Going from Engineering Manager to Director

[Music] good to see you both we were i know we were just chatting before that you mentioned you actually have been uh attendees for for some of these conversations in the past so how awesome is it to have you both now up and sharing your wisdom with the group i'm excited oh yeah i'm so excited i love all these sessions and i'm really excited to talk to everyone here excellent love it well i'd love to just start briefly if each of you wanted to share a quick background on yourself you know anything that you think folks might find interesting from this group um joyce why don't we start with you yeah sure um hi everyone i'm joyce um i'm a director of engineering at shift um i lead the team that focuses on our internal tools so our operations side of the business the tools we provide there our ios team and as well as our seller customer team my team is about 20 people right now um and uh yeah excited to be here excellent and bobby hey everyone my name is bobin i work at twilio um for all those who don't know about twilio it's a cloud communications company building products to help our customers engage better with their customers across many channels we have power of api i lead teams across north america and europe building distributed systems um you know low latency high throughput types uh recently for an example we launched event streams in our you know public event but uh you know title wise i i'm a director of engineering but my primary responsibility is basically helping engineering leaders increase engagement and execution in their teams personally i love cooking for my family and friends i love jumping rope and you know traveling when i can nice well we were also saying before right since everybody's like in their homes right if we have children or dogs running around or doorbells ringing or whatever no one will judge because i'm sure that's happened to the audience members as well um so i'd love to actually just dive in um with the first question for both of you um before i do that though i want to let folks know you can always ask your own questions and we encourage that because those are the questions i like to to ask and then then answer uh so in the q a tab on the top of your screen next to your chat if you click on that you can ask questions and you can upvote other people's questions so feel free to do that at any time i'm generally going to go in order of the the q a up votes unless there's something that's like crazy sensitive or weird or whatever which is very very rare um and we actually already have one that has six up quotes so i i'll ask that second i'll start with a kind of a little bit of a layup question first which is you know this general conversation is going to be about uh you know going from engineering manager to engineering director we probably have folks that are you know maybe they've been an engineering manager for a while and they've they're maybe they feel like they're ready for being a director maybe um and then from director to vp you know thinking about that transition you know what that looked like and um it may be new for folks who may be familiar with folks but that career ladder and career journey that conversation is what you know we're gonna be focusing on so maybe it's just each of you want to share a little bit about your experiences thus far in going up that career ladder that career journey and maybe if you think of like what is maybe what's the most surprising or unusual or unexpected about that and um and what have you expected what's kind of gone your way so it's kind of an open-ended question but um why don't we start with you if you have any reflections and then and enjoy yeah i can i can go first so growing up the career ladder i think a lot of it what i've learned over time is basically the ownership that we take um you know in general there is you know most companies will have some sort of career some sort of jobs roles and responsibilities that they define but a lot of times it boils down to us on what are actually we gonna do about that how do that translate into what do we expect from the role what our managers expect and literally laying out a plan to work towards it um so i've experienced that in general you know having a plan really helps uh and understanding that uh role really you know in detail uh is also very helpful so you know i in general like talk to people talk to people who are doing that role well uh talk to your manager um i i think that those are some of the things that that i've learned have really helped me uh but but in general have a plan uh that you and your manager really align on on this is this is the way to go it definitely makes sense that you know particularly in the just career paths when you don't have a vision or aspiration or you you know have thought process behind how you're going to go about it sometimes the needs of the organization start driving your path right and if you're not rowing your own boat then the kind of the water pushes you you know in the organization so that makes a lot of sense um what are your thoughts choice yeah um i have a lot of thoughts on this so i'm gonna try and condense it i'm sure we have enough time to talk about it a little bit more but um but i would say like i agree i think that um that like you said there is a lot of like external factors that kind of control that um like you know your move from getting to manager to a director and um i agree with bob in that having a plan is good having an idea of what your ideal situation would be like great just to like have as like a north star but don't be super tied to it like maybe just before me but i've always worked at startups and startups are known for being chaotic and so you like no matter how you plan it and no matter how you imagine it happening expect that things can go a little bit differently and be open to those opportunities and like be able to focus on the things that matter to you and then when you see those opportunities maybe in like a different outfit then then you can at least like jump on it and then make it into like the perfect kind of ideal situation that you had in mind because um you you have that impact like bob and said like you have that that authority and it's kind of like you and your manager's responsibility to problem solve that together um so i would say that's the biggest thing that i would kind of call out um that it kind of comes in all shapes and sizes and and don't limit yourself to like a specific um like ladder right a lot there's a lot of conversation about ladders being like a little bit more old school it's more kind of like uh um i think people call it like a net so like