Behavioral

How do you personally define and measure success in your role as an engineering manager?

Engineering Manager

Spotify

Meta

TikTok

Buffer

Strava

Vivendi

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Expert Answer

Anonymous

7 months ago
4.6Exceptional
As a manager, there are a few things I am looking at the measure my progress and improvement.
The first thing I look at is having clear measurable success metrics for the team that aligns with the org and company and working towards meeting that goal. My current team is responsible for delivering mission-critical messages to our end users. We have various metrics tracking the reliability of our backend systems and the deliverability of our messages. To make sure we are tracking our success metrics, we do a monthly review of our core metrics and have in-person discussions if there are any potential problems or a way to improve our metrics.
The other thing I look at is people management. There are two main areas here. One is growing people and the other is doing performance management. For performance management, I have continuous conversations around performance and expectations utilizing my 1-1 time with my reports so there is no surprise when there is a performance issue. When I had someone who was marked as below expectation, the person agreed with the ratings because we had continuous conversations. While the IC was improving and got back on track, the annual performance review looked at the past year and the IC wasn’t surprised by the rating. For growing people, I also utilize 1-1 time and discuss individuals' short-term and long-term goals. I discuss with my reports where are growth areas, and how we can find opportunities to help them grow. For example, I had a mid-level engineer who was interested in improving their technical leadership skill and getting more involved in defining and scoping projects phase. I started inviting the IC to meetings with stakeholders and had a quick sync after such meetings to discuss the meeting and describe why I answered some questions in a certain way. The IC is now one of the senior engineers in the team and he is effectively leading projects involving multiple teams.
To receive feedback and be aware of what I am doing well or need to improve on, I do two things. I have my reports meet with my manager once a quarter where they can provide feedback to my manager without me being present, and later my lead will relay the feed to me with his input as well. The other thing is my current company does pulse surveys twice a year. When the survey results are out, I have my team get together and discuss the results and provide more context without me being present. I review the final outcome and create action items as needed. For example, one of the feedback I got was improving the overall recognition of our work. I started announcing our project deliveries and impact to the broader group.

Anonymous

7 months ago
3.3Strong
When the team is happy with what they are doing, engaged, helping  each other's success and collaborative.I can assess the team engagement in 1:1’s and try to allocate the work based on their aspiration and skills.  When the team is on the same page and well informed about our roadmap, goals etc by having regular team sync’s. And deliver the goals with minimum deviations

Anonymous

8 months ago
3.3Strong
Success for me is 1) goals delivered on time and in quality with  reasonable operational load 2) satisfied employees who feel challenged, enjoy their work and safe

Anonymous

12 days ago
3.2Strong
At Auctane I would do the following:
a) How did i execute on projects and measure on Impact to customes and business
b) How did i empower my team mates to grow in thier carrer - either by help them get promoted or switch roles
c) How did I grow personally?
By measuring these and continuly coarse correcting to be a better manager is how i reflect as a EM
  • How do you personally define and measure success in your role as an engineering manager?
  • What is your personal definition of success as an engineering manager?
  • How do you determine if you have been successful in your role as an engineering manager?
  • What metrics do you use to gauge your success as an engineering manager?
  • How do you determine your effectiveness as an engineering manager and what factors contribute to that determination?
  • What are the key indicators of success in your role as an engineering manager and how do you monitor them?
  • How do you assess your performance as an engineering manager and what factors influence that assessment?
  • What benchmarks do you set for yourself as an engineering manager and how do you track progress against those benchmarks?
  • What criteria do you use to evaluate your success as an engineering manager and how do you ensure that your team is aligned with those criteria?
  • How do you set goals for yourself as an engineering manager and what methods do you use to track progress towards those goals?
  • What measures do you use to determine if you have been successful in your role as an engineering manager and how do you make improvements based on that determination?
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Interview question asked to Engineering Managers interviewing at Wish, GoCardless, Spotify and others: How do you personally define and measure success in your role as an engineering manager?.