People Management

Are you a hands-on engineering manager, and how do you make decisions about delegation?

Engineering Manager

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Answers

Anonymous

7 months ago
4.2Exceptional
I would consider if this task can be stepping stone for someone to grow into a role, this task would be assigned to them.
If this work is impactful and has visiblity to Executives I would assign it to Senior member who can be owner and i have handsoff approach.
If this is a repeatable with less complexity task I would assign it to a Junior Engineer for them to take care of automation.
I would communicate the reasons of delegation and set clear expectations for the task completion.
For all the tasks I would gauge the current skills of the candidate and provide coaching mentoring  and skill development for them to handle the task.
I would share an example where there was a high impact feature to be built. I engaged a staff engineer for Scoping and architectual design and engaged juniors for coding tasks.The junior members were provided coaching on the translation of architectural design to Service definition.

Anonymous

9 months ago
4.4Exceptional
1. Do I have the skills to do it and know how to do it? If yes, then I will consider if this task needs to be done repeatedly? If yes, then I would delegate it to a team member who I think has the skills to do it so that they get familiar with the task and can do it next time without supervision. I would also consider my load while deciding to delegate or not.
2. If there is a task for which only I have the skill but that task is not urgent then I will delegate it to a team member giving them resources and  time to learn the skills needed and complete the task. If it is urgent then I will do it but plan to upskill a team for future.
3. If I believe a task can be done better by a team member then I would prefer to delegate.
4. I will delegate a task if that task is a routine task and can be distributed to a group of team members making sure one person does not become a bottleneck.

Anonymous

10 months ago
3.6Strong
Delegation is a very important skill. As it shows your team members that you struct them and is genuinely interested in their growth
urgency and importance - I evaluate the urgency of the task and the impact. If the task is a time bound task which has signification impact on the customer then I tend to do it myself to not put the team member on the spot. complexity - If the complexity is high I oversee the task myself. I assess the potential risk of delaying the task to the business and consider the impact on stakeholders before making a decision. expertise and skill level - if the task maps with the skills of the individual I like to delegate to promote development collaboration - delegation can empower team towards autonomy which is good for developing leaders
e.g.
I delegated running weekly RCA call for the platform team to the Architect in my group
  • Expertise - In 2 quarters time, architect has build good knowledge about the overall system
  • Collaboration - Architect has run major cross team projects and showcased skills needed to collaborate with respect with other teams
  • Attention to detail - Architect was part of the meeting for 3 quarters and knew how to drive the post mortem meetings
  • Reverse shadow and feedback - I gave the opportunity to the architect to run the RCA call and did reverse shadow and provided feedback later.
  • Expectation setting - Setting up the right expectations for running the call and identification of the long term tech items for roadmap,
  • Review process - setup a biweekly cadence with architect to review this
  • Are you a hands-on engineering manager, and how do you make decisions about delegation?
  • How would you describe your management style in terms of hands-on vs delegation?
  • Are there specific factors you consider when deciding whether to take on a task yourself or delegate it to a team member?
  • Can you give an example of a time when you delegated a task and what you learned from the experience?
  • To what extent do you prioritize hands-on involvement in day-to-day project work?
  • How do you balance being hands-on with ensuring your team members have the autonomy they need to grow and develop?
  • How do you decide when to step in and when to allow your team to handle a task independently?
  • Can you share how you ensure that delegation is effective and leads to successful outcomes?
  • How do you measure the success of delegation and what steps do you take to adjust your approach if needed?
  • How do you evaluate your delegation decisions, and what steps do you take to continuously improve?

Interview question asked to Engineering Managers interviewing at ZoomInfo, Noon, Roofstock and others: Are you a hands-on engineering manager, and how do you make decisions about delegation?.