First, the Philosophy

My job, as I see it, is to support my team. What the company pays me for is output, but my personal view is that by supporting my team, I increase autonomy, ownership, and pride in the work, and that leads directly to better output. Further, I think it’s really important as a human being, as someone who deeply cares about the people around me, that I support my team even after we no longer work together.

I have quarterly calls with a dozen of my former employees – people I now consider friends and colleagues. That’s a network that I can rely upon for anything. When I run into a tech problem, I can ping Jake and ask him for advice. When I have a team struggling with the latest Python frameworks, I can call James. When I need management advice or mentorship, I’ll call Bryce. When I need someone to hold me in check and tell me I’m full of shit, I’ll text Patrick.

The Compliment

About a year ago as I left a job, I was doing my final one-on-ones with my team. I explained, briefly, my reasons for leaving the company, what my plans were for the future, and offered to sit and talk about anything my team wanted to do. This was really important to me.

Most of them expressed sadness. “I’m sorry you’re leaving,” they’d say. “I really learned a lot and enjoyed working with you.” For others, it was just another Tuesday. But for some, it was an emotional moment.

One of the managers that reported to me sat with the information for a minute, then he said, softly, “I’ve worked for a lot of companies, and a lot of managers. I’ve never worked for one who made me feel supported, and who made me feel like I was a human and not a resource.”

Honestly? That’s the most incredible thing anyone has ever said to me.

The Lesson

I thanked him for that, obviously, but I also took it as a teaching moment. I told him it was my pleasure and my honor to work with him. I told him how I believe very strongly that when he is successful, I’m successful.

To put it more starkly: if he fails, I fail.

And so why wouldn’t I do everything in my power to make him successful? That makes perfect sense to me. And so I did.

I gave him opportunities to lead. I let him drive architectural decisions with my input primarily as a set of guardrails. We talked as peers and equals, even though the corporate ladder says I’m his boss and he’s my employee.

But here’s the thing that a lot of power-intoxicated leaders miss: I can’t make you do anything that you don’t want to do. I can’t physically grab your fingers and type for you. I can’t force you to read a ticket or PRD if you don’t want to.

If I want my team to do something, I have to convince them. I have to make them believe that the direction I’m offering is worth it.

“But you can fire him, Brian!” you might be thinking to yourself. And you’d be right. I could fire him. But then what happens?

I don’t get what I wanted. He has lost his job and livelihood. I now have to interview dozens of candidates to replace them. And then, maybe, I get what I wanted… three to six months later.

Worth it? Almost certainly not.

On Authority versus Responsibility

Contrast this with a familiar archetype: the leader who treats titles as authority and not responsibility. You know what I’m talking about: the founder who says “I’m the boss, do as I say,” and who treats disagreement as insubordination rather than input and collaboration. Who, frequently, will loudly proclaim their desire for collaboration, yet fall back on appeals to authority when they don’t get their way.

As a colleague of mine once said, “If you have to say you’re the boss, then you’re not acting like the boss.” You see this all the time in politics and leadership. The people with the real power are not out there bragging about how powerful they are. They’re quietly getting things done.

And the real leaders, the ones with loyal followings and people who will do anything for them, treat their roles as responsibilities rather than power.

An Illustrative Lesson on Responsibility vs Authority

A mentor of mine taught me this lesson. He asked me one time, “When I introduce myself to everyone else, what do I say?”

I thought about it for a moment, then said, “You say: I’m John Smith, CTO.”

He shook his head. He said, “Next time, listen to what I say. I don’t say my title. I say I am responsible for technology.”

Sure enough, the next time I saw him introduce himself, he said, “I’m So-and-So, and I’m responsible for technology at Company.”

There’s a lesson here: words have meaning. Words have power. The way that you present yourself to the world, however subtly, influences the way people look at you. Note what he didn’t say. He didn’t say “I own technology” or “I manage technology” or “I lead technology.” No, what he said was, “I am responsible for technology.”

See the difference? He’s saying: The buck stops with me. I have a responsibility to make sure that my teams are successful.

Back to the Beginning

My job, as I see it, is a responsibility to support my team to make them better engineers, better colleagues, better communicators, better friends and parents and siblings and neighbors. It’s not just my job, it’s my duty to leave this company – this team! – in a better place than I found it.

When my former colleague says to me, “No manager I’ve ever worked for has supported me like you have,” then that sound you hear is me reveling in my success. I’ve created a space where they can succeed, where they feel loved and heard and understood, where they want to be for the long haul. And that environment? That better world that we’re creating where people are happier and more fulfilled? One of the side effects just happens to be… better output for the company.