I recently took a position of team lead, managing a team of 8 tech people. I managed projects not people before. Could you suggest any books or blogs on how to manage tech teams.
I've heard that in the late 80s Microsoft had a policy of handing out copies of Peopleware to every new manager. And then asking them enough questions about it to ensure they actually read it.
I read Managing Humans twice, both before starting to manage a team, and after having managed a team for a year. The book was great both times, but the second time, when I had more experience, it was insanely better. Suddenly, everything talked about in the book made sense - I had real-life people and situations straight out of the book, and I could understand exactly what Rands was saying.
My advice - read the book. It's amazingly accurate. Then read it again once you have experience; you'll be able to appreciate it a whole lot more.
The Mythical Man Month — it's a fairly popular read, and it's topic lies somewhere between managing projects and managing people and focuses on the "human element" of software engineering: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month
Gerald Weinberg's The Psychology of Computer Programming is a classic, well worth reading. Also second the recommendations for The Mythical Man Month and Peopleware
I think its good, but it's been so long since I was at this stage and read it (late '80s) I'm not 100% sure.
That said, I've not regretted one bit reading every apropos book Weinberg had written through the '90s (which is about when I stopped reading these sorts of books).
Christina Wodtke's Blueprints for the web http://amzn.to/cTDimh is about information architecture, but is full of tangential wisdom about managing web teams. I learnt more this book than from other books that are actually about managing teams.
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[ 0.16 ms ] story [ 16.9 ms ] threadMicrosoft no longer does this. It shows.
My advice - read the book. It's amazingly accurate. Then read it again once you have experience; you'll be able to appreciate it a whole lot more.
It's not a management book, per se, but it's great for gaining undersanding into why people work and what truly motivates them.
EDIT: His talk at the TED conference:
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html
Scroll down, check out the articles in the "Reading Lists" column.
I think its good, but it's been so long since I was at this stage and read it (late '80s) I'm not 100% sure.
That said, I've not regretted one bit reading every apropos book Weinberg had written through the '90s (which is about when I stopped reading these sorts of books).