My girlfriend used to cover for her brother a lot growing up. If her parents called and he wasn’t home, she’d invent excuses like him being in the shower.
Of course, that would sometimes end badly for both of them. But when he needed her, she was there.
As an engineering manager (EM), you can’t protect your team against every critic or problem, but you can still advocate for them when they need you to.
Still, there are serious consequences now, which can make you desperate to leave the room when it’s time to speak up for them. Especially when you’re unsure if protecting someone who’s underperforming is the right choice.
The first pain of advocating
Let’s say you hired two new team members a few months ago. You are super excited because they have many years of experience and you know they can add lots of value to the team.
However, project managers start complaining about how long the coding is taking. Other departments mention the lack of code quality and how your new team members have a hard time implementing the changes they request.
You advocate by defending your engineers and asking for more time. Or you say the problem is the complexity of the tasks, not them.
But then a few more months pass, and nothing changes – the amazing work you expected never arrives. You feel disappointed and sometimes even ashamed when you think of how wrong you were to defend their mistakes to everyone else.
This happens all the time.
The problem with feeling like you made a fool of yourself is not the feeling itself, even though it is uncomfortable. It’s second-guessing your leadership skills and carrying the fear of being wrong into your future relationships.
The second, third, fourth, and fifth
Advocating for your team often means needing to sound confident about their progress. After going through the above scenario a couple times, it might be harder for you to do that, especially if you tend to overthink.
As if this wasn’t enough, there’s also the fact you’d probably rather stay out of difficult social situations like this one. But as an EM, you represent your team to:
- Upper management
- Other managers
- And other team members
So, you have to meet and sometimes argue with those people to give your team everything they need.
For example, let’s say you’re discussing a new project, and upper management says you have three days to complete a task.
You know your engineers are perfectionists and like to have time to work on technical debt and improvements. But upper management doesn’t:
- Need
- Like
- Or approve deadline adjustments
So, you have to convince them of the work’s value. Even more, you can’t let the meeting end without a solution that works for everyone, including your team.
To add even further complexity to your job, you also have to advocate for the business and upper management:
- Listening to what they say
- Convincing your team to do tasks in a certain way
- And ultimately helping reduce costs or increasing the company’s ROI
Many times, you’ll feel caught in the middle, but this is the way engineering management is. And no one else is going to do it.
The dream
Engineering management throws everything against us introverts we don’t like. But you took on this role for a reason, and I’m willing to bet it wasn’t just for money (although it was probably for that, too).
Like with anything, advocating for your team (and others) gets easier over time. As you practice, experiment, and make mistakes, you’ll learn exactly what and what not to do. One day, you’ll realize it’s become just another task on your list of priorities, no more special than any other.
The time this takes varies for everyone, though. But when you get there, it feels great. You’ll feel amazing knowing you’ve convinced others of something related to your team, and your team will be grateful to you. Or, if you’re advocating for the business, they’ll feel more connected to what’s going on.
Either way, you’ve effected a change many fail to, and it’s all because you took the time to stick with the hard stuff and learn until it became easier. And there are steps you can start taking right now to make this happen sooner than later.
The solution
You’ll be tempted to start doing all of these as soon as possible. Don’t.
Start with the strategy you can most easily implement and will have the biggest effect on your situation. Once you’ve mastered it, layer in the next one.
1 - Communicate more with your team
Sometimes, people perceive introverts as insensitive because many of us don’t externalize our feelings as easily as extroverts.
I would say we feel with even more intensity and empathy than others realize, though. But since we don’t share this with them as much, they can understandably question our motives.
Not sharing makes us feel safe, but you can’t advocate for your team as well if they don’t trust you. They won’t share with you what’s really happening with them and their work, and they’ll think of you as “just a boss trying to force us to work more.” Being open helps them see you have their best interests in mind, and you can more accurately speak on their behalf.
This doesn’t mean you have to share details from your personal life, though. Keep it work-related and talk about:
- What happens in meetings
- How you’re advocating for them
- The company’s vision
- Problems you’re working to solve
- What’s happening in other teams, and why
- And so on
You don’t (and shouldn’t) share every piece of information, though, as some information is classified or restricted. But keeping them in the loop as much as possible means they:
- Feel like you have their backs
- Respect you more
- And listen to you as an authority because of it
Building this relationship also makes your job easier when advocating for the company instead. You’ll assume the older sibling role – the connection between your “parents” and your “younger siblings” just like my girlfriend and her brother.
So, the next time upper management tells you your “younger siblings” should eat more vegetables or do their homework, they’ll accept it better because they know you’re only trying to do what’s best for everyone.
2 - Learn who’s actually worth advocating for
Let’s say you decided to track your team’s working time to know more about them and how they work. But one engineer doesn’t want to use the time tracker. You asked her once, maybe twice. She always says, “Yes, no problem”, but never uses it.
