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The Software Manager Minimum

Greg Thomas
Management Matters
Published in
5 min readMay 19, 2021

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You’ve been writing code for years (possibly longer) and have been promoted to Software Development Manager (or all its variants of Senior, Engineering, Program, etc). Whatever your title, you are responsible for a team of developers that look to you for guidance and direction.

How you got the role isn’t important (doesn’t matter whether you were the first, second, third, last choice, the default one or maybe you filled a req that they needed someone in), you are in that role, you are a Software Development Manager.

Transitioning from writing code to running a team isn’t easy. Code made you successful, code is what got you on the radar of your manager and their manager and maybe even higher.

Now that thing is being taken away from you and how will you succeed.

Sidebar: I’m not an advocate of Software Managers not coding, I think it’s a great thing and addresses many gaps (personal and professional) in the role. It also contributes to you being a great leader and being successful as a manager. However, I know a number of organizations that have a hard set rule — “Thou shalt not code”.

Whether you still code or don’t (your choice), you are in this role to lead people to deliver a thing of value. That thing can be a product, a platform, a solution, take your pick.

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Management Matters
Management Matters

Published in Management Matters

There's plenty out there for the C-suite. What about the rest of us-the high potential managers & up-and-comers. The future C-suite. Real leadership & management advice for front- and middle-management. A publication focused on management matters, because great management matters

Greg Thomas
Greg Thomas

Written by Greg Thomas

Software Architect, Developer, Author and Leader helping organizations build scalable software delivery teams and implement cloud-based solutions

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