Leading leaders who lead engineers (remastered) (Changelog Interviews #634)
Mar 26, 2025
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Lara Hogan, author of *Resilient Management* and a management coach, delves into crucial leadership dynamics. She emphasizes the importance of sponsorship over advice for career growth and how it uniquely benefits marginalized communities. The discussion explores the distinct roles of mentoring, coaching, and providing feedback, alongside practical strategies for effective leadership. Additionally, Hogan highlights the neuroscience of belonging and the transition from engineer to manager, advocating for self-reflection and a focus on adaptability in leadership.
Sponsorship is essential for career advancement, enabling individuals to gain visibility and opportunities that mentorship alone cannot provide.
The 'manager Voltron' concept highlights the importance of collaboration among various leaders to meet diverse team needs effectively.
Transitioning to management from engineering presents challenges that require clear expectations, feedback seeking, and a focus on celebrating small victories.
Deep dives
The Importance of Sponsorship in Career Growth
Sponsorship is highlighted as a crucial element for career advancement, more so than traditional mentorship. Unlike mentorship, which focuses on providing advice, sponsorship involves advocating for someone's skills and ensuring they receive opportunities aligned with business goals. Studies show that individuals with sponsors experience faster career trajectories, greater visibility, and access to challenging projects that promote growth. This shift emphasizes the need for leaders to actively support and promote the potential of their colleagues rather than just sharing knowledge.
The Next Generation of Heroku and Its Implications
Heroku is transitioning to a new platform called Fur, which aims to embrace open standards and modern technology stacks. By adopting container images and Kubernetes, Fur enhances developer flexibility and integrates tools like Docker. Despite significant changes, the core focus on developer productivity and the familiar app deployment processes will remain intact. This evolution signifies Heroku's commitment to stay relevant and reliable in a rapidly changing tech ecosystem.
Differences Between Mentorship, Coaching, and Sponsorship
Laura Hogan differentiates between mentoring, coaching, and sponsorship as essential management skills. Mentorship primarily involves sharing knowledge and advice, while coaching emphasizes asking open-ended questions to facilitate self-discovery and problem-solving. Sponsorship, on the other hand, is about actively promoting individuals for advancement opportunities. This framework guides managers in adopting various approaches to support their team members effectively.
Embracing the Role of the Manager Voltron
The concept of a 'manager Voltron' is introduced, encouraging collaboration among various leaders to provide comprehensive support. No single manager can fulfill all the needs of their team; therefore, forming a supportive network is vital. This network aids in diverse areas such as feedback delivery, mentoring, and career development. By identifying individuals who can provide specific support, managers can create a well-rounded resource for both themselves and their teams.
Navigating the Transition from Engineer to Manager
Transitioning from an individual contributor role, like engineering, to management presents unique challenges primarily due to the absence of measurable success. Managers often find it difficult to celebrate small wins, leading to feelings of stagnation. It's essential for incoming managers to set clear expectations for their roles and actively seek feedback from their peers and teams. Emphasizing a growth mindset and recognizing the value of small successes can facilitate this transition and help new managers adapt effectively.
The Role of Feedback in Professional Development
Delivering effective feedback is a critical management skill that can enhance team performance and individual growth. The SBI (Situation, Behavior, Impact) framework serves as a guide to structure feedback, ensuring it is specific and actionable. By focusing on observable facts and connecting feedback to what the recipient values, managers can make the conversation more constructive. Adding an open-ended question can further transform feedback into a two-way dialogue that fosters a collaborative growth environment.
This week we’re bringing you a remaster of our epic 2021interview with Lara Hogan – author of Resilient Management and management coach / trainer for the tech industry.
The majority of our conversation focuses on the four primary hats leaders and managers end up wearing; mentoring, coaching, sponsoring, and delivering feedback. We also talk about knowing when you’re ready to lead, empathy and compassion, and learning to lead.
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Sponsors:
Heroku – The Next Generation of Heroku “Fir” is coming soon — Fir is built on a foundation of cloud native technologies and open source standards, ensuring portability, interoperability, and a vibrant ecosystem for your applications. Cloud Native for everyone, for the next decade and beyond.
Depot – Build faster. Waste less time. Accelerate Docker image builds, and GitHub Actions workflows. Easily integrate with your existing CI provider and dev workflows to save hours of build time.
Retool – The low-code platform for developers to build internal tools — Some of the best teams out there trust Retool…Brex, Coinbase, Plaid, Doordash, LegalGenius, Amazon, Allbirds, Peloton, and so many more – the developers at these teams trust Retool as the platform to build their internal tools. Try it free at retool.com/changelog
