Is Tech Lead the WORST Job For Most Programmers?
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- Опубліковано 15 тра 2024
- Just the name Tech Lead has this kind of prestigious ring to it, and if you're like most programmers you might think it's the job to shoot for. But 20 years of my career have been spent leading software teams, and you might be surprised to know that tech lead is actually the worst job for most programmers!
Some of the information in this video applies to IT professionals in any technical leadership role: whether that be leading programmers, UX, DevOps, QA - or any other discipline related to software development. But several of the points are more specific to programming leadership.
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CHAPTER MARKERS
0:00 Introduction
1:20 1 TECH LEAD MYTHS
1:29 1.1 Smartest Team Member
2:11 1.2 Writes The Best Code
2:59 1.3 Chooses Key Technologies
3:45 1.4 Most Highly Compensated
4:12 1.5 Motivates Through High Standards
5:19 2 WHAT SHOULD A TECH LEAD DO?
5:22 2.1 Improve Team Effectiveness
6:35 2.2 Defend Team Members
7:52 2.3 Congratulate Team Publicly
9:00 2.4 Getting Team Consensus
10:19 2.5 Help When Things Get Hard
12:57 3 HOW BAD TECH LEADS GET PROMOTED
13:28 3.1 Strong Individual Contributor
14:13 3.2 Company Promotes Out Of Fear
15:01 3.3 Management Misunderstands Role
15:25 3.4 No Desire To Lead
16:15 4 BECOMING A TECH LEAD
16:34 4.1 Practice Defending Your Team
18:19 4.2 Practice Congratulating Team
19:30 4.3 Read Books on Leadership
20:46 4.4 Work Closely With Others
21:52 4.5 Learn More About the Business
23:28 Episode Groove
#programming #softwareengineer #softwaredeveloper - Наука та технологія
Is Tech Lead the worst, or best job for you after watching this episode? Do you agree leadership is important for tech leads? Let me know your thoughts!
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Chapter Markers:
1:20 1 TECH LEAD MYTHS
1:29 1.1 Smartest Team Member
2:11 1.2 Writes The Best Code
2:59 1.3 Chooses Key Technologies
3:45 1.4 Most Highly Compensated
4:12 1.5 Motivates Through High Standards
5:19 2 WHAT SHOULD A TECH LEAD DO?
5:22 2.1 Improve Team Effectiveness
6:35 2.2 Defend Team Members
7:52 2.3 Congratulate Team Publicly
9:00 2.4 Getting Team Consensus
10:19 2.5 Help When Things Get Hard
12:57 3 HOW BAD TECH LEADS GET PROMOTED?
13:28 3.1 Strong Individual Contributor
14:13 3.2 Company Promotes Out Of Fear
15:01 3.3 Management Misunderstands Role
15:25 3.4 No Desire To Lead
16:15 4 BECOMING A TECH LEAD
16:34 4.1 Practice Defending Your Team
18:19 4.2 Practice Congratulating Team
19:30 4.3 Read Books on Leadership
20:46 4.4 Work Closely With Others
21:52 4.5 Learn More About the Business
23:28 Episode Groove
Im lead software developer and I consider myself good at it but it's also the craziest job. Having to spin the plates of, line management, developer, mentor, keeping up to date on standards, client meetings and delivery, leading can sometimes feel impossible.
Leaning on your team is incredibly important (and in my case, the tech principals) and accepting that some days your going to have to just pop one of the plates down for a bit.
I would also echo what this vid reflects on, my most important role is keeping the team "oiled", i.e unblocked, supported and informed
Also "building a good team" building a team mentality, that people support each other and congratulate people where needed aka build a good team culture. That's a magic sauce that has a bit of luck to it, I'm really glad to have such a brilliant team right now :)
A tech lead is a strange word. Some companies mean a person who is leading a specific technology. A specialist. Others mean a person who knows enough about all technologies to lead the entire team. A generalist.
Anyway you need authority in meetings to give enough room for each problem and keeping problems at a reasonable size if it gets heated.
I think the best way to sabotage a tech lead is to set or imply the expectation that he should be the top performer on the team. This means that his #1 priority remains development and not leadership, but additionally it actually disincentives him from being a good leader, since any success of his team members actually threatens his own position.
Exactly!
That's just another reason why you don't put programmers in management positions. The other important reason is this: isn't it weird to put your best developers doing a task, management, that they didn't study for and don't have experience in? Isn't that like putting the best guitarist in the town playing the drums? That notion always seemed dumb to me. You work hard to be the best programmer possible and does the company put you in super complex programming problems? No, they make you do management...wtf?
I’d rather have somebody who actually understands what the programmers are doing than some unskilled programmer manager. I feel better when I can go to my tech lead and can be guided by his previous knowledge. I personally don’t believe unskilled managers should even be allowed in the industry, as Steve jobs said they are a detriment to the product and the people
@@moviesynopsis001 if you need help, reach out to a more senior team member (yes, the kind of guy that in the current silly state of affairs would be put into management as a tech lead, but shouldn't). That isn't the manager's job IMO.
@@elimgarak3597 they never help. They are always too busy and they will only usually help their friends. It's not that simple. They usually don't have the time for it.
I definitely feel for the tech leads I've worked for. They get put under a lot of pressure.
I wasn't really promoted to tech lead, but the role kind of just became mine. There weren't any official tech leads when I started. I was put into the tech lead role because I was a great individual contributor and very knowledgeable about tech and the systems we work on.
