Concur fully. This is known as MBWA, Management By Walking Around. It's an absolute must.
Also concur with the implicit warning in Kent's note. Keep your tech skills current. See my ;login: paper (Dec 2010, A Vacation From Technology) on what happened to me. The Rip Van Winkle effect. Another also. Peter's comment on a differentiation between leader and manager. Critical to understand this, as it's probably the biggest failing of most people who are put in charge of something. Anyone (almost) can manage. It takes real skill and effort to lead. Managing only gets 20% of the job done. On Tue, Jan 7, 2014 at 10:33 AM, Brodie, Kent <[email protected]> wrote: > I too, have been in this position (in 1999, with a department re-org, I > was made a “manager”). The advice below from Peter agrees with the one > biggest thing I wanted to say on the topic. The only thing I’d add to it > is, work with the people (staff), **in person**, a LOT. Meet with them > one on one on a regular basis. Get caught up regarding their problems, > issues, requests. Do not manage via email. A trap I found myself > getting into at one point was “hiding in my office”, and then digging > around doing technical things anyway and avoiding the PEOPLE STUFF, which > is what you do now, 100%. > > > > Making technical people managers is a difficult and challenging path. > > > > Best of luck! > > > > In a bizarre twist of fate, 5 years later after our re-org, when I had > finally gotten to be GOOD at being a manager, our department was > outsourced, and I ended up being a technical person again for a massive > research department. It’s kind of like Star Trek IV (Voyage home), when > Admiral Kirk gets demoted back to Captain . I’m not unhappy. J J > > > > > > *From:* [email protected] [mailto: > [email protected]] *On Behalf Of *Mark Honomichl > *Sent:* Tuesday, January 07, 2014 9:38 AM > *To:* Peter Grace > *Cc:* LOPSA Discuss > *Subject:* Re: [lopsa-discuss] Graduating to management and the pains > thereof > > > > While I am by no means a full on DevOps guy, I thought the book The > Phoenix Project brought some interesting thoughts to the table. > > > > As somebody who has been through this type of transition, I felt that the > most challenging part was disconnecting myself from the day-to-day. We > always say "when I get there, I can still be one of the guys. I have the > technical chops. I can help out." While this is true, it took me a long > time to learn a) my company no longer payed me to do the day-to-day stuff > and b) you do a disservice to your team if your not transitioning your > knowledge to them so they can do it. > > > > Past that, I focus on being a leader, not a manager (I believe that there > is a distinct difference). > > > > _______________________________________________ > Discuss mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss > This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators > http://lopsa.org/ > >
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