11 ms·

A Framework for Engineering Managers

427 points by aviramha 4y ago

blowski 4y ago
Interesting read. I’m not sure I agree that an EM defining processes is operating at a more mature level than one merely challenging them. I try to challenge processes but coach the team to find the right processes themselves. I define processes myself only as a last resort.
- aviramha 4y ago
  The way I see it - you defined that the way to create further definitions is by collaboration, so it's still a way of defining process. I assume it's not just a "democratic" process to create a process ;) btw, totally agree on the point though!
- andsoitis 4y ago
  > one merely challenging them I'm always more interested to hear from someone who also has suggestions for improvement or change.
mosselman 4y ago
This is great, thanks.
mariogintili 4y ago
I feel like these structures are often used to prevent people from getting a raise by raising the bar too far
Hermitian909 4y ago
This is really well done, but I feel like it (and other such frameworks I've seen) all start to fall apart at high levels of seniority. What makes someone D7 in this framework? The real answer is not in the charts, it's that they're very business critical. Maybe they're some ultra-niche specialist or just the only one who's been at the company since the beginning and knows where the bodies are buried. Things change in very interesting ways once the power dynamics between employer/employee shifts so the company asking the employee what it will take to make them stay.
- aviramha 4y ago
  My take on management (and really on life) is that every theory/framework is a setting stone and not instructions. The framework helps you think better, but reality is always more complex than what is described and covered in the framework. Best managers IMO are aware of many different strategies, frameworks etc and adapt it to suit their organization needs (based on the culture, people, goals, etc).
5350-uiop-1130 4y ago
thanks for this, very useful. at least a basic framework to work with and adapt to my needs.
twinklegarg7 4y ago
[flagged]
rishav_sharan 4y ago
This is great. Is there something similar for Product Managers as well?
- ivalm 4y ago
  Isn’t this TPM in this framework?
  - Jolter 4y ago
    A Program is not a Product. I guess the distinction is only important in larger organizations but trust me they are different professions.
  - rishav_sharan 4y ago
    TPM & Prod managers are separate disciplines nowadays in most large companies. a PM continues to be user and product focused, while a TPM focuses more on the tech architecture & project management.
buro9 4y ago
This attempts to recreate https://sfia-online.org/en https://sfia-online.org/en , but it is way harder than one imagines and then is in danger of being too prescriptive and inapplicable. It's better to go the other way and work out the principals behind progression... that the further in their career the more ownership, agency, and scope they have. Most things can be guided by merely understanding the principals of it. This very old doc (from Sun Microsystems engineers IIRC) remains excellent https://web.archive.org/web/20090420152505/http://mark.kampe.googlepages.com/lancelot.txt https://web.archive.org/web/20090420152505/http://mark.kampe... It speaks to the spirit, the principals, behind progression... and that makes it extremely applicable to lots of fields, personal paths, and environments.
- chrisweekly 4y ago
  principals -> principles (very different words)
  - buro9 4y ago
    Yeah. Mobile phone keyboard are the bane of communication
- vladsanchez 4y ago
  Your point of "Ownership, agency, and scope" resonated with me but it hasn't been my case. I have almost 30yrs experience and still struggle to earn agency and ownership on subject-matter topics/projects. Not sure what's my problem but my point is that none of these frameworks are prescriptive, only descriptive. Thanks for sharing your ideas.
ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
Nice. Like all of these types of things, I believe that an heuristic approach is best, and this would work well for that. I could see a training curriculum being developed from it. However, it’s also likely that an HR policy document would be developed, with compensation and review targets. That could have … interesting … ramifications. BTW: the image does not do so well in GitHub’s new dark mode.
lifeisstillgood 4y ago
I think there is a cut off point where influence is entirely down to hierarchical position. Yeah there are some people who cross cut and have personal influence (every org has celebrities) but in the main a person who has 1000 people reporting to him has more influence than someone with 2 people. How they got to that position will have very little to do with the skills sets mentioned here. It's kid of like the French aristocracy before the guillotine was invented writing a book on how to rise through the ranks to become an influence at court. It's missing most of the important stuff PS - I am getting overly cynical but I do favour democracy in organisations
- jiveturkey 4y ago
  It might be that you are reading this thing as a way to GAIN influence. This is a measurement of how much influence you HAVE.
webspaceadam 4y ago
On the first glance i really like that approach, but i have the feeling that something is missing. They address the issue, that different people can be on different stages in different axes, but there is no real explanation of how to handle the differences. Someone can come in with little knowledge about the technology, hence not using it before but is very well suited to "lead" discussions about architecture or processes.
harryf 4y ago
It's a nice idea to things like this _in theory_. Medium has something similar they called Snowflake - https://github.com/Medium/snowflake https://github.com/Medium/snowflake ... but note the disclaimer... > Heads up: Medium isn’t using this tool anymore, but you’re welcome to! The problem with things like this is the typical engineering mindset, when shown a graphical or numerical analysis of their performance will zoom into analyse every detail and in the end it's just backed by the managers impressions and judgement. For similar reasons I have a strong opinion that engineers shouldn't be paid performance related bonuses, because no matter what happens, it's just going to upset them - the best case - maximum bonus - just equates to a "meh". Better to pay a good base salary upfront ... Anyway use tools like this with caution IMO.
- maest 4y ago
  > the best case - maximum bonus - just equates to a "meh" Can you elaborate on this? I find it surprising since bonus pays are very commonly used in many industries (and, in fact, relied on very heavily in e.g. finance)
  - blowski 4y ago
