Engineering with People Intelligence | Microsoft, Yahoo, SAP, Carnegie Mellon | The Engineering Career Coach

I transformed from a curious software engineer to a strategic leader, guiding massive teams at Microsoft, Yahoo, Walmart Labs, and startups. Along this journey, I generated over $2.3 billion in revenue. But it wasn't always smooth sailing.

My quest began with questions about management, innovation, and leadership, leading me to an unexpected discovery - emotional intelligence. It sparked a new realization; traditional corporate management training teaches frameworks, not leadership. That's why I created Taha's Method, a unique approach focused on leading yourself before others and applying management frameworks rooted in human principles.

And boy, did it work!

In 6 years, I led from 0 to 250+ team members. To date, I have coached over 600+ professionals, including those at Google, Netflix, Oracle, Microsoft, Meta, Intuit, Yahoo, and startups, helping them to secure management as well as IC roles (Principal+).

But why stop there?

In January 2022, I walked away from a 7-figure career to dedicate myself to enabling ambitious software engineers to reach their full potential. I developed a personalized 6-month 1:1 coaching program - and the impact has been phenomenal. (Check out the reviews from my clients below.)

Every day, I share insights on LinkedIn about effective leadership, emotional intelligence challenges, and career advancements. In doing so, I've created a vibrant community of learners and leaders.

For me, great leadership can make the world a better place. And I believe that everyone has the capacity to become a great leader.

So, are you ready to unlock your potential? 

Join me, and let's change the world one leader at a time.

Taha Hussain

At Microsoft, I saw three kinds of senior engineers. 

The first were the Masters.

They were the best technicians I had. 

Flawless code. 
Deep systems knowledge. 
The kind of engineer you begged to review your work.

But most of them were stuck at L64 for a decade.

They stayed in the code. 
Their reach stopped at their fingertips.

They blamed managers for not making them bigger than they were willing to become.

The second were the Heroes.

They ran toward outages. 
Took the hits. 
Brought everything back online.

And the team leaned on them. Too much.

The mess returned, and the Hero was there again in the middle of it.

They absorbed complexity. 
They multiplied reliability. 
They did not multiply successors.

The third were rare. The Challengers.

In calibration discussions, it took 30 seconds. 
Everyone said, "The best."

They did not step in. They stepped back.
They handed the outage to the junior.
They let the mid-level bleed through a design review.

They held the line until people changed shape.

They did not multiply output. 
They multiplied people.

Masters make code.
Heroes make systems.
Challengers make people.

And people outlast everything.

Want to grow into the kind of engineer people call “the best” in 30 seconds?

Enroll in the Top Engineer Method.

I built it from my experience shaping engineers at Microsoft, SAP and startups into true Challengers.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Engineering Career Coach | Microsoft, Yahoo, SAP, Carnegie Mellon | Engineering with People Intelligence

The most dangerous person to work for is a first-time manager.

Not because they don’t know what they’re doing,

But because no one punishes them when they get it wrong.

For six months, every misstep gets wrapped in gift paper labeled “growth.”

And you?

You’re the ribbon they pull apart.

Every new EM goes through the same phase:

• Break the silence
• Practice discomfort
• Prove you're a leader: "give tough feedback"

So they go looking for something to fix.
Even when there's nothing to fix.

In September, three new clients came to me.

Each on a PIP, all under first-time managers.

The feedback reads like a template.

Facts. Expectations. No warmth. No context.

Here’s the part no one wants to say out loud:

New managers are afraid.

Afraid of being wrong.
Of sounding junior.
Of being exposed as someone who never belonged in the chair.

So they overcompensate.

And you become the proof they’re looking for.

If you're working under a new manager: tread lightly.

Don't confuse their fear with your failure.
Don’t make their practice your identity.

Most don’t mean harm. 
But they are learning on live subjects. 

Treat them like a cop on the highway:

Hands at ten and two.
No sudden moves.
Let them pass.

Then get back to driving your career.

You can't choose every manager you work for.

But you can choose how you grow under them.

Need help taking control of your growth?

