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Introduction

Welcome to the Tech Lead Handbook!

This is the book I wish I had when I started my career in tech. It took me a long time to figure out how to be a good engineer and longer to be a good Tech Lead, the role I have enjoyed most and spent longest doing. I figured things out as I went and it was a slow process. My aim is to help others accelerate this journey and become more effective more quickly.

This book contains a set of ways of thinking and a toolbox of techniques that I have gathered by reflecting on my own experiences; learning from those I’ve worked alongside; and distilling various books, articles, and podcasts.

Who is this for?

This book is primarily written with the Tech Lead persona in mind, and aims to help those aspiring to become Tech Leads to accelerate that transition, and help those already in that role to become even more effective. But people in adjacent roles — Product Owners, Scrum Masters, Architects, Testers, and others — should also find much of it useful.

What is a Tech Lead?

Many organisations have a role called Tech Lead, but the specifics vary widely.

Scale. Tech Leads usually lead a single team, but this is not always the case. Someone with this job title may lead a small team of two or three, a larger team of ten or so, or even two or three teams that may comprise twenty or so people in total.

Coding. Tech Leads are always expected to remain in and around the code, but in some teams and organisations they remain significant individual contributors while in others this more takes the form of mentoring, pairing and reviewing code.

Architecture. Tech Leads always contribute to defining the system architecture, but the extent varies widely depending on the organisation and in particular whether there is a separate Architect role and if so how that operates.

Culture. Tech Leads always play a role in nurturing and shaping the culture, and in some cases they are the the primary person doing this in the team(s) they lead, while in others there may be significant contributions from a Scrum Master, Delivery Lead or Product Owner.

People management. In some organisations, Tech Leads do not have formal people management responsibility, while in others they do. I have found that in either case a familiarity and confidence with people management techniques is necessary to be effective in the role.

Process. Tech Leads always take the lead on defining and evolving some aspects of the team ways of working. In some cases, this may be limited to the more technical aspects such as branching policy, while in others they may also lead the agile and people management aspects.

Not a traditional book

This book is not really a book. It is a collection of articles that are intended to be usable individually and to be readable in any order. It also being continuously extended, updated and improved, using a pull-based, incremental and iterative approach. It is an agile approach, rather than waterfall.

As I find the need for an article that explores a topic, I develop and release it. As my understanding evolves and I get feedback, I refine and improve it. This has all the benefits of any agile approach to developing something: value is released incrementally, and feedback guides future developments.

Contribute

If you’d like to get in touch, or if you find something confusing, wrong or incomplete, then I’d love to hear from you! ↗