I tried being the tech lead you described for a while, I think I got decent at it. But when enough people leave the company and you're constantly flooded with new hires, and you need to start building the relationships and teaching all over again, it gets exhausting. After your video, I will definitely try to be better again. Thanks
Same here. I was the most senior and the most experienced developer in my field in my team, so naturally I handled all the tech stuff now, even though there is no title bestowed upon me. Perhaps being tech lead might suck.
Similar happened to me. Things were disorganized, so I told my team that I'll go to all the meetings and will tell you if you need to attend. That led to me organizing backlog, representing our team, and defining direction with the product owner. The company liked it because I did a good job, but I noticed I was doing less and less coding. Eventually, I burned out from a feeling of just being a nanny running around wiping everyone's butt all day all week long.
@@insertoyouroemailit's really hard to find the time doing tech as techlead. You have to do the tech, otherwise you will loose your technical skills, skills that you need to be a good tech lead (the tech is so fast changing nowadays, you have to keep learning and that requires practical work, not just reading). At the same time you have to do things you mentioned.
@@thomasroine Yeah, I actually left because and at the next place I told them I had zero interests in advancement, just let me code. A few weeks ago they asked me if I wanted to take charge of a new project that would be spun out into a new team. I said "no thanks". I think when I'm older it will make much more sense to start moving into leadership but not now, I'm only 35. Like you said, there's so many new things ahead that I need to keep up with.
Oh people who still have a reasonable doubt in skillsets are the better ones out there.
Fluctuation sucks, and telling your manager they suck at keeping the expertise you build up inside the company sucks even more.
Tech lead here - I like to think Im an above-average tech lead and I can 100% without a doubt attribute my success to my team. I try to stay out of my own way and really rely on the wisdom and experience of my devs. I am definitely NOT the best Dev in the organization and I’ve always understood that I don’t have to be. My job is to lead and empower my team, and that doesn’t require me to be some all-knowing deity. Overall I love my job because I love people and truly find joy in taking care of my team. I’d go to war to defend these guys.
Great attitude of servant leadership! Your team is lucky to have you. 👍
@@HealthyDev Appreciate the kind words! I was lucky to have grown up having many examples of great leaders in front of me (and likewise got to see early on what makes a poor leader). However the lucky one in this equation will always be me, I’m beyond grateful to have my team.
Your words and attitude here shows you are a great leader 👊
@@DominicBurford Appreciate the kind words! I was surrounded by a lot of good leaders growing up and am thankful for that.
my tech lead is the opposite. he often tries show that he's the best by putting us down, and criticising us in sprint demos for decisions that he endorsed. basically making us the scapegoats. in terms of planning and educating the team, nada, zilch. sometimes we even run out of work for the next sprint because the product owner and him are best buds and both dgaf about their leadership roles.
All I wanted to do was to be given a task and be left alone to work on it. Unfortunately, my company made it feel as though by not being a lead I’m somehow failing… now I’m a lead, I’m semi-miserable and the happiest moments I have are the ones when I get to do some coding myself.
There’s nothing wrong with choosing not to lead! It’s so frustrating when companies do this. 🥲
@@HealthyDev "There’s nothing wrong with choosing not to lead" - if you say this in a big corporation there is a high chance you will be replaced in the next 3 to 6 months, or you will be pushed using all sorts of tactics to quit.
Then decides to move somewhere else yourself, not all company think like this. Actually, my first ever manager did explicitly state his deception when I said my 5-year goal was to go into project management / team lead as he said, we need good developers that keeps developing.
I also currently work with someone that got into a lead position that he didn't like, thus stated looking at jobs, we did hire him because he said he wanted to get back at development and really seems good at it. The reality is that we need way more experienced good dev than team lead, so it's important for those that do not want to start managing to stay on development because they are good at it and happy doing dev.
@@ForgottenKnight1how often have you seen people offered lead, they’ve turned it down, and this really happened?
I feel like this is a tale we tell ourselves to avoid the discomfort of having to decline and set boundaries in a respectful way.
@@HealthyDev This happened to me. I declined the role three times: first in a meeting with my manager, then the director, and then finally the VP. The VP looked at me and rudely said, "Fine...I guess you'll be an IC the rest of your career." There were no threats made directly, but my manager stopped having growth discussions with me and I got the cold shoulder from the director and VP in the hallway after that, so I felt I had to move to a different org within the company after a few months.
The thing is, they were right in seeing the potential of me in that type of role because I eventually made the move and did it successfully. I just didn't want it at the time, for that product, in that part of the org chart.
I used to work under a tech lead who was technically very competent, but unapproachable because everyone was intimidated by him. Never was given any feedback about the late night or weekend hours that I put in to get the work done, which was a little bit demoralising.
I've always thought raising team morale is extremely important for people leadership positions... I remember as a senior dev praising my colleagues, doing pair programming with them, teaching them things I've learned, and never making them feel stupid.. while the tech lead was just coding or in a meeting...
Ugh, so sorry. This is exactly what I’m trying to help people avoid in the video. Maybe your tech lead wants to help more, but doesn’t know how to set healthy boundaries and realistic expectations with management?
I was that awful tech lead once. I started as a one man team, respected and appreciated by management. Then we brought on a few more devs and I was still the star developer, but now I had to maintain my reputation as the best or face replacement. Officially I was expected to mentor them but I had never been mentored myself and had no clue how to mentor others. And I didn't have time to learn while maintaining my own output. Plus, we were always given separate assignments within the project so we almost never had an opportunity to actually cooperate on anything. We were there to maintain our own outputs while dealing with each other's bugs. Not a great way to build mutual respect! I was under constant stress from being expected to both outperform the stronger hires and to pull the weight of the weaker ones (interns, mostly). I was miserable, my team hated me, and I resented most of them. Ultimately management lost interest in our project and the team attritted away. Now we have a much smaller team with distinct, separate roles. We support each other instead of competing. I'm happier, healthier, and appreciate the security but regret having blown my shot at growing beyond a simple dev role
@@gillonba I feel you.
