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Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

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Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#11
This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers.

It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles.

This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#13
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

Not OP, but I think TLM works best when it's a transitional role. You have someone you want to groom into a full-time manager, and you have a team that you plan to grow over time. TLM itself is not that efficient, but can lead to strong full-time managers who understand the team really well and had time to grow into the role.

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#14
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

(personal opinion)

I thought it was a nice stepping stone for people to learn management without having 10 people dumped on them. But it looked bad on paper.

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#15
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

The value of that kind of role is that the person interfacing with the bureaucracy and the business hierarchy and its many demands also actually does the technical work and knows things about what they are working on.

Without it, nobody on the management side of things actually writes any code, or has first-hand experience with working on the product. The line managers just end up as a go-between between the workers and their directors, because they only know what their reports tell them. They don't know much for themselves.

You can't quantify this sort of loss on an earnings report, but among many other things, it does a great job of diluting ownership of the product away from the teams working on it.

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#16
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

It's a rather awkward role as you have to carve out a maker's schedule within a manager's schedule [1]. As others have mentioned, it only makes sense as the person ramps up for full management or decides against that career path.

[1] https://paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#17
post #2

The 35% reduction refers to the number of managers who oversee fewer than three people, according to a person familiar with the matter. If you oversee 0-2 people, in most cases that’s probably not an efficient ratio. How did Google get so many folks in that position in the first place? And I assume the other 65% take up the slack to fluff their teams? Or what? Leave the other 65% managing 0-2 people?

Not a Goolger but my experience is that this is usually an optimistic promotion where someone is made a manager with the expectation of growing headcount later. But later never happens, or coincides with turnover to the degree that they never bubble up to a decent span of control.

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#18
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

I never worked with a TLM who actually wrote code regularly.

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#19
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

speaking from personal experience, it's not that good to have TLM as your manager because in some ways you're competing with your manager on technical scope, and you'll lose

Re: Google has eliminated 35% of managers overseeing small teams in past year

#20
post #12

This was called the TLM role at google. Technical Lead/Manager. You were expected to code and manage a couple of more junior engineers. It’s part of an effort to have dedicated managers and dedicated engineers instead of hybrid roles. This is being sold as an efficiency win for the sake of the stock price but it’s really just moved a few people around with the TLMs now 100% focused on programming.

Do you have any opinion on the success/value of the TLM role?

I think the idea of a leader on the line makes alot of sense. Someone should represent the work and be able to navigate the hierarchy. These types of roles always exist informally anyway.

There’s always a downside to anything, and the merits/demerits are all about the politics of the org.

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