Enroll in the Top Engineer Method.

I built it from my experience growing engineers at Microsoft, SAP, and startups through messy, imperfect management environments.

Start now: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Your career deserves steadier hands, especially your own.

graphical user interface, text, application

If you feel like a fraud, here’s the good news:
You care.
You’re aware.
You want to do the thing right.

Most actual frauds don’t feel like impostors.
They feel entitled.

So if you’re doubting yourself, keep going.
It means you’re getting closer to something real.

Impostor syndrome doesn’t mean you’re unqualified.

It means you’re growing faster than your confidence can catch up.

Give it a minute.

If you are in that space where your ability is clear but your belief lags behind, I built Top Engineer Method for you. 

It helps engineers turn quiet doubt into quiet confidence.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

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Talks about #careers, #leadership, #softwareengineering, #emotionalintelligence, and #engineeringmanagement

Most people don’t stay at companies out of loyalty.

They stay because leaving would expose how little they’ve grown.

We tell ourselves we’re “committed.”
We’re often just comfortable being seen as reliable.

Loyalty without evolution isn’t noble.
It’s stagnation dressed as virtue.

Stay because you’re learning.
Leave when you’re not.

That’s loyalty to yourself.

When you outgrow your environment, it is not betrayal to move on. That is the moment for reinvention. 

The Top Engineer Method was built to help you find it.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

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(7) Feed | LinkedIn

The best engineer on the team is like salt.
You don’t notice them.
Until they’re gone.

No big goodbye.
No incident.
No drama.

Just... friction.

PRs bounce around.
Standup feels heavier.
The sprint goal slips, but no one names it.

Someone blames shifting priorities.
Someone else says it’s dependencies.

No one mentions the name that’s missing.

Because no one realized they were the one holding it all together.

They weren’t loud in meetings.
Didn’t “drive the vision.”
Never showed up with a 5-point plan and a Notion doc.

They just made everything... smoother.

Caught the edge case.
Spotted the bug early.
Asked the quiet question that saved two weeks of rework.

And when you thanked them?

They just nodded. Maybe dropped a 👌. That’s it.

They didn’t need credit.
But they deserved something.

And now?

Now the team is full of smart people, doing smart things—
but it doesn’t feel smart.

It feels scattered.
Tense.
A little bitter.

And someone says,

"I don’t know... it just felt easier before."

Yeah.

Because salt doesn’t call attention to itself.
It just makes everything else taste right.

Until it’s gone.

And then, all you taste is the missing.

If you’ve ever felt like the missing ingredient no one names, I built this for you

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Most engineers chase titles.

Senior. Staff. Principal. Lead.

But here’s the truth:

Your title isn’t your ceiling.
Your communication is.
Your visibility is.
Your leverage is.

I’ve seen Staff Engineers nobody trusts.
And Seniors with Director-level influence.

If your work is invisible, your value is too.

So speak clearly.
Document generously.
Mentor someone.
Present your work.
Post your lessons.

Quiet excellence is noble.

But it rarely gets promoted.

Need help making your work visible without feeling loud?

Enroll in the Top Engineer Method.

I built it from my experience growing engineers at Microsoft, SAP and Walmart into people the org could not overlook.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Skipped a workout.
Ate delivery again.
Didn’t show up for the interview.
Didn’t practice.
Didn’t read.
Didn’t grow.
Didn’t win the day.

But you know what?

You're still here.

Still trying.

Still learning.

That counts.

Don’t let the shame of an unproductive day bleed into the next one.

New day. New shot.

Let’s go.

The middle is the worst place to be.

Not building a career
Not learning
Not resting, not recovering
Not risking, not growing

Just floating in a lukewarm pool of “meh.”

If you want freedom, you have to move.

Left or right.
Up or down.
Forward or backward.

Just pick.

Because staying in the middle?

That’s how people wake up 15 years later filled with regret.

Choose a direction.
Then sprint.

If you’ve been stuck in the middle — not failing, not fulfilled — you’re not alone.

That’s why I built Top Tech Leader, to help you pick a direction and lead with intent.

