to great management fundamentals also and that's where i think you'll see a lot of teams that are moving really fast or scaling really fast start to break down is is just around fundamentals because they're not doing those things well so you know i would recommend uh everybody every leader of any level you know always be you know continuing to learn about and polish your management skills um how to set expectations how to give feedback how to you know how to coach how to you know motivate how to you know all of those kinds of things how to hire you know and build great teams um so that's that's the first one is really just nailing the management fundamentals and the other thing i think is uh delegation and coaching right learn learn how to delegate because you know again if you're taking on a direct role and he's trying to do the job that you that your manager should be doing for them you're going to disempower them you're going to um they're going to be frustrated that you're always involved and so you have to learn how to um you have to learn the art of delegation and and and and let people um you know learn for themselves and potentially make mistakes and and that can be really uncomfortable when you're used to you know being the accountable manager um you know the idea of letting go a little bit and letting someone kind of maybe maybe make mistakes but and then giving them the coaching and helping them learn from those experiences is is is an art um so you know practicing that i think is important um the third thing is communication i think you know leaders are always communicating whether whether you're whether you think you are or not you're communicating uh by the words you say the questions you ask um in one-on-one settings in group settings um but you're also communicating by your behavior and by um the things that you know people can observe about you and um and i in you know when you're in that director role you know all managers is true of all managers but i think the more scope and responsibility you take on the the bigger this becomes you're kind of a cultural beacon like you're you're you're signaling to the organization and to your organization what the culture is like and if you're um if you are not aware of what you're communicating and how you're communicating it when you choose to say things and in what what audience you choose to say those things you can actually do a lot of damage and so that's that's something to to to think about and learn about is just the art of good communication um one-on-one in groups and you know there's other forms of other forms of communication and then the last thing that i think is just so critical is um giving feedback um giving feedback i think is one of the more powerful tools you have as a director in in that role you know we live in a we live in in a world of servant leadership and i and i firmly believe in the then the whole you know concept and spirit of servant leadership um but sometimes we take that so far that we forget that we're also responsible for you know giving hard feedback when it needs to be given right that you know servant leadership doesn't mean anything goes uh servant leadership means doing um and being there to help the team be successful and sometimes that means being direct sometimes that means giving hard feedback when it needs to be heard um just a couple weeks ago i had a leader that was exhibiting a behavior that i thought was damaging to not only to them and their reputation but also the organization and so i had to give them some really hard feedback and they obviously didn't like hearing that and i didn't like doing it i don't you know nobody nobody wants to go you know give somebody some heart feedback but i have a responsibility to the team and to the company and you know all of these things to make sure that we're setting the right culture we're setting the right tone and so when you observe those kind of things you can't be shy um about addressing them right and so um and i if uh anybody's read you know kim scott's radical candor you know sometimes we can be too afraid to go give the hard feedback because you know we want to be nice um but we'll empathize people into you know really really bad situations so those are those are the four main things really management fundamentals delegation communication and giving great feedback i love that it also sounds like when you are in a director kind of role people are always watching when you're a manager it's like yeah you're a manager you have a team whatever but when you're a director you made it sound like you know every interaction kind of counts because you can never know who's there and whether or not they know who you are you are sort of this face of the company exactly no matter what yeah and i think a lot of people people draw these strange lines in their mind about who's leadership who's company leadership and and who's not right and and everybody kind of draws that line differently some people it starts at their manager for some people it doesn't start until you get to like the executive team and um and one of the things that i've i notice in in direct i firmly believe directors are part of the company leadership right so if you're a director you know you're expected to you know um understand what the company is doing and help communicate that and connect your team to that mission and vision and all that kind of stuff um if if you draw that line in the wrong place like so if let's say you're you're a director and you don't think of yourself as company leadership um that can lead to all kinds of you know bad communication things where you know uh you can you can set the wrong tone because you're you you know you're not aligned with kind of you know the overall kind of company culture and mission all right or not all right but uh let's move on you you already mentioned that if you're thinking about uh promoting someone to a director role you are gonna um you're gonna ask them about why they're interested in the role um what are some of the things that you watch out for or some of the things that will make or break someone's promotion in your mind yeah so there's um there's the why the motivation and and typically you know i think it's it's really because you you want to because you believe in the in the multiplicative power of leadership um that i think is really the the the best reason to want to get into because you feel like you can unlock more