@@HealthyDev Maybe, but I have a feeling that he just had a superiority complex and should have never been in that position. His technical skills were good, but people skills were terrible. I do hope he's better now though!
@@gillonba Thank you for sharing, we don't always know what a person goes through which is precisely why I try to be nice to everyone, regardless of position. It's amazing how much communication can help in relationships, whether with co-workers or spouses.
I have seen tech leads often have the same wish to go back being individual contributors. They were either pushed to the role without consent or simply accepted the role to survive competition.
This is exactly what happened to me. I wasn't asked whether I wanted to be a tech lead, I was told. If I'd been asked, I'd have said "Hell no!"
he's back 🎉 and brought a really relevant topic.
I think a lot of smaller companies don't even have official tech lead roles and many devs just sort of end up naturally becoming the de-facto tech lead. How to deal with that kind of situation would also be an interesting topic, especially when management doesn't really recognize or acknowledge when a dev has slipped into that role. That can be a dangerous mix.
When your podcast episode came up, I slammed the play button the first chance I got. Publish at whatever schedule you want: I'm listening each time you hit the feed. Thanks for the insight, as always.
I had the video in the background and didn't notice you were also playing the guitar! Nice content.
I think of the Tech Lead position as kind of like the coach of a sports team. Chances are, that person wasnt the best player of their sport, but they were good enough to know what the best players go through and what they need. Then you go about trying to put every team member in their best position to succeed, and that means something different for every individual. So at that point you are leading people doing software development, you are not actually leading the software development. Like you said, the job is about helping everyone get better.
Exactly. Well put! I, for instance, don't know enough about PHP/Laravel and Angular to act as a technical guide but I know enough about it to understand the problem space, the challenges the devs face when using it rather than using another tech stack including another backend stack (like Go or NodeJS for instance) or frontend tech like React for instance. The devs know their platform and we think, that it is a good starting point for new team members as well. What I do understand well, are the logical and theoretical problems to solve as part of each domain or module being developed as I went through solving these or similar problems hundreds of times during my career. Here I can help with advice or initiating discussion and communication about problems arising, connecting the stakeholders of each situation or problem space. I can help with finding the right words addressing the different stakeholders. This is actually the way a good coach leads his team. You're absolutely right :)
I always thought the same donparkison. In fact, I think that a lot of "soft skills used in sports coaching" are really useful as a tech lead
Total bs they need to be the best player. That's just an excuse to not promote the best worker and instead promote the person they like the most usually the white guy.
@@imveryhungry112 The best developer should be promoted, but to a technical role if that is where their skills are. Likely an Architect who can direct the technical vision. Thats different from the Tech Lead who is responsible for the day to day functioning of the team. Tech lead is more about leading people. Architects are about leading the technology.
@@donparkison4617 yeah i just see this constantly. the quiet asian guy who does like 90 percent of the work NEVER gets promoted and his white mediocre coworker gets promoted because hes a "better leader". Its just a way to keep people down in my opinion. Honestly if some guys amazing at programming and you offer him to be the tech lead with a huge financial increase who is going to turn that down"? And if you feel he isnt a "leader" then mentor the person. Who is a "born leader"? That is bs that people are "born leaders". You learn that stuff from doing it at work. Its just crazy you go to any engineering team and the person in charge is inevitably some white person who doesnt know anything about how any of it works and theyre leading a whole bunch of brown or black engineers who are masters at their craft. Its like MODERN DAY SLAVERY.
I just want to say that I love your videos. They strike the perfect balance between outlining principles and giving vivid examples that are relatable. Your direct experience in the field and your reflection upon your experiences are super valuable. Keep it coming!
Thank you, I’m trying to get a little better with each video. Good to hear I’m moving in the right direction. 🙏
Thank you for posting another video! I'm always learning something, and reminded of best practices when I watch your videos. Keep'm coming.
YOURE BACK! i've waited very patiently for a new video. haven't watched yet, very excited to watch :D glad youre back.
The healthy software development comeback is exactly what I needed right now. I appreciate the content deeply. Thank you!!
I’ll start by saying I’m really glad your back (again) Jayme.
I’ve been a Tech Lead for the last 3 years on a 20+ year career in mostly game dev. To me, it really was the end goal, and I had a lot of work to do on my soft skills to get there
I relate to everything you were saying, to me, this job really is about mentoring other devs and be their advocate above anything else.
There’s a big part missing from this video tho, it’s how tricky the relationship with the lead dev is, you have to work as a duo with competing roadmap, and features will always win unless you’re able to articulate and sell your technical roadmap
I think that’s a perfectly valid view. The point I made about helping your team get better, and the one about working closely with your teammates was meant to encourage mentoring, though I didn’t use that term. Wholeheartedly agree.
Great video! I've seen many good developers become bad tech leads or managers which can be explained by the Peter principle.
glad to see you uploading content again!
This is really more like a progression of responsibility. You begin as a junior having lots of overview and little trust. As a intermediate you are given responsibility for sections of implementation. As a senior you begin to take responsibility for mentoring, system design, and a broader set of skills. Team lead is a kind of specialist area where you look after development methods, standards, and often the person who manages the sprint/schedule. The detail varies, but it is always about increasing sets of responsibility.
