Your team’s success is your success

Here is a valuable experience I had during my career.

In response to a question I asked, my CTO, told me I better focus on writing code.

I responded that it is strange that I am hearing this feedback as a side note, not as a performance review. Especially given that I keep a very short feedback loop with my immediate manager.

I was told that that message was a performance review.

I was ready to dive into details and work on my performance. But my peer found it annoying and wanted to close the conversation.

The reason I did not produce any code, was that I was doing everything I could to enable 4 other engineers to solve problems and move the project further: blockers, design decisions, research, refining requirements with PO, showing how to cut corners and ship it in time and how to deal with uncertainty.

Eventually, I told my CTO that he could either trust me and let me do my best to ship the project or find someone else who will blindly do what he says.

I love writing code. Really. It’s beautiful. But I will always prioritize my team success over my personal code contribution. Do you want me to write code or ship the project? Because sometimes, these are mutually exclusive.