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Discussion on: Sure you want to be a tech lead?

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kyleljohnson profile image
Kyle Johnson

When I was a tech lead I loved it. One important point about being a tech lead, you have to be a jack of all trades which requires alot of experience and knowledge. You being a good developer who knows a language really well will not do it. You have to be able to talk with all the other tech teams. You have to be able to see and understand the big picture.

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vitalypushkar profile image
Vitaly Pushkar

Very well put, Kyle.

I've been struggling in my first years on this role and tried to learn from everything I could get my hands on.

It wasn't until I identified five main areas where I should focus: Leadership, Communication, Project management, Business thinking and analysis, System design and architecture and finally Software Engineering.
Notice how Software Engineering is the last in the list?.. That's because it's least helpful at being a good Tech Lead. It's expected that you are a good Software Engineer by that point, but it's not going to help you succeed as a Tech Lead. Took me a while to realize, though.

Anyways, after I identified those areas I then tried to find the best resources to improve each of the areas on my own.

Many books, articles and courses later I compiled a list of the most valuable and influential ones and kept returning to it when I felt I need to get better.

I shared it with a couple of friends over time and they found it useful, so I published it on a separate web page: techleadcompass.com/

Hope somebody finds it useful, too!

Best,
Vitaly

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michaelrice profile image
Michael Rice

It's a crazy role, huh, Kyle? Having been a manager putting people in tech lead roles as well as being a tech lead myself many times, it's a very fluid role.

Tell us more about what you loved about it? For me, my first experiences were, well, different.... Can't say I loved it!

Later, when I got to see incredible tech leads in action, I learned what worked...

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kyleljohnson profile image
Kyle Johnson

I just loved being the guy in charge and responsible of putting the lego pieces together. I was a tech. lead for a city government. Every project was a big systems integration project. System A had to talk to System B, System B had to send data to System C in a weird format so that it could process it, so on and so on. A lot of responsibility is on you to make sure everything goes well.

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Michael Rice

Agreed. So how did you do it? Just stay really close to the team (I call it a tracking and adjusting behavior)? Or did you spend a lot of time upfront to define the vision (another one of the behaviors I outline in the book)? Both? Neither?

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kyleljohnson profile image
Kyle Johnson

Staying really close to the teams.