My tip - don't. It's a demotion.<p>The lowest-level manager has significantly more accountability than anybody else (i.e. most likely to be fired without 8 months notice a director would get) with few upsides (lower pay per hour of work, worse career trajectory, greater stress, will be forbidden from having negative opinions about anything the company does, more likely to be scapegoated for a boss's mistake).<p>See the Gervais principle: <a href="https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/" rel="nofollow">https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...</a>
I find this GDC talk more concise and comprehensive, on the same topic:<p>So They Made You a Lead, Now What?<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z98rF3bllao" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z98rF3bllao</a>
i haven't listened to this but will at lunch for sure. I'm in the process of making the switch to management after accepting a new role around last Nov. It's painful, one of the hardest parts for me is knowing when I've had a good day or bad day, there's not a good measure, things are very subjective. The mentoring and leadership aspect of management I've really taken to and didn't expect to enjoy so much. Pairing up a Sr. and Jr. dev and watching the Jr. dev bloom and the Sr. dev become a better communicator, to the point i've put them in front of a client, has been the highlight so far.
When I moved from programming into management, the hardest thing I found was to change from flow-driven work to interrupt-driven work. I started with the golden rule: "Manage people the way you would like to be managed." That lasted about ten minutes. I changed it to "Manage people the way they want to be managed" which was much more succesful.
To me the hardest part of moving into management from engineering came with the realization that "accomplishment" is a much squishier thing. Almost every action as a manager ends up as a compromise across several different very soft-skills variables.<p>Recognizing the core of what matters and not getting hung up on other distractions seems to be the difference between success and failure. I don't focus on my career at all and have found that it usually takes care of itself so long as I don't bypass any opportunities.<p>Here's my checklist I use to see if I'm doing a good job (by my own measure), and these are not in order of priority but must be balanced simultaneously:<p>- put your staff first, leadership is a service function<p>- ship, on time, and within budget -- exceed expectations
I'll be soon transitioning from a team lead to manager (with a new company). Can anyone add any recommendation to my list of resources?<p>Books:
Peopleware,
5 dysfunctions of a team,
Ziglar's Top Performance,
Pragmatic Programmer
(and others, but these are the top ones)<p>Websites:
askamanager.org,
Joel on Software<p>Podcasts:
HBR ideacast