Feeling Overwhelmed as an Engineering Leader: Causes and How to Cope
Article summary:
Overwhelm is more common in Leaders than you may think. Many people and technical engineering leaders feel overwhelmed by the constant demands of their roles. Many leaders feel isolated, unable to get support.
The Specific Challenges of Overwhelm in Leadership Roles: Overwhelm in leadership is particularly tricky due to the high ownership and ambiguity of the role and ideas of having to be on top of things, while often having limited actual decision-making power or autonomy.
Understanding the Sources of Overwhelm: For many leaders, overwhelm comes from multiple, compounding factors, including the fast-paced, innovative nature of the tech industry, as well as low clarity, caring about the people you work with, issues with your boss or company, combined with low feedback and questions of identity.
To manage overwhelm, prioritize self-care using methods like BICEPS and energy management, and establish support networks through mentorship and communities.
Many engineering leaders grapple with what can be best described as: “Everything happens so much”: Feeling inadequate, overwhelmed, and pressured from the constant burden of having way too much to do, at all times, with no clear solutions. These feelings are highly common in technical and people leaders alike.
Yet, many leaders feel isolated and alone, and feel like they have nowhere to turn for help: Your boss, who may be sympathetic, but is constantly stressed, and whose judgment on your leadership abilities may impact your career advancement and compensation? Or your HR team, who can’t offer much in actual solutions? Or your peers, who understand, but face similar challenges?
A recent study by Development Dimensions International showed that nearly 60% of leaders feel drained at the end of the workday.
Even though these feelings are so wide-spread among leaders, this topic is taboo.
For many leaders, there’s a pervasive shame associated with it, and a fear of being seen as someone who’s not “strong enough” to be a leader.
So, why is overwhelm so common for leaders, and what can you do if you (or a peer!) is dealing with it? In this article, I’ll share with you strategies that have worked for teams and leaders, and what I’ve personally found helpful in navigating overwhelm in engineering leadership roles.
Understanding What Overwhelm Looks Like
From the outside, overwhelm in leaders often looks so subtle that it’s almost invisible.
In my extensive experience working with leaders dealing with overwhelm, and having faced it myself, it’s often unnoticeable - until someone quits, seemingly out of nowhere. Many leaders feel compelled to handle this overwhelm on their own (and more often than not, unfortunately, there really is no support within organizations), which causes strain to their personal lives and relationships. This leads to exhaustion and tiredness, and takes a toll on their mental and physical health.
Broadly defined, overwhelm refers to the psychological and physiological state of experiencing a flood of thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations, usually tied to a specific challenge or problem. In the context of engineering leaders and management, overwhelm can manifest in various ways:
Key Signs of Overwhelm
Exhaustion: This includes physical, cognitive, and emotional fatigue that undermines a person's ability to work effectively. Tracking daily activities, monitoring screen time, and taking regular breaks can be crucial in managing exhaustion.
Cynicism & Sarcasm: An erosion of engagement, where distancing oneself psychologically from work occurs. Cynicism and sarcasm become coping mechanisms, masking frustration and disillusionment. Recognizing and addressing these attitudes is vital for preventing further burnout.
Inefficacy: A sense of incompetence, lack of achievement, and reduced productivity. Reduced confidence and motivation can hinder creative problem-solving, leading to increased errors, missed deadlines, and a decline in overall product quality.
Where does overwhelm come from, and why is it so common in leadership roles?
What makes overwhelm so tricky in leadership roles
Many people in the technology field deal with overwhelm, and you’ll find that a lot of factors are true for people outside of leadership roles too. I’m focusing on people in technical and people leadership roles as this is my main field of expertise, and I found that there are additional factors that make this a tricky subject for leaders:
Leaders are typically expected to take charge and control, and even viewed as being in charge and having control, e.g. by your teammates. At the same time, your ability to actually lead can be very, very limited: Either because you have barely any decision-making power, a boss who’s micromanaging, or are largely expected to execute on others’ input.
Many ideas and ideals of leadership are still associated with being on top of things, and having everything figured out.
Many leaders pride themselves in having a high degree of ownership, accountability, and are very invested in doing good work, and feel a high sense of responsiblity towards people. There’s nothing wrong with any of this, but, simply said, the world can be a bit easier if you don’t care.
Understand the Sources of Overwhelm
Overwhelm often stems from multiple sources, and the resulting mounting pressure leads to gripping feelings of overwhelm, a hefty mix of self-doubt and frustration, expanded by a lot of unknowns and not wanting to disappoint. That’s why the first step to addressing your overwhelm is understanding which factors play into it.