Yeah - this is kinda where I'm at, except "senior" vs "Junior" vs "neophyte" are a progression of skills of the person, while a tech lead would be a role you would place someone into. I think Junior has shifted from 3 to 5 years of solid experience to anything from neophyte (freshman) up to but not including senior. Regardless, a Junior Journeyman is expected to be able to accomplish goals that are set by seniors and assisted by seniors, while a senior programmer is expected to be able to accomplish or know how to accomplish those goals without direction. And so ideally you would put a senior programmer into the tech lead position on a team or project, but it could be the best man for the job is the junior programmer. To the extent that a company has "positions" that corrospond to senior programmer, its more a description of what experience level should fill that slot.
@@pureabsolute4618 The danger is that experience != years. I've seen developers who have been in the same job for 20 years, and they have a very narrow skillset and experience. I've seen people with one year experience who have become trusted very quickly because of their aptitude. Perhaps 'senior' and 'junior' are really just poor language that have too much baggage.
@@cheetah100 Unfortunately for the industry I totally agree with you here. Developers are sooo specialized, and their specializations take all of their time, which means after a few years many developers are just really good HTML template masters. Although I will give kudos to those who master CSS wtihout going insane. However, to pile on, managers don't seem to understand this, and will still promote people to senior without requiring a genuine goal or litmus test. Mine, as mentioned, is that a senior should know, in general, how to get a project completed without supervision. The tech lead role, OTOH, only requires the "responsibility" for the full picture of the project - they can work with more knowlegeable people either on the project or the organization to get that job done. Which is why a junior programmer might full that role - nothing wrong with learning the tech stuff on the job, while making sure you check the "techinical understanding of the project" box.
Only when you rock a guitar like that you are an undisputed tech lead
I have seen individual contributors often pushed to tech leads to save money. The promotions and salary increments are often not aligned immediately and people have to wait for an entire year or even two for their compensation revisions.
Fantastic advice, appreciate the flavors shared.
Thank you for this video! You give me more confidence that a tech lead role is something I could actually do and be good at, rather than it being overwhelming.
Can't believe you're back 😭😭😭 missed you so much
I'm very happy to have found your channel. Thank you for sharing your experience.
Thanks for the video, really helpful and useful tips I'll need to incorporate into my daily tasks
Wow! Thanks a lot for this video. I was just promoted to Software Lead a couple months ago to a growing team after entering Software Engineering for two years. I understood that it meant more management and less coding but I felt an immense amount of pressure feeling like I should be the best technical individual on the team. This video provided a lot of relief, reassurance and direction to help me understand and grow in this role. Still not sure if I want to remain on this course long term or to just be a technical contributor but this insight is priceless. I appreciate all your videos!! Thanks again.
Pretty much the same position here as a founder and CTO of a start-up. Before I was more ir less "just" coding, and during Covid not up to the standards I have set for myself, so this change really brought back the excitement into the job. But as you, I am not 100% sure I want to keep doing that for the next decades.
You’re very welcome. I try to make the videos I wish somebody made for me. 😉
You don't need to know everything about tech. But you should know most of your requirements and know what fits or fits not.
It also really helps to have a decent network of experts. So if you ever hit something really challenging you know who to ask.
I was a cross-functional tech lead for 4 years. I came from an electronics background and my role was to "lead" not only the electronics team, but also software, mechanical, acoustics, certs & compliance, and sometimes production teams -- it was a "tech project lead" / "product owner" kind of position. Because of the diverse backgrounds I was responsible for, I always made it known that I didn't know all the answers, that the teammates are more than likely more knowledgeable about the technicalities of each discipline than I was, and I asked them to let me know any and every time they think I should or shouldn't be doing something. I told them that I'm not their "leader" or "manager" but I would do my best to try and remove any obstacles that are preventing them from moving along smoothly and succeeding. This was true across the several different cultural backgrounds of the folks I worked with.
I still don't know if it was what I said or the way I said it, but I managed to get good enough rapport and was able to help everyone move along at a steady pace, if not always at top speed. I guess I could say, I was able to help myself grow and succeed by being honest to the team about what I could do, what I could not do, and offering to help them move forward smoothly to succeed.
Of course, all this included the frequent apologies to customers & management for any mistakes or delays or other such things. I tried to take the brunt of the displeasures, saying it was my fault for not anticipating such-and-such ahead of time, and at the same time publicly pushing credit to a team member or team for many accomplishments. I knew my responsibilities were important, but I told my teams that they were the main characters, and I was just the supporting character. It wasn't easy; there was always more and more to endure as one became more and more elevated (if one is honest with oneself). There was always as much discomfort as all the dubious "glory", if not more.
I just checked out your website, it has an amazing amount of information - _thank you_ 😀
I stepped into a "Chapter Lead" engineering role this week - this video is super helpful to remind myself of what is and what is not important! Thanks!
I've been in the business for a long long time, and a few years ago I got promoted to senior engineer, more bc my EM was pushing for it really hard to her leadership, and she had to kind of fight to convince them. We mostly had "ephemeral tech leads" at the time. Project-based and typically picked from Staff or Principal level engineers. I never really understood what they were doing, well "they facilitate technical discussions, arbitrate forks in the tech roadmap tech, moving things forward". I shortly after got an offer from a startup, and was assigned a role all the way to Staff Engineer & Tech Lead. Staff level because I had vastly the most experience. Didn't ask much about what their expectations were on the TL bits - "same as at that other big Swedish music streaming place, I reckon". Big mistake - always agree on expectations!
The startup has been low on staff, and I've had to do a lot of hands-down coding (that's what I had been doing all along before - it's what I know, basically). And I've been dreading work more and more, as I don't feel I fit in anywhere, and in some sense I feel lika a failure with low impact on the company success. Not a good place.
