How to Hunt an Engineering Manager for Your Company

ITExpert Hiring IT specialists for different directions and positions

Hiring IT specialists for different directions and positions

Looking for an engineering manager? Perhaps you need to replace a departing manager or plan to scale up and add several new members to your team. We’ve compiled a guide on the essential skills an engineering management professional should have, along with tips & tricks on how to make an offer to an IT specialist that will entice a skilled leader to join your team.

Who is an engineering manager?

The primary goal of an engineering manager in IT is to ensure that the team is successful and achieves its objectives as efficiently as possible. In practice, this involves a wide range of both technical and managerial tasks, from communicating company goals and managing the technical roadmap to developing career plans for each team member.

An engineering manager should be an expert in the technologies their teams use, enabling them to navigate and communicate effectively with clients. Typically, this role is filled by a Senior-level developer who has held a Team/Tech Lead position and has at least six years of experience in IT.

Engineering manager’s portrait: hard and soft skills

This role focuses on team development and supporting the growth of developers. This professional should always prioritize others’ achievements.

Such a specialist should:

Have a deep understanding of development processes and programming principles.
Possess people management skills — a managerial foundation for effective team leadership (or at least prior mentoring experience).
Have extensive experience in cross-functional collaboration and communication, working with product managers, designers, developers, testers, DevOps engineers, and marketers.

Sometimes also having a degree in IT, Scrum Master, and other certifications is important.

Engineering manager vs tech lead

The tech lead and eng manager are the project’s “best friends.” The main difference is that the tech lead focuses more on the technical side of product creation, while the engineering manager is a strong leader with an interest in people and their development.

Tech lead	Engineering manager
It is the expert responsible for process improvement, seamless work, and preventing misunderstandings regarding technical details and product requirements.	Focuses on team management, i. e. quality communication, feedback, and team member development.

Nick Kliestov

CTO and co-founder at ITExpert

“It’s important not to confuse the engineering manager with the tech lead. The latter is a full development team member who also performs management tasks. The engineering manager is responsible for the team, handling management and development.

For a tech lead, management duties usually comprise 10-30% of their responsibilities (the rest is development), while for an engineering manager, management takes up 50-60% of their time, with the rest typically being operational tasks like hiring and equipment procurement.”

How to attract a talented manager to your team: 3 tips

Drawing the professional’s attention and motivating them to join your team is a challenging task. Here are three tips to help you succeed:

1. Try direct search

Engineering managers are often engaged in significant projects and aren’t actively looking for new positions. Direct search allows you to “pull” these superstars from their companies, offering them new career opportunities. Additionally, headhunting reduces the time-to-hire, as you contact only the most relevant professionals instead of waiting for them to find your job listing on job boards.

2. Broaden your search queries

If you’re reviewing candidate profiles on LinkedIn and other platforms, try experimenting with Boolean search.

For example, include similar job titles in your query. Responsibilities may vary between companies, and your desired talent may work under different job titles. The query might look like this:

(CIO OR CTO OR “VP of Engineering” OR “Engineering Manager” OR “Technical Director”)

If you’re looking for an IT professional with domain experience, think about what keywords will be useful. You can include them in the Boolean string:

(web3 OR defi OR blockchain OR cryptocurrency)

3. Analyze key motivators

Attracting a manager requires more than just offering extra vacation days. Managers are interested in practical tasks and project challenges. Describe what will be expected of them. Perhaps building processes from scratch or scaling up to 100 people? Include these details in the vacancy description.

List achievements, awards, and other key facts about your product, such as the number of users, projects completed or clients served, etc.

Screening interview questions for an engineering manager

Here’s a list of key questions for your first interaction with an engineering manager:

How many people do you manage at work? What is the team structure?
Have you scaled teams before? Please tell us more.
How have you optimized processes in previous roles? Can you share the results in numbers?
How do you support team development? Do you have experience in coaching or mentoring?
How do you address the “bus factor” in a project?
How do you resolve team conflicts?
What would you do if one of your top performers burned out right before a release?
What team-building advice would you give a newbie manager?
Have you launched projects from scratch? Tell us about that experience.

Add any other questions that interest you and tailor them to each candidate’s experience.

Hire an Engineering Manager with ITExpert!

Hiring highly skilled Engineering Managers requires strategic planning, effective, and timely communication with the candidate, as well as a balanced assessment of technical and soft skills. We will help you simplify this process!

Our IT recruiting agency specialists have been hiring tech/non-tech IT specialists for companies all over the world since 2015, from the USA to Israel. Our clients include Sony, Deloitte, and Depositphotos.

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Advantages

We work with the most difficult vacancies in the IT field:
We are trusted by companies from 17+ countries of the world because we find the best tech talent.

Relevant candidates:
Our CTO helps you fine-tune your search.

Experienced recruiters:
We have case studies and backgrounds in different niches and domains, so we know what kind of candidates you are looking for.

Fast recruitment:
We show the first relevant candidates within the first 2–3 days.

Guarantee:
We replace a candidate if the specialist does not pass the probationary period.

Do you need an engineering manager for an IT team? Leave a request for a free consultation!

FAQ

When will I receive my first Engineering Manager resumes?

You will see the first resumes within 2–3 days after you start your search. The ITExpert team has a hot database of candidates, access to niche resources, and experience in hiring Engineering Managers, allowing us to deliver fast results!

How many resumes does it take to make an offer to Engineering Manager?

On average, it takes seven resumes from our team to successfully fill the position. However, this can vary based on your specific processes and how confident you are that you’ve found the right candidate. Sometimes a job offer is given after the first interview.

How quickly does ITExpert fill an Engineering Manager position?

We strengthen your team and reduce hiring to 22–26 days. Nonetheless, our portfolio has some exceptional cases where the position was filled in just two days. Share your goals and deadlines, and we’ll adjust to meet them.