I've been in a leadership (+mgmt) position for ~2 years now. Previously I was an individual technical contributor and was the technical lead on most projects.
My challenges in that role is that I had to do a lot of thinking and planning in terms of design, breaking down work, coming up with schedules and assignments. The team, and my management, would all wait on me... so some pressure there.
As the responsible person for the execution of the technical work, how would I balance assigning the difficult and most interesting/challenging work to others, especially when my instinct is to just take ownership of that part because of fear of failure or missed deadlines.
A lot this resolved over time and also by the team itself. Some teammates demonstrated a lot of ownership on the project and it easier to assign them larger and more difficult tasks.
It all came down knowing the team I worked with, their talents, and who was up to do X.
Now the hard part for me after doing this for several years is trying to tame my engineering instinct. I enjoy building things, seeing everyone else do the "real" work is hard. It's taken me time to adjust to my new role which is more mgmt and less technical leadership.
Good luck with your new role!
I've been in a leadership (+mgmt) position for ~2 years now. Previously I was an individual technical contributor and was the technical lead on most projects.
My challenges in that role is that I had to do a lot of thinking and planning in terms of design, breaking down work, coming up with schedules and assignments. The team, and my management, would all wait on me... so some pressure there.
As the responsible person for the execution of the technical work, how would I balance assigning the difficult and most interesting/challenging work to others, especially when my instinct is to just take ownership of that part because of fear of failure or missed deadlines.
A lot this resolved over time and also by the team itself. Some teammates demonstrated a lot of ownership on the project and it easier to assign them larger and more difficult tasks.
It all came down knowing the team I worked with, their talents, and who was up to do X.
Now the hard part for me after doing this for several years is trying to tame my engineering instinct. I enjoy building things, seeing everyone else do the "real" work is hard. It's taken me time to adjust to my new role which is more mgmt and less technical leadership.
Thanks for sharing! This is all fabulous insight!!!