Some of your suggestions I feel are actually passions of mine. Kind of eng/mgmt glue, working for engineers to get time to hack, work in pairs, facilitate agreements and stuff. Will look to try and incorporate this more in my work. Really love this video, it has helped to clear and un-taint my idea of TL as a position. Now I just need to learn to communicate. And read some leadership book. Heartfelt thanks for great content (and reading this!), looking forward to the next one! Cheers
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, experience and pieces of advice in this area. Much appreciated ❤❤❤
As a person who is considering the position I really picked up some hints and nuances to pay attention to on my own way 😊😊😊
I've been a tech lead for about a year and a half at this point. It's reassuring to hear the things you say because I kind of accidentally fell into some of the patterns you describe. Definitely feels like I'm still getting used to the position and being better at it though. Appreciate the video!
Fantastic advice. Great format for the discussion as well. Thank you for sharing.
My pleasure. Glad you enjoyed it!
Hi Jayme, I completely agree with all the points you made in this video.
The Peter Principle shows us how the wrong people can get elecated into a tech lead role, it also has the habit of of pushing good tech leads into more senior roles. This not only denys teams the value good tech leads deliver, it can also result in loosing these people by pushing them into roles they hate.
Just stumbled upon your channel recently, and I've been hooked ever since! Your content is amazing, thank you for sharing!
Welcome to the channel! Happy to have you here. :)
I was an IC elevated into a Tech Lead position over 10 years ago. Fortunately I naturally fell into the right traits you listed here…and that’s great but it was a company that had all the bad traits you mentioned. It was the most gratifying but difficult professional experience I’ve ever had. I appreciate you putting so eloquently my feelings and experience. We need better leadership in tech and this video helps. Thank you!
Yay, more videos like this. Awesome!
It’s good to see you back!
The worst thing a company can do is promote someone to tech lead because they fear losing them or the knowledge they have. Its probably the most toxic situation for both sides in the long run. But, time and time again I have seen it in industry.
Love the ending music! Not to diminish the rest of the content, but it was my favourite part.
Thanks, I'm trying to get better!
Thank you sir! Really doing us a favor!
Thanks for making this content. Really appreciate and enjoy it
I have checked your channel regularly since you posted your last video. As a programmer and small entrepreneur your videos are valuable to me in many ways. Welcome back!
Thanks! So happy to hear this stuff is helping you. 🙏
Great video, thanks, you look like have a interesting solid and humble experience in coding.
I have been there and I went back to architect/specialist cause I don't like to manage people or a lot of meetings :)
A terrible mistake you can make as Tech Lead is to expect that all the other developers should follow your path to work and deliver the same as you did as developer.
You got my like when you started playing the guitar at around 5:20 lmao great video tho, a lot of insight and details that you don't usually consider or even comes across your mind, and veeery useful info. Cheers!
good to hear a critical analysis of what it takes to lead. to many "I am manager, I am boot" mentalities
As a new TL I appreciate this video a lot. It helps me calibrate what im doing right and where the opportunities to improve are. Also nice playing lol
Thanks! Glad you found some of it helpful. 👍
So good to see you back
This is really good shit. Thanks @HealthyDev!
Thanks for this video, you remind me of what I like about this role. However, this role really sucks if management proves to unresponsive or untrustworthy.
Hey Jayme, I've been following you for a while, just wanted to say thanks for all the positive videos to help out Devs/Engineers and level them up :)
You're so welcome! Thanks for the encouragement. It means so much more than you know. 🙏
Thank you for a great video! My perception has always been that tech leads are the best developers/dev ops etc. In my experience it's the people who are really good developers that get promoted to be tech leads (not all of them suit the role, as you've explained). I've never seen anyone who is not a strong dev get promoted to a job like that.
Yeah that’s understandable. The problem I see there is the person is a really great senior developer. But not a lead. Leading implies leadership, but of course that’s just my opinion!
I've been a software developer for nearly 25 years, working my way up from junior to senior and more recently have become a tech lead. Your advice and tips are on point. Defending your team, highlighting their good work, making decisions by democracy, spending time with them etc are all the necessary skills that make a great leader. The soft skills are probably more important in a leadership role than the technical ones.
Have been one for several years, most of the time you don't even get to pick the technology as you would expect in the job title because in a big corporation they would have architects that don't code and impose a lot of red tape over the project, so tech lead in name only you don't get to call the shots because there is always someone higher than you who will.
Additionally, most of the time you are now mentoring your team in good practices, domain knowledge, technical knowledge, tools of the trade to avoid burnout and not overcommitting, and then butting heads with other roles like the product owners, management, operations, so the time spent on IC has decreased.
This video is really spot on though.
I’d agree, in larger companies tech leads have a little less autonomy and they have more governance for sure to deal with. Thanks for sharing your perspective!
Pretty much my experience as well, feels more like title inflation just for hierarchical reasons.
I am a tech lead / lead developer, and totally agree with what you’re saying. I am the first to throw myself in the line of fire to catch bullets for my team. Also, I know that all people make mistakes, and I try to implement systems to prevent them from reaching the client, internal QA or even my project manager (I’m working in an agency). As a flightsimmer, I am an absolute fan of checklists for everything that is even remotely critical, as well as the 4 eyes principle.
Good advice. Perhaps no-one really knows what it's like until they actually try it, but this video makes a lot of things more clear. I know some persones that tried it and got back to being IC.
Nice guitar tone BTW.
