Antoine: From engineering manager to Alaner — Part 1
Alan has the reputation of being a company with “no meetings” and “no managers”. We thought it would be a good idea to let an Alaner, Antoine — that was doing meetings and has the title of Engineering Manager — a place to discuss those topics. We decided to interview him. Some of those questions were asked in his “fresh eyes report”, which we do for any newcomer. We also added a few ones to help give more context.
This article is part one, we’ll publish more questions and answers later on.
Where are you coming from Antoine? Could you briefly explain what was your role in your previous position?
I was Engineering Manager in a leading French company in the investment banking industry.
I managed between 6 and 18 software engineers in 1 to 3 teams. We worked on 4 multi-years projects and a bunch of short-lived ones.
My role was three-fold:
- Manage projects, make sure they go smoothly and communicate on roadmap and progress
- Ensure my teams could work with as little friction as possible by putting in place processes or organizational changes
- Provide growth opportunities for each member of the team and making sure everyone is happy with their work
In a sense, it’s a rather classical Engineering Manager role.
What were you worried about when you applied?
Naturally, coming from a manager role to a company like Alan I was wondering how I would fit in. I was feeling a mix of curiosity and fear.
Curiosity: because most of the tasks a “manager” does have to be done eventually, regardless of the organization. How are projects managed? Who grows and empowers people? How does it work with almost 500 employees? What are the growth opportunities?
Fear: because I was worried about being judged for being “that guy”, landing in an environment where people despise managers of all sorts. There are many examples of bad management styles (“Know-it-all“, micro-manager, etc.) but I think there is a lot of value in having great leaders. Are Alaners in their own bubble and dogmatic? Is there a gap between what they say they do and what they actually do? Would I be doing 100% of IC work?
How did you address those?
The blog was a great resource to know more about Alan and the culture. I was impressed by their quality and the variety of their authors.
During the interview process, I could ask questions to each of my interviewers and lift the veil a little bit on the day to day. Every person I met I would’ve enjoyed working with. They each gave me a unique perspective on how things work at Alan and gave me reasons to join and see for myself.
At that time, I had done many interview processes and the one at Alan was really top tier in terms of attention and care.
I was really reassured by the whole process and the fact that Alan hires people not roles. To some extent, I could define what my role would be based on what I enjoy doing the most and where I think I can add value. Grow as an individual and take on a larger scope as I go.
I decided to take the bet, and I am glad I did!
What did you expect during your onboarding?
I was expecting to be in a team where I would gradually get to know the company, the individuals and the technical stack. Request access to various software, follow up on those tickets every now and then.
But from the blog articles I read and the discussions I had after my interview process, I knew already it would not be like that. Alan hires people not roles and this starts right from the onboarding.
I joined the same day as some other newcomers (fellow engineers, sales, etc). We were presented with our onboarding path as a dashboard on Notion with everything that we’d need to do for the next 4 weeks. This includes:
- Attending to presentations on the tools used by the company (Notion, Slack, GitHub, etc.) and more engineering oriented ones (backend, frontend and mobile stacks)
- A lot of reading! The written culture means all the knowledge is available at your fingertips
- Setting up your developer environment and playing with the app locally
Starting the second week, I joined a different team every week to discover what they’re working on and modestly contribute to simple tasks. This is called “woodchuck” at Alan and allows you to discover different people and part of the product.
After the woodchuck period (4 to 6 weeks), I decided which team with available seats I wanted to join.
Let’s not hide it, it’s an intense period! Because you literally have access to all the company’s knowledge, it’s easy to get lost by all the interesting content. Luckily you have buddies to guide you through the onboarding process , help you focus and find your own path.
- Another engineer with a similar experience as you: your role buddy
- A culture buddy that will help you navigate the culture through the leadership principles
I was also introduced to my coach who would follow me at Alan on the longer term.
What surprised you?
I was surprised by how Alan fully implements their values, in particular the radical transparency. It’s something easy to advertise on paper, so at first I was a bit skeptical and thought “Where is the catch?”
- Surely not all Slack channels are public: yes they are
- Not everybody can see my performance reviews: yes they can
- Some decisions happen behind closed door: nope
- But even the top management?: yes, they even embody this principle, leading by example
What makes it work is that everyone is safe-guarding this principle: if you notice someone is not “public-first” you can give that feedback to them. This is true with all leadership principles. Feedback is welcome at Alan, there is no judgement and the intention is always to improve.
I was also very impressed by the talent and kindness of everyone at Alan. I am very happy to be surrounded by such people and learn from them.
Conclusion
This concludes the first part of this interview. The follow up will include answers to those questions:
- What are the main changes compared to your previous position?
- What do you miss the most compared to your previous position?
- And more
Stay tuned!