Learn more → https://lnkd.in/gHSYuJrv

Geeta Sharma landed L6 role at Google for $672K.

But the real breakthrough happened before she said yes to the offer.

Senior Engineering Manager.
CS grad. Data, storage, cloud.
20+ years at the same company.

She came to me looking for a new role.

Four interviews before we met.
Two failed.
Two she never showed up for.

She thought she needed motivation.
A goals doc.
A practice plan.

I gave her both. She didn’t show up. 

It wasn’t a failure of willpower.
It was a systems error.

And it got worse.

By July, she wasn’t even a manager anymore.

By October, she was L6 at Google.

I wrote about what happened in between.

"The Debugging of Geeta Sharma"

Read it here: https://lnkd.in/gyt-UGCp

An Engineering Director hired me to prep him for an M2 role at Meta. He didn’t get it. Not even M1.

On paper, he was perfect.

• Scaled systems
• Managed managers
• Hit every target
• Told every story by the book

So what went wrong?

It wasn’t his answers.
It wasn’t his architecture.
It wasn’t his delivery.

A leadership blind spot, hidden inside his success.

Startups reward it.
Big tech exposes it.

And it revealed itself with one question.

I wrote about it in the article:

"Why Meta rejected Jeff."

(Tap the image below to read it 👇)

One question exposed the blind spot that decides promotions. The Zoom call started on time. Jeff appeared, fiddling with his headphones. He had a poli

Open article: Why Meta Rejected Jeff by Taha Hussain • 4 min read

Senior engineers think it’s about the code.

Staff engineers know it’s about something else.

I’ve seen the same story 100 times:

A sharp Senior does everything right — clean commits, crisp design docs, predictable delivery — and still gets passed over.

Meanwhile, someone with half the technical depth overtakes them into a Staff role.

It’s not politics.
It’s not favoritism.
It’s five invisible skills no one talks out loud.

I wrote about them here:

5 Skills That Separate Staff From Senior

(Click the image below to read it 👇)

I’ve watched this play out too many times. A Senior engineer does everything right. They know the systems cold. Their code reviews are precise. Their 

5 Skills That Separate Staff From Senior

Every engineer hates politics.

Until they watch a weaker idea win
just because the right person said it.

Until their carefully-prepared presentation dies quietly
because they didn't loop someone in.

Until the obvious solution gets tossed
because it makes someone uncomfortable.

At first, you think it's just unfair.

Then you realize:

Fairness was never the game.
Influence was.

Influence isn't about charm or manipulation.
It's knowing:

→ When to speak up, and when to wait.
→ Which egos need room, and how to give it gracefully.
→ How to present your solution as an upgrade, not a threat.

You can pretend politics don't exist.
You can hope your quiet contributions get noticed.

Or you can choose to see the invisible currents clearly.

You don’t need to play games.
You need to stop assuming merit wins on its own.

Engineers can learn influence without faking, manipulating, or selling out. 

Here’s how: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Managers obsess over grooming people for promotion.

They forget to groom themselves for replacement.

If your team falls apart when you step away, you did not build strength. You built a bottleneck.

Great managers are not trying to be the hero.

They are trying to be removable.

They train decisions into their people.
They design systems that run without hand-holding.
They make themselves less necessary every quarter.

That is how you earn real scope.

First, your team runs without you.

Then the org trusts you with more than your team.

If you want to build that kind of team, that is exactly what Top Tech Leader is for.

Practical systems, real scripts, and a clear operating model for managers who want ownership, not chaos.

Join here: https://lnkd.in/gHSYuJrv

You say you’re open to feedback.

But you’re not.

You’re open to praise wrapped in suggestions.
You’re open to feedback that doesn’t hurt.
You’re open to what confirms what you already believe.

The moment it threatens your self-image?

You shut down.
You start nitpicking how it was said.
You label it “rude” or “harsh” or “not actionable.”

Here’s what’s really happening:

You’re not protecting your growth.
You’re protecting your guilt.

Because if the feedback is even half true?

