Lessons from 3 Years as an Engineering Team Lead

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I spent three years working as an Engineering Team Lead at an ed-tech startup (US, full-remote). As my SaaS product grew, I decided to leave the company and focus on it full-time. I wanted to reflect on what I learned during that time.

This post is partly for myself, so I don’t forget the lessons that took time (and a few mistakes) to learn, and partly in case someone else finds it useful. Whether you’re a new team lead or thinking about becoming one, I hope this gives you something helpful to take away.

What’s Actually Important as a Team Lead?

When I first took on the role, I thought the job was mostly about shipping features and helping the team hit goals. And sure, that’s part of it.

But one idea that really stuck with me came from The Making of a Manager by Julie Zhuo:

A great manager is someone who helps their team achieve strong results today, while also setting them up for strong outcomes in the future.

That second part, the future, was the piece I hadn’t fully appreciated early on.

As a lead, you’re not just looking at the next deliverable. You’re looking at the team itself: Are we building trust? Is everyone learning? Are we set up to keep growing sustainably?

It’s less like being a sprint coach and more like being a showrunner. You’re responsible for the current episode and for making sure the whole series can keep running well. (Okay, not sure if that metaphor tracks, but you get the idea.)

People Management: Where It All Starts

Build Relationships

This one sounds simple, but it matters more than you’d think. When you have a good relationship with someone, it’s easier to give feedback, offer support, and have real conversations.

You don’t have to be best friends, but getting to know people beyond just tasks and tickets goes a long way.

Give Feedback Regularly

Performance reviews shouldn’t be the first time someone hears feedback. Ideally, they should be a summary of everything you’ve already discussed with your direct report throughout the review cycle.

Consistent, smaller pieces of feedback help people know what’s expected and where they stand. It also removes anxiety from the review process.

Some useful habits:

• Use 1:1s to check in and clarify expectations
• Give quick feedback on specific tasks when things are fresh
• Share broader behavioral feedback every few months
• Include 360° feedback to get a well-rounded picture

The best feedback is clear, specific, and kind. When something needs to be addressed, it’s best done calmly and directly.

Talk About Career Growth Often

Don’t wait until someone asks. Make growth a regular topic in 1:1s. Use your career framework, if you have one, to identify skills they’re building and areas they might want to stretch into.

One thing I realized I could have done better was keeping more structured work logs for each direct report. It would have made performance evaluations, especially annual ones, smoother and more consistent.

Things I now believe are worth tracking over time:

• Key projects and responsibilities
• Strengths demonstrated
• Skills they were working on
• Cross-functional contributions
• Behavioral patterns
• Time in role

Having these notes makes it easier to recognize growth, give accurate feedback, and advocate for promotions or changes when needed.

Team Management: Creating a Healthy Culture

Share More Than You Think You Need To

As a lead, you naturally end up with more context than the rest of the team. If you’re not actively sharing it, people won’t have it.

So communicate often. Write things down. Bring people into conversations early. It’s better to repeat something than to assume everyone is already in the loop.

I tried to live by the principle: “No doc, no work”.

If it’s not written down, it’s like it never happened, and your future self will thank you too.

Plan Meetings That Actually Work

A good meeting isn’t just one where decisions are made. It’s one where people feel heard, clear, and involved.

Before any meeting, ask:

• Why are we meeting?
• What should people walk away with?
• Do we need a decision, discussion, or just an update?

Julie Zhuo’s checklist is a good one:

After a good meeting, participants should feel like:

*- It was a good use of their time

• They learned something helpful
• They know what to do next
• They felt included and engaged*

Avoid Silos and Work Together

High-performing teams aren’t just a group of fast individuals. They collaborate, challenge each other, and share ownership of problems.

That means breaking down artificial divides like “front-end vs back-end” or “design vs engineering,” and instead encouraging early collaboration and shared responsibility.

One idea that helped shift my thinking was mob programming. It’s not always practical, but the philosophy behind it challenged the usual focus on individual productivity. It emphasized collective problem-solving, learning in the open, and treating complex work as a shared effort.

That mindset had a big impact on how I approached team collaboration.

Here’s a great talk on the topic.

Delegate to Grow the Team

Delegating isn’t just emotionally uncomfortable. It’s often practically difficult, especially when you’re under pressure with tight deadlines and release schedules.

But even then, it’s worth making the effort. In fact, that’s when it becomes most important.

You may be faster, and you might already know how to get it done, but unless the task falls into your top-priority bucket or your teammate isn’t yet set up to succeed, you should still try to delegate and coach them through it.

The long-term payoff is worth the short-term overhead. Delegation creates space for others to grow, and for you to focus on higher-leverage work. Even when it slows things down at first, it builds team resilience and capacity over time.

Foster Psychological Safety

As a lead, your words carry more weight than you might realize. The way you communicate, respond to feedback, and show up in everyday interactions shapes how safe others feel to speak up.

People need to feel safe to share ideas and concerns, and that starts with you. Be open to feedback, admit when you don’t know something, and create space for quieter voices. A psychologically safe environment leads to stronger trust, better collaboration, and a more engaged team.

A Few Simple Task Management Wins

Break Work Into Smaller Chunks

Large stories often lead to incomplete work, surprises, or missed deadlines. Small stories are easier to estimate, easier to complete, and give a better sense of momentum.

Use “Story” Labels Intentionally

In Jira or similar tools, I recommend using the “Story” issue type specifically for user stories. These are tickets that represent features delivering real value to end users. This approach helps the team stay focused on outcomes rather than just tasks.

Well-written stories should be small enough to complete within a sprint, incrementally deployable, and easy for Product and QE to track. If a story becomes too large, consider breaking it into multiple tickets with clear dependencies.

Following this structure improves estimation, sprint planning, and collaboration across development, QA, and release.

Two Books I’d Recommend to Any New Lead

The Making of a Manager — Julie Zhuo

This is the book that helped me the most early on. It’s written in a very approachable way and covers everything from 1:1s to team culture to feedback. Highly recommend.

How to Win Friends & Influence People — Dale Carnegie

It’s a classic for a reason. Yes, the examples are dated, but the core ideas around communication, empathy, and influence still hold up surprisingly well.

That’s it for now!

Looking back on these three years, I’m grateful for everything I had the chance to learn, and for the people I worked with who made it meaningful. Writing this down has helped me organize my thoughts and appreciate the progress made not just in outcomes, but in mindset.

If I ever step into a similar role again, I know I’ll return to these notes as a reminder of what matters most.