How to Be A Good Tech Lead - Survival Guide

As a Tech Lead you have more autonomy and influence over your team’s direction than you had as an Individual Contributor.

And because it’s relatively easy to move back-and-forth between IC and Tech Lead it’s a great way to learn what you like, and don’t like, about management and test the waters of the Management track.

Unfortunately, most Engineers don’t get much (if any) formal training on this new role before they begin. That’s why we’re offering this survival guide on how to be a good tech lead.

Based on the three major roles-with-a-role, this guide will dig into what being a great Tech Lead entails and offer tips for performing well.

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[johnnguyen]

"When it comes to working with people, EMPATHY = FRIEND, EGO = ENEMY" 100% agree, thanks for pointing that out!

[brianmoeller]

I'll be coming up on one year as TL at my company. I'm a senior developer and I struggled with not only giving up my coding time, but learning Agile/Scrum and what a TL is since this was just adopted by our company. Talk about overload! I resisted and resisted being a coach and what I thought was babysitting other developers. Only a month ago did I finally give in to the TL mindset and I I was no longer fighting myself over time and responsibilities. I now focus a majority of my time on keeping the project on track and doing the leg work necessary to keep the other developers working smoothly.

Once I embraced this role, MY management have been complementing me left and right about the work. I hear promotion talk and I was just moved to lead another more complicated project and have had immediate impact. Because of this, I'm back out here looking for ways to improve as a TL even more. Thanks for your video

[DanielRPersonal]

Hi. New Lead under stress (from the non-tech responsibilities). The tone of the video helped cheer me up and see how some aspects that were stressing me can be viewed as opportunities to grow in those areas if I can learn how to value them. Thank you.

[reginalddavis]

Great video! I just became a tech lead and I've been trying to get a better grip on what it means to be a "tech lead" since we don't have any formal training on it. Great overview of what to expect and what my responsibilities will look like! Thanks and keep up the great work!

[RoDaX]

Nice video... As a Tech lead nearing 1year in the position this video did help showing what I was nailing and what I should improve. Just a quick thing in my case I am not a software engineer but rather a system engineer

[vandnapatel]

Great Video! Thanks for sharing this. I totally agree with @Danny R, the tone of the video helped cheer me up and look for opportunities to learn and grow.

[osamafarooqi]

Amazing content :) Thanks for sharing this and looking forward to see more of your videos about this. I love your confidence !!

[anotherman]

I evaluate myself as a mid-fe dev, but I cracked an interview for a senior position and got proposed to be a fe-tech lead. wanna try it out, but it's scary af

[vivienh.missamou]

handy, great. really straightforward. a map at a glance. i do appreciate... :)

[james-brgm]

Finding time to code is definitely one of the biggest challenges. It's interesting that 30% is mentioned, it's not a lot. If you read a lot of job descriptions for tech lead it's often heavily weighted on development skills but we cannot possibly continue to be experts with 30% of time on coding compared to senior developers & tech specialists that should be getting 80%. It is a bit of a jack of all trades role and I often think default expectations just aren't realistic. Leave as much of the planning to product/project managers, delegate as much technical queries and work to the developers doing the work and find mentors for the people you're managing.

[fabiomino]

😭 💀 I’ve been watching ultrasound videos and searched “lead tech duties” and saw this video…welp I was so confused when she said software engineer

[ila]

I am not ready to take up the posititon.I don't know.I feel like, It is going to be a great change and hard commitment. :(

[PizzaPizza_]

I'm a tech lead but I don't know how to code 0_0. I really, really, really hate coding. I barely passed my programming classes I force to take for my IT degree lol

[moderneinstein]

There can only be one TechLead . Patrick Shyu .

[uwstvnz]

if you are suffering from tl position why do you even put urself in this position in the first place?

[riordan]

Mf somehow I got 200% the salary and 1000% more responsibility