Building Leadership Skills As An Aerospace Engineer

In my opinion, this is really what differentiate a Principal from a Staff and a Staff from a Senior Engineer. Softskill-wise, there’s no better predictable of someone’s maturity level and capacity to influence an organization at scale than those 3 macro-skills: 1. Sponsorship (truly supporting other people's ideas),  2. Selfless & Egoless way of leading (Don’t be a politician: Say “I don’t know” & admitting your mistakes) 3. Be Open to Influence (To lead, you have to follow. To influence, you have to be influenced) I know, I know, what about accountability and ownership? What about the ability to drive things and make them happen quickly? What about the ability of distilling complex and ambiguous problems into a simple solution? What about coaching and mentoring? What about super deep expertise? What about the ability to navigate and coordinate efforts across the org to deliver big cross-area projects? What about thinking strategically and planning for the long-term? They are super important too, they are crucial. But, in my experience, they are not the best predictable of what is going to make someone succeed and scale their impact and their career beyond the Staff Level. Confidence to sponsor other folks ideas even when they are super shiny or bold ideas and even when you would probably solve slightly differently without “cookie leaking” and without getting credits to yourself. Tanya Reilly has an outstanding article on this. Selfless and egoless way of leading. You are an engineer, You are not a politician. Admit your mistakes and what you got wrong as a Senior Engineer, your team will respect you a lot more (and be a lot more influenced by what you share) in the long run. Give your support quickly to other leaders who are working to make improvements. Even if you disagree with their initial approach, someone trustworthy leading a project will almost always get to a good outcome. If there's something you disagree with but only in a minor way, let others take the lead figuring it out. A helpful question here is, "Will what we do here matter to me in six months?" If it won't, take the opportunity to follow. Great questions to ask: - Tell me the last time you supported one of your more junior engineers ideas  - Tell me about the last time you admitted a mistake you made to your team - Tell me about the worst technical mistake you made over the last couple of years as a Staff in the company  - Tell me about the last time someone on your team changed your mind

I've coached 100+ engineering leaders I notice something striking about those who struggle 'Your team doesn't trust your leadership.' That feedback crushed Sarah, a brilliant engineering director I coached. Technical excellence wasn't her problem. Executive presence was. Here are the 5 patterns I've used to transform leaders like her:" 1. Your Code Won't Speak For You • I learned this hard way: shipping great features ≠ leadership • My turning point? When my CTO said "Adi, being right isn't enough" • Now I teach: presence amplifies technical expertise 3x 2. Build Your Leadership Foundation • I train my leaders: decide at 70% certainty, adjust at 100% • True story: lost a key hire because I mispronounced their name • My non-negotiable: prep or don't show up 3. Master Critical Communications • Counterintuitive but works: silence creates authority • My rule: 2 ears, 1 mouth - use proportionally • Learned from filming myself: fixed my conflicting body language 4. Develop Real Gravitas • Keep a "win log" (saved my review when my boss changed) • Share struggles openly - my team's trust doubled • Progress > Perfection (my daily reminder) 5. Details Make Leaders • 10 minutes early = on time (saved countless crisis meetings) • Visible note-taking changed my team's meeting culture • Anticipate needs (how I earned my first executive role) Fun fact: Sarah fast-tracked to a delivery VP role in 6 months. What's your biggest executive presence challenge?  Drop it below - I read every comment. Found this valuable? ↓ Save this post for future reference ♻️ Share with another tech leader who needs this 🔔 Follow Adi Agrawal for hard-earned leadership lessons from the tech trenches

If you’ve been doing great work and still aren’t getting promoted, I want you to hear this: It’s probably not your skills. It’s how your work is positioned, perceived, and prioritized. I’ve coached engineers who were outperforming peers technically, but kept getting passed up. Not because they weren’t ready. But because leadership didn’t see them the way they needed to. Here’s what I help them shift: 1. Stop assuming your manager is tracking your wins. They’re not. They’re busy. You need to document your outcomes and share them regularly, not just at review time. 2. Tie your work to outcomes leadership actually cares about. Are you reducing risk? Improving velocity? Increasing efficiency? Frame your impact in their language, not just technical output. 3. Start operating at the next level before you’re promoted. Lead cross-functional efforts. Anticipate roadblocks. Step into ambiguous problems and bring clarity. Don’t wait for permission, show you already belong there. 4. Build your advocate network. Your manager isn’t the only one who matters. Peers, product partners, tech leads, their feedback and perception shapes how you're seen across the org. 5. Learn to communicate your value without apologizing for it. This isn’t bragging. This is leadership visibility. The right people can’t support your growth if they don’t know what you’ve done or how you think. Promotions are not just about technical excellence. They’re about strategic presence. Knowing how to shape your story, show your impact, and signal that you’re ready. If you’re stuck right now, it doesn’t mean you’re not capable. It means you need to change the way you’re showing up. And when you do, everything starts to shift.

As Chief Engineer of strategic ballistic missile submarine USS Kentucky, I felt I had to have every answer. I was in every action, every system, every repair. The stakes were too high for anything less. But here’s the truth: that approach was untenable. No single person can shoulder that weight forever. What saved me—and what made our team world-class—wasn’t my control. It was: ✅ Delegation — trusting officers and sailors to own their watch. ✅ Intent-based leadership — giving clear direction, not micromanagement. ✅ Trust-based communication — speaking up early, listening deeply. ✅ Transparent expectations — clarity about what “good” looked like. ✅ Deep but meaningful checking — not hovering, but verifying. Scaling your business is no different. Early founders often try to be in every decision, every hire, every customer interaction. But just like on a submarine, that weight will break you—and stall your team. The transition from “I control everything” to “we achieve everything together” is what transforms brilliant engineers and scientists into enduring leaders. 💡 Where are you in that journey—holding every answer, or scaling through trust? #Leadership #ScalingUp #Delegation #ExecutiveCoaching #EngineeringLeadership #CoreX #Trust #IntentBasedLeadership #focalpountcoaching

The mark of a good leader is how the team functions in their absence. - Some leaders leave behind a team that struggles—systems and workflows are heavily reliant on their presence, causing productivity dips and frustration. - Others leave behind a team that continues to thrive. While the team may miss their contributions, they are fully equipped and empowered to operate seamlessly. The difference lies in mindset. Good Leaders: - Focus on mentoring and growing the team, not just solving problems themselves. - Build systems that are resilient and documented, minimizing dependency on individuals. - Encourage knowledge-sharing to ensure no critical information is siloed. - Regularly assess workflows, empowering others to take ownership and innovate. It’s about shifting from being indispensable to making the team indispensable. This lesson took me time to learn, but it’s now one of the first things I teach mentees—helping new grads grow into high-performing engineers in just a few years. #Leadership #Mentorship #EngineeringExcellence #TeamResilience #GrowthMindset #TeamBuilding #KnowledgeSharing