    I remember going through performnace-related bonuses. If somebody tried super-hard and got a "level 5", they got a £5K bonus. Somebody ticking along without being outstanding got £3K. Most people realised the extra £2K wasn't worth the extra effort required to get it.
    - yakak 4y ago
      A raise of even a small amount makes a big difference over time because raises continue and even compound a little. Consequently, a cheap company will try to make the near certain portion of a bonus feel like part of your negotiated salary and extract effort with bonuses as ephemeral raises.
      - quickthrower2 4y ago
        It doesn’t compound at all. If the going rate is $200k and I switch jobs my previous salary doesn’t matter, and therefore compounding doesn’t matter.
xEnOnn 4y ago
It’s a pretty comprehensive framework and I think it’s great. It would have been better if it also has a table of salary range for each level in different regions so that companies aren’t misinterpreting these job levels or, at worse, misuse the guide to manipulate their employees. There are companies which make their employees senior or tech lead but pay $50k and use the same framework as expectation. It cannot be based entirely only on job titles because they are “free” to issue. You can easily mint new titles out of thin air. To back these job levels or titles with real value, their corresponding pays need to be relatable. If we could print money without backing it with something scarce like gold, guess what will happen? Haven’t we seen some companies where there are so many senior, lead or even principal engineers but yet they getting paid lower than a mid engineer at another company? Job level/title inflation. On the other hand, at companies that don’t inflate their job levels, they could still be underpaying their “seniors” and “leads” with junior or mid level pay while expecting them to operate along with the guide.
- roguas 4y ago
  > If we could print money without backing it with something scarce like gold, guess what will happen? We do. We adjust monetary supply for markets to be stable - money has been not backed by anything tangible for quite a while. Like with any proposed framework(also applies to monetary stuff) you find out how it affects outcomes and you adjust usage.
  - xEnOnn 4y ago
    Yes, I’m aware that we do. I’m just trying to give an analogy of what I’m trying to convey. In the case of job levels, employees really shouldn’t be shortchanged into believing the job titles given to them. The remuneration is a better indicator when in doubt.
  - rsanek 4y ago
    I feel like 50 years (since end of Bretton woods) really is not that long, plus we do still rely on petrodollar demand vibes to provide some sort of link to a commodity. We have yet to see the dollar truly unlinked from anything physical.
pliuchkin 4y ago
Thanks, very useful. I'm just finding it hard do adapt and find a place for the role of a Software/System Architect (which is very common in my industry) in the framework since it conflicts a bit with the other roles, mainly, Tech Lead. I`m thinking of Software/System Architect to be a TL7.
rgavuliak 4y ago
The black labels on charts don't go well with the black GH background
- Sodman 4y ago
  Thanks for this, I didn't even see the labels and was re-reading the text trying to see if they had specified which chart directions represented which measurements! Unfortunately GH doesn't have a way to alternate images in a readme based on light mode vs dark mode afaik.
  - rgavuliak 4y ago
    I guess the solution would be to use labels in a colour that works for both.
mepiethree 4y ago
I really like this, the Dropbox career framework, and the Monzo career framework. I synthesized all three recently into one that I keep for our company, and the work pays such dividends. We do quarterly performance reviews and not only does having a consistent standard make these fair, but it reduced my time to write them from 1 hour per report to about 30 min. https://dropbox.github.io/dbx-career-framework/ https://dropbox.github.io/dbx-career-framework/ https://github.com/monzo/progression-framework https://github.com/monzo/progression-framework And my nascent adaptation.. https://kevala-progression.herokuapp.com/ https://kevala-progression.herokuapp.com/
jb3689 4y ago
Interesting idea. Tech lead at our company is mostly a TPM role mixed with the TL responsibilities listed here. In fact every senior engineer is expected to act in the TL capacity at our company. No commentary as to whether that is good or bad just relating that is how our (fairly large, well-known) org works
lamename 4y ago
Reminds me of Patreon's IC leveling doc https://levels.patreon.com/ https://levels.patreon.com/? Note: '?' required for link to work
- newfonewhodis 4y ago
  > Note: '?' required for link to work Wow that is an extremely dumb feature (bug)?
nutate 4y ago
wouldn't folks just join the military if this was their dream?
fjdbeb76 4y ago
zerkten 4y ago
I wonder if the author plays Football Manager[1]. The attributes screens use this same visualization. [1] https://www.passion4fm.com/img/football-manager-player-attributes-categories.png https://www.passion4fm.com/img/football-manager-player-attri...
hkon 4y ago
Cool, do any companies have something that resembles this in action?
peterfield 4y ago
Interesting. That said, the word "risk" is missing. Fundamental aspect of tech/project/program management - IMHO a good framework should include that!
vivegi 4y ago
These frameworks are behavioral competency frameworks. When used for assessing competencies, it is useful to define what the behavioral competency is unambiguously and include positive and negative examples of the behavior. People have questions like, "What should I do to move up the next level?" A competency framework helps answer that question. For eg: say one is currently a manager of people (a.k.a. First level manager) and is looking to move to a manager of managers role (eg: a department leader). A well-defined competency framework would clearly elucidate what kinds of behaviors are expected from each level so that it is clear when having a 1:1 discussion on career progression on where the behaviors are already demonstrated and where there are gaps that need to be worked on. Raises, bonuses and promotion are generally a "past performance + future potential" decision. The competency framework can feed into past performance as well as future potential. Eg: a line manager who is performing poorly on certain competencies may not get his full bonus compared to a line manager who is demonstrating satisfactory levels in all required competencies. Also, year-on-year trends of behavioral competency measurements can also inform on future potential/promotion decisions. Gaps can identify training / development needs. It is useful when applied consistently.
jurschreuder 4y ago
My career framework is doing whatever the [ graphical content ] I want and collect an amazing team that also does whatever the [ explicit ] they want.
Ava433 4y ago