potential um and and have have more multiplicative effect um if it's you know bigger title bigger you know bigger paycheck um more power uh you know or or i you know i want a seat at the table those tend to be they're not necessarily bad things but um in and of themselves they can lead to a lot of negative mindsets that will um that will that can cause problems um the other thing that i that i really look for is um is there a current team you know under control is it high performing are they delivering great results are they you know is this person someone who is you know helping solve problems not just within their team but but around them as well because those are the kinds of things that you know um directors will typically do is not just you know solve problems with your team but solve problems for the company and and not be afraid to you know uh pick up something that maybe needs attention even if it's not in their their direct area of responsibility so you know looking at you know a lot of the things that we just talked about do they have good management fundamentals are they are they a good communicator um those kinds of things i also you know i try to take those um transitions slowly i think that's a mistake a lot of companies can make is they'll thrust people into those roles without a lot of preparation and so you know to the extent possible and this isn't always possible but you know i try to find you know if someone's thinking about a direct role like okay well let's find a junior a more junior manager that you can just mentor kind of informally and let's see how that goes right um let's uh you know maybe expand your scope and give you one other manager or a lead to to manage um as opposed to suddenly thrusting you into you know here's four or five managers um you know potentially with six seven eight nine you know direct reports themselves and you know broader scope and context that can be effective if you have somebody's really high potential and all those other fundamentals are in place but um i think the transition should be like very carefully managed because failure at this transition can really set back a career for a long time and i think you know i think leaders should try should take that seriously so if um if you are if you are um leading and you are helping someone rise to the director role what are some of the signs kind of that you should watch out for if if we have some some weepies or some other directors who are listening to us how will you know if your new director is struggling or not kind of on the right track or or if they are if they are in need of some coaching or mentoring yeah um there's a lot of different signals um that uh to look for but you know i i i tend to look for um are they enjoying it right um you know it should be uh this should be a a positive kind of career trend transition that that the person is excited about um and so a lot sometimes you'll see or i'll see um people are like you know this isn't what i thought it was and and that's usually a sign to probe more like what about it isn't what you thought you know and and sometimes it's you know i can't my impact um is like i can't determine what my impact is it's hard for me to determine sometimes it's you know i'm in too many meetings and i just don't you know like in the work that i'm doing um things like that um i do look for people that are kind of like you know the image is you know their hair on fire right there they're running around crazy they just you know you can just like you tell when somebody just doesn't seem like they're um uh you know have a very stable existence right and so that's somebody i i tend to pull aside and ask you know hey how are things going are you doing okay they're usually rushed or hurried in their communications you know things like that um again you know it's are you exuding confidence or are you making people kind of worry about you and then the third thing that i tend to look for is you know i'll do skip levels with new directors and just you know talk to their managers about how's it going you know are you getting what you need um how's the team doing how's the team feel you know any feedback and things like that and um there's usually signals there about you know whether they're too disengaged or or um or too engaged you know that's a balance not micromanaging but also not you know unavailable um you know how what's the decision making like are they making good decisions are they exercising good judgment things like that so those are the big ones that i can think of and um the the other side of the same question if you are a new director i wonder when you told us about that story of you taking on your first director role did you feel that something was off before the performance reviews that you got or how can one as a new director kind of um realize about themselves i did not um and but that was because of a particular thing that i needed to work on which was um i did not have good relationships i didn't have any i didn't i didn't have um i didn't have my own you know personal board of directors if anybody's ever heard that term you know i didn't have a mentor i didn't have you know a coach i didn't have um other engineering leaders that i could talk to about the challenges i was facing um i did not seek out feedback um and i think that is probably the number one if i could if i could give one tip it's seek out feedback um do not be don't be afraid especially when you're stepping into a new leadership role and it doesn't matter what leadership role it is but this is especially true i think for people making this transition is talk to you know find out all the people that are uh connected to to you and your role all your stakeholders your peers your your leadership your team and sit down with them and ask them what are your expectations of me um do you have any concerns about you know me in this role like what do you think's going well what do you think's not going well and i think um you know a lot of people have a hard time giving the hard feedback and so you know sometimes i encourage people to not take no for an answer like you know i need at least one piece of constructive criticism before i leave this conversation right um because we all have things that we need to improve and if you're doing that if you have a good mentor you have a um someone who's you know kind of can help you navigate that and you're and you're actively seeking out feedback that