You’d have to face all the moments you coasted.
All the things you said you’d do and didn’t.
All the ways you played small when you knew better.

That’s not feedback rejection.
That’s ego triage.

You’re not built soft.
You’re just rusty.

Let the feedback hit.
Let it bruise.
Let it point to something real.

Then fix it.
Quietly.
Relentlessly.
Like a professional.

No shame.
No tantrum.
Just reps.

If you want to turn bruises into breakthroughs, this is where you begin.

Enroll in the Top Engineer Method.

I built it to help engineers grow without defensiveness and improve without drama.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Engineers say they hate DSA.

“It’s irrelevant.”
“It’s academic.”
“No one uses red-black trees at work.”

Bullsh*t.

You do not hate DSA.
You hate what it makes you feel.

Slow.
Stupid.
Exposed.

It drags you into problems where you cannot hide behind frameworks.

Where your fancy IDE does not save you.
Where the question does not care about your title, your tech stack, or your years of experience.

And suddenly you are alone with the voice.

“You are not good enough.”
“You have been faking it.”
“Everyone else figured this out years ago.”

So you avoid it.
Or mock it.
Or treat it like a ritual for insecure overachievers.

Engineers blame DSA because blaming themselves is too painful.

Because admitting you feel behind is heavier than any algorithm.

Because if you say it out loud, you have to do something about it.

You’re scared.

Scared that you’ve plateaued.
Scared that you’ll try and still fail.
Scared that your edge is gone.

Here is the reality:

You do not sharpen a knife on bread.
You sharpen it against steel.

Most of your day is soft.
Setters. Getters. API glue.
Tickets that keep you busy but never really test you.

DSA is not for the job.
It is for the edge.
For the part of you that still wants to be dangerous.

You do not have to love it.
You have to stop hiding from it.

Because that shame you keep dodging?
That is where the growth lives.

The edge is in you.

But only if you are willing to bleed a little.

If you're ready to stop hiding and start facing challenges, enroll in the Top Engineer Method.

I built it from years of training engineers at Microsoft, SAP, and startups into the kind of talent others can’t ignore.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Promotions teach you how to climb.
Layoffs teach you how to survive.

One rewards loyalty.
The other rewards leverage.

If you’re only optimizing for titles, you’re fragile.
If you’re building skills, networks, and reputation, you’re durable.

One path depends on your company.
The other depends on you.

Need help building a career that survives any company?

Enroll in the Top Engineer Method.

I built it from years of growing engineers at Microsoft, SAP and startups into durable, high-trust professionals.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

If you're an engineering leader, here's a hard truth:

Your job is to manage up and craft down.

Executives don’t care about clean architecture.

Engineers don’t care about stakeholder politics.

So your influence lives in the middle:

• Translating chaos into clarity.
• Turning vision into interfaces.
• Turning ego into velocity.

Bad managers hide in ambiguity.
Great ones compress it.

The more clearly you think, the less your team has to.

Need help?

I help engineering leaders cut through ambiguity and lead with clarity.

Learn how inside the Top Tech Leader program ↓
https://lnkd.in/gHSYuJrv

If you're a manager and you're tired all the time...

It's probably not the work.

It's the emotional overhead.

• The passive-aggressive reports
• The pressure to perform + protect
• The back-to-back meetings
• The politics
• The feeling that you're never doing enough for your team

Managing humans is hard.

You're not broken. You're carrying too much.

Want to last in this role?

You need boundaries.
You need peers.
You need space to not be strong.

You're a manager.

But you're still a person.

Don't forget that.

If you’ve been feeling the weight of leadership, you’re not alone.

That’s why I built Top Tech Leader — a place for managers to grow without exhaustion.

Weekly Live Sessions.

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gHSYuJrv

In a toxic org, being great makes you a target.

• You get more asks
• You become the buffer
• You absorb the chaos

Eventually you get burned out while someone else gets promoted.

Don’t try to “fix the culture.”

That’s code for “die slowly.”

Instead:

• Set hard boundaries
• Leave a trail of impact in writing
• Document everything

You’re not stuck.