Someone ignoring you doesn’t have to mean there’s a bigger problem (like not respecting your authority) – maybe you just didn’t explain it clearly. But when you repeat the process more than two times, start looking for additional red flags, such as:
- Others complaining about the amount of work they have to do to compensate for someone who’s underperforming
- Drama between colleagues tracing back to the same person
- Resistance to following procedures
- Lack of accountability and responsibility – it’s always someone else’s fault, and doing a good job is never a priority
- A poor or negative attitude about you, the work, the company, or even other colleagues
- And lying or any other form of unethical or disrespectful behaviors
You may not find any, but it’s still a good idea to check. These will clue you in to who you need to start having conversations with and whether or not you should advocate for them in various situations.
When talking with them, you don’t need to be negative or rude, though. The point is to help them improve, so use constructive feedback. You can even motivate them by saying you’d like to advocate for them but can’t, as things currently stand. Alternatively, you might want to bring issues to the team to solve (without naming anyone specifically).
Regardless, taking these steps shows your team you care enough to see and solve them. Doing so also builds your credibility with them and others as you advocate for the people who deserve it, not those who don’t.
You won’t be perfect in all of this (no one is), but you’ll also improve and feel more comfortable when you do advocate for your team.
3 - Practice the three pillars of influence
Imagine a real charismatic guy, very polite and nice. He:
- Is well dressed
- Sounds confident in what he’s saying
- And prepared a presentation with every reason why management should give his team everything they need
He also called everyone by name and asked how their kids were (or something similar).
If you were listening, wouldn’t you do your best to help him? Probably – I would! Not because you’re easily swayed or anything like that, but because humans have a natural tendency to want to help influential people.
So, how can you, as an introvert, develop the same kind of influence without having to become someone you’re not?
The first step is using logic: your rational thinking.
Imagine you were advocating for your team, and you started talking about how amazing technical debt is. Even if you’re making a strong point, the people you’re talking with won’t see it unless you take the time to explain. Not to mention, is that the best point at that particular time?
In other words, take the time to consider what’s going to make the most sense when advocating.
The second step is using your credibility.
Hopefully, you’ve already been developing this before and in your current role, but it’s also worth knowing that this takes all shapes and sizes, including your:
- Clothes
- Posture
- Achievements
- Personality
- Work ethic
- And so on
The third step is using emotion.
In many ways, facts and how others perceive you support this part of influence. Emotion makes people care about your facts and reputation. Without it, in many cases, they mean nothing.
And you don’t have to manipulate them to develop this part of influence. Do what you should do anyway: build a connection. Talk to them about their families, struggles, accomplishments, and your own. Most of the time, this is enough.
4 - Show them the pain, the dream, and the solution
When advocating, it helps to have a formula to follow. This is the one I use.
First, show them the pain.
Speak in a language your superiors or other managers understand. If you ask someone to do work without pay, they won’t do it. Asking for things that will cost others resources for problems they don’t understand or see has the same effect.
Instead, use an angle they can relate to. Maybe you need to hire more people, for example. Start by saying:
- All the amazing things you did this year
- What was initially planned
- Everything you did beyond that
- And why you think you need the additional help
To that last point, explain to them what targets won’t be hit because of how overworked your team already is. Discuss their burnout and what feedback you’re getting from them. Talk about your worries that some will leave, ultimately costing the company money.
But remember, this is not a threat – present this simply as fact.
After, show them the dream.
Tell them how well your department could perform with more people and resources. Again, talk about this in a language they would understand. The money they would make, for example, or how much quicker your team could complete the work.
Finally, give them the solution.
Be specific. You don’t want them to think you’re asking for an infinite amount of extra things – show them you’ve considered what’s actually needed and why. And because you’ve followed this formula, they’re far more likely to agree.
The short version: it’s not as easy as one, two, three, but it can get close
As an introverted EM, advocating for your team might seem impossible or daunting. You may have already tried and even advocated for the wrong person!
But you can improve this essential skill. Here’s how:
- Communicate more with your team: share with them what’s going on outside their sphere, problems you’re trying to solve, and so on – this builds a greater culture of trust and appreciation, which means they’re more likely to tell you what’s going on
- Learn who’s actually worth advocating for: if you notice one red flag, look for others – address them immediately and constructively
- Practice the three pillars of influence: use logic, credibility, and emotion to your advantage – you’re not manipulating anyone, but having a strong command of these elements creates more of the results you’re looking for
- Show them the pain, dream, and solution: paint a clear picture of what will happen if your team doesn’t get what it needs, be specific and talk to the pains of who’s listening, and create an ideal picture, the “dream,” of what you and your team could do with their help
None of this is easy and will take time and effort. Over time, you’ll improve, and your team will thank you for everything you’ve done.
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Originally published on Medium.com
Content in this blog post by Alex Ponomarev is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