you should avoid any blind spots that are going to cause you to fail and as long as you can adjust your behavior to what people tell you you're going to do great i love that thank you um wow yes and so people shouldn't be afraid of giving those constructive pieces of criticism because it is after all helping the entire organization yes all right um so if uh there is a there's a new director you are now vp so you are at least one level but i am assuming a couple levels above them do you have any tips for for those executive leaders to help their directors what are what are some of the things that people in positions of higher leadership can do to make it a successful team yeah i think um you know one is being aware that this is happening i i think a lot of you know this it took me it it took me i remember the day i i never forgot i'll never i remember the exact day and conversation that we realized this was when i was at riot that this was happening that we had a lot of managers that were struggling to make a director transition and and so we had a we had a conversation myself and the rest of the leadership team about what do we do about that how do we how do we help fix this right and so i think number one is you know if you're an executive and leading an engineering organization you know i think the number one is to just be aware that this is a challenge right and and think about that and and the in your hr team or you yourself might even have the data that would suggest that like look at how many you know look at you know director promotions look at the performance afterwards and things like that um and this is especially true in the companies they're growing really fast you'll i think you'll find a lot of this the second thing is once you've identified the problem just figure out what are the support systems that are going to work right for us it meant sitting down and describing to all of the engineering leaders um what we expected of our engineering leaders and we developed a framework that was uh that was essentially you know uh was these are the seven things that we think all engineering leaders are accountable for um and and it is the sign of great engineering leadership um but then we also described those seven things at the manager level the senior manager level the director level the senior director all the way up to my role as the cto and um and we did some training and we communicated that out to the organization so that people understood what the expectations were right because a lot of i think a lot of teams don't ever even really define what that looks like and every company is going to be different but you know define what you expect of your directors so that you know they can understand what are the rules of the game um because people don't like to play games they don't know the rules for um and then the third thing is um you know i think build the support systems in place like understand and be be okay like this is not um uh understand that this isn't easy and create a supportive environment where where you can manage those transitions um you know and and i would say that takes two flavors one is you know mentorship and training and guidance and coaching so find mentors for for those people that are making that transition give them the opportunity to take training find executive coaches for them whatever whatever works within the context of your company but then the third thing is is provide a safe exit for people who maybe made that transition either prematurely or they just don't want to do it right i think the worst the worst thing to do is to you know force people down that path um or or they decide they want to go down that path and then um there's not a safe way for them to exit that and go do something else if they're not the right fit for the for the role um with as little kind of damage to to them and their career as possible um because you know again it is hard um and a lot of people you know don't make the transition well and so um but they're still great contributors right maybe they just maybe it was premature and they should just be in a senior manager role um or maybe they decided you know what engineering leadership isn't for me i'd rather be a senior i see and and i think that's okay too right um because uh keeping leaders in roles where they don't want to be usually has some bad consequences right and it sounds like it would be damaging for the entirety of the company not just for for the person exactly um okay uh could you could you tell us a story where you helped someone who just became a new director or or when when it was not a straight path for someone to kind of make this transition and and how um they can be coached or helped or yeah not thrust yeah i'll um uh so the story that comes to mind is someone that um you know we we put this person in a role and they were going to be responsible for um a particular function i won't i i can't give too many details or you know people might you know figure out who uh what this is about um so they're responsible for a particular function and um i remember you know early one-on-one conversations the person was really struggling with this whole idea of uh what i was talking about earlier about where the light where they drew the line that they viewed themselves as uh not part of the leadership as opposed to a part of leadership and the particular challenge that was creating was they were waiting for the company to define their function this person would come to me and say you know i need the company to tell me what they expect from this particular job right um or or this particular function at the company and you know i was asking them to put together a plan and you know you know you're the leader you chart the course here you know you're the person who needs to come up with the vision you're the person that needs to come up with the the success criteria all of that kind of stuff and and we just kept hitting this this roadblock of you know i need the company to tell me what to do essentially and i remember the breakthrough conversation i asked this person i said imagine you're the ceo of the company do you think like you wake up on tuesday morning and just while you're eating your wheaties suddenly go you know what you know what i was thinking about last night i need to go to find this function for the company i i need to of of all the things that you have on your mind you're probably not thinking you know this