Thanks! My hearing is shot above 10k so it’s tough to know if I get the EQ right on the guitar lol. 😉
@HealthyDev, I got this video in my You Tube recommendations today. This is a great video. I really like your presentation style, deep knowledge and your guitar playing skill. I am going to binge-watch all your videos over this holiday season. LOL. I am happy I found your channel. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
Welcome to the channel! Thanks for your support. 👍
Oh man, it's so nice to hear someone saying this, I've been a Tech Lead for longer than I care to remember and I can relate to so much of what you're saying. I've always focused on bettering the people around me, I'm never the smartest dev, I aways focus on leveraging the strengths of my team, and building a strong team culture is always my number one goal. Once you get the culture where it needs to be you can almost sit back and watch the high performance go nuts. And when devs you've lead in past roles begin to follow you when you move on, that's the best part, that's when you know you're doing okay!
Nailed it. The big problem with being a team lead is that you miss out on opportunities that you pass along to your team members instead. Training? Forget it, my people need it more than I do. I encouraged one of my team members transition out of my team because they wanted to go to engineering…it hurt the team as a whole but it supported their career development. Just be careful or you’ll wind up in management.. performance reviews, compensation, lots of useless meetings. Offshore? Good luck. Granted, it’s been at least 6 years now since I’ve been out of the role but I’ve set some hard policies for my team.. like “every email represents this team and myself as lead”.. no misspellings, customer focused, understand and address the problem in customer terms. Try to insulate them from the politics and the overhead… ensure they grasp the metrics but focus only on the key ones. It’s rewarding but a giant PITA.
Tech Lead and Solution Architect is a blurred line too. Much of what you mention also applies to an architect’s role. But then most of the great Tech Leads I have met could take the Architecture role if they wanted to be even less hands-on. So that blurring is a good thing, in my view.
If a company provides roles and promotion paths for ICs instead of forcing them into management, it helps with this. If the only way up is to be tech lead or a manager then you get shoe horned into it. This sounds like a problem created by team structures. The tech lead being a different role from the engineering manager, separating some of those concerns helps also.
Awesome video thanks! That was exactly what i needed being in a transition phase myself. The thing i struggle most is keeping it all together and keep people motivated when times are hard and customer keeps trying to feature creep all the time. Can you recommend 1-2 books on leadership?
This is exactly how I expected FC leads to be at my job. Sadly, this is not the reality. Leads end up being the person with the highest level and they kinda scope larger ask to broad task and let the members of the teams pick up the task they want. I was so shocked because I came in as an entry level fresh out of Uni but I had another life as a senior leader in the military and I would ensure to drill into the heads of my young leaders this exact concept around leadership. Train them, coach them, and challenge them to work on their leadership skills and be the best leaders because good leaders foster good teams and good teams win battles. So going from the military to a large tech company I am so surprised how they handle leadership.
Great video, thanks!
Really loved this video, there are lots of things really interesting.
The way you're describing the role makes a whole lot of sense.
And it absolutely shows that my manager has no idea about any of it.
I’m a tech lead and I can confirm this is good content! Wish the CTO and managers understood or remembered these same lessons.
The Peter Principle is a thing in a lot of companies I feel. Thankfully my current company understand that leadership & engineering are two very different skills and don't always come hand in hand ; as such it offers two promotion paths which build into the strength of each individual and their aspiration/affinity for the business.
State of art video. Thanks.
Can't say enough amen to this. 😅 I hope every company will have this understanding.
This is my first day watching this channel, and I am already start loving it. really great tips and ideas here. thank you
Welcome to the channel!
Wow. Drop everything; watch video. Putting out the fire can wait.
Great video as always
I've been leading for a while and wish I had bumped into this video before. Congrats, dude!
It’s only two days old no worries lol. You’re an early adopter. 😉
I was promoted to Tech Lead at the beginning of this year. I didn't want to do it. For most of this year I have been extremely stressed. I drafted my resignation, called my immediate manager out of courtesy to forewarn him. I was talked out of it, by him, the Delivery Director and the Head of Engineering. I'm glad I stuck at it. It's incredibly challenging, different in so many ways to being a developer. Yes I have felt and still do feel that I have to be the smartest guy in my team. I can't know everything but I have to be able to crack the most difficult problems. This is a great video. Really really great. Thanks.
Your story is my story, but I've got burned out and needed to take year career break. Don't repeat my mistakes, learn from it.
I agree with the principles in this video, and I see that they work in practice.
I just found your channel. You're amazing.
Welcome to the channel!
This is actually really good advice for anyone who finds themselves leading a team, not just for tech leads.
I've been working for a huge telco for a little bit over a year and my original position was just as Sr. Developer. Today I'm also a Data Engineer Sr. and the Tech Lead for my "working cell". It helps that I've managed groups of all sizes before and I'm not a kid anymore, but it is a struggle. What I don't do is make technical decisions by mylsef, or at least I wait until I've had input from everyone else so I'm sure I did't leave any good idea I didn't have out. Oh, btw... I'm still making developer money -.-
Amazing video!
Great inputs.
So, people who are natural achievers and who are brought up in strict households with high expectations and who attended schools that encouraged competition may not be cut out for the tech lead role.
It takes conscious effort to not project to another person the internal and external expectations one person grew up with.
Thx for the info, Big Bro.
You bet
Thanks for laying out the information in such a clear way, especially what kind of competences a lead really requires. I'm not a tech lead, but a team lead. Just wanted to share my story and findings as a lead because I feel like a lot of this video translates to anyone who leads developers towards development goals.