427 points by aviramha 4y ago

Interesting read. I’m not sure I agree that an EM defining processes is operating at a more mature level than one merely challenging them. I try to challenge processes but coach the team to find the right processes themselves. I define processes myself only as a last resort.

aviramha 4y ago
The way I see it - you defined that the way to create further definitions is by collaboration, so it's still a way of defining process. I assume it's not just a "democratic" process to create a process ;) btw, totally agree on the point though!
andsoitis 4y ago
> one merely challenging them I'm always more interested to hear from someone who also has suggestions for improvement or change.

mosselman 4y ago

This is great, thanks.

mariogintili 4y ago

I feel like these structures are often used to prevent people from getting a raise by raising the bar too far

Hermitian909 4y ago

This is really well done, but I feel like it (and other such frameworks I've seen) all start to fall apart at high levels of seniority. What makes someone D7 in this framework? The real answer is not in the charts, it's that they're very business critical. Maybe they're some ultra-niche specialist or just the only one who's been at the company since the beginning and knows where the bodies are buried. Things change in very interesting ways once the power dynamics between employer/employee shifts so the company asking the employee what it will take to make them stay.

aviramha 4y ago
My take on management (and really on life) is that every theory/framework is a setting stone and not instructions. The framework helps you think better, but reality is always more complex than what is described and covered in the framework. Best managers IMO are aware of many different strategies, frameworks etc and adapt it to suit their organization needs (based on the culture, people, goals, etc).

5350-uiop-1130 4y ago

thanks for this, very useful. at least a basic framework to work with and adapt to my needs.

twinklegarg7 4y ago

[flagged]

rishav_sharan 4y ago

This is great. Is there something similar for Product Managers as well?

ivalm 4y ago
Isn’t this TPM in this framework?
- Jolter 4y ago
  A Program is not a Product. I guess the distinction is only important in larger organizations but trust me they are different professions.
- rishav_sharan 4y ago
  TPM & Prod managers are separate disciplines nowadays in most large companies. a PM continues to be user and product focused, while a TPM focuses more on the tech architecture & project management.

