In an organization with many teams, problems will arise that span across these teams and require solutions broader than an individual manager’s purview. These types of projects include things like: introducing changes to a quarterly planning process, agreeing on broad architectural changes, rolling out a new project management tool, or making changes to how on-call is managed.

In a high functioning organization, leaders (often — though not exclusively — managers) will share the burden of solving these challenges. Through my years coaching managers and discussing with other engineering leaders, I’ve noticed that certain managers seem to take on more of this work than others. Diving deeper into it, there are a handful of reasons for this. Below is a summary of some ways we, as leaders, can help encourage others we work with to successfully develop solutions to complex organizational challenges.

Consider each of these four areas for ways to remove detractors and increase motivators for those you work with:

External Motivators

It’s best to begin by considering external factors, they’re more often in your control and more easily visible. A lot of these have to do with you as a leader, and possibly your peers or your manager’s behaviors. Does your organization reward and praise people for taking on this kind of hard work? If not, get started. (This is an opportunity for you to demonstrate some cross-team influence in getting other people on board to support your efforts here.)

It’s also worth being explicit with managers of your expectations for doing this kind of work and the value of taking on these types of projects. I would expect that every senior engineering manager is doing this type of w