Manage yourself before managing others 🙊 & My New E-book ✨
Hey friend,
Guess what? I've started writing an E-book on Principles of Effective Engineering Leadership. I am excited to see how it's coming along. 😬
This e-book will give you Principles and a Summary of expectations as you grow into an Engineering Manager.
If a friend asked me, what are some things they need to make sure to be successful as an Engineering Manager, this E-book would have all the secret sauce. 🍝
Do you think it would be useful? Click on one of the emojis below,
😍 Love the idea
😕 meh, it's alright
👎 you can do better
I can't wait to share more with you 😃. But more on that next week. Over to this week's newsletter.
We often have many meetings and tasks we need to get done 😅. So it can be tricky to figure out prioritization and what needs your focus and attention the most.
Let me propose a framework you can use "Stephen Covey’s Quadrants, aka Eisenhower Matrix." Trust me, this framework has saved me so much time for the past few years, and I swear by this.
Eisenhower Matrix ✨
The four quadrants of the 2x2 grid are,
- Important & Urgent
- Important & Not Urgent
- Not Important & Urgent
- Not Important & Not Urgent
Urgent means whatever urgent is to you. Fake Urgency can pull you away from Real Importance.
Important & Urgent 🤝
- They require immediate attention and are "Get it done Now!" tasks.
- You’ll be less stressed if these tasks get done.
Important & Not Urgent ✅
- Spend more time on these tasks and a quadrant where you should spend the most time.
- If you don't focus on these, they will soon become important & urgent so focus on this quadrant majority of the time.
Not Important & Urgent 🏃🏽♀️
- These tasks are in the "beware" category — they can drain time and energy without contributing to your long-term goals.
- You should delegate these tasks
Not Important & Not Urgent ❌
- These are tasks where you will waste a lot of time.
- They don’t add much value and activities that drain your energy. It would be best if you spent less time here.
In simple terms:
- Manage top-right
- Spend more time in top-left
- Waste less time in the bottom half
You can pick next week's Newsletter topic.
You read this newsletter weekly. Hence, now you have complete control to decide what topic I should cover in next week's newsletter.
Select one of the topics below
- How to handle underperforming Employee
- How to know when someone is ready to get promoted?
- Common Mistakes Delegating
🧰 The Engineering Leader's Toolbox
- Eisenhower Matrix
- 5 Lessons for new Senior Engineering Managers - I wrote this blog post for lead dev.
- FREE personalities Matrix Assess your Leadership personality and see your archetype
That's all from me :)