you know there's different paths there's different ways you could go sideways you could go even backwards but like it's all kind of like kind of interconnected and you can get one and not be able to escape exactly exactly fascinating so it's it's uh it's like hearing from above inside kind of this idea that you got a plan but in addition joyce you're kind of saying in addition be open to the opportunities that may be in front of you right so it's like having a direction but having openness so that even if you have a plan sometimes the way that you might achieve your ultimate aspirations might have a very unusual path we last week we're actually talking kind of on the product side there's a lot of thought that you know if you're working on an interesting uh highly visible uh product or service that your organization that that will somehow like make you more visible and like be promoted more easily et cetera and i think one of the that was a myth that we were spelling there like regardless of what you get assigned to if you if you work hard you know and you and you do great work typically people will notice and if people aren't noticing you know whether that be because of you know issues that are in your control or issues beyond your control maybe issues related to diversity inclusion or issues related to bias if folks aren't putting in the energy and efforts to notice right and you've you've done your best then sometimes it makes sense to look elsewhere yeah that's right that's right um i was actually talking to someone about this the other day um someone asked me the question of you know like what if their those rules are all taken right like what if and like no one the this person in particular wasn't asking about the director role but more about like going to the manager role but i still think this applies because i've gotten this question elsewhere too um that if if those roles are not available in your company don't limit your thinking to just the company and i don't mean you should leave i i'm i'm saying that like imagine what you would do in that role and see if there are opportunities to grow those skills in the position that you have currently and the organization that you're in currently and that can be a very practical conversation with your manager your manager should absolutely know that like hey like you want to do this eventually in the future um and so it's not it's not just the okay like this is my first step and then the next step i have to take here um like think broadly about it and like really focus on like what is it what does it mean to be a director like what's the kind of work you'll be doing as a director and focus on that it's kind of like what david said like if you're doing good work then those opportunities will always come to you whether it be at your current organization or somewhere else does that resonate with you that absolutely resonates with me it reminds me of the conversation that i had with a senior vp and i know of the organization stepped in and you know i was talking to him about you know career growth in general and he mentioned like oh and tell me why do you think um people get promoted and with their hard work and they do all these things and you know i was just basically making that up and um he was he was like it's all wrong people uh people get responsibilities and they get responsibilities because people trust them with responsibility so you have to build trust um and it's it's sort of ironical that you know i have a lot of things if i'm doing all those things well you know somebody will go oh let's give this to you know joyce and she's doing all the other things really well so you know you sort of kind of attract opportunities that way if you're doing the things you're doing well really well so that opened my eyes to like it's not about you know the quantity of the work it's just really about the quality of the work you produce and um i was also you know in a place where oh i'll do this i'll do that up you know just again increase my my area so i could say i do a lot of hard work but absolutely it boils down to the work that you're doing just do that well and uh put effort in it make sure it's a high impact work uh it's worth doing obviously but what joyce says absolutely resonate what she said was also earlier resonate to reiterate the plan as as business changes so you know that that's also very very true choice i love it you brought up the the big t word which is really important word and particularly as you go up the career ladder trust right the um i was actually having a conversation with a mentee on plato um not a plug but uh on this past monday and uh he was mentioning a book that he was reading i don't know the name of the book so if you all read it feel free to post it in the chat but it's talking about how you know in organizations there are really kind of three resources most folks talk about too which is kind of time and money um budget but that there's a third resource which is trust and that that resource is really the resource that you most start to need to rely on and and gain and obtain as you go through the career ladder because you know it's like the less trust you have the less folks will trust you and your team and the less impact that you can have and you know making a difference is a lot about impact so i know we could talk about that for a while but i'm gonna dive into the questions folks are asking so we can start getting through these so this first question is from daniel and again i either of you can answer it um what are the top two or three skills that you remember having to develop that you didn't use often as a first-line engineering manager i can i can go first um so the top thing that comes to my mind is is business writing skills um that is something that i didn't really think when i was a first line and that would be so important uh but it's kind of also true that as i've grown into these other roles um you know personally my i'm coding less but i am actually reading a lot of documents that are business oriented and i am writing a lot of things that are going to impact the shape or direction of you know what we're going to do as an engineering team or our systems and things like that so um writing at an altitude that is that is gonna you know take uh vp level people and you know it's worthy of their time in a condensed manner still you're gonna able to put all the things that you want to put in in a piece of paper i think that's a skill that i didn't really have um i took some courses on it uh in the end to to educate myself but that was one of the skills i absolutely love that you mentioned that one i'm reminded when i think when