Signal Detection
After-Hours Commits and What They Actually Mean
It's 11:47 PM on a Tuesday, and one of your developers just pushed a commit. What do you do with that information?
- By TeamPlot
- 6 min
Blog
Ideas for engineering managers — signals, 1:1s, and leading with context.
Engineering Management
The Manager's Blind Spot: Why Your Best Engineers Get Overlooked
There's a cruel irony in how engineering management attention gets allocated. The people who need it least tend to get the most of it. The people who need it most often get almost none.
- By TeamPlot
- 7 min
Engineering Management
Scaling from 4 Direct Reports to 12: What Breaks
Four direct reports is comfortable. You know what everyone's working on. You remember what came up in last week's 1:1 without checking your notes. You can sense when someone's off just from the vibe in standup. Management at this scale is intuitive — you can hold the whole team in your head.
- By TeamPlot
- 8 min
One-on-Ones
The 1:1 Preparation Problem: Why Most Engineering Managers Wing It
You have a 1:1 with a developer in four minutes. You glance at your calendar, try to remember what you talked about last time, scan Slack for anything obvious,...
- By TeamPlot
- 5 min