4 Destructive Work-Life Balance Impacts You'll Face As An Engineering Manager

Many hold the view that the busier and more stressed you are, the better you are at your job.

This includes most managerial roles, not just engineering management (EM). You may even hold that view yourself — I did.

For some background, I’ve been a proud workaholic since the age of 18, wearing that title like a badge of honor. But I worked so much it led to the point of complete burnout — I even ended up in the hospital. Because of it, I had multiple surgeries, and I was sick for 10 years of my life.

Not everyone experiences consequences so severe, but you don’t know what’s going to happen. And pushing yourself over and over will eventually cause something to break.

I want to help you avoid this. I want you to know that being a good EM doesn’t equate with:

Working overtime
Pulling all-nighters
Never seeing family or friends
And high-stress levels

I do still work hard, and sometimes, I also work a lot. But I know what is healthy and works for me, and you need to do the same.

Work-life balance impacts you’ll face as an EM

Transitioning from an engineer to an EM (if you haven’t already) will impact your work-life balance — there is no way around this. You can reduce the impacts with time and effort, but first, you need to know what they are.

1. Burnout from putting in too many hours

You are going to work more as an EM (or in any managerial role) — it’s just a fact. The role necessitates it, but the work, although challenging, is also very rewarding.

However, if you’re like many people, you’re going to want to do even more than what’s necessary. You’ll think you need to prove yourself by working even more hours long into the night. You’ll likely even see results from this, driving you to work longer and longer.

But continuing to work at this level — late nights, long hours, no home time, and high stress levels — eventually leads to what I experienced, or worse. It’s possible you could be one of the few to avoid it, but why take that chance?

I am now consciously aware of this in myself and my team. I work hard not to create this culture in my company.

You can get great results from pushing yourself and your engineers but it has to be healthy and sustainable. Otherwise, you’re risking collapse.

Unfortunately, there’s no formula or ratio for the perfect work-life balance (otherwise, I’d gladly give it to you). In fact, even measuring it with how many hours you put in doesn’t work, either. Instead, look at it in terms of your energy levels.

This is what I do, working more when I’m able to and less when I can’t. I make sure not to tap into and use up my extra reserves, and I encourage you to do the same.

2. The drain and guilt of endless meetings

As an EM, you are going to attend more meetings than you ever have as an engineer (if you aren’t already).

If you aren’t used to or comfortable with talking, a day of meetings can fatigue you mentally, physically, and emotionally (it can even if you are). Please, don’t underestimate this. And remember, your measuring your work-life balance in terms of energy levels, so prepare for this drain ahead of time.

This is not just important for your work life, either. This kind of drain can affect you outside of work, too, reducing your desire and ability to communicate and straining your relationships.

And if that wasn’t enough, there’s another trap new EMs fall into that you’ll also need to avoid: feeling guilty about being in meetings all day. It’ll feel like you aren’t doing “real” work. And you’ll be tempted to put in those extra hours catching up on other duties.

It’s very easy to get caught up in this cycle and justify working more than is sustainable for you. Very easy.

So, don’t beat yourself up when you’ve been in meetings all day — it’s part of the job. And you’ll eventually develop ways to manage your other work as well.

3. Taking everyone’s work on your shoulders

Nothing will guarantee a worse work-life balance more than doing your job and everyone else’s job. But that’s another easy trap to fall into and a common misconception about the EM role.

As an EM, you want your team to perform well, which can sometimes lead to you picking up the slack of underperformers. This is dangerous and often leads to the destructive cycle of doing your team’s work for them as they come to rely on you for it more and more.

Say you have an engineer who repeatedly comes to you so you can fix their problems. You’ll probably think if you say, “No, you need to figure this out yourself,” it will reflect poorly on you and harm your career. You’ll think it’s easy to simply complete the task yourself because it gives quick, guaranteed results.

It does give you those results, but it creates more problems than solutions. Ultimately, this way of managing leads to:

Becoming overloaded with work
Under-performing elsewhere
Failing to coach and help team members improve
Burning out

You may also think, “What kind of manager am I if I don’t help?” But there is a difference between helping through coaching so your engineer improves and helping by doing their work for them.

If someone is underperforming, you shouldn’t be working instead of them, you should be working with them to fix the problem. This will lessen your workload and help the engineer to improve.

4. Your work self carrying over into your personal self

When you work in any career long enough, the traits required to do that job leave an indelible mark on your personality. For example:

Many soldiers remain disciplined, such as making their beds every day
Many teachers continue giving lessons to friends and family
And many security personnel take extra steps to remain safe

If you stay an EM long enough, you will carry your planning, efficiency, problem-solving, preparedness, and need for control into your daily life. Once you have developed this muscle, it won’t go away unless you work at it.

Examples include:

Going on holiday, so you book two Airbnbs because one might cancel
Needing to go somewhere, so you plan three routes in case of road closures
Arranging divorce terms before your wedding just in case (consider a prenup instead)

In other words, engineering management is going to leave a trace. This may seem like an excellent set of skills to carry over into your personal life, and it is in many ways, but your family and friends might not always agree! So, keep that in mind.

Use the Ford approach to minimize these impacts

There’s an old story about Henry Ford and when he paid the conveyor belt service team in one of his factories. Since their entire job was focused on things that went wrong, Ford decided to pay them only when things were going smoothly, and they had nothing to do.

In doing so, he ensured they carried out all repairs quickly and efficiently. The quality of the work also increased, so the workers didn’t have to repeatedly make the same repairs.

You can apply this same principle to engineering management and your work-life balance.

Incentivizing downtime leads you to a proactive rather than reactive approach to your role, which in turn improves the quality and efficiency of your work. And this preventative maintenance ensures the machinery keeps running without breakdowns or burnouts.

The short version: you are not your job

Being a successful EM isn’t about putting in extra hours, it’s about learning how to manage your energy so you can do more in the same amount of time without going overboard.

Failing this, you’ll face problems such as:

Burning out from putting in too many hours: while you are going to put in more hours, especially at first, continually putting in excessive hours gives short-term results and long-term problems
The drain and guilt of endless meetings: prepare for how much energy meetings are going to take, and acknowledge that meetings are a part of your “real” work
Taking everyone’s work on your shoulders: while it is admirable to help your team, covering up for underperforming members ultimately adds to your workload — instead, coach them so they can improve
Your work self carrying over into your personal self: it’s going to happen, but be aware when it’s helpful and when it’s not

Using the Ford approach helps, where you focus on optimizing work so you have more downtime than the other way around.

It’s also helpful to keep the positives of the EM role in mind. It’s a hard job, but you’ll develop more skills, get to see your engineers grow and thrive, and be an important part of meaningful work. But you can only do that if you manage your work-life balance.