179: Beware the Lazy Engineer’s Way to Promotion

[00:00:20] About his career path in engineering management. You see, he got his first team and started working hard, started focusing on the one project that was in front of him, the primary focus for his team, for his organization, they got to work and they did an amazing job. They delivered on the project. It was a big success and Rahul got rewarded.

[00:00:42] He got recognized for that. When his boss gave him a special spot award, he got a bonus. And as a reward. For doing great work, Rahul’s team was given two big projects. Well, the two projects split the energy of the team in different directions. And Rahul found himself working extra time to pick up the slack and some of those IC tasks that his team did not have the capacity to complete, but he had a reputation.

[00:01:12] See, he had just delivered on that last big project and he wanted both of these projects to go extremely well. He put in the time. He started working late nights. He started putting in some time on the weekends. And at the end of those two projects, the great news for Rahul is that both of them were a success.

[00:01:32] Again, big wins. He’s building his reputation. He’s growing in his career. And Rahul was feeling on top of the world. And guess what? Those two projects being a success. Victories led him to the next step in his career. He went from one team and two projects to three teams with four projects. And guess what?

[00:01:54] He can’t contain that to five days a week. Rahul is now working all the time. He’s on seven days a week. He’s putting in more hours than ever before. He’s diffused in his energy and focus. He’s not able to fill in all of those cracks. And the strategies and the approach that he had leading one team on one project or one team on two projects no longer worked.

[00:02:20] And instead of building his reputation, all the projects began to suffer. He ended up under the microscope in even more meetings to report out on the status of all these projects that had fallen behind. And unfortunately, it led to burnout. And he and I end up in a coaching conversation. This path, this predictable path to burnout is one that I’ve seen hundreds of times.

[00:02:50] Rahul put in his absolute best effort. He used the tools that he had, but unfortunately the success, the success of delivering on one project was rewarded with more work. And the thing that made him successful with one team and one project, the strategy of deep focus on that work. And honestly, filling in gaps with an IC mentality, that individual contributor mentality, getting back into the work that led him to Burna.

[00:03:27] Now, He got that promotion midway. He went from one team to three teams. He got the raise. He got the spot award bonus, but Rahul took the lazy way to promotion. The lazy way to promotion is to work harder. The lazy way for engineering managers to pursue the next level. is to fill in all the gaps to work the nights and weekends.

[00:03:59] Now, I know you’re looking at me like, Zach, what are you talking about? There’s nothing lazy about working nights and weekends. In fact, that’s working even harder. I didn’t say Rahul wasn’t working hard. I said he was doing it in the lazy way. You see, it’s hard to work nights and weekends. It’s harder to level up as a leader.

[00:04:19] It’s harder to live a life. As a lifestyle engineer would live to be an essentialist, to focus on less, but better to become a better leader and not just a harder working manager. Rahul was missing some of these key distinctions, and it begins with his mindset. You see, he brought the mindset of an individual contributor to the role of engineering manager.

[00:04:49] He brought the mindset of hard work as the pathway to his success and reputation. And that will only take you so far. Hard work is a great ethic. Work ethic is important. If you’re not willing to work hard in your engineering career, you will be limited. There’s going to be occasional late nights and long weeks and working the weekends in our career path.

[00:05:15] That’s part of it, but that’s the exception, not the rule. That’s something we do to overcome a mistake or a setback, not the way we solve for career growth and promotion. The lazy way to promotion is to simply put in more time to fill in the blanks and the gaps of the projects yourself. Bye. The lifestyle engineering way is to focus on less, but better the more of doing less as Greg McClellan would say in the book, essentialism.

[00:05:47] It’s that disciplined pursuit of less thinking about the 80 20 rule. What is the 20 percent of input that you’re bringing that delivers 80 percent of the value and getting relentless to find that. The first and most important thing for you to shift in your pursuit of career growth and promotion is this mindset that when more shows up on your plate, that your default response is to ask yourself, how do I fit it all in?

