Christoph Nakazawa
Hello there! I’m an Engineering Manager at Stripe living in Tokyo with my wife and two daughters. I’m currently working on Athena Crisis.
Originally from Austria, I've been building video games and social networks since 2002. I spent the 2010s at Facebook in Menlo Park and London managing JavaScript Infrastructure and the React Native team. I built Jest, Metro, Yarn, and MooTools.
I write about Frontend Development, Engineering Management, Leadership, User Experience, and more. Check out my pinned post or jump into the category that’s most exciting to you:
Mastering Tech Lead Management
Most engineers are faced with the choice to switch to management at some point in their careers. Changing to Engineering Management (EM) or sticking with an Individual Contributor (IC) role feels like a black-and-white decision, and people often feel pressure to pick one or the other. Instead, there is a less well-known hybrid role at many companies: the Tech Lead Manager (TLM) role.1
Responsibilities
The responsibilities of the TLM role can be fuzzy and include a mix of people management, technical leadership, and individual contributions. Let’s take a look at common EM and IC responsibilities:
Footnotes
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Also sometimes ambiguously referred to as “Staff Engineering Manager”. ↩