buro9 4y ago

This attempts to recreate https://sfia-online.org/en https://sfia-online.org/en , but it is way harder than one imagines and then is in danger of being too prescriptive and inapplicable. It's better to go the other way and work out the principals behind progression... that the further in their career the more ownership, agency, and scope they have. Most things can be guided by merely understanding the principals of it. This very old doc (from Sun Microsystems engineers IIRC) remains excellent https://web.archive.org/web/20090420152505/http://mark.kampe.googlepages.com/lancelot.txt https://web.archive.org/web/20090420152505/http://mark.kampe... It speaks to the spirit, the principals, behind progression... and that makes it extremely applicable to lots of fields, personal paths, and environments.

chrisweekly 4y ago
principals -> principles (very different words)
- buro9 4y ago
  Yeah. Mobile phone keyboard are the bane of communication
vladsanchez 4y ago
Your point of "Ownership, agency, and scope" resonated with me but it hasn't been my case. I have almost 30yrs experience and still struggle to earn agency and ownership on subject-matter topics/projects. Not sure what's my problem but my point is that none of these frameworks are prescriptive, only descriptive. Thanks for sharing your ideas.

ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago

Nice. Like all of these types of things, I believe that an heuristic approach is best, and this would work well for that. I could see a training curriculum being developed from it. However, it’s also likely that an HR policy document would be developed, with compensation and review targets. That could have … interesting … ramifications. BTW: the image does not do so well in GitHub’s new dark mode.

lifeisstillgood 4y ago

I think there is a cut off point where influence is entirely down to hierarchical position. Yeah there are some people who cross cut and have personal influence (every org has celebrities) but in the main a person who has 1000 people reporting to him has more influence than someone with 2 people. How they got to that position will have very little to do with the skills sets mentioned here. It's kid of like the French aristocracy before the guillotine was invented writing a book on how to rise through the ranks to become an influence at court. It's missing most of the important stuff PS - I am getting overly cynical but I do favour democracy in organisations

jiveturkey 4y ago
It might be that you are reading this thing as a way to GAIN influence. This is a measurement of how much influence you HAVE.

webspaceadam 4y ago

On the first glance i really like that approach, but i have the feeling that something is missing. They address the issue, that different people can be on different stages in different axes, but there is no real explanation of how to handle the differences. Someone can come in with little knowledge about the technology, hence not using it before but is very well suited to "lead" discussions about architecture or processes.

harryf 4y ago

It's a nice idea to things like this _in theory_. Medium has something similar they called Snowflake - https://github.com/Medium/snowflake https://github.com/Medium/snowflake ... but note the disclaimer... > Heads up: Medium isn’t using this tool anymore, but you’re welcome to! The problem with things like this is the typical engineering mindset, when shown a graphical or numerical analysis of their performance will zoom into analyse every detail and in the end it's just backed by the managers impressions and judgement. For similar reasons I have a strong opinion that engineers shouldn't be paid performance related bonuses, because no matter what happens, it's just going to upset them - the best case - maximum bonus - just equates to a "meh". Better to pay a good base salary upfront ... Anyway use tools like this with caution IMO.

maest 4y ago
> the best case - maximum bonus - just equates to a "meh" Can you elaborate on this? I find it surprising since bonus pays are very commonly used in many industries (and, in fact, relied on very heavily in e.g. finance)
- blowski 4y ago
  I remember going through performnace-related bonuses. If somebody tried super-hard and got a "level 5", they got a £5K bonus. Somebody ticking along without being outstanding got £3K. Most people realised the extra £2K wasn't worth the extra effort required to get it.
  - yakak 4y ago
    A raise of even a small amount makes a big difference over time because raises continue and even compound a little. Consequently, a cheap company will try to make the near certain portion of a bonus feel like part of your negotiated salary and extract effort with bonuses as ephemeral raises.
    - quickthrower2 4y ago
      It doesn’t compound at all. If the going rate is $200k and I switch jobs my previous salary doesn’t matter, and therefore compounding doesn’t matter.

xEnOnn 4y ago

It’s a pretty comprehensive framework and I think it’s great. It would have been better if it also has a table of salary range for each level in different regions so that companies aren’t misinterpreting these job levels or, at worse, misuse the guide to manipulate their employees. There are companies which make their employees senior or tech lead but pay $50k and use the same framework as expectation. It cannot be based entirely only on job titles because they are “free” to issue. You can easily mint new titles out of thin air. To back these job levels or titles with real value, their corresponding pays need to be relatable. If we could print money without backing it with something scarce like gold, guess what will happen? Haven’t we seen some companies where there are so many senior, lead or even principal engineers but yet they getting paid lower than a mid engineer at another company? Job level/title inflation. On the other hand, at companies that don’t inflate their job levels, they could still be underpaying their “seniors” and “leads” with junior or mid level pay while expecting them to operate along with the guide.

