Moving from an orchestration-heavy to leadership-heavy management role.

Overview
The article discusses the shift managers experience when moving from roles focused on executing pre-defined plans (orchestration-heavy) to roles that require broader leadership responsibilities. It outlines six components of problem solving, highlights common signs of an orchestration-heavy mindset, and offers advice for developing a leadership-heavy approach.

Key Takeaways

• Recognize the six steps: problem discovery, problem selection, solution discovery, solution selection, execution, and ongoing revision.
• Orchestration-heavy managers often focus only on later steps and avoid questioning problem definition.
• Indicators include overemphasis on prioritization, accepting problems/solutions as given, and concentrating on sprint planning.
• Transitioning to a leadership-heavy role requires expanding focus to all six steps and building awareness of the broader problem space.
• The learning curve is steep as organizations move away from pure orchestration roles.

Who Would Benefit

• New engineering managers transitioning to senior roles.
• Mid-level managers in organizations shifting from top-down to bottom-up structures.
• Technical leaders seeking to broaden their problem-solving scope.
• Anyone interested in improving leadership capabilities in tech.

Frameworks and Methodologies

• Six-step problem solving framework.