Delegation for Engineering Managers: What to Let Go First
New engineering managers often keep doing IC work because it’s familiar and it feels like “helping.” The cost is burned-out managers and underdeveloped reports. Delegation is how you scale your imp...
Source: DEV Community
New engineering managers often keep doing IC work because it’s familiar and it feels like “helping.” The cost is burned-out managers and underdeveloped reports. Delegation is how you scale your impact and grow your team. Here’s what to let go first and how to do it without dropping the ball. Why Delegation Is Hard Faster to do it yourself (short term). Explaining and reviewing can take longer than doing. You have to invest now for payoff later. Quality anxiety. “What if they get it wrong?” So you check everything and become the bottleneck. Identity. If you’ve been the go-to technical person, letting go can feel like losing your value. The shift is from “I do the hard stuff” to “I make sure the right stuff gets done well.” Delegation is the main lever for that. What to Delegate First 1. Recurring, well-defined work. Code reviews, routine ops, small features with clear specs. The outcome is clear; the main risk is consistency. Delegate these early and document standards so the bar is obv