folks are used to conversing with their direct manager you know they usually hopefully get their time and attention and so it's okay if they are fairly detailed and they go into a lot of you know depth and you know when it comes to making the right decisions you know as a senior engineer you want to have your detailed design doc shown that you've like thought through everything but then as you're kind of alluding to you know the higher up the louder you go the busier people are the less time people have and so you know i think one of the most valuable parts of writing that i learned was very similar to what you described is you know like the executive summary being able to really really really simplify your writing and sometimes you know if you're looking at an email or even a slack message reviewing it two or three or four times and like i know the closest analogy i i have is uh you know chanel says like before you leave the house like take off one uh you know one accessory it's like you know before you send that email maybe take off one sentence is is a way to think about uh sending mail to managers um joyce does that resonate you have any other uh skills that that you think were really relevant in that next step yeah totally i i think that's a great one um uh yeah especially like the executive summary um i think a lot of times when you are just the line manager you are mostly responsible for communicating to your direct manager um rather than like to the executive team um and so being really effective in terms of like what are the details that your audience needs like in a short and concise like clear manner um i think that's definitely a skill um the other ones that i was thinking about too is kind of similar but like the the ability to like to have that influence on the wider group um and uh and i think that falls into the same category of communication um and like really being able to be a little bit more focused on it because you get busier too and so like um being able to carve out enough time to focus on that and prioritize that against everything else that's on your plate um and so i think like being able to have those conversations with the other kind of stakeholders um in a way that doesn't have to require you to have one-on-ones all the time because that's just too much time um so that that sort of communication like the broader communication the being able to like uh problem solve with them and bring them along because a lot of times at this level i feel like you you set a lot of the strategy rather than waiting for the strategy and so um being able to have those conversations collaboratively and also to drive those together i think is very important um and i i didn't think about that as much when i was an engineering manager um and then the other thing too is like learning learning through um people on your team like so for instance like the like ios i like i'm not an ios developer i'm not an ios expert um but i lead the ios team right and so being able to learn from like our ios tech lead and um other teammates there like being able to learn enough so that i can do my job effectively but not have to be the expert and like that means that learning through ways that are different than the way i used to learn as an eng manager because as an end manager i would learn by like digging into the code and like doing it all myself and like you know like i don't have time for that right now and that's not the best use of my time for my team and so that was a skill that i had to learn um and i'm still learning to be honest so uh yeah those are the two that stand out to me that's excellent and and ties into trust again right like you need to be able to trust your team and the if you find that you're as a director you're constantly going in and inspecting code maybe that's revealing of a greater trust issue you know that you need to to look at right either that there's something where maybe maybe you should be considering you know looking into the folks that are on your team or you should be looking inward and going why am i having a hard time trusting people maybe yeah checking with a therapist who knows different for everyone whether we like it or not we all bring our whole selves to work and the reasons why we may trust easily or not trust easily whether we like it or not sometimes relate to work and sometimes don't so whatever those issues are the point is that you have to find a way to both have trust and earn trust and what you're both alluding to is forms of communication that communication becomes more important so i love that i'm gonna go into uh this next question here from rowan in your experience what are some common mistakes that new directors make after transitioning into the role oh i'll start with this one um assuming that you have all authority like like like uh just because you're given the title doesn't mean that you can just be like hey do this and do it this way and like this is how i want it done kind of thing um and like i i think like maybe on some level engineering managers also can fall into the same um pitfalls but um i think that that is a surefire way of losing trust once again of your team and also peers um like i said this is a role where there's a lot of like influencing involved and that comes from earning that trust now i'm like anchoring on trust all the time david you have it like imprinted in my head now um but but yeah like i think that like it's a common mistake that like just because you're put in charge of this team that like you you just you assume like a directive role um where you're extremely authoritative um i think in some ways like you have to provide structure and you have to provide some kind of like leadership but especially if you're working with a wider scope um i think that like there's a lot more work involved in earning that trust um and building out the structure that suits the team rather than like just you right um and so uh that comes through like education that comes through like working with the team that comes through like you know like like we were just saying like iterating right um and so i i would say that's the most common that like just because you get into this role it doesn't mean like you could do it in whatever way you want to like it has to suit the team and it has to suit the organization and um those cracks will like like definitely show over time um if you continue down that path i think it's a common uh it's a common and understandable mistake that we make when we are first a first-line manager right that all day long for many for however many years that we've been an engineer the way we got things done was moving all the pieces in the puzzle