Operating in a fast-moving industry that likes to “break things”
The tech industry, while fast-paced and innovative, often pressures leaders to adopt the mantras along the lines of, "Move fast, break stuff, do more with less." This mindset can lead to dangerous consequences. Leaders fear falling behind due to constant evaluations of new tools, features, and evolving frameworks.
Concerns about job security
More than one-third (37%) of business leaders say AI replaced workers in 2023, according to a recent report from ResumeBuilder. And according to an Asana survey, 29% of employees say their work tasks are replaceable by AI. Even beyond these specific effects, tech layoffs are still rampant, with almost 300,000 employees laid off since 2022, and more layoffs ongoing.
High change rates
Industry pressure often translates into workplace pressure, with organizations constantly changing strategies and goals. The overwhelming workload and constant changes in priorities create high pressure.
Navigating overwhelm as a leader involves wrestling with a high change rate, a multitude of changes to handle, and the real phenomenon of change fatigue affecting both leaders and their teammates.
Wanting to protect and shield teams
Especially in high-change or chaotic organizations, many leaders want to protect their teams from at least some of this chaos. They become a “shock absorber” for their teams.
Example
I worked with an experienced engineering manager whose company had gone through a range of difficult changes: from re-orgs, to layoffs, to new strategy directions. This dedicated and hard working manager has been burnt out for a while, but doesn’t want to go on medical leave, even though this would be accessible to them. Why? They’re concerned about what will happen to their team once they’re off, and want to avoid exposing their team members to all the chaos in the organization.
Poorly-defined leadership roles
Many leadership roles lack clear definitions, success criteria are unknown, and they tend to be substantial. They are often established to fill gaps where processes or structures are absent, offering clarity during uncertain times, and operating independently. High accountability for team success, coupled with limited support or context, and the invisible work behind the scenes, intensifies the pressure.
Example
I often hear from leaders, especially in VP or Head of Engineering roles in startups and scaleups, who are tasked with “taking care of people and processes” so that CTO can focus on technical strategy. At the same time, many newer startup CTOs struggle to express expectations, leaving their reports in a space of high uncertainty.
In the fast-paced tech environment, leaders are often left to "figure it out" on their own, without the necessary check-ins being asked like, “how are you doing?”, or “what do you need?”.
Many leaders tend to internalize the belief that solving every problem is solely their responsibility, fueling a fear of failure and echoing deep insecurities.
High-ambiguity work and the pressure of being in the middle
All leadership roles share the common trait of having a high degree of ambiguity baked in. This also means that leaders often lack the positive experience and dopamine hits of accomplishments.
In practice, this also means that translating is a critical part of the job: Leaders are often handed complex problems to solve (e.g. “increase our revenue by x through expanding our product”), and need to translate those to lower-level team members who require a more clearly defined scope. It’s taxing to constantly be in the middle, translating between higher and lower levels of the organization.
Not feeling a sense of agency
A significant factor in overwhelm is whether you feel like you have agency, and feel empowered to make changes yourself, with your team, or influence change outside of your immediate area of impact.
Low visibility and feedback
Much of the work of a leader is unseen, such as supporting employees through difficult times, giving feedback, managing performance, and maintaining situational awareness. Leadership work is often never truly finished, with responsibilities like ensuring alignment and sustaining high performance forming an ongoing continuum.
On top of that, leaders typically don’t get a ton of feedback from their busy bosses and employees. Employees (understandably) often shy away from direct criticism often because of the power dynamic that’s baked into the relationship. This also means it can be even more difficult to understand where you’re at and how you’re doing.
Who you are
According to ComputerWeekly, 45% more women than men leave technology roles, and half of the women in tech roles depart before the age of 35. These trends are largely attributed to sexism, racism, microaggressions, and a homogeneous work environment. In extreme cases, this can manifest as overt bullying. USA Today reports that 'LGBT employees were the most likely to be bullied (20%) and experience public humiliation (24%). And 'Nearly one-quarter of underrepresented men and women of color experienced stereotyping, twice the rate of white and Asian men and women.'
These dynamics also impact leaders: Who you are, and to what degree you’re able to be who you are, let alone be successful, may still be a concern for you. In addition, many of us want to make workplaces better for the people in our organizations and teams.
Emotional labor, “glue work”, and unrecognized work
There’s a historical pattern in the tech industry where especially members of underrepresented groups tend to be asked to take on additional work that’s
Outside of the role & responsibilities that they’re assigned and paid for
Involving a lot of emotional labor
Not factored in when it comes to promotions, or even negatively impacting ability to advance, because doing this work has taken away from your time to hone the core skills needed for your role
Examples often include: DEIB work, emotional labor like checking in with teammates, taking notes during meetings on a regular basis and other types of "glue work", making sure others’ voices are heard.
