Connecting Engineers with Skills for Effective Technical Leadership
A few years ago, at an engineering conference, we sat round a table drinking beers and swapping stories. Mike Bourland mentioned a common question people had after he got up on a huge stage for a company presentation to a large audience. “Mike, how could you do that so well, weren’t you nervous?” His response “Well, I’ve been playing music …
A Technology Development Perspective If you do not maintain and grow your technical expertise you will limit your pathways in technical leadership. It remains an attribute of your engineer’s career stool that distinguishes this trail from the engineering manager trail. Therefore, as you develop the other legs you never neglect it. “Technical expertise must come first…. Technical leadership starts there. …
What comes to mind when you think of leadership? Leading a Team Motivating a Team Managing a Team Directing a Team Technical leaders do need to manage teams to yield technical results. This trail has many guidebooks. Intertwined with the team trail is setting direction and decisions. I have found less guidebooks for this trail. Based …
Training someone else in a skill you have mastered does not require years of mastery. To grow others takes practice just like any other skill. Training provides the most concrete way to grow other engineers in your field. Engineering, like most technical fields, does not offer formal education in how to teach. Anyone recall the unevenness in your college engineering …
As an engineer on the technical trail, you need to develop skills and behaviors that support the growth of the four attributes of your technical career stool. Beyond traveling the attribute paths of Technical, Business Acumen, Leadership, and Growing Others you need to determine your path in moving from technical contributor to technical leader. These requires developing supporting skills which …
Have you ever wondered why corporations refer to their promotion paths as ladders? Maybe it’s because you need to be able to climb to get to that next promotion. Maybe it’s because you need to build something before you get to that next rung on the promotion ladder. Maybe it’s because the image speaks of being higher than others. Maybe …
Do you wonder what a technical career path looks like versus a technical management career path looks like? Do you wonder why Jane in the next cube over received the promotion to staff engineer and you didn’t? Have you been wandering in your engineering career without a notion of where to chart your course? Have you been told your communication …