and constructing things you know and of course you know typically you'll work with other people but it's like you can move all the pieces of this puzzle yourself and now like it's kind of like when you become a manager and you try and do that you know now you're like moving physical people and the people are like don't move me and instead it's like you have to play a game of chess with your your arms behind your back or something that you know you have to do it through communication and then even more so it's like being blindfolded when you're a director right you have to like trust everything you can't be in the code above and i'm curious is does that resonate with you but also if if you've seen any other uh mistakes or pitfalls either that you've made or that you've seen others make uh in going up the ladder yeah i've made plenty of mistakes um so i think completely resonate with joyce right i think the director role is different with different companies because they're all different sizes the way i see it is a it's a partnership role uh you're not directing anything alone like period uh and you get to get to experience some of that in in manager role but you still have your team you're you're focused on one area most likely and with director i think the problem space are likely going to be large enough that you're not going to be able to solve alone by just with your team you might have to work with your counterparts really more sometimes to influence their work sometimes to you know come to a common ground create win-win situations so um not having enough relationship built uh in a way so that you can have enough you know provide candid feedback or or help each other i think it's a it will not set up either your team or yourself for success so that that i think i won't speak too much on that the other thing um i feel is you know going from any role uh and trying to change things immediately is also i feel uh is not a wise sign i mean in general uh sometimes you sometimes you you have to read and understand the lay of the land what it is and sort of understand like what is happening what are the good things the bad things and uh what do you actually want to change and how does that fit so i think understanding the role before doing anything uh and how are you gonna play your part is is very key and i think it's important and a lot of people make mistakes after transitioning into a new role in that area yeah and i i mean i think folks know when they see somebody coming into either new role or even from outside the company like just a new employee that the folks that you see they're asking a lot of questions and that are listening and that are trying to understand before they start making recommendations you know those are the ones that you know you go oh wow this person is is taking things in and trying to make an informed decision it's kind of part of what you're alluding to in my mind is that that sort of thing of taking things in you know before you're just going in and kind of like here's my plan and my vision right that you're taking the exhibit that's healthy you sort of have to fight it i mean i can understand i've been in that situation where i got into this new role like hey you know i've been a struggle with these areas i want to provide structure and support in these areas which i think are lacking and you go after it you know hard and strong and that's very good but but in general i think i always come back to like who cares the problem you're solving is is it worth sorting just make sure your partners are aligned and uh and again listen in and take some time before you make make any of those changes per se um before again so that's the mistake that i have made that's the mistake i've seen other people make sense well like it's like when you're um i'm not a parent but i know plenty of folks on this call are parents right and sometimes folks go into parenting they go i'm gonna be different than this one or two parents that did things in a way that didn't work for me you know and you kind of just take your style and like run with it right and and i can't speak much to whether that works or not as a parent but i could say that that happens all the time for engineering managers or just management in general right you have a manager that works really well for you that you want to emulate or a manager who did something you really that did not work well for you that you don't want to emulate the challenge is kind of everyone's different not everybody is like you and not everybody is motivated in the same ways right being part of a appraised driven organization or a fear-driven organization some people resonate with one way or another and one type of manager or another and so it's like you have to like read and take in your environment to to kind of know where to proceed or how to proceed um i'm gonna move on to the next question here uh so this one from israel working at a small company with very little middle management what are some good ways to develop collector type skills as an engineering manager that will be attractive when applying to larger organizations now i know joyce you mentioned that you you know kind of been a lot in startup world so i imagine you've got some sort of experience with this kind of kind of thing you have any thoughts on this one yeah definitely um so i would say things that are like more like focused on the wider organization like impact and change on the wider organization if you could talk to specific examples of you know driving change there and then seeing it to a successful like launch and adoption with the rest of the team um i think that's a really good way to start because then those those experiences can be relevant in these roles um like i think in a lot of roles and i'd be curious to hear about bobbin too but like when we're interviewing we love seeing like that proactive kind of approach of identifying a problem rallying people behind it and then being able to execute on a solution right um and so i would say like though those kind of or the two things that i feel like i would focus on um and i think that like there are a lot of opportunities especially i think um the question mentioned very little middle management that that signals to me that there's probably a lot of opportunity for like you know impacting the organization because if there's very little middle management then like they have a lot on the plate right there they're managing a wider team um and so they may not be able to have the opportunity to think more strategically and like widely across the organization right and so if you have space to do that thinking then engage those those managers right like hey