Books recommendation for (first time) Engineering Managers 📚

“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go.”

Photo by Leon Pauleikhoff on Unsplash

I was promoted to management back in January 2021, and at that time, I was a little prepared for this.

It happened because of a company reorganization and because I was the only one really interested in taking this path. With my manager, though, we started this journey before that moment. It started with an open discussion about this possibility, but most importantly, it started with an intentional mind shift: I needed to learn how to do it.

I was super curious about this role, and I deepened the vastness of resources available on the internet. Eventually, I found some books that helped me out with this new career challenge and that I genuinely recommend to other people thinking about jumping into engineering management.

This is the list of books that I read and that I’ve planned to read.

Books I read:

• The Manager's Path: A Guide for Tech Leaders Navigating Growth and Change by Camille Fournier

• Become an Effective Software Engineering Manager by James Stainer

• An Elegant Puzzle: Systems of Engineering Management by Will Larson

• The Making of a Manager: What to Do When Everyone Looks to You Book by Julie Zhuo

• When they win, you win. Being a Great Manager Is Simpler Than You Think by Russ Laraway

Books I want to read:

• Resilient Management by Lara Hogan

• Managing Humans: Biting and Humorous Tales of a Software Engineering Manager by Rand

• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni

• Measure What Matters: OKRs: The Simple Idea that Drives 10x Growth by John Doerr

• High Output Management by Andrew Grove

• First, Break All the Rules: What the world's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Curt Coffman and Marcus Buckingham

My reading list is longer than this, and it could be endless, but I want to keep it short to the ones that have a high impact on first-time managers.

This article is inspired by this article by Gergely Orosz ✨