Great article and I'm looking forward to read part 2. Both as an EM and as an EM's manager, I've seen those problems so often, that I've even put one of them (planning, or as I called it, preparation) as a company wide evaluation criteria.
One I'm concerned about its reception is the last one, micromanagement. I found this one often misinterpreted and sometimes even weaponized against even some of my senior managers. First of all, I like Kim Scott definition of micromanagement as a control-oriented managers: they share little information, focus on details, don't listen, etc. On the other hand, absentee managers never asked questions, never know answers, don't want to know the details, etc. Both are wrong: a good manager is a though partner that know what's going on in their team, set goals, asked questions and found answers. And that's where the bad press of micromanagement get weaponized: many EM are afraid to ask their team for status update. They don't know what's going on because the engineers are communicating in DM or around a coffee. There is no plan or estimates because the team doesn't want to be told when and how to do things. Briefly, the EM is doing all the mistakes you cite above because of the fear of being taken as a micromanager, to be accused of "not trusting the team". And if the fear of being accused of micromanagement is your weapon, the fear of being accused of "not trusting the team" is likely the ammunition.
Let be fair: most of our teams can be improved, they can do better, elsewhere our industry wouldn't have so many problems of retention, burnout and missed deadlines. Blindly trusting your team is not management and even less leadership. Problems, struggles, blockers, learnings, those are all normal and shouldn't be hidden but brought up to solve together. It sounds like a fearful proposition, but leadership takes courage and respect. Courage to admit our errors and respect for those working to fix them.
Great article and I'm looking forward to read part 2. Both as an EM and as an EM's manager, I've seen those problems so often, that I've even put one of them (planning, or as I called it, preparation) as a company wide evaluation criteria.
One I'm concerned about its reception is the last one, micromanagement. I found this one often misinterpreted and sometimes even weaponized against even some of my senior managers. First of all, I like Kim Scott definition of micromanagement as a control-oriented managers: they share little information, focus on details, don't listen, etc. On the other hand, absentee managers never asked questions, never know answers, don't want to know the details, etc. Both are wrong: a good manager is a though partner that know what's going on in their team, set goals, asked questions and found answers. And that's where the bad press of micromanagement get weaponized: many EM are afraid to ask their team for status update. They don't know what's going on because the engineers are communicating in DM or around a coffee. There is no plan or estimates because the team doesn't want to be told when and how to do things. Briefly, the EM is doing all the mistakes you cite above because of the fear of being taken as a micromanager, to be accused of "not trusting the team". And if the fear of being accused of micromanagement is your weapon, the fear of being accused of "not trusting the team" is likely the ammunition.
Let be fair: most of our teams can be improved, they can do better, elsewhere our industry wouldn't have so many problems of retention, burnout and missed deadlines. Blindly trusting your team is not management and even less leadership. Problems, struggles, blockers, learnings, those are all normal and shouldn't be hidden but brought up to solve together. It sounds like a fearful proposition, but leadership takes courage and respect. Courage to admit our errors and respect for those working to fix them.