Don't be too hard on yourself
Domain-specific struggles don’t mean you’re a bad leader - you can bounce back from them stronger.
👋 Hey, it’s Stephane. Welcome to my weekly newsletter where I share lessons, and stories from my journey to help you lead with confidence as an Engineering Manager.
I almost quit my job because I was convinced I was bad at it.
As an EM today I’d like to think that I am good at a few things. Over the past decade I have been working hard to understand and sharpen the skills great leaders possess. One area that I am working on improving though is influence across the business.
It is not a very straightforward one and requires the combination of loads of different actions to come together. It’s fine, I am working on it!
Two years ago I was working with a team and organization that needed a lot of that. To an extent that I hadn’t experienced before.
Couldn’t get people from different teams to see what I am seeing, couldn’t get internal moves that I thought were vital to be made, and so on.
I was clearly bad at influencing the business as I needed to!
So my confidence took a hit.
I couldn’t stop …