Here are seven lessons other tech leaders have learned the hard way when hiring for IT management roles.
Don’t wait until it’s too late
By the time Ani Mishra, engineering manager at DoorDash, realized he needed to hire an IT manager, it was already too late. He was managing too many people, overwhelmed by meetings, and starting to lean on senior engineers for help. “I thought, okay, I need to bring in a manager,” he says. “But the team was growing super-fast. It kept growing until I had 20 direct reports and I still did not have a manager.”
Managing that many people is crushing. “It’s hard to keep track of what they’re all working on or how to set them up for success,” Mishra says. “I saw signs of dysfunction. People felt directionless and were getting blocked. Some brilliant engineers were taking on manager tasks because I was in back-to-back meetings and firefighting all the time. Productivity lowered because my top performers were doing things not natural to them.”
