I don't see those responsibilities as being equally emphasized at a given point in a team's lifecycle. Early on, the tech lead will be primarily an engineer an

I don't see those responsibilities as being equally emphasized at a given point in a team's lifecycle. Early on, the tech lead will be primarily an engineer and hiring manager: there's not enough people to really need a process yet, and so the tech lead lays the technical foundation while building up the team with the right people. As the team grows, the tech lead will reduce their engineer responsibilities and start focusing on project management in order to deal with the complexities that come from a larger team. Once the team is at a steady state, both in terms of people and process, the tech lead can focus on people management, primarily by training people to take over the other responsibilities. I'm not saying there won't be periods where a tech lead is being stretched too far as the team transitions between these phases, but if the stretching persists for too long then something has gone wrong.