roguas 4y ago
> If we could print money without backing it with something scarce like gold, guess what will happen? We do. We adjust monetary supply for markets to be stable - money has been not backed by anything tangible for quite a while. Like with any proposed framework(also applies to monetary stuff) you find out how it affects outcomes and you adjust usage.
- xEnOnn 4y ago
  Yes, I’m aware that we do. I’m just trying to give an analogy of what I’m trying to convey. In the case of job levels, employees really shouldn’t be shortchanged into believing the job titles given to them. The remuneration is a better indicator when in doubt.
- rsanek 4y ago
  I feel like 50 years (since end of Bretton woods) really is not that long, plus we do still rely on petrodollar demand vibes to provide some sort of link to a commodity. We have yet to see the dollar truly unlinked from anything physical.

pliuchkin 4y ago

Thanks, very useful. I'm just finding it hard do adapt and find a place for the role of a Software/System Architect (which is very common in my industry) in the framework since it conflicts a bit with the other roles, mainly, Tech Lead. I`m thinking of Software/System Architect to be a TL7.

rgavuliak 4y ago

The black labels on charts don't go well with the black GH background

Sodman 4y ago
Thanks for this, I didn't even see the labels and was re-reading the text trying to see if they had specified which chart directions represented which measurements! Unfortunately GH doesn't have a way to alternate images in a readme based on light mode vs dark mode afaik.
- rgavuliak 4y ago
  I guess the solution would be to use labels in a colour that works for both.

mepiethree 4y ago

I really like this, the Dropbox career framework, and the Monzo career framework. I synthesized all three recently into one that I keep for our company, and the work pays such dividends. We do quarterly performance reviews and not only does having a consistent standard make these fair, but it reduced my time to write them from 1 hour per report to about 30 min. https://dropbox.github.io/dbx-career-framework/ https://dropbox.github.io/dbx-career-framework/ https://github.com/monzo/progression-framework https://github.com/monzo/progression-framework And my nascent adaptation.. https://kevala-progression.herokuapp.com/ https://kevala-progression.herokuapp.com/

jb3689 4y ago

Interesting idea. Tech lead at our company is mostly a TPM role mixed with the TL responsibilities listed here. In fact every senior engineer is expected to act in the TL capacity at our company. No commentary as to whether that is good or bad just relating that is how our (fairly large, well-known) org works

lamename 4y ago

Reminds me of Patreon's IC leveling doc https://levels.patreon.com/ https://levels.patreon.com/? Note: '?' required for link to work

newfonewhodis 4y ago
> Note: '?' required for link to work Wow that is an extremely dumb feature (bug)?

nutate 4y ago

wouldn't folks just join the military if this was their dream?

fjdbeb76 4y ago

zerkten 4y ago

I wonder if the author plays Football Manager[1]. The attributes screens use this same visualization. [1] https://www.passion4fm.com/img/football-manager-player-attributes-categories.png https://www.passion4fm.com/img/football-manager-player-attri...

hkon 4y ago

Cool, do any companies have something that resembles this in action?

peterfield 4y ago

Interesting. That said, the word "risk" is missing. Fundamental aspect of tech/project/program management - IMHO a good framework should include that!

vivegi 4y ago

These frameworks are behavioral competency frameworks. When used for assessing competencies, it is useful to define what the behavioral competency is unambiguously and include positive and negative examples of the behavior. People have questions like, "What should I do to move up the next level?" A competency framework helps answer that question. For eg: say one is currently a manager of people (a.k.a. First level manager) and is looking to move to a manager of managers role (eg: a department leader). A well-defined competency framework would clearly elucidate what kinds of behaviors are expected from each level so that it is clear when having a 1:1 discussion on career progression on where the behaviors are already demonstrated and where there are gaps that need to be worked on. Raises, bonuses and promotion are generally a "past performance + future potential" decision. The competency framework can feed into past performance as well as future potential. Eg: a line manager who is performing poorly on certain competencies may not get his full bonus compared to a line manager who is demonstrating satisfactory levels in all required competencies. Also, year-on-year trends of behavioral competency measurements can also inform on future potential/promotion decisions. Gaps can identify training / development needs. It is useful when applied consistently.

jurschreuder 4y ago

My career framework is doing whatever the [ graphical content ] I want and collect an amazing team that also does whatever the [ explicit ] they want.

Ava433 4y ago