[00:06:23] How can I do more? People pursue productivity through more engineering managers pursue results through more that mindset must shift. Stop asking yourself first, how can I fit it all in the behavior of a lifestyle engineer? The mindset of a lifestyle engineer is to look at the introduction of more into your life and to immediately pause.

[00:06:56] to slow down and ask yourself, which of these things are the critical few and which are the trivial many, which are the 20%, which are the 80%, which piece of this gives me more leverage and which piece burns my energy for low return. Where do I need to level up my strategy or my systems for leading?

[00:07:23] Rather than do more of what I already know that isn’t going to work, isn’t going to scale. Pause and ask the harder question. The question of a true leader. To ask for help if you don’t know that answer. To get a coach, to get a mentor, to have the, Crucial conversation with your boss about where things are not going to work under that current operating system.

[00:07:51] You have lifestyle engineers push the pause button. You see, slowing down to go fast is the most counterintuitive thing we can do, but this is what great leaders do. The lazy way is to just keep doing what you’re doing and do more of it. The leadership path for your career growth is to slow down to go fast.

[00:08:17] Slow down to ask the question, Where must I improve? What must I level up in? Which of these tasks are not critical? If we don’t push that pause button, then you end up on that rat race, that inevitable decline that Rahul faced. More work shows up. So you do that work and then more work shows up and you do that work.

[00:08:42] And next thing you know, you’re putting in nights and weekends constantly. You’re overwhelmed, you’re out of control and you’re burning out. And don’t wait for rock bottom to get the support, to make the change, to get off of that lazy path to promotion. Get the support you need. Now, if you’re already on that path, if Raul’s story is resonating for you, then push pause right now.

[00:09:10] Let’s have a conversation, you get clear, talk to your mentors, figure out what needs to happen to change that trajectory. Now, book a call with me and my team. don’t wait for rock bottom to bounce back. We can make that change now. Maybe you’re where Rahul was when he had one team and one project and you’re crushing it.

[00:09:29] Awesome. Go crush it, but be prepared that success is going to create more work for you to do. And if you take that more and diffuse your energy among more things, two airplanes at half throttle don’t take off. They both crash at the end of the runway. An airplane only achieves liftoff. With full throttle.

[00:10:01] We’ve got to get up to speed, get in the air before we can throttle back. When you go from one project to two from one team to three, if you diffuse your energy to a third across all three, doing it in the same way, those three teams will not all succeed like the one did. We must learn how to delegate, learn how to lead, learn how to level up within ourselves.

[00:10:28] So that our energy out creates that disproportionate return in don’t fall victim to the lazy way of promotion. If you want to move up, push pause and get clear on what is most important. Stop asking how to fit it all in and start asking what matters the most. Focus your energy on those things. Give yourself some permission to leave other things unfinished and undone, and get the help you need along the way to master the skills of leadership at the next level before you end up hitting rock bottom like Raul did.

[00:11:08] If you need support on this, if you feel stuck on this, or you’re not sure where you’re at in that journey, That is a great opportunity for us to connect and build a game plan and a roadmap for you on how to achieve that next level without taking the lazy way. 

[00:11:25] This is a conversation I’ve had. hundreds of times, you’re not alone. And there are solutions that are proven that we can take to help you get there. If you want to book that conversation, let’s do it. we’ll grab 15 minutes and understand where you’re at, where you’re stuck and what’s possible for you in the next 90 days and beyond.

[00:11:44] Thinking about your career, grab a growth audit with our team. You can do that with the link in the show notes here on the podcast. You can jump to our website. The link is there, or if you want. Easily, you can grab your phone and send us a text message. It’s one word, just text the word lifestyle to the number five, five, four, four, four lifestyle.

[00:12:07] The number is five, five, four, four, four. It’s just that five digit short code. Send the text. We’ll send you a link back right there on your phone so that you can do it. If you’re working out or driving right now, be safe. Of course, let’s have the conversation. Don’t be lazy. Work less. And get bigger results.

[00:12:25] Let’s do this.