i'm hearing from the team that like um our our product requirements aren't clear or something like that right and um use specific examples of where you're hearing this and like engage with them on like how can we change this and then um be practice just say like i think this is important i'd love to like drive this right um and so then through that experience i think you can both show your proactive um like like tendencies and also like the experience that you'll get in terms of like driving larger change thinking more strategically and thinking across the organization even if it's not like like directly impacting just you and your um like your code or like your projects and things like that um and so i would say that like i would start there um i think that that would be really helpful and um and and getting that experience and then also starting with thinking because uh um that's also something that like you want to start practicing because that's what you'll do a lot of in this role what i'm hearing is that uh people like to hire problem solvers and a problem solver you know regardless of your organization structure right that um and you're solving problems via interactions with people right that um that that impact is something that people will notice and that people will value which i think is it makes total sense yeah and can i say one thing about problem solving so like i think we as engineers we're all problem solvers right we love stop solving problems we love identifying problems i would say that like in this role one thing that i've noticed is that there's more there's more of a focus from like identifying a solution to identifying the problem like i think as an engineer like you your main focus is around fix this problem like how do we how do we build this thing right um but i think in the management route you start to shift your focus on identifying the problem with a with a group of people because i think that like that is what helps alignment is once you all agree on like this is the problem that we want to solve and this is the actual root cause um then i think that's what drives a lot of the alignment rather than this is how we should build this one thing and so yeah yeah just like my experience i think that like like shifting that focus was kind of unintentional but now that i look back it makes a lot of sense to me and so like as you're thinking about like how can i do more of that kind of thinking um just like you know you'll see these opportunities in your world as well um but that's just something that i wanted to kind of call out because i think it's great that we're all problem solvers and we will continue to be but i think that the way where you focus shifts a little bit when you go into management that idea of um illuminating what the problems actually are are you solving the right problems as opposed to diving into the solution again kind of related to what button was saying earlier about like kind of listening and absorbing your environment a little bit like not just being like i'm gonna do xyz but like looking around perceiving perception like that that's huge and particularly you know as your job becomes more about trust and communication the more senior you get the things that are more about human psychology start to matter more right the elephants in the room i i i have i talk i read a lot of articles on this topic like but um the you know there are so many elephants in the room and organizations that nobody services or brings up that can actually be causing a lot of the problems that you know if you're purely technical and you're just focusing on the tech you won't catch them for example you have an engineer that's not productive you know maybe the most straightforward thing to do is to just kind of go in and like crack the whip if you will but sometimes they're not productive because they have they had a tragedy in the family or they um really don't like what they're working on you know and the solution may be to move them or to give them you know time off or so you know you have to identify those types of things to really know what is the actual problem and to do that you have to have trust the team right so it goes back to dress but when you have reflections on all this yeah i have a reflection that you're very skilled at bringing up the keyword again and again that's fair no uh yeah i mean joyce uh highlighted pretty much most of what i had thought um so my first role as a director was in a startup and that team or company grew from 50 60 people to 200 300 people when i when i left and i think in any growing company if you're there there are always going to be more problems than there are problem solvers or people effectively solving them so opportunities are abundant um one advantage that i think the startup provides is you are much more closer to an executive um whether the cto or ceo whoever then you are on the larger companies you have a little bit more hierarchy and you know that therefore for information you have filter and delay so you can actually work on skills on like working with your senior executives what are they actually trying to solve and then building uh work on building like solving larger problems um within your organization or area of control you also have uh opportunities such as you know leveling up the startup like i've been in startups sometimes we have to do the you know shortcut ways to survive and that's fair but like in in long term like how do we bring up the excellence in the engineering organization assuming that's an engineering organization uh you know how do we bring up industry practices for example i worked with rsvp at the time to to bring up uh you know more agile workflow in startup which were loosely followed uh and that i think was valuable when i like in elsewhere you know and of course the problems you can solve are you know talk about the outcome talk about the impact to a larger company when you're interviewing i think that that goes a long way as well that's excellent so we got about 20 minutes left so i'm going to do a little bit more of a not lightning round per se but i'm just going to do like one question on one to be one question to the other and we can get through kind of as many as we can this question from uh wesley is and i'll i'll uh i'll post this one to you bubban and then we'll go to you choice um and if you want to add you know totally fine like if you're like i really want to mention something that's totally fine uh okay so wesley asks roughly uh what did you find a tougher transition and why going from engineer to engineering manager or going from engineering manager to director uh the engineering manager to director i