Many leaders struggle with how to handle this work: How much of this work should I be doing as part of my job? How much can I ask other people to contribute? How much can I say no to?
Not knowing if an issue is with you or with your environment
“Is it me? Am I doing it wrong?” - I get this question a lot from people who have been in the same company for a long time or are a bit earlier in their career, are dealing with difficult challenges, and wonder: “Is it me? Am I doing it wrong? Or are there dynamics going on in the company that shouldn’t be this way?”
Example: A newer engineering manager who really struggled with feeling overwhelmed by their role and felt that their boss was really prescriptive of how things had to get done. Their boss had highly specific ideas for not just why and what, but how work should be done. In addition, the environment overall was very unusual, with approaches to management that aren’t common - leaving almost no agency for this engineering manager to define with their team how work should get done.
Your boss
You work for an inexperienced boss: The tech industry still predominantly overvalues technical skills. Many startup founders or higher-level leaders got into their roles because they’re great engineers, but are still learning to be managers.
Many leaders, especially in startups, are really busy. You may not want to be a burden on them, and feel like you need to absorb a lot yourself.
On the flipside, you may be putting in a lot of work to set clear expectations for your direct reports, give them actionable feedback on a regular basis. That’s important work, but if you’re not getting much of this for yourself, it can become really draining.
The resulting imbalance can be really hard to deal with.
Feeling stuck and unable to change anything significant about your situation
Lastly, overwhelm is often exacerbated when you feel like you’ve already tried a lot of things but nothing helped. I often hear from experienced leaders who have been in the industry for a long time. They know the time management techniques (pomodoro! GTD!), the prioritization frameworks (Eisenhower matrix!, Deadlines!), have tried saying no to requests more or delegating - and still feel stuck. This can even intensify the feeling of overwhelm - feeling like you’re running out of options.
Taking Control and Alleviating Overwhelm
Overwhelm often is the result of compounding factors, and can feel impossible to tackle.
How to get started: I recommend picking 1-2 ideas from the list below to get started. Find things that resonate with you and that may help you get a new perspective. Experiment, and see what feels right for you!
Take care of yourself
Understand Your Core Needs: Identify and understand core needs using resources like the BICEPS method. Reflect on factors contributing to unmet needs and take proactive steps to address or improve the situation.
Manage Your Energy: Effectively manage energy, not just time. Keep a document highlighting events and how they make you feel throughout the week. Review patterns to make informed decisions about adapting and improving energy management.
Establish a Personalized Framework: Create a framework for weekly reflections, use mood-tracking apps for quantifying emotions, and maintain a gratitude journal. Acknowledge and process what is lost when navigating overwhelming change.
Control the Content You Consume: Manage stress by controlling the content you consume. Consider stepping back from ad-inundated social media platforms and explore more in-depth resources, such as podcasts.
Manage the impacts of change
The relentless pace of change can contribute to your own sense of change fatigue, requiring you to simultaneously guide your team through these constant shifts. Acknowledging and addressing the challenges associated with high change is crucial for leaders aiming to navigate overwhelm effectively.
Get support for encouragement and perspective
Seek mentorship or guidance from someone within your company who you trust.
External support and the perspective from someone who has experience in the industry and is not entangled in your company’s power dynamics can be helpful too:
Find a mentor or coach.
Reach out to others in engineering leadership communities. Many communities have private channels for people with different identities, like women, non-binary and trans folks, or BiPOC. The ones I’m most familiar with are the eng-managers Slack, the LeadDev Slack, the CTO Craft Slack, and the rands Slack community (the biggest one in there).
Getting therapy can also be really useful!
Acknowledge what you can and can’t do
Your job as a leader is to know which fires you need to put out, and which ones you need to let burn. What may sound a bit bleak, is really important to keep in mind: You can't fix everything, and you need to let go of the idea that you’re only successful if everything is going well at all times.
Shift Focus from Volume to Prioritization: Proactively determine which tasks to prioritize or let go of, rather than leaving choices to external factors. Regularly align priorities with supervisors to enhance clarity and foster a shared understanding.
Navigating overwhelm as an engineering leader involves managing an influx of tasks, the weight of team success, and the fear of the unknown. This problem is often overlooked by mainstream media, contributing to internalized stress and the misconception that leaders must have all the answers. I hope this article has equipped you with valuable insights and strategies to help you manage your overwhelm, and, most of all, wish you that you find things that work for you.
