Don’t Let Your Software Engineers Tackle Complex Tasks Alone
Reduce risk and boost learning and productivity by pairing your team members on challenging work
Having managed several software engineering teams in my career, I’ve picked up a few techniques for keeping projects on track and engineers happy. Here’s one for fellow engineering managers: when assigning a sizeable task (anything that will take at least a week) to your team members, ensure at least two engineers are working on it together. Here’s why.
Teamwork Makes the Dream Work
When engineers collaborate on a big, complex task, they bounce ideas off each other, review code with full context, and never feel abandoned. It’s like having a built-in safety net in the development process. Plus, they may parallelise the work and complete it faster. Finally, if one of them is out sick or on leave, the project doesn’t come to a halt.
Going Solo Is Risky
When a single engineer tackles a project alone, it’s a different story. They have less support and might spend extra time seeking help when stuck. If they get distracted, the work stalls. Knowledge about the problem and implementation stays locked in their heads. When they leave the team, it goes with them unless meticulously documented, which is costly and time-consuming and doesn’t guarantee others can use the documentation efficiently. This situation may create a bottleneck, with only one person capable of handling certain tasks.
Pair Engineers Up for Success
To avoid these pitfalls, ensure every large task has at least two engineers working on it. It’s a good idea to appoint one engineer as the lead to make it clear who is accountable for the outcome. This setup helps build management, planning, and communication skills for engineers aiming to step into leadership roles eventually. It’s also an opportunity for engineers to understand each other’s working styles, strengths, and weaknesses.
Watch Out for Incompatibilities
Ensure the engineers you pair up have compatible working styles. For obvious reasons, avoid teaming up two indecisive people. Similarly, pairing overly confident, somewhat stubborn individuals might lead to constant clashes of opinions.
So, look at your team’s backlog and think about who you can pair up to tackle the biggest tasks. This simple technique can help your team’s productivity, knowledge sharing, and morale.