person over here is one of like a thousand people that we hired to do a job i need to i need to go i need to go i need to provide some vision for them and i said or do you think if you put together the vision and you put together the the define the problem put together the vision come up with the success criteria and then went and presented it to the to the executive leadership do you think do you think they would you know maybe have some good feedback for you and do you think that would be a way to kind of and i just i saw the light bulb go on i i literally watched him move on to the other side of the line it just the the line moved in his head and he's like oh you're right i'm part of the company leadership this is this is why you put me in this role because it's up to me to define what success looks like it's up to me to kind of shape the world around me and this is you know i can't overemphasize this this is one of the bigger challenges i see with leaders overall is waiting for the waiting for all the conditions of the world to kind of fall into place to to create success rather than realizing that they as leaders are empowered to go you know go go go create the conditions for success go put together a proposal go create the vision go present it go get alignment go you know don't just sit and kind of wait because that is going to probably um you know you know at a minimum you're robbing yourself of of the the you know the the power you have as a leader to go affect change so that's the that's the one story that comes to mind there thank you for the story very inspiring i was actually gonna ask you about this uh so it's a nice way of us to kind of get on the same page because as you were talking to us about the director being sort of within the leadership and and now they are being the face of the company the first thing that came to my mind is that i personally have always thought about myself as being the face of the company that i work for yeah because i understand that whenever i switch companies or whenever i take on a new venture it is something that people will associate with me as a person so in my mind it always goes the other way around as well so i will always a little speak for the company even if i say you know like these are not the company views i am a person who is hired there in this part of the team no matter how small of of a role you have at the company you are part of the the building breaks of that company yeah definitely definitely especially if you have so my question is especially if you have an externally facing role right like what you do right yeah right right right and with that said could you share some tips if they come to your mind about because this is a great way of lighting the bulb in someone's mind um but even if they are not a director just yet is it a trait that you look for in people or is it something that you instill in the people uh it is a treat i look for in people and if it's not there i try to instill it and um you know i hate to use a negative example but i'll tell you where i see this the most is when when a company does something or there's something about the particular environment that frustrates people right so let's say the company made a decision to i don't know away you know free sodas i'm just or or or to uh or to you know i don't know it's something that kind of gets people a little frustrated and riled up um just if if you as a a leader a manager or a director um express your frustration openly uh in public forums or in front of your team or in front of like that's a perfect example of where you're um [Music] you're not thinking of your role as a leader within the company to try and help uh be um the voice of reason the voice of calm uh we used to have this saying uh calm is contagious right and so when when everybody's getting angry and frustrated if you as a manager are also getting angry and frustrated um outwardly uh in group settings in slack in you know whatever that's an example of where you're misunderstanding your role as a leader if that makes sense that's where i see it the most there are other examples of that and don't get me wrong that doesn't mean you can't get frustrated doesn't mean you can't be angry but you need to deal with those emotions in private probably with your boss um or or with your manager or with the company leadership until you can get to a place where you can represent it you know or disagree and commit whatever the case may be but it's never okay in my opinion for a leader to be a part of the kind of the the anger and the frustration and that kind of stuff in an outward fashion like that's the that is the key difference i think between a great you know kind of director and senior leader and someone who's still learning what it means to lead wow thank you so much i am sure that people will want to get riled up because they will feel like they are more more because it creates a sense of connection right when you are in a team and you are like oh yeah our free soda we need our we need our soda back um it is kind of giving that sense of unity even though you are in a leadership position with with the team wizard and the best way to build that unity is to listen listen ask questions empathize right but what you can't do is also be like you know what you're right i'm angry too right yeah and i disagree with this decision right you're just sewing descent and that's not that's not okay for for a leader to do thank you um thank you i am uh kind of at the end of my questions so um let me summarize a little bit because we have talked about so many things we we talked about what are the the necessary conditions that a leader needs to kind of have within themselves to to be a good role model for everyone and to to lead and and um some of the ones that really stuck with me were being the the voice of candor when it comes to feedback and being the voice of the company when it comes to whatever it may be and kind of what you said in the end to be an active participant within your life at the company not just the kind of like a victim of the circumstances and um it also sounded or to me it sounded like a lot of proactive putting yourself out there is needed more so than it is needed when you are a manager uh for example but you also need to kind of make the most of your managerial role so you can lean onto those skills and not have to like when you're driving you don't think about switching gears because you have