I'm a developer who has been promoted to senior/lead for my team a few months back. I would say all-in-all I have about 4 years of full-time experience, so not a lot of experience. Development-wise I would call myself decent. I know my stuff, but I'm more of a generalist than a specialist in any topic. So to be honest I was a bit surprised when my manager told me during my performance review that they wanted to give me the promotion. When I asked what it is they think made me a good lead, they told me it's not necessarily what they think, but what the devs in my team thought about me. In my case my co-workers (devs/product owners) basically asked if I would want to become a lead.
And now comes the kicker. I've never felt imposter-syndrome before, but now I do. Because initially I didn't really understand what it was that made people think that I was a good lead. I felt like I didn't have the technical knowledge to tell people how to build something, or that my contribution was necessarily bigger than my co-workers. But after a lot reading and actually just talking about it with my colleagues, these are some things I think I learned about being a lead over the last few months that I wanted to share. To anyone reading, please share your thoughts or anything you've learned yourselves.
- Leading is not about your personal output. Better yet, leading is not about you at all. You're not adding to the output of the team, but instead you should focus on being a multiplier for your team. Meaning, by supporting your co-workers, you're able to increase the team's overall performance/output, even while decreasing your own personal output. Basically you're there to make sure things actually get done.
- Leading is not about being the smartest or most knowledgeable person in the team. Better yet, the chances are that there is someone in the team (or company, or maybe even external) who knows more about it than you do. I believe a big part of leading is making sure the right person is doing the right type of work. That doesn't mean that people's shouldn't be allowed to learn. But even then, as a lead you should still provide support for that person, even if you can't personally give it to them.
- You should always be the most approachable person in the team. No matter the issue, people should be able to come to you for help. And even if you can't help them yourself directly, make sure you connect the people who can help each other. Because even if some developers are introverted or have difficulty socializing, it's up to you to make them feel comfortable approaching you.
- When making technical decisions, a big part of it involving the team in the decision. So I spend quite a bit of time in structuring my own findings in a way, so that I can clearly communicate the though process or the reasons for making certain technical decisions. Of course, everything I suggest is up for discussion, and when needed I'll also ask people to figure out some technically detailed parts for me. That way they're part of the technical preparation, and when possible, that same person will also be knowledgeable about the feature they're about to implement. It's not about "doing as I say" but it should be about "making a decision as a team". Sometimes it requires quite a bit of effort to have people make decisions, so you'll have to really listen to them and guide them towards what they think should be done. Of course you can challenge the technical input you get, but you should never punch down on people, even if the idea is actually really stupid.
Amazing feedback, attitude, and insights here. Couldn’t agree more. Thanks for sharing what you’re learning!
@@HealthyDev No problem, keep up the good video's!
A company is a meritocracy ? I almost spit out my coffee. I think the term you are looking for is mediocracy.
Sounds like you need a new job if your company is a mediocracy. 😂
Can still be a meritocracy. Perhaps those being promoted are demonstrating skills outside of coding. You're pretty useless inside a bank for example if you don't understand governance.
Lol!!! Hopefully you get my point. It was in reference to tech leads seeking recognition for their own work if they still have an individual contributor mindset - as opposed to showing leadership through recognizing their teammates too.
@@HealthyDev of course ! Great video by the way. I like your point on the importance to improve the skills of everyone in the team. I've been a tech lead in the last two years, and that was one of my main concern. Depending of the motivation and talent of the team, however, it can be extremely frustrating to invest tons of energy in that and seeing absolutely no result. Sometimes, at the end of the day, you are stuck doing 90% of the work yourself, especially when the management doesn't want the problem to be known, for fear of making the team look bad, and having it reflects on them. How can you get more resources for the team when upper management thinks everything is going fine and everything gets delivered on time ? Complain to upper management and get fired. Software development is f***ed-up, it is the worst possible career choice for talented individuals.
People usually won’t take action unless there’s some pain.
This may be unpopular, but consider not doing 90% of the work to hit the deadline. That’s unsustainable, and unfair to you. Are you doing scrum or kanban? You may need to let some sprints go late. Or if kanban let some tasks go late. Not on purpose, but if people aren’t delivering their part.
When questions are raised as to why, the team member who failed needs to have their need for more support highlighted, not buried. It’s the tech lead’s job to make sure the team is supported and has realistic goals.
Please don’t break yourself over unrealistic deadlines if you don’t have the right team or support. I’ve done it, and it’s a dangerous game that can easily lead to burnout!
Yeah, I would say the leadership side is more important than the technical side. I strongly agree that the tech lead should be trying to make the individual team members become better at what they do. The thing that resonated with me most in this video, and is probably something I need to get better at, is defending the team members.
Please also upload as podcast. I often listen to you while working out.
It should be available at 11 am CST today (Wednesday). I release these as a podcast two days after UA-cam.
25 yoe as well. My roles tend to be some kind of staff position like tech lead or architect. I am not the best programmer, but better at working with end users and management. At my age the best thing I can be doing is clearing out the blockers affecting the rest of the team so they can kick butt.
I feel like one of the hardest challenges as a tech lead is to find a balance between being nice and being tough to developers, especially dealing with more junior ones.
It sure is! It’s one of those things that’s not really easy to get good at by learning, really just requires a lot of trial and error. I made a ton of errors - I’d like to think I’ve gotten better.