You’re in the wrong game.

If you don’t learn the system, the system will decide for you.

If you know you’re capable of more but tired of toxic games, I built the Top Tech Leader for you. Learn more ↓ 

https://lnkd.in/gHSYuJrv

The higher you climb, the fewer people can tell you the truth.

At Senior, everyone praises your decisions.
At Staff, they start copying them.
At Principal, they stop challenging them.

That silence feels like respect.
It’s actually your next ceiling forming.

If no one pushes back, you’ve stopped growing.

Need help?
 
Enroll in the Top Engineer Method. 

I built it from my experience growing engineers at Microsoft, SAP, Walmart and through personalized coaching. 

Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gMGfmVas

Challenge is what keeps your trajectory alive.

Dell Technologies

Lead Product Manager for managed services integrated with multiple 3rd parties:
•	First customer booked 6 months after soft launch of colocation capability
•	Formed a product team to launch a new managed colocation service.  This managed service has booked several multi-year deals.
•	Leading the product team in optimizing the sales motion and service delivery to grow sales year over year.
•	Negotiated resale contracts with 3rd party service providers for a one-stop managed service experience for customers

Principal Product Manager

Defined as-a-Service (XaaS) offers for servers and storage.  Developed managed colocation services from incubation to launch.  Led an extensive virtual team across Services, Products, Marketing, and Sales.
The colocation services platform delivers managed services integrated with 3rd party colocation providers.

Zerto

Led the software roadmap for Zerto’s continuous data protection platform used by Cloud Service Providers and enterprises.
•	Delivered new features twice yearly to protect virtualized workloads in VMware, Hyper-V, Azure and AWS environments.
•	Managed strategic and technical partner relationships in support of $100M+ annual revenues.
•	Established technical standards for software release management, product security, product documentation, and customer experience management resulting in customer growth with minimal product team growth.
•	Developed customer focused benchmarking documentation for optimizing product performance.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Drove the roadmap for all storage integrations with VMware vCenter and vRealize Suite.  Managed the Software Defined Storage product lines that are used in Cloud-based 
networks, enterprises and small/medium businesses.  
- Successfully transitioned a legacy product line to Agile development methodologies while launching a new product
- Managed six product releases to completion in two years
- Developed 700 person sales community by training seminars, webinars and wikis
- Drove usability improvements based on user experience that reduced installation time and simplified daily operations.
- Led go-to-market strategies for a freeware product that generates 50+ weekly leads

World Wide Product Manager

Cisco

As cross-functional team leader of engineering and product managers, integrated acquired companies into Cisco’s engineering division.  
• Created consistent product and service offers across the engineering teams while maintaining productivity of the acquired engineering teams
• Generated $150M in incremental bookings by implementing a new software customization process 
• Developed offer strategies including new capabilities for usage billing, software subscriptions and licensing which automated all the business transactions.
• Defined and executed go-to-market strategy for the $700M IP Video business, leading to repeatable transactions and multi-year deal management guidelines
• Brought software release process into compliance for SOX, ISO and Open Source while supporting Agile development practices

Senior Product Manager

Managed the product lifecycle of the legacy Edge Router product line. Migrated global installed base to next generation Edge Router product line with compelling features and marketing programs. 
•	Developed revenue share arrangement with partners to generate $20M in incremental bookings
•	Grew market share while migrating customers to next generation product
•	Created and executed end-of-life plan with pricing strategies, trade-in programs and competitive differentiation

Sr Manager, Product Managment

Led team of 12 product managers in product lifecycle and go-to-market for two softswitch product lines.
• Grew revenue from zero to $100M+ per year by delivering software releases to match customer needs
• Launched a user group with 100+ active customer participants which resulted in rapid feature delivery from exposing the engineering team to customers

Senior Manager Product Management

Alcatel

Led team of 35 product managers and product marketing experts in the Signaling Transfer Point product line. Generated $120M annually from global service providers.

Senior Director, Marketing

DSC Communications

- Led software quality improvements while delivering revenue generating features.  Managed a diverse team of 200+ with annual budget of $15 million and annual product revenues of $100 million.