made that kind of automative in your mind and now you can look for the things in your surroundings uh that you need your attention and also and this is kind of just um happening in my head i it the entire conversation just sounded like into a director role is a lot of kind of disengagement on the on the molecular level so maybe you are not getting the the sort of details of what is going on and and the things that are are happening on the frontiers of the of the engineering teams for example but you're getting a lot more information when it comes to what is the company vision how we are gonna make a difference what is our vision for this particular team how we are going to sort of align everything together so in a sense it's like a beard in between where you are you are getting more information but on a lot bigger um sort of um platform for example and um and you are still trying to get people to be on the same page with you but it's uh and it's a lot more nuanced and it's it's a lot less tangible when you are a manager of individual contributors you can you know you can say you know kubernetes is not the best choice here or whatever we are doing this in c-sharp because and and what you have described is more like communications and people and sort of persuading everyone and and and giving them reason to to work with you yeah yeah i think um yeah i i generally agree with that one thing i should i do want to clarify though is um i do think it is important i don't want to give anybody the impression that you know especially as a director in an engineering organization you know it's very important to stay technical and it's very important to to understand what's happening on your team i think it's just for engineers who are you know were senior engineers then became a manager that became a director it's very easy to spend too much time there and and then not do the other things that are also expected of a director so it's it's additive not um you know and and and as as you said you know you're probably farther away from the problems also so you're in a lot of cases you're maybe not the best person to make those decisions anymore you know you need you need the the this you know your senior uh ics and your managers the other people that are closer to the problem to make those decisions and that's what you have to figure out is like how do you how do you stay close enough that it's not out of control but not so far away that you don't know what's going on anymore right right thank you thank you for clarifying that so do you have anything else to add that we have not uh mentioned or we have not talked about yeah the one thing i feel like i have to say is um you know i think some of your listeners could listen to this podcast and be like why would i ever want to do that job because it sounds it sounds terrible um and i think uh you know i just i want to i want to say it is a very it can be a very rewarding job um you know somebody once told me or i heard this i don't even remember where i heard it um so i apologize but they said you know if you want to be a better manager if you want to be a better leader you have to be a better person and that always like i that has stuck with me for years and you know i think the journey to being a director and beyond you know being an executive is a journey of self-discovery it's learning a lot about yourself and it's learning a lot about people and it's learning a lot about organizations and and it's challenging it is it can be hard but it's so rewarding um on the on the other side when you when you make that transition successfully and you get to see the impact that you can have on your teams and and and on a company and you get to coach other managers going through their transitions and you get to see that all that potential unlocked it is it is incredibly rewarding so i don't want your listeners to walk away from this thinking you know why would i want to do that uh that sounds terrible it is uh it is worth the journey if if if you're up for it but don't expect it to be linear or easy thank you so much i love it that you told us to become better people because i completely agree with you and uh and i hope our listeners will will uh take that away and start their own journey if they haven't yet although i'm sure if they have gotten this far to listen to this podcast they have already started well on their way that's good all right um so today we talked about transitioning from manager to director and we talked about the various aspects through which you can um get support and make yourself better in it you have mentioned a book that might be coming where can our listeners follow you and your work the two places right now um are twitter and linkedin i'm not terribly active on either platform at the moment because i um i also just in a transition i've been at been an epic for about six months now um but uh as i make more progress in the book um you know i'll definitely keep linkedin and and twitter updated on other places that folks might be able to engage with some of the content awesomeness thank you so much dearest listeners watchers today my guest was mike sivers again it was a pleasure to have you on the show um he is now vp of development at epic games and we talked about the transition from manager to director and um i am so glad you could join us thank you so much for spending time with us thank you so much for having me this is the level up this is the level up engineering podcast i am carolina thought and i definitely hope to see you next time thanks for staying with level up engineering if you enjoyed this podcast so will your friends share this episode on your favorite social networking platform to stay up to date with our content follow level up engineering on spotify apple podcast or google podcast brought to you by coding sans a software development agency building web applications with angular and node.js check them out at codingsands.com [Music] you

Channel: Level-Up Engineering Podcast 🎤

Views: 50,910

Keywords: Level-up Engineering, podcast, engineering management, engineering leadership, Coding Sans, level up engineering podcast, CTO, engineering manager, interview, software development, leadership, management, Mike Seavers, Epic Games, Riot Games, VP of Online Development, managing managers, from manager to director, becoming a leader

Id: r6x0lTzfBMI

Length: 61min 13sec (3673 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 16 2022