Grow Others
Developing your team's capability so the function performs whether you're in the room or not.
Why it matters
Your impact is limited by your team's capability.
This is the move that separates good technology leaders from great ones. Good leaders deliver results through their own effort. Great leaders build teams that deliver results without them.
What it looks like in practice
Growing others means hiring well, coaching effectively, building leaders beneath you, and creating a culture where people develop. It means having the patience to let someone struggle through a challenge instead of jumping in and solving it yourself. It means investing time in people development even when there are fires to fight.
The most important person you develop is not your most junior engineer. It's your most senior leader. If you can build two or three strong leaders beneath you, your impact multiplies dramatically. They extend your reach, carry your thinking into rooms you're not in, and create capacity you didn't have before.
How to develop this
Growing others also means being honest about performance. It means having the difficult conversations early instead of letting underperformance linger. It means setting clear expectations and holding people to them. Kindness without honesty isn't kindness. It's avoidance.
Ask yourself: if you left your position tomorrow, how long would the function perform at the same level? If the answer is not very long, you've been leading through personal heroics instead of building team capability. The goal is to make yourself less essential, not more.