Engineering Manager

⏱ 4 min read The PIP — performance improvement plan — is one of the most consequential and most-mishandled tools an engineering manager has. […] Read article

⏱ 3 min read EM calendars get out of hand fast. By the time you notice, your week is a quilt of 30-minute slots, Read article

⏱ 3 min read Most engineering management writing assumes a PM partner. Platform, infra, security, and developer-tools teams often do not have one — Read article

⏱ 4 min read Engineering managers in 2026 negotiate offers with the same fundamental dynamics as senior ICs but with a few twists — Read article

⏱ 3 min read The engineering manager role in 2026 is being reshaped by LLM-augmented engineering in a way no previous wave of tooling Read article

⏱ 3 min read “Why can’t we ship faster?” is a question most engineering managers hear weekly. The honest answer is usually some combination Read article

⏱ 3 min read The annual plan is one of the highest-leverage artifacts an engineering manager produces. Done well, it sets expectations, surfaces dependencies, Read article

⏱ 4 min read Engineering managers burn out at rates not well captured in industry surveys. The role lacks the tangible-output signals that ICs Read article

⏱ 3 min read The transition from EM to Director (or Senior Manager) is the second-hardest in management, after the IC-to-EM jump. The skills Read article

⏱ 3 min read The most common difficult-EM scenario in interviews: a productive engineer is also creating problems for the team. They ship the Read article

⏱ 2 min read Distributed teams are now standard. Many companies have engineering split across US East/West, EU, and Asia. The interview probes whether Read article

⏱ 3 min read Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs) are the rhythm by which engineering leaders communicate progress and priorities to executives. Done well, they Read article

⏱ 3 min read Internal mobility is one of the most-underused career levers for engineering managers. Switching teams within the same company can give Read article

⏱ 3 min read If you manage managers, growing them is one of your highest-leverage activities. A strong senior EM can grow 4–8 new Read article

⏱ 2 min read Engineering management looks superficially similar across company stages but is fundamentally different in practice. The same person can thrive at Read article