How to be a great team lead?

Not in order of appearance...

1. Don’t micromanage.
2. Don’t piss your team off.
3. Don’t let your manager run the show, just follow his asks for the team.
4. Be there for your team.
5. Constantly motivate them without being too pushy or “corporate”.
6. Find ways to help them grow with you through training or constantly communication through sharing knowledge.

And the number one rule of them all...
7. Don’t be a douchebag 🙃

Trust me, my previous team lead was a piece of shit (still is) and that ass got demoted to a mere peon now 😂

@Superviral when does it become micromanaging?

📌

@NickyBones thank you so much!!!

Hi @chickie, thanks for asking an important question. So much goes wrong in management.

I'm a huge fan of servant leadership, very different from traditional "control&command". I've recommended the book "Peopleware" for years.

My take:

You're responsible for success of people. Thus make it your main concern to remove their obstacles and especially not become an obstacle yourself. Extra points if you live by the motto "successes belong to the team, failures belong to me".

Devs are experts in what they do. They are also smart, reasonable adults. Trust them, treat them as equals. You most probably don't know better how they should work. They're also "professional question-askers", so forget trying to bullshit them. They'll notice.

In many environments devs get ordered around, their concerns disregarded. Don't be yet another instance of that. Instead, represent and defend your team's interests towards those that are. Managers will accept you as "one of them", use that power.

@VaderNT Are you talking about a manager or a team lead. Where I've worked team lead is part of dev team and so dev itself too.

@joas good point! I was referring to team leads that mostly do management duties.

Tbh so far, I haven't had team leads that actually still do development themselves. A senior dev that inofficially did some "leading" and representing the team on the other hand, yeah I've seen that. He was a pretty chill guy anyway, who never really wanted to lead.