As with most first time engineering managers, I headed down a road with not much guidance and hoped for the best. I armed myself with a lot of books, read a lot of blog posts, asked my friends what they liked and didn’t like about their managers, and reflected on my own experiences. Here’s some things I’m trying and learning in this WIP. — Prepare yourself mentally for the switch. You’d think this would be obvious, but it was a shocking adjustment for me when I switched to the management path and realized, “hey, I have to talk to people all day now.” I went from sitting at my computer lost in code most of the day, to talking to…