Well folks, I have news. I have now been a manager for a little over three months. Prior to that, for about 10 months, I was doing project lead work, dealing with both developers, project managers, and business units. You may be wondering why. I am a developer at heart and will always be a developer. I love technology and learning new ways of doing things. I am at a point in my life where I need to make a change. I know that I am not the strongest developer. There are two career path that I can take. Architect or manager. I chose management.
My manager was supportive enough to let me "test" out management. He created a project lead position in his team and put me on it. I have about 5 people. I manage their daily tasks as well as other managerial duties. During the ten months, I had the opportunity to work more closely with other managers, both on my managers level and higher.
One day, about three months ago, I was presented with an opportunity to be the manager of the Application Support team. The team consists of eight FTEs and two contractors. Most of these folks are folks that I have been working with the past several years. These folks support a little over 200 applications ranging from in house built application using Microsoft and Java technologies to vendor applications. I accepted the opportunity and challenge. I was enthusiastic about the opportunity and its challenges while at the same time scared. However, I am one who hardly ever backs down from a challenge. I may fail but I go down fighting hard.
Being a manager is definitely much different than being a project lead. There are so many other things that a manager has to do. Being responsible for ten people and managing their expecatations as well as expectations of others is something I don't believe that I can prepare for, regardless of what books I read and what I do. There are no training other than on the job. What has helped me is the support that I get from my family (especially my wife, taking care of my son while I am either at work working or at home working the long hours), and from a lot of folks at work.
I find myself reading a lot more nowadays. Not books about MVC, MVVM, or WCF. No technologies book for me. It's books like 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, One Minute Manager, and High Five. I have always considered myself being able to handle all sorts of different people. And I find myself being challenged everyday.
The first three months has definitely been challenging. I know that there are many more challenges to come. I welcome them. I know there will be days where I want to go back to being a developer. I hope days like those are few and far between.
With my new challenges in my professional life, I will be changing what my blogs are about. It will now include management. I will keep you all posted.