I am Technical Lead at my company and most of what you say is true. I was a senior software engineer beforehand and I was promoted to Tech Lead last year. I had to do line management courses and do a lot of managerial work. I soon got fed up with that and told my boss I didn't want to do line manager work. Luckily he agreed and now I play more of a team lead with a technical consultant role for the rest of the business. I also get to do coding which is my main interest. I kept the pay rise though haha. I think it's important to do what you love at work and not chase the money or prestige. It doesn't always work out the way you expect
I've been in the business world and sales industries for most of my adult life (20 years at this point). When the pandemic hit, I decided to go back to school for game development. I love game dev, and am glad I decided to switch careers, but it sounds like the skills I developed in the business world leading sales teams might mean a tech lead position is a good fit for me. A little down the road of course, don't graduate for another 6 months.
Some of the best developers I’ve ever worked with had experience in other professions related to business. I think you’ll find it will help a lot in the long run.
not currently a techlead but been it in the past and I totally agree. The first time I became a lead I felt unsuited as I was definitely not the most experienced, but then I realised my most valuable contributions werent the code, it was making sure the team worked together and understood each other
Bam! 💯
Love it. You've got a lot of things I agree with here. However I can't help but think that the 'scope' of the tech lead isn't as grand as all you've mentioned, but rather these are good things to do in support of your Manager, your Project Manager, your Project Lead, etc. But perhaps this is one of those things that depends on the size of the company, and joining many roles under one undersized title might happen more often than not. I consider the Tech Lead role to be the "understander" and "arbitrator" of technical aspects of the project. Of course, insert stuff about communication, and a smattering of leadership here, both of which you covered really well. Most of your points I would assign to the Manager (developer manager) itself, supported by the lead's insights into best practices, perhaps a technical background behind why your team thinks this way, etc. To me, this is the last refuge of the excellent fully hands on coder - everything above that I call a manager. One of the key aspects between a manager and a tech lead is that a manager, in general (big companies have weird practices), can hire and fire people on their team, while a tech lead works with what he has. This makes all the difference in the world with how people respond to you and how far you can go in terms of fixing or helping people. Anyway, My 2c - new subscriber, and I hope to learn alot :).
This video came at the right time for me and affirmed my thoughts that i don't want to be a tech lead. I will communicate this as soon as i can
Glad it helped!
Make a lot of great points here. I think one of the root problems here is that at some point as a dev who is really pushing hard and keeping up to date with new tech, there isnt much increase in salary/compensation. I think the problem is that people think that managers must be given a higher salary than a expert dev, which I think is a bad mindset. Many expert devs have far more demanding jobs and more valuable skills than a manager does (highly sought after on market). There are quite a lot of people who can do middle manager as its an easier job than staying on top of lots of complicated and constantly evolving tech stacks. A good IT company will realize this and make sure to keep their devs well compensater and appreciated but many more are stuck in an old mindset where manager is ”king”. Im not saying that being a good manager is easy, but I do think that being an expert software dev in many fields is much more demanding and a much harder skill to get and also much more valuable on the job market then an average manager is.
After something like 25 years of software development in different contexts I am now acting as the Tech Lead for the first time in my life. I love coding. Can't stop, doing it, creating things out of thin air basically :) But honestly, I really like the fundamental principles of acting as a Tech Lead, connecting different actors in a software dev project by using knowledge, experience and communication. I absolutely dig the human aspect of this job as I am simply dealing with human actors that have their own goals, fears, images of them self and their surroundings. This goes for all hierarchy levels. There is a lot of politics hidden under the table. But mastering those is a challenge that is a new level and I like it. I see my role not only as what you described but also as the one connecting management ideas and business goals to project managers and product owners - might be strange but it needs someone doing this job and I am more than happy doing it as this only benefits the whole project by bringing clear information and goals to the team. I don't want them to deal with unclear situations I have been in so many times. As a developer you want clear goals. You want to know, how much freedom you get while developing your ideas and your code and you want a certain amount of freedom as coding is an act of craftsmanship driven by strong creativity. Well, I am thrilled to see, how this progresses and where I will shine or fail. Either way, it could be, what I was looking for all the time - let's see, how it goes ;)
Incredible attitude. I’m sure you’ll do great!
Good content, videos like this have a way of starting or being part of cultural shifts in industries, social communities, or whatnot. (Oh, you may need a pop filter for your mic... not sure, I've got headphones on and it kinda went away at the 12 minute mark... but was kinda constant when you cut setting back to your office... sounds like subtle little licking mouth noises... dunno, could be wrong. Otherwise, hope it helps.)
Thanks, I think I may have had the mic pointed too much at my lips in this one, I usually go for the Adam’s apple. Will try to get that right in future episodes!
I was hired a tech lead at a new company about 2 years ago. Coming from an engineering background, I had no idea what the actual tech lead position entails. I was believing those same exact myths you just mentioned which to this day causes so much imposter syndrome in me. I had to learn the ropes on my own most of the time due to not getting any mentoring. I still have a long way to go. There are aspects I love about the job but at the same time, I miss coding.
Hang in there. Our industry has a lot of growing up to do with respect to preparing people for lead positions. Good job struggling through it even if you didn’t get the support you’d like. Maybe that can help you see how resilient you’re able to be when situations aren’t optimal. That’s a great quality to have as a person.
I'm now around 4-5 month in a like trial tech lead position for a project, because the previous tech lead for the previous project did shit 🤦
Now I felt the pressure and how hard it is to be a tech lead
This in combination with your video shows me: I dont want to be that role! I'm good in coding, I enjoy coding and find good patterns and such.
But doing all these things a tech lead should do, I feel like I'm worse for the team
Nothing wrong with being an amazing senior developer!
Same can be said for marketing leadership. A social media team leader does no client work and do auditing and scheduling.
Thanks for this elaborate vid that shows me I’m actually doing a pretty good job at tech leading my team 😁
Awesome! Your team probably has no idea how good they have it.