As I'm moving on to a new role soon, I'm leaving behind my capable engineers in my department. This post is all about my reflections for the past years with regards to managing a team.

Treat everyone like family

I treated every single member in my department like family. Everyone in the department is a valuable asset to me. Making the environment at ease for everyone have it's benefits such as:

  • Allowing every single member to voice out their thoughts freely without fear
  • Motivates every single member to enjoy working in the team
  • Motivates every single member to help out one another

Opinions matters

I always believe that being in a position of power does not mean that my decisions are always correct. There's a reason why a team exist and we should maximise the value of its existence.

When I have an idea that I think it should work, I like to try to conduct my own proof-of-concepts (POCs) to validate my thoughts. Then, I will call a meeting with my respective teams to tell them my idea and demo the POC. After which, I will open the floor to everyone to gather ideas and feedbacks. This allow me to widen my perspectives and allow further improvement to the idea before it's moved to implementation phase.

This process cultivates a sense of inclusiveness for my engineers and motivates them to innovate and contribute more to the department.

Mentor and groom the team

As the manager of the team, it's important for us to impart our knowledge and experiences to the team. Everyone of us started our career from the ground up to where we are today.

The internet today is filled with tons of information about our domain. However, it's not easy to identify the correct information from all these information. Thus, with proper mentoring and guidance, we can ensure that every single member pick up the correct knowledge and improve themselves.

Supportive to everyone

Nobody will stay in a company forever, thus it's normal that your team will have people leaving for higher roles outside. As the manager, we should be supportive and proud for them.

Maintain professionalism

I think it's normal that one will encounter emotions during interactions with others. However, as a manager, we should control our emotions and maintain professionalism to our team. Being defeated by our emotions will not only affect the morale of the team, it will also cloud our judgement while making a decision.

To end off..

At the end of the day, these ramblings are my own thoughts and please take it with a pinch of salt.

There's no right or wrong in management and everyone have a different management style. Whether or not we are a good or bad manager, it's for the engineers that used to work under us to judge.

Adios guys! :)