I recently read a book that made me sit up and think, “Wow, I did my career all wrong.” So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport is a must-read for anyone just starting out or even older folks who want to optimize the remainder of their career. 

In the book, the author argues that the commonly accepted wisdom of “follow your passion” doesn’t actually lead to either career success or career happiness. On the contrary, following your passion without first accumulating the necessary career capital is likely to lead you into failure, where passion splats face-first against the hard reality of capitalism, where your passion isn’t what’s economically valuable – your skills are. Passion comes from success, argues Cal, not the other way around.

To complete Cal’s point, he argues that instead of blindly following your passion, one must apply deliberate practice (and if you don’t know this term, look it up!) to whatever job you’re engaged in, build a collection of rare and valuable skills, and only then trade those skills in for the sort of job you would ideally want.

There’s a lot more to the book, but this article isn't a book review. Instead, I want to dive a little bit deeper on Cal’s point around passion. 

Um, I’m going to have to call partial bullshit on that…

As a manager, I have so often seen team members, especially ones just starting their careers, so deeply in the grip of imposter syndrome that they spend all their time trying to demonstrate to the team how hard-working, intelligent, and capable they are. They work crazy hours, or they lock themselves in a room and don’t ask for help when they need it, or they take on too much, and then burn themselves out trying to finish it all, writing bugs in the process because they're too tired to think clearly.

The result is stress, disengagement, and burnout. 

Now, I know this isn’t the kind of “deliberate practice” Cal has in mind but stay with me just for a second. The best antidote I’ve found to this condition is to try and reconnect the individual with why they went into the field to begin with. What made them choose computer science over medicine or hospitality or law? Hopefully, it wasn't just the money...

Now, my friends, we’re going to tread dangerous ground. You see, I’m convinced that the best employees tend to be ones who genuinely enjoy what they’re doing, ones who are motivated to grow not because it might help them get that Senior or Principal title, but because they are interested in what they’re doing and want to get better at it.  

In other words… they’re following their passion.

I can’t speak to all other professions, but if you ask most successful software engineers how they got started in computers, they’ll say that they liked to tinker when they were kids. Silly stuff, like game mods, maybe even some light hacking. Perhaps they built a website for a friend or relative.

The common thing I’ve often seen when talking to high performers about their career story is that gleam in their eye when they talk about software. They love what they do, and it shows. Their deliberate practice comes organically instead of having to be forced, and they get genuine satisfaction out of getting better. They may still have the imposter syndrome, but it's greatly tempered by that genuine day-to-day satisfaction.

But this is just one profile of someone passionate about their job. As Col points out, passion often comes from mastery. So, the other profile of "passionate" engineers is those who may not have even started in software engineering but fell in love with it over time.

Gender diversity is another important point here, and I've managed female engineers passionate about what they do, despite the obstacles placed in their path by this male-dominated discipline. I should be clear here: gender diversity is a topic that deserves several articles of its own, and by someone far more qualified to speak about than me. The important thing is that as engineering manager it's critical to level this playing field and make engineers of any gender and any race feel welcome within the team.

Encouraging Passion

Just like everything else about humans, passion must be nurtured. This is where the engineering manager can really help. Tools such as praise, public recognition, and a structured approach to skills development can help engineers validate and expand on that initial spark that got them into software development in the first place.  

In that sense, I agree with Cal’s point that passion can come from success. Nothing engenders enthusiasm for one’s work quite so much as winning. This is why it’s important for the engineering manager to start a new hire’s track record by getting them to succeed at something early on. It doesn’t have to be anything big, but it does need to be visible. 

So how else can an engineering manager encourage this passion? Here are a few proven ways:

• Promote ownership. In my experience, the more senior software engineers tend to be more passionate about the problems they solve than the algorithms they write to solve them. In other words, encourage your engineers to solve problems instead of merely completing tasks. This means delegating effectively, and trusting your teammates to come up with a solution and execute in a way that they think is right. All the usual caveats apply, of course – trust but verify, and so on, but enable them to take the time to do it themselves, even if it's not always the most efficient path. Letting your engineers own problems instead of solutions supercharges your team.
• Align work to interest. One of the questions I like to ask in my 1:1s is some form of "Are you having fun?" Or, better yet, "On the scale from 1-10, how much fun are you having?" Track that number over time and be wary if it falls too far below its baseline. If you team is collaborative (as it should be), it shouldn't be hard to redistribute work. Barring emergencies, if Mary isn't enjoying the work she's currently doing, chances are Bob will... so create the opportunity to detect this issue early and rebalance.
• Keep your teammates on the edge of discomfort. In other words, keep them at the edge of their ability. Doing the same thing over and over gets boring quick, and boredom kills passion. When they've mastered the small problems, them something that'll challenge them, make them just a bit uncomfortable. Succeeding in work like that does wonders for engendering passion. It's also critical to have the team structure/culture in place to early-detect failure and help them turn it back into success. This might come in the form of team mentors, pair-programming, or team process.

Connecting the dots

So, there we have it. On one end, Cal’s advice about not following your passion, but rather developing skills through deliberate practice. On the other end lies my firsthand experience of presence of passion being a key differentiator between rockstars and not.

How do we reconcile those two points of view?

This is where Cal’s next point comes in, and where I’ve realized I have gone astray in my own career. Those who are happiest in their work tend to have a unifying mission, be it curing malaria or discovering time-travel. That mission becomes the passion that drives their career choices and growth.

For example, in the last few years, I’ve realized (mostly through writing articles such as this one) that my passion lies in fully understanding this highly complex role of the frontline engineering manager, and then using that understanding to help other developers and engineering managers succeed. Had I discovered this fifteen years ago, the last fifteen years of my own career journey might have looked very different. I would’ve spent less time chasing new technology frontiers, and more time chasing new leadership frontiers. I would’ve found ways to connect my professional life to this passion more so than merely succeeding with my own teams. 

What about you, my fellow engineering manager? Where does your passion lie? How do you connect your career to that passion? Give some feedback in the comments! We'd love to engage more with you!