So You Want to Be a Manager? Welcome to Meetings, Metrics, and Mayhem
summary
Manager role claims shift from coding to being an enabler with concrete tradeoffs: inherited a surprise layoff of two people in month one, spends 70–100% of calendar on meetings, and must build cross‑team alignment, meeting notes, and monitoring and observability where none exist. Priorities include creating psychological safety, running one‑on‑ones, handling PIPs that can reverse, pacing to avoid burnout (author recovers with a week of Runescape).
AI-written summary · about
chapters (12)
- 0:00From shock to management
- 1:26Management isn’t a promotion
- 3:10Supporting engineers
- 4:59Loneliness in management
- 7:05Psychological safety
- 9:09Balancing tech and people
- 12:00Manager as therapist
- 15:09Avoiding burnout
- 17:41Difficult conversations
- 19:52Remote management
- 22:16Letting go of tech work
- 23:40Handling layoffs and PIPs
related talks
25mThe making of a manager's manager
26mSo you want to be a manager
19mOops I'm a Manager - On More Effective 1-on-1 Meetings
27mWhat's my manager doing all day?
31mThings I Wish I Knew When I Became a Manager
48mFrom Developer to Manager... and Back
19mShould I become a manager in IT
24mWelcome to Management! - Tips & Tricks for Junior Leaders