feel was a more tougher transition um and a decency bias could play here i don't know but the reason i feel that way is when you're an engineer and you get into an engineering management position you are more likely to already be performing at a lead level like for example your other engineers might even look up to you uh your manager may look up to you and you're sort of without even the title you're sort of performing in the lead role and with the manager you may get people responsible that's a whole different level but i think that's a little bit more easier to i don't have the right word but like to to get into i feel uh like i mentioned earlier engineering manager director is a lot more partnership role um your manager's help uh is necessary but not sufficient uh it's you have to have a lot of stakeholders input in and you need to again work with other people so relationship building communication skills um are difficult to learn in my experience rather than technical skills i can i can feel if i spend two weeks on some technology i can get a very good handle at least understand it i people are different and the way they communicate are different so uh that's a longer it takes longer time to learn and execute and all that stuff so i feel uh that's a little bit more transition it reminds me of uh one of the an audience member asked once about if introverts are capable of being you know directors and above and and i was like you know raise your hand if you're an introvert and actually most of the folks raise their hand on the panel and the point is is these are skills you got to learn them you got to practice them but they are they are skills communication is a skill earning trust is a skill and there's books on it there's science on et cetera joyce uh this question from sherwin how is your conception of who your team is um how has that changed as a first line engineering manager we frequently think of our teams as our our individual contributors how does that sense change as you lead a larger organization oh that's a great question um obviously you have people who are directly kind of reporting into you um whether that be through like another manager or like you know i see like principal engineer or something like that um and so like there is that idea of a team too so like that's a lot of like what you would think about for career development um and like making sure that you're kind of on the ball with that um because like i feel like that's an easy one to slip um but but i think that when you think about your work and like the the area that you want to impact um it includes a lot more people than just the people who who report into you um like i work very closely with our design and product teams um and that's not just through like the projects that we're working on but also just like thinking about like future planning right um like problem solving at that level and like we in our business we have a big operational component of the business and so those stakeholders like the the kind of partners that you want to work with there like i think of them as like part of the team because for instance like whenever we have like planning meetings um talking about like quarterly planning or things like that like there's always like our our head of biz ops our like our head of sales like the those people are in the room just as much as like aren't my engineering managers are and so um i think that's a really great question like the the team there's like different kind of like focuses of teams um so there's like one team that i focus on for like the people management stuff and then there's like the the team in terms of like we're doing work together we're doing these projects together um and this is how we're gonna like solve these problems together make sense uh this question is from jimmy bevin how do you manage your time as an engineering director and what are your priorities that's a really good question um i wish i could answer that very straightforwardly uh i think um thinking about how i manage my time uh first of all i think what i've learned my time is always available i make myself always available to my immediate team um so in terms of you know the company priorities are some you know get transferred in some way to to you and to your areas of responsibility so you need to make sure those are uh those are in line but without going into very specifics i think my number one priority is always like helping my engineering leaders increase execution and engagement and if they're you know needing help in any of those areas that's that's where i go to first um second priority priorities again maintaining that harmonious relationship with my peers and partners because again i mentioned that's a partnership role so how are like my priorities i won't be able to do it alone i need my product organization i need my game organization i need some other engineering teams and and all those to work all collaboratively so managing all that um is usually my my other priority um and of course there is there's you know coaching and all that stuff this next question joyce is from daniel assuming that moving into a director role involves the development of a lot of soft skills which is a loaded word i know a lot of folks that work in hr really hate that word because critical skills call what you want um how do you make it clear to those in a position to promote you that you have those software critical skills um so my my approach to this is um i'll have frequent conversations of the expectations that i need to meet there so what i mean by that is that usually in organizations there's like um there's role descriptions or leveling descriptions or things like that right and um they're they're they're up to interpretation right and like they have to be a little bit more flexible for a reason but um but one of the things that i do and i i used to do a lot more frequently too um is that we would go through those we would look at the the descriptions and your current level and then the descriptions in the next level and um i would sit down with my direct report and we'd go over them like we basically have some homework where um the direct report had to highlight like it was like red yellow green green is like i feel like very confident in this i like i feel like i'm good here i don't like i don't have like a ton more work to do here yellow is like i'm working on this but i feel good about it red is like i'm not working on this but um and this is an area where i need help like i want to improve it right and um and then we kind of go over it and i think that what was helpful there is that like it's kind of a calibration process with you and your manager to like make sure that you are interpreting these levels in the same way right because a lot of times you know you could like i've seen descriptions where it's like demonstrates leadership or something like that right and it's kind of like okay like yes but like how right um and so then in those in those discussions those gaps show up either it could be like someone like highlighted something green and it's like oh wait i think i have i think there's more work that you need to do here or it's like some like it's highlighted red and it's like well i actually think that you're doing this pretty well right and so being able to kind of calibrate with the expectations between you and your manager is a very like helpful process especially when it comes to these like software skills because it is kind of up to interpretation and um and i think that the next step beyond that was like once you identify those gaps once you identify like where you and your manager are kind of like off um then dig into the details right like like what are the examples of how you've demonstrated this that like maybe they didn't have visibility on or like maybe they wanted to see a little bit different and like like maybe the conversation gets a little bit uncomfortable but this is this is where you have to really dig in if you if you're feeling that misalignment because it's so up to interpretation um so that i would say like yeah maybe propose that to your manager or like you know approach the conversation of like hey like i want to like debug this with you you know like something something here doesn't feel right um and i want to get clarity and so um i that's an exercise that has worked for me for you to take it like make it whatever you want um but uh but i would say give that a try and make it like a problem-solving experience with your manager and i think that they would really appreciate that it's it's so true having some kind of framework to look at so that you can as objectively as possible say where do i stand with that framework and talk out as you're describing the places where maybe there's a little bit of of subjectivity and kind of get an as an objective of you as you can so that you know exactly what you love level up on and then in addition you can document you know the things that you've done and when you've used those specific skills not to plug but that's a platform that i'm building if you check out my my uh startup it's a platform to do exactly that but um but it's it's it's interesting because there are a lot of organizations particularly startups that don't have job descriptions don't have a leveling framework don't have like a set of skills to get from one level or another and when you're in a position like that you know you were talking earlier about proactivity what better way to do this than to say hey i noticed we don't have any kind of leveling framework you know here's what other startups use and if folks want to know you can go to website levels.fyi or progressions.fyi there's some third-party resources where you can find leveling systems that big companies use um check it out but it's a it's a really good call that once you have a framework you know that you can operate off of that framework i'm gonna move on to the next questions we go through we got about 10 minutes this next one from josh uh for you bubbin in your opinion how important is time enroll when looking to go from engineering manager to director uh it's a good question um i was having a conversation around this very recently uh and i think it's uh it's important uh i think it's important and how important i think it is you have to figure out in your organization um what people say but i've felt that there's a lot of um honestly there's a lot of opinions about how much you have spent time in draw before before you're quote unquote ready to go to em to director and there's some validity in that in my opinion i think you know it requires you to build that trust if you will to to see that you have performed long enough in a role and then you're ready to move on but so in my opinion it is important um but my opinion is less important it's important how your company perceives that and that what that is but more important than that is what you have done that uh that allows you to move on in the next level like so again focusing on impact or outcome uh most likely he's gonna win when compared with time and role if you know if it's it's really head to head but time and like you cannot discount time and role experience teaches a lot of things and that's also valuable i'm reminded uh with this question of the dunning-kruger effect right which is that uh when you look at of the set of people that believe that they know a lot about a particular topic there's a you know very clear uh you know binomial distribution if you will of the people they fit in two camps either they actually they know so much about this topic that that they they know that they're they're good at it and they can kind of assess it and the other side is the dunning-kruger effect but you know so little about a topic that you can't even adequately assess your own ability and therefore think that you're good at it and when i think about time on the job you know when you jump on a job that you have no experience doing and being a director is very different from being an engineering manager as you both describe then you may think that you know what you're doing but it may actually be because you lack the experience to assess your own ability that you might think that you're doing well and maybe not though so i appreciate that you say the answer is yes because i know there are some folks that you know want to be double promoted yesterday um this next question from riley for joyce what kinds of goals do you set for yourself to grow from a frontline manager to a director beyond beyond managing more individuals or teams yeah um this is a really good question um i would say that i think like i hate to be a broken record but i think like thinking about like problems that you can solve across the organization like setting a goal around that i think would be really helpful so i'll tell you about like what i did um so i was working on a team where we had um basically like four different teams focused on like a specific customer experience right um and not only the customer experience but like the the kind of business uh metrics around that customer experience right and um what i noticed was that each team was kind of doing their planning independently of one another and i i felt like there was an opportunity there right and so like like i was kind of vocal about it with my boss and i was just like hey like this doesn't make sense like how can we do this better and um like at the same time i would talk to the other teams because i was edge manager of one of those four teams and so i would talk to the managers of the other teams and the product managers of the other teams and then like i would create those relationships and then just start like having meetings with them you know like i just put it on the calendar and i was like okay i just want to know for the sake of my team's planning like what yeah what are you guys doing right and then we eventually got into the habit of doing that regularly and um like like everyone is kind of like oh yeah like we want to solve this problem but i'm busy or like you know like i have to work on this other thing and so if you have if you have that energy and you also want to do it then that shows you know that shows by like you to being proactive and you um creating those relationships right and like yes there's like i know some people are a little bit more cautious about am i stepping on people's toes right um and i would say if you're if you're vocal about it like if you're having these conversations with people and like identify those people who you think you might be stepping their toes on um and talk to them you know like talk to them about like hey like i i'm seeing this happen like is it is there a way that i can help here right and so you can have those conversations very productively and then that kind of creates momentum for other problems that might come up that are a little bit more wider than that and so um i would say like that that was one of my examples of like like thing opportunities that i found across the organization but i'm sure i'm sure at organizations that you guys are at um you will identify those two like there are opportunities always in growing teams and growing organizations and so if there's anything that stands out to you it's like huh that sounds very fun like i want to solve that like make that known and just start doing it you know talk to talk to the people that you would anyways if you're solving that problem and um and kind of start from there and so in terms of goals like set a goal around that excellent setting goals problem solving you know these are themes for a reason right our last our last uh few minutes i'm going to open it up back to both of you for our last question or two um this one from muhammad do you sometimes think that being a director wasn't the right decision like maybe too much pressure or anything like that or if not for you maybe you've seen that for someone else um but i'll start with you um i i don't think that you're doing that um i i'm so i'm not sure about like being director or anything i don't necessarily tie it to a title uh i do have a you know vision for myself and i want to be there and directors part of that so i don't necessarily debate that but you know you have sometimes go in a place where you're there you're facing too much pressure or you're not getting enough you know help or direction i think that's in my opinion when i reflect it's usually because we are out of our comfort zone that's okay um you know i i was again getting a mentorship with one of our senior vps in the company and he was like it's a good thing to be outside your comfort zone for a lot of times and if you're not you're probably not growing so um you know it's a personal thing uh for me i i i do feel that hey is it too much pressure or you know am i in the right place at the right time that kind of stuff but like i don't necessarily challenge myself like hey did i do the right thing by getting myself you know into this role or things like that that i feel is correct but yeah i can understand it's it's very the middle management is hard choice your thoughts uh my answer is absolutely like it gets tough for sure um and i think that like what i keep in mind is exactly what bobbin said you are constantly iterating right um and i think that that that's something that i have to remind myself all the time too is that sometimes like things just don't feel right like sometimes like what you're doing doesn't seem to be working and like you want to like fix all these problems and you get kind of frustrated there's absolutely moments where i feel like like maybe maybe i'm not cut out for this right um and and like that i i just say that to say like like i don't think that means that you shouldn't be doing it i think everyone kind of feels the level of like imposter syndrome that at like at various moments um and so yeah like don't worry it's tough like what we're doing is tough and like i think um you're allowed to kind of feel that um don't beat yourself up about feeling that um but like you know like you'll you'll get through it you'll learn like kind of what bobbin said too like if you're not out of your comfort zone you're not learning um and then and then you'll you'll get to a place where like your comfort zone gets like bigger and bigger and now you have like bigger even bigger challenges that you have to like take on to keep continue growing right um but yeah absolutely those are well said choice yes last question and see if you can answer this in a sentence or two which is going to be incredibly hard but why not end with with a fun moment uh this one's from zhenjong how do you proactively manage your own perceptions in the organization especially if you have a unique value that the rest of the organization attunes to and may make false assumptions about your behaviors as quickly as you can how about uh bubban and then joyce and then we'll wrap it up get feedback don't complain act on that feedback excellent great yeah conversations have conversations excellent oh wow you guys you're both very very fast i love it with that we we've been our time thank you both this was wonderful so many illuminating thoughts ideas from both of you i love both of your perspectives i get a lot of takeaways related to trust communication it's a lot about the people and you can't really you know have that visibility that you had before as you go up the ladder and then you need to think a lot about relationships a lot about problem solving and making an impact and uh you know that it's not easy and one thing i'll interject as well is self-care sometimes when you're when you're busting your butt right that you're getting burned out because health care matters totally excellent well with that i thank you both and have a wonderful rest of your day thank you so much david thank you so much everyone david you

Channel: Team Plato

Views: 11,044

Keywords: engineering

Id: hfEGG4dxTls

Length: 53min 29sec (3209 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 17 2021