Onboarding as a New Engineering Manager

About the role

This is a newly hired manager position at Microsoft, with responsibility for leading a team in an engineering management capacity.

Responsibilities

• Build trust as the number one priority with team members, peers, and leaders above.
• Proactively reach out and connect to team members, peers, and senior leaders.
• Share personal life story to start conversations and build rapport.
• Actively listen to team members and peers, ask for suggestions, and take notes.
• Follow up on all action items identified during conversations.
• Conduct one-on-one meetings with peer engineering managers to understand role expectations and job scope.
• Take leadership in your own onboarding journey.

Qualifications

• Several years of prior management experience.
• Prior experience as a technical leader before transitioning into engineering management.

Skills

• Ability to craft heartfelt, psychologically safe communications for new teams.
• Radical candor approach: sharing personal context and listening actively.
• Note-taking and action-item tracking.
• Proactive outreach and relationship building.
• Preparation and self-study using leadership books, podcasts, and talks.
• Ability to learn job expectations through visual mapping and collaborative conversation.