Senior Director of Software Development

Principal Product Manager @ Dell | Managed Services and Cloud Product Management | Author of Product Management IRL

As the Lead Product Manager at Dell Technologies, my focus is on pioneering managed services that seamlessly integrate with third-party providers.  My expertise in defining XaaS offers and developing managed services from incubation to market introduction has been instrumental in sales growth and service delivery. Collaborating with an extensive virtual team, I've negotiated key contracts and empowered a product team dedicated to year-over-year growth, all rooted in a deep understanding of software product management and networking.

Amy Mitchell

After 150 weeks of writing about product management…
the biggest surprise isn’t the articles.
It’s what product managers have taught me.
 
Three years ago, I started writing to share what I knew.
Today, this newsletter reflects what product managers are actually working through.
 
To mark week 150, I pulled back the curtain on:
• The most-read themes of the year
• How each article actually comes together
• The topics I intentionally don’t cover
• What I’m focusing on next

🔗 https://lnkd.in/g_9iw4kc

Product Management Work Today by Amy Mitchell

I recently hit a stretch of product work where almost nothing was clear
fuzzy intent, 
shifting expectations, 
lots of noise. 

I kept trying to choose the “right” option… and it only made things worse.

Then I remembered something I’ve learned (and relearned) over years of product manager work:
  - Ambiguous work isn’t an options problem.
  - It’s a systems problem.

When I stop hunting for the perfect option and instead build a simple system to shape the problem, I get traction again. The work starts moving. I start moving.

I wrote down the 6-part system I now use when I feel stuck in ambiguity.

🔗 https://lnkd.in/gPVDxTs5 
.

System to Handle Ambiguous Work by Amy Mitchell

I’ve been trying to move new initiatives forward while every conversation circles back to modernization, transformation, AI, and automation.
 
When these themes land all at once, it's hard to turn them into progress.
 
I wrote about how product managers can translate this swirl into motion by connecting big themes to three tangible outcomes:
1️⃣ architecture alignment,
2️⃣ incremental automation, 
3️⃣ platform maturity.

 Anyone else seeing these big themes?
🔗 https://lnkd.in/gWus8XyF

Turn Big Themes into Progress by Amy Mitchell

Another function combines into product. Elena Verna brings us reasons to embrace brand in your product. 
 
Brand+Product = caring about how your product makes people feel.
 
My 3 favorite reasons brand is a product job:

1️⃣ Your product is the brand
          - Your product is the user's first touchpoint
 
2️⃣ User generated content and reviews outweigh traditional product visibility
           - Your product reputation is going to be seen before any marketing campaigns
 
3️⃣ Think about how your product makes people feel
            - People talk about products that feel different
 
"Brand isn’t a marketing exercise anymore. It’s a product responsibility."

Open article: Brand… a Product job now? by elenaverna.com

Learning from an AI-first CPO. If you want to stop sprinkling AI around your product, Rina Alexin's interview with Aleks Bass, CPO at Typeform, breaks down what AI-first means.
 
3 changes to be AI-first:
 
1️⃣ Procurement is your new best friend
       - POC (Proof of concept) procurement to test multiple solutions in parallel safely
 
2️⃣ Clarity + Observability = Control
       - Every team has a clear AI strategy
       - Every initiative must be measurable
 
3️⃣ Speed from experiments to outcomes
       - AI becomes a quiet multiplier instead of a headline
 
"The best AI for product managers is the kind that disappears into better outcomes."

Open article: How to Build an AI-First Organization: Lessons from Typeform’s CPO, Aleks Bass by productside.com

How to Build an AI-First Organization: Lessons from Typeform’s CPO, Aleks Bass

I’ve seen smart teams get stuck in the same debate for weeks.

It’s rarely about who’s right. It’s about what kind of decision everyone’s really making.

When you recognize the layers, the emotion starts to make sense. 
And progress follows.

Thank you to Isaac Goldfarb for asking how to recognize layered decisions.
🔗 https://lnkd.in/gCRPX3xs

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