An Engineering Manager Breezed His Way to a Final Onsite but Was Immediately Declined - Details Within
You can make a strong argument that the greatest frustration IT professionals are enduring in the labor markets right now is the experience of going 4-5 rounds with a company only to have the firm go dark or just immediately reject them for no reason at all.? This is a story about a midlevel engineering manager who breezed his way to the company's final onsite but was declined immediately. But this time, I have the reason why and if you are an Engineering Manager, Director of Engineering or even a VP, please keep this story in mind.?
Let's call him Michael. His formal title was Software Engineering Manager and his career progression was a nice one. He came out of college as an Associate Software Engineer and within eight years had made it to the Staff level with a midsize technology company.? In 2020, he was offered a position with a startup as an Engineering Manager and he's been functioning at that level for the past four years now. We recently had a client here in Austin that had an opening for a Software Development Manager and the interesting coincidence was that Michael's former boss worked at the company. We uploaded Michael into the company's system and after a positive backchannel with the former boss, an interview was scheduled immediately. The interview process included two virtual meetings and then a final onsite. Michael did very well on these first two interviews and we were very excited to schedule his onsite. It was set for the next week which meant that Michael had three interviews done with this company in the course of 2-1/2 weeks. That is a very compressed timeline in these current labor markets. We could not help but feel some very positive momentum going into this final interview.?
The day after the onsite, Michael and I discussed how the final interview went and he said that while it wasn't a slam dunk, he felt like the interviews went well. The next day, however, I received the feedback from the client mentioning that they were going to pass and I'll paste the words for you here,?
Good morning, Mark and I wish I had better news but we are going to pass on Michael. From the beginning, he's been super nice and his delivery has always been really good. But it was at the onsite that we realized everything he has spoken about has been at a high level. We need a hands on manager for this role.?
We even prompted him to go deeper into detail about his approach to growing teams and performance management but he seemed to resist. And by the way, this heightened our concerns regarding his technical background too (we were concerned about that from the start). I'm sorry but we are going to pass because he just isn't the hands on engineering manager that we need at this time.?
When being interviewed for engineering leadership opportunities, the experience can definitely be a double edged sword. You have to strongly impress on both high level strategy and hands on engineering skills. Regardless of our profession, speaking at a high level puts our visionary skills on display and another nice byproduct is that we can also be viewed as a thought leader in our chosen craft. In the traditional sense, I can't blame senior engineering leaders for having applied their focus to long term goals and strategic endeavors. In fact, just last week, I had a client give me a Head of Engineering role and here is what the founder emailed me when we kicked off the search,
I look forward to working with you on this, Mark and the primary qualifier we'll be focusing on is the candidate's response to the following question, "What's your vision and strategy for an engineering org?". We have 13 engineers to date and we are aiming to hit profitability in the next 18 months. So #1 priority for us is strategic leadership that helps us achieve this goal.?
In terms of this startup, the founder is making it very clear that he needs an executive leader, eg. Director of Software Engineering and above. For this company, you definitely want to speak at a high level because it clearly tells the founder how knowledgable you are when it comes to strategic leadership. That said, I can assure you the moment will come when this company explores how "hands on" you are.?
From what I am seeing from the labor markets here in Austin, here is a pretty harsh update on the current leadership roles that are open in town,?
I want to offer my words here simply for consideration. If you are functioning in a leadership role right now, especially if you're a Manager or Director of Software Engineering and you're progressing towards a final onsite with a company, rather than applying your focus towards perfecting the strategic narrative, perhaps take the weekend before the interview to dive into the gnarly code and do everything possible to sharpen up your technical acumen. Even if the company throws you a curveball where their Principal Engineer starts asking you technical questions, your immediate responses will validate the fact that you have not left that world and that you still function very well at that level. Remember, it's all about the impression we make on the other party and after having gone 3-4 rounds with a company, the last thing I would ever want is for you to be classified as a "high level, hands off engineering manager".? We've all been to an automobile repair shops and experienced the Head Mechanic telling us that while they believe the main problem is with the transmission, they won't know all of the issues until they get under the hood. Observation from a high level and then deep diving to find the real problems.
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I will never dispute the nice impressions that come with well delivered strategic narratives and high level visionary skills. But if you have a final onsite coming up, perhaps you can project yourself as the type of engineering leader who still very much enjoys working right alongside with your team of software engineers to not only find the problem but also fix it in very good fashion.? Should Michael have been able to express these qualities to my client, they might very well have stepped up and made him a strong offer. After all, let's not forget that Michael's former boss works at this company and gave him a positive reference.?
I've said it a millions times; if it were 2022, you could be as eloquent as you wanted, speak to no end regarding your high level, visionary leadership traits and where you plan to take a company's engineering organization. And the offers would just come rolling in like high tide. But those days are long gone. For engineering leadership opportunities here in Austin, in the course of presenting your impressive strategic visionary skills, please also make it clear to the company that you also love "getting under the hood" with your engineering team. Present these two qualities in a balanced manner and the result could very well be that the company views you as their ideal candidate. And from there, an attractive offer would be made.?
Thanks,
Mark Cunningham
Technical Recruiter
512-699-5719
Transmission Planning Engineer
10 个月It’s best to just be yourself. There are managers out there who are very hands on with the engineering work, and there are managers who solely manage the team. They fit different niches. If you’re a manager who wants to be a people manager you won’t be happy working as a manager who’s required to be in the trenches.
Data Dude
10 个月It's interesting how smaller companies and startups structure their engineering, and it's not engineering-oriented. Larger companies separate technical leadership from HR leadership. High-level ICs function as Tech Leaders on a project-by-project basis, but the technical leaders aren't doing HR leadership. The reporting managers are in charge of employee development, while the TLs don't have individual reports or handle HR concerns but focus instead entirely on the technical aspect of each project and nonetheless architecting and delegating construction of individual components among the team as fits their skills. Technical Leaders that are ICs aren't responsible for team/human development, they're responsible for project/program development. Most startups are still way behind on being an engineering focused organization. It's just night and day different between how startups structure engineering and the Mag7 do. Technical Leadership and HR leaderships are different tracks. High level ICs are typically TLs for multiple projects across multiple cross-functional teams. Large companies focus on optimizing their best engineering talent without burdening them with stuff people managers can do.
Chief Data Architect at Stellantis
10 个月I'm not surprised about this candidate's outcome. The ZIRP era has ended, and teams are smaller because companies need to run leaner. Engineering managers must keep their technical skills sharp. How else will you have intelligent and productive interactions with your team? Engineering managers shouldn't just be people managers.
I write KILLER resumes that cut through the competition ?? ? LinkedIn Personal Branding Content Expert? ? Podcast Host (Top 10% Globally) ? Female Founder
10 个月Absolutely, it's crucial for engineering leaders to stay informed about the type of leadership qualities in demand. This post serves as a great reminder to continuously assess and improve our leadership approach. Thank you for sharing!
Recruiter at OP Labs and well-known taco lover
10 个月great post Mark, but I think the company could have simply asked about how hands on someone is? How time coding vs managing/code reviews / planning / architecting etc. I think in general it is best to ask every manager or above candidate this regardless of what you want. I would extend it